Cracks
Mr. Jana was cleaning my apartment the week he was fired. He and I, we used to have small chats whenever he came there to clean, which was usually once a week. That was probably because I spoke manageable Hindi, enough to be at par with his cocktail of Bengali and Hindi — which probably was more than what most people he worked with could do. After his first day of work and what was expected of him was well established, he would walk in quietly upon being let in, open the balc
Jan 37 min read
Hotel Room Service
Cancun was supposed to be easy. Spring break, turquoise water, wristbands, all-inclusive meals, a week of not thinking. That was the deal. You fly in, put on your shorts and fancy shades, and forget who you are for a while. The city is built to make that happen. Every street bends gently toward American comfort — dollars accepted everywhere, menus translated before anyone even asks, music loud enough to drown out anything that might feel complicated. I stayed in a huge proper
Dec 31, 20254 min read
Bouquets I’ll Never Send
There comes, I think, a strange kind of clarity in life — the mildly inconvenient kind you don’t earn intentionally, but stumble upon after a long season of misunderstanding yourself. And from that clarity grows a new, problematically precise longing for things you’re now convinced will finally make you happy. Meeting someone at that exact stage of your life — someone who seems to check all those freshly discovered boxes — is what I can only describe as a momentous disaster.
Dec 14, 20253 min read
Essentials of FLAT-ITVA
"They are our enemies,” they said. They called it an ideological war — a war to right wrongs. The residents of the flat were not to have any kind of relationship with the residents of complex no:6. And when Rahul from the 4th floor went to meet his lifelong friend Dev from the 5th floor of complex 6, the former was branded as anti-flat-ional, and it was established that he was, in fact, a danger to the other residents of complex 5. Then came Mr. Thamburan, president of the r
Dec 12, 20253 min read
Would Love Go Better With a Side of Paperwork?
It is often easy to think of marriage as a culmination of love — but was love ever truly enough to sustain a marriage? Marriage as an institution is something that has baffled me of late. Growing up, I used to think of marriage as something you just do in life — you know, just like how you are expected to go to college, get a job, retire, and die. The basics. I don’t know whether to blame the societal thought that made it seem so, or something else altogether. But as your
Dec 12, 20252 min read
Road to Nowhere
I sometimes dream of a motorcycle ride. I'm on a winding road, with thick green cover on both sides. A cool — yet somehow warm — breeze is blowing, and my favorite playlist is on loop. As I ride into a clearing, sunlight slowly creeps in — the kind that just makes you feel warm, at ease. For a moment, I'm free. With each gear shift, the weight I carry — the ache, the doubt, the noise of a world too loud for my quiet questions — begins to loosen its grip. The headlines, th
Dec 12, 20253 min read
What We Keep
As memories fade, what are the things we hold on to? It's only natural to forget some details about a trip you took a couple of years ago — you try to console yourself. As someone who has taken great pride in his memory, you know that feeling of disappointment when you just can’t tell someone what they were wearing on a trip — a little party trick you had picked up over the years. You forget the little things you used to remember, like where you stayed or which touristy s
Dec 12, 20253 min read
