Diverted. A burst tire. A security alert. People begin pulling out their phones, scrolling, refreshing. Then the board blinks. Just once. Then again. And then the yellow words flicker and shift.

  Flight Status: Awaiting Confirmation.

  We both see it. We stare.

  ‘What does that mean?’ Aditi asks. Her voice is quiet but sharp.

  ‘It said “On Time” two seconds ago,’ I say. ‘Maybe they’re still landing. Or like . . . yesterday. Maybe it got diverted.’

  I look outside as if that would give me an idea.

  The speaker above us crackles.

  ‘Passengers waiting for the Indigo flight from Jaipur to Delhi, please note: arrival status is being updated. We request your patience. Further information will be shared shortly.’

  There’s no alarm in the voice. No panic. But it’s not the usual script either. For the other two flights that got diverted, there was no announcement. I check my phone. Nothing. The last message from Megha was about an hour and fifteen minutes ago. A selfie from the plane. Half-asleep, but smiling.

  I send her a text. ‘Landed yet?’

  Aditi’s staring at her screen too. ‘Nothing from Aman.’

  Around us, other people start to shift. You can feel the atmosphere change. A man stands up suddenly and goes to the information counter. He’s asking something. The woman behind the glass is nodding, checking her screen, saying something that’s obviously not satisfying him.

  Then the TV in the corner, which has been on low the whole night, is turned up.

  The news anchor is in the middle of a sentence.

  ‘. . . crash-landing on the outskirts of Delhi. Eyewitness reports suggest heavy smoke. No official statement yet from the airline, but emergency teams are on site.’

  The headline reads in red:

  BREAKING: FLIGHT FROM JAIPUR TO DELHI CRASH-LANDS. CASUALTIES FEARED.

  I freeze.

  Not all at once.

  It’s more like a slow lock. One joint at a time. Neck. Chest. Hands. Legs. My head spins. Of course, this is not true.

  Aditi turns to look at me. Her face is still. No blinking. She looks like she’s listening to something far away, like her ears have stopped working and she’s waiting for the sound to catch up.

  ‘No, that’s . . . some mistake,’ I say, my voice hollow as I stare at the news ticker, trying to find a flaw in the data. ‘They’ve mixed up the flights. It can’t be ours.’

  She picks up her phone again. Dials. Presses the speaker button. The dial tone rings. Once. Twice. Then nothing. Network error. Do I imagine it? Do I hear sirens? No. I’m imagining it. This is old news. This is not today. Not this flight. Not the flight Megha was on. There’s some mistake. There has to be.

  I look at the screen again. The image has changed. Now it’s showing wreckage. Twisted metal. Smoke rising. A group of men in neon vests walking towards the camera. A partial view of the wing. I recognize it. Indigo’s logo. Faded. Tilted wrong. Aditi bends forward suddenly, like she’s about to throw up, but she doesn’t.

  Someone behind us starts crying. A loud, uncontrolled sob. Someone else starts calling someone.

  My hand is still clenched around the phone. I don’t remember deciding to hold it. My thumb moves on its own, hovering over Megha’s contact. The TV is wrong. The news is always wrong. It always is wrong. I just need to call her. I press her name. The call doesn’t connect. I press it again. Nothing. A raw, pointless anger flares in my chest.

  Not her. Not this flight. The TV is lying. They lie. Just static and noise and lies. Call her. She’ll pick up. She has to.

  My mind, finally accepting the phone is useless, pivots to its next rational, desperate task. I start typing ‘Plane crash . . .’ into the browser.

  I hear Aditi whisper, ‘No. No. No. No.’ Over and over again, each time softer.

  From the corner of my eye, I watch as Aditi’s phone slips from her hand and crashes to the ground. I sit back next to her. The browser loads. The articles say the same. No one is saying the word. But everyone knows.

  The reporter on TV says the words ‘no update on survivors’ and ‘fireball’ and ‘engine failure’ and ‘skidded’ and suddenly the blood drains from my head.

  I hear her voice, faint but clear.

  ‘What if this is wrong? This is wrong.’

  ‘This is wrong,’ I say.

  Planes don’t just crash. On the floor between us is the paper cup of tea, half finished. And in my pocket, a toothbrush she gave me.

  The rain outside has stopped.

  11

  Aditi

  The sound around me is distant. Like I’ve ducked underwater. Like someone turned the world upside down. Volume, movements, everything’s muted. My breath’s ragged and I feel my chest constricting. Is this what death feels like? There are people speaking, crying, phones ringing, but nothing feels real. Everything’s too loud and too far away all at once. Nothing feels real. In this alternate reality, my fingers keep refreshing X. It’s not me. I want to stop doing it. Because if I stop doing it, it will stop from happening. But how am I to control this when it’s not me who’s doing it? It’s my fingers. Every time I swipe down, I want it to say something else. I will it to say something else. Anything other than what it’s saying.

  That it was a mistake. That it wasn’t our flight. That it was some simulation. That they’re safe. That the first reports were wrong.

  That someone, anyone, survived.

  I don’t care. Only Aman survived. He has to survive. How can it be otherwise? He just took a flight. How can he not be there?

  Of course, he has survived. What’s this? This is not happening, of course. So silly, it’s another one of those bad dreams.

  But the same tweet appears again and again.

  ‘Indigo flight from Jaipur to Delhi crash-lands. Many casualties feared.’

  The word that catches on my tongue is feared. Not confirmed. Not certain. Just feared. See how cruel and funny that is? God’s a bit like that. God, of course, knows for sure Aman has survived and yet he’s holding that information from me. Possibly to teach me a life lesson.

  Look how I saved Aman? Now, be good to everyone.

  I’m telling god—message received. I’m clutching the Ganesha locket around my neck and whispering to it. I tell my personal god that it won’t be a locket, but a visible tattoo. Please let Aman walk in through those doors. Please. Of course he will. I tell god I will be the best version of myself from now on. Fanatic, dedicated, loyal. The kind who walks up the temple steps barefoot. Just let him be safe.

  But what am I even saying? Of course he’s safe.

  Then someone points towards the glass wall that separates us from the real world outside.

  We hear the sirens first. Then blue and red lights flash, lighting up the puddles outside. Two ambulances pull up. Or ten. Or twenty. Slowly. No urgency. That’s how I know.

  No one’s hurt. Or they would be running. Maybe they got everyone out in time before the aircraft went up in flames. Aman would have come sliding down those yellow inflatable slides. It will be a funny story to tell afterwards. Everyone’s safe. Maybe except for a couple of people who were sitting at the back of the plane. They always say the back of the plane is most dangerous, right? Furthest from the exits.

  I can’t breathe. Not the gasping kind of panic. Just . . . like my chest has forgotten how to rise and fall. Like I’m hollow. Like someone has scooped everything out and left me skin.

  A few men in uniform walk in. Airline badges around their necks. The tallest is the one who will speak. It’s clear by the way he’s holding his head—stoic. C’mon, won’t he look stressed if something had happened? Of course, nothing has and that’s why he’s able to walk straight, professional. He’s here to tell us nothing is wrong, and that every passenger was extracted and they are all now wrapped in blankets and being given hot coffee.

  He’s soaked, like he ran from the parking lot. Everyone turns to him.

  He doesn’t look at us right away. He talks to the woman at the Indigo desk. She holds a hand to her mouth. Nods. Then straightens up. Nothing has happened, of course. The Indigo girl is just surprised that it was a big accident, but thankfully, no one was injured!

  Maybe a few people had broken bones from the slide.

  And then the man walks forward, clearing his throat.

  ‘The Indigo flight . . . has crash-landed outside Delhi airport,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry. For now, there are no confirmed survivors. We are still trying to get the fire under control.’

  It doesn’t feel like real words. It feels like sounds pretending to be words.

  No confirmed survivors.

  Did he say that? Or did he say confirmed survivors? We have confirmed survivors.

  Someone screams. Someone drops to the floor. Another woman bangs her fist on the glass counter. A phone clatters. There’s the crash of a chair falling. They are all hearing him wrong.

  I want to tell the people who are panicking that he’s saying confirmed survivors.

  But I don’t move. His voice is suddenly drowned out by people’s voices.

  I refresh X again. A new tweet. This time from the ministry.

  ‘We are saddened to confirm that the Indigo flight from Jaipur to Delhi has suffered a fatal crash. Rescue teams are on site. At this moment, no passengers have been reported alive.’

  I read it out loud. I don’t know why. My voice doesn’t sound like mine. Did it read passengers have been reported alive? All passengers? I turn to look at Raghav. He doesn’t say anything. His face is pale. But he’s not crying. Neither am I. Not yet. There’s nothing to cry about yet. Just a man who has announced that he doesn’t know what has happened.

  I dial Aman’s number again. This time, it rings.

  Once.

  Then . . . nothing.

  Why would he cut the call?

  Oh? He cut the call? He’s alive? I want to show everyone. Did I imagine the ring?

  No, the phone rang. How can it not ring?

  More people are gathering by the doors now. The ambulances haven’t moved. They just sit there. Idle. Flashing. Waiting for nothing. The TV turns louder. Now they’re showing images. Mangled seats. A part of the wing, scorched. A child’s toy on the tarmac. A woman’s handbag, open. Shoes scattered. I imagine his shoes. The grey Converse ones.

  I turn to Raghav. His eyes are on me. Behind him, I see the paper chai cup we left on the floor. It’s empty now. A little crushed. Who knocked it over? Who stepped over it? The ambulances are still outside. Flashing red, then blue, then red again.

  I whisper, ‘No. No. No. No.’

  I close my eyes and try to imagine Aman’s voice. Just his voice.

  I can’t.

  I can’t.

  I’m hearing everything wrong. They are saying everyone’s not dead.

  Or . . . everyone’s dead? I want to run to him, but where would I run? I just stand. Still.

  The rain outside has stopped.

  12

  Raghav

  Time doesn’t stop. It fucking doesn’t stop.

  It should. It should collapse into itself. It should fall silent and cease to exist.

  Singularity or whatever the fuck people talk about? Where time and space and reality, everything bends? Nothing has meaning. Why doesn’t it, when meaninglessness has been achieved already? But the world just keeps going on shamelessly. Footsteps echoing, announcements continuing, fluorescent lights humming overhead like none of this is happening. People breathing, coffee warming, vending machines beeping, ambulances screeching. It fucking goes on? Relentlessly?

  Megha is gone.

  I’m not waiting for confirmation. I don’t need the news anchor to finish her sentence or the airline to issue a second press release. I know it in the way you know things because your body knows it. You know when you keep your palm over steam that it’s going to burn. How could you not know when they rip your heart out from the chest? Of course, you feel it. I feel it. I feel her absence just as I felt her presence. I’m burning now. Dangling over the fire. The girl I loved—love, loved, will always love—is gone. I know it in my bones. I just know it. I can feel the earth shift on its axis. I can feel my future shift and twist and contort into nothingness and meaninglessness.

  I don’t remember standing up, but I’m on my feet. I don’t remember walking away from Aditi, but I’m pacing now, away from the benches, away from the board still stuck on ‘Awaiting Confirmation’.

  What am I doing? What do you do when your life’s over? What are the steps? Who’s written the self-destruct book? What’s the first thing I have to do? And then, I know. I hate it immediately. How can I know what to do now? Why? What right do I have to live any more when she is not? My mind has computed the most rational explanation despite me trying to tell it not to. If there were any doubt, it wouldn’t have. But I know. There are no survivors. People are stupid. They are asking questions. Can’t they see what’s on the screen? A fireball. God himself died there. Everything’s dead. Just fucking, please, everyone, get off the phones. It’s done. It’s over.

  I look at my phone. I know the things to do. The terrible, terrible things to do right now. It’s to scroll and scroll and scroll and hope and hope and hope that it’s not true, though it’s as true as death.

  I need to make a call. That’s the terrible thing I have to do. I have to call Megha’s father and give him the news.

  Megha’s father.

  I stare at his number on my screen. The man who only hated me, and for whom I only had hate. But I also hoped, stupidly, stupidly, the last day that she left them, that one day he’d come around. Like from concrete, a small sprout would eventually surface, break open the entire thing, that her family would replace mine. Fucking nonsense.

  He didn’t know Megha was taking a flight today. It was a work trip. That’s how she packed her bags. That’s how she escaped the drama.

  I press call.

  It rings once. Then twice. Each second feels like a punishment.

  Maybe I should be punished. I’m the reason this is happening. I’m the reason Megha’s presumed dead. That’s what the TV screen’s saying: presumed dead. Nothing is presumed. She’s dead.

  He picks up.

  ‘Yes?’ he says. Gruff. Suspicious. He knows it’s me.

  ‘Uncle . . .’ My voice falters. My mouth is dry. I swallow. ‘It’s Raghav. Megha’s flight—’

  There’s silence. I have to say this in one go, like a news reporter. Cold. Facts.

  ‘She was on the Indigo flight from Jaipur to Delhi. It crash-landed. There’s been an accident. The airline just confirmed. No survivors.’

  I don’t know if I’m saying it clearly. I don’t know if the words even make it across. His response is not words. A jagged inhale. Then I hear her mother’s voice. Faint. Confused. Angry. That’s how I have always heard her.

  ‘What’s he saying?’

  I continue, still spilling the facts. They need to know. And I can’t explain it repeatedly because every time I do, she dies again. Over and over again. Every time a news report flashes, every time someone screams, they die again.

  ‘She wasn’t going to Bangalore. She was coming to Delhi. She was on the flight. I’m sending you the ticket.’

  I navigate to WhatsApp and send him the ticket. The ticket I booked. The seat I selected. I did the web check-in. I did everything that led her to this.

  And then I hear the moment the news lands.

  I hear it as her mother starts sobbing.

  I hear something crash. I hear a television.

  I hear them running into her room.

  They would notice that she has taken more clothes than a two-day trip would require.

  They would see all the signs. The goodbyes. They would remember tears in her eyes.

  They would have recounted the conversation.

  They didn’t know it then—how could they? But now it must be clear to them.

  I hear the conversations, but I can’t make out what they are saying. It’s in Assamese. Her brother has walked in too. He knew. They shout at him, asking if he knew. And he says he didn’t. He lies and why not? They tell him about the crash and now he’s crying. She dies again. The volume of the TV goes up. I hear both of them—wailing now, raw, broken. She dies again.

  The call’s cut.

  I call them back, but there’s no answer. I broke a family earlier. Now I have destroyed them. This is my doing. I lower myself on to the bench like gravity’s taken over.

  Aditi.

  I look back.

  She hasn’t moved. Her back is straight but her eyes aren’t focused on anything. She’s trapped. Like I’m trapped. I get up. Slowly. Like my limbs are lead.

  ‘Aditi,’ I say.

  She doesn’t blink.

  ‘You need to call his parents,’ I tell her.

  She looks at me like she doesn’t understand the language.

  ‘They don’t know,’ I continue. ‘You should be the one to tell them. They need to hear it from someone who loves him.’

  What the fuck are these words I’m saying to her? Why am I trying to find sense when there’s none left? Her mouth opens slightly. She makes a sound that isn’t a word.

  ‘I can’t,’ she says. ‘I can’t do it. I don’t want to do it.’

  ‘You have to.’

  ‘Fuck them,’ she says. ‘It’s their fault.’

  Her head begins to shake, but her knees go before her words do. She collapses into my arms. Her whole body gives way like a puppet with its strings cut. I catch her just before she hits the floor. I look for help. She’s not the only one. I lower her down. She’s conscious, barely. Her face against my chest. Her breath shallow and ragged. I hold her closer. She breaks down fully now. And I do too. Outside, the ambulances still flash red and blue. Inside, everything has fallen silent.

  Grief has no volume. But right now, it is the loudest thing in the world.

  13

  Aditi