Page 104 of Scars and Crowns

I convinced myself that was enough. That duty filled the same spaces family was supposed to. I know better now. Because this . . . This noise.

Kairav arguing over imaginary predictions. Maa pretending not to laugh while laughing harder than anyone else. Sara announcing life-changing discoveries with complete scientific confidence.

My wife sitting beside me in a pale pink kurta, cheeks still carrying the faintest trace of rose-red every time our eyes meet.

This is what I had been missing.

Not silence.

Life.

I tighten my fingers around Anamika's hand once more. She glances at me. Smiles. Small. Private. Entirely ours.

And I realise, with a fullness in my chest so overwhelming it almost steals my breath, that I could spend the rest of my life at this very table, being teased by my family, watching my daughter orchestrate chaos before breakfast, and seeing my wife blush every time someone catches me looking at her . . . and I would never once ask for anything more.

WATER CRISIS

ANAMIKA

The picnic is Amma Saheba's idea.

She announced it over dinner with the same calm authority she uses for everything else, as though she's simply informing the weather of her plans. "The men can survive one afternoon without us," she declared, "We're going to the lake tomorrow."

No one argues. So here we're spread out beneath the enormous banyan tree near the northern edge of the estate, where its wide branches throw cool shade over the grass. A thick cotton sheet is spread beneath us, the picnic basket sits open between Amma Saheba and me, and the lake stretches out ahead, its surface shimmering under the afternoon sun every time the breeze ripples across it.

Sara has already abandoned us.

She darts through the grass after a bright yellow butterfly, laughing every time it changes direction, her tiny sandals kicking up little sprays of dust as she runs.

I watch her for a moment before taking another sip of tea. "You know," Amma Saheba says, following my gaze, "your daughter informed me last week that I've been holding my teacup incorrectly." I blink.

" . . . She what?"

She nods with perfect seriousness. "Apparently there's a proper way to hold one." Her lips twitch. "And I've been doing it wrong for the last sixty-one years."

I burst into laughter before I can stop myself. "No . . . "

"Oh yes." She lifts her cup to demonstrate. "She took this very personally." I can already picture it.

Sara standing with both hands on her tiny hips, patiently correcting someone three times her age with complete confidence because, in her mind, facts are simply facts.

"I believe," Amma Saheba continues, "she learned it from you."

"I have never corrected anyone's teacup grip in my life."

"You'd better inform your daughter of that."

My laughter only grows louder. "She also looked at my saree over breakfast," Amma Saheba says, somehow managing to keep a perfectly straight face, "and told me my pleats were 'a little bit messy today, Dadi . . . but that's okay. Everyone has bad days.'"

I nearly inhale my tea. "Oh my God."

"I've had royal dressmakers arranging my sarees since before you were born." She sighs dramatically. "I've survived state dinners, foreign diplomats, and palace etiquette. But apparently I cannot survive your child."

I wipe tears of laughter from the corner of my eyes. "I promise she doesn't get that confidence from me."

"No." This time her smile softens. "We’ll say she inherited it from Yuvaan."

I look up. "He was exactly the same." Her eyes drift toward Sara. "He said whatever was in his heart. Didn't stop to wonder whether he should. If he thought something was true, he simply . . . said it." She smiles to herself. "Then, somewhere along the way . . . " Her voice grows quieter. " . . . he stopped." The laughter between us fades naturally. Neither of us rushes to fill the silence.