10-11-2025, 10:47 PM
Episode 2 – “Limits at Infinity”
The rest of the day after Meera’s first class passed like a dream Arjun wasn’t part of.
English period: Mrs. Nair read out some lesson; the words floated above Arjun’s head and dissolved.
Chemistry: the teacher demonstrated titration; Arjun saw only purple droplets falling into a conical flask shaped like a waist.
PT: he ran the 400-metre trial and came last, because every time he rounded the bend he imagined the curve of a hip instead of the track.
When the final bell rang, he drifted out of college like a sleepwalker. The usual chaos—bikes revving, girls giggling, ice-candy vendors shouting—felt muffled, underwater. He boarded the 201G bus, pressed his forehead against the cool window, and let the city blur past.
Bannerghatta Road. IIMB flyover. Dairy Circle.
None of it registered. Only one image looped behind his eyes: purple silk, gold border, a waist that dipped like the graph of y = 1/x—approaching zero but never quite touching.
At home, the smell of rasam and potato fry greeted him. His mother, Lakshmi, was stirring something on the stove, the end of her cotton saree tucked at her waist the way all mothers do.
“Arjun beta, wash your hands. Food is ready.”
He dropped his bag, went to the sink, let the water run longer than necessary.
Lakshmi watched him.
“What happened? You look like you lost your mark list.”
“Nothing, Amma.”
He sat, tore a piece of chapati, dipped it in dal, and stared at it as if it were an unsolved equation.
Lakshmi frowned. “You didn’t touch the video game also. Usually you fight with Akka for the TV remote. Today straight to room? Fever?”
“No fever.”
“Then?”
Arjun opened his mouth, closed it. How could he explain that a woman in a purple saree had walked into his life and rewritten every constant he thought he knew?
Lakshmi placed a hand on his forehead anyway.
“Tomorrow we have cousin Shruthi’s engagement in the city. We have to leave by eight. No college for you.”
The spoon slipped from Arjun’s fingers and clanged against the steel plate.
“What? Amma, no! Tomorrow is… we have maths portions to cover.”
“Maths will be there day after also. Family is important. Your father already took leave.”
“But Amma—”
“Arjun.” Her tone ended all debate. “Wear the cream kurta. And sleep early. We have to reach Palace Grounds by ten.”
He pushed his plate away, half the food untouched, and dragged himself to his room. The PlayStation glowed in the dark, inviting. He switched it on, loaded FIFA, chose Manchester United—and stared at the screen for twenty minutes without pressing a single button.
Messi ran in circles. Ronaldo celebrated a goal Arjun hadn’t scored.
He switched it off.
On the bed, he lay on his back, hands behind his head. The ceiling fan chopped the air into slow pieces.
Tomorrow I won’t see her.
The thought hurt more than failing a surprise test.
He closed his eyes and tried to summon yesterday’s image: the way she had written dy/dx, the small flick of her wrist, the tiny strand of hair that had escaped her bun and curled against her neck like a comma.
Sleep came late, restless, full of purple.
Next morning, the house was already loud with relatives.
Shruthi’s engagement was at a convention hall near Mehkri Circle—flowers, fairy lights, filter coffee in steel tumblers. Arjun wore the cream kurta, hair oiled and combed flat by his mother. He stood near the sweets counter, counting minutes.
His cousins found him.
“Arjun anna!” Little Neha tugged his sleeve.
“You look boring. Come, take selfie.”
Older cousin Rohit appeared with a plate of jalebi. “Macha, long time. Still single?”
Arjun shrugged.
Another cousin, Karthik, grinned.
“Class twelve, na? Must be having at least one girlfriend. Tell, tell—who is the lucky girl?”
The question was casual, tossed like a cricket ball.
Arjun opened his mouth to say “no one,” but the image that flashed was Meera leaning over the blackboard, purple pallu slipping a fraction, waist curve glowing.
His stomach flipped.
Girlfriend?
The word felt too small, too ordinary, for what he was beginning to feel. Yet the thought of calling her that—of holding her hand in a theatre, of texting good-night, of introducing her as “my girl”—sent a current through his veins sharper than Red Bull.
He swallowed. “No girlfriend.”
Rohit laughed. “Liar. Your face is red.”
“Global warming,” Arjun muttered.
They dragged him for photos, for dance, for more sweets. The function stretched—speeches, photo sessions, lunch, tea, more photos. By the time they piled back into the car, it was past eleven at night. Bangalore’s roads were empty, streetlights blinking yellow. Arjun pressed his face to the window again, counting hours until morning.
He reached home, brushed teeth, fell on the bed still in his kurta.
Tomorrow. I will see her tomorrow.
That single thought wrapped around him like a blanket. He slept smiling.
He woke to sunlight slicing through the curtains and the wall clock screaming 9:03 a.m.
For one confused second he thought it was Sunday. Then panic hit like cold water.
“Amma!” He bolted upright. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
Lakshmi appeared at the door, wiping her hands on a towel.
“Beta, you came so late yesterday. Let you sleep. One day rest won’t kill you.”
“One day? Amma, I have to go! Today is important!”
“Important how? Since when do you cry to go to college?” She laughed softly.
“Yesterday you were begging to skip.”
Arjun was already in the bathroom, toothbrush in mouth, shirt half-buttoned.
“Amma, please. I’m getting late.”
“Arjun, listen—”
“No, Amma, I’m fine. I’m going.” He spat, rinsed, grabbed his bag. “I’ll eat in the canteen.”
Lakshmi watched him sprint to the door, shoes in hand. “At least take idli parcel!”
“Bye, Amma!”
She stood in the doorway, puzzled.
“Ayyo, this boy… suddenly toppers’ disease?”
Arjun ran. He caught an auto, promised the driver extra twenty rupees for speed. The auto flew—Silk Board, Forum Mall, Hosur Road. He reached college at 9:27. Second period was ending in three minutes.
He took the stairs two at a time, tie flapping, bag bouncing on his back. Corridor empty. 12-A door closed. Through the glass panel he saw her.
Ms. Meera.
Same purple saree. Same low dbang. Same gold border catching the tube light like a secret. This time with a loose hair
She stood at the board, marker in hand, writing:
Slope of the tangent = lim (Δy/Δx) as Δx → 0
She underlined the word slope, turned slightly to address the class, and the saree shifted.
The pleats tightened across her backside, outlining the perfect, generous curve of her ass—two symmetrical parabolas meeting at the base of her spine. The fabric dipped into the small hollow above her tailbone, then rose again, smooth, endless, like the graph of y = x² rotated and made flesh.
Arjun froze at the door.
In his head, numbers danced.
If I consider the curve of her ass as a function f(x)… the slope at the point of maximum curvature…
He visualised the tangent line kissing that curve at exactly one point, the way a derivative kisses its function.
Instantaneous rate of change of my heartbeat: infinity.
Someone inside the class noticed him. Vikram waved frantically.
Arjun snapped out of the trance, knocked once, pushed the door.
“Excuse me, ma’am.”
Thirty-five heads turned. Meera lowered the marker. Her eyes—those wet-earth eyes—found him.
“Yes?”
Arjun stepped in, bag slipping from his shoulder. “I… I’m late.”
Meera raised an eyebrow.
“Very late. Name?”
He was still half-lost in the after-image of that curve. It took a second to remember language.
“Arjun. Arjun Rao. We had a family function last night… came home late…”
The bell rang—shrill, final. Students started packing.
Meera capped the marker. “Arjun Rao. See me after class tomorrow if this repeats. Go to your seat.”
He walked down the aisle, pulse loud in his ears. Vikram whispered, “Dude, where were you?”
Arjun didn’t answer. He reached his bench, dropped into the chair, and looked back at the front.
Meera was erasing the board. The saree stretched again as she reached high, revealing that same handspan of waist—smooth, glowing, the tiny fold above her navel moving like a slow integral sign.
She finished, picked up her books, and walked out without another glance.
The classroom exploded into noise—bags zipping, benches scbanging.
Arjun sat still, disappointment and joy fighting inside his chest like two opposite vectors.
Disappointment: he had missed the entire period.
Joy: he had seen her. Even for thirty seconds, he had seen her.
He exhaled, long and slow, and felt the disappointment melt.
Thirty seconds was enough.
Tomorrow he would have forty-five minutes.
Tomorrow the limit could approach infinity.
He smiled, packed his bag, and followed the crowd out—lighter, hungrier, and absolutely certain that calculus had never been this beautiful.
![[Image: 1762560954049-2.jpg]](https://i.ibb.co/ympP9h0V/1762560954049-2.jpg)
The rest of the day after Meera’s first class passed like a dream Arjun wasn’t part of.
English period: Mrs. Nair read out some lesson; the words floated above Arjun’s head and dissolved.
Chemistry: the teacher demonstrated titration; Arjun saw only purple droplets falling into a conical flask shaped like a waist.
PT: he ran the 400-metre trial and came last, because every time he rounded the bend he imagined the curve of a hip instead of the track.
When the final bell rang, he drifted out of college like a sleepwalker. The usual chaos—bikes revving, girls giggling, ice-candy vendors shouting—felt muffled, underwater. He boarded the 201G bus, pressed his forehead against the cool window, and let the city blur past.
Bannerghatta Road. IIMB flyover. Dairy Circle.
None of it registered. Only one image looped behind his eyes: purple silk, gold border, a waist that dipped like the graph of y = 1/x—approaching zero but never quite touching.
At home, the smell of rasam and potato fry greeted him. His mother, Lakshmi, was stirring something on the stove, the end of her cotton saree tucked at her waist the way all mothers do.
“Arjun beta, wash your hands. Food is ready.”
He dropped his bag, went to the sink, let the water run longer than necessary.
Lakshmi watched him.
“What happened? You look like you lost your mark list.”
“Nothing, Amma.”
He sat, tore a piece of chapati, dipped it in dal, and stared at it as if it were an unsolved equation.
Lakshmi frowned. “You didn’t touch the video game also. Usually you fight with Akka for the TV remote. Today straight to room? Fever?”
“No fever.”
“Then?”
Arjun opened his mouth, closed it. How could he explain that a woman in a purple saree had walked into his life and rewritten every constant he thought he knew?
Lakshmi placed a hand on his forehead anyway.
“Tomorrow we have cousin Shruthi’s engagement in the city. We have to leave by eight. No college for you.”
The spoon slipped from Arjun’s fingers and clanged against the steel plate.
“What? Amma, no! Tomorrow is… we have maths portions to cover.”
“Maths will be there day after also. Family is important. Your father already took leave.”
“But Amma—”
“Arjun.” Her tone ended all debate. “Wear the cream kurta. And sleep early. We have to reach Palace Grounds by ten.”
He pushed his plate away, half the food untouched, and dragged himself to his room. The PlayStation glowed in the dark, inviting. He switched it on, loaded FIFA, chose Manchester United—and stared at the screen for twenty minutes without pressing a single button.
Messi ran in circles. Ronaldo celebrated a goal Arjun hadn’t scored.
He switched it off.
On the bed, he lay on his back, hands behind his head. The ceiling fan chopped the air into slow pieces.
Tomorrow I won’t see her.
The thought hurt more than failing a surprise test.
He closed his eyes and tried to summon yesterday’s image: the way she had written dy/dx, the small flick of her wrist, the tiny strand of hair that had escaped her bun and curled against her neck like a comma.
Sleep came late, restless, full of purple.
Next morning, the house was already loud with relatives.
Shruthi’s engagement was at a convention hall near Mehkri Circle—flowers, fairy lights, filter coffee in steel tumblers. Arjun wore the cream kurta, hair oiled and combed flat by his mother. He stood near the sweets counter, counting minutes.
His cousins found him.
“Arjun anna!” Little Neha tugged his sleeve.
“You look boring. Come, take selfie.”
Older cousin Rohit appeared with a plate of jalebi. “Macha, long time. Still single?”
Arjun shrugged.
Another cousin, Karthik, grinned.
“Class twelve, na? Must be having at least one girlfriend. Tell, tell—who is the lucky girl?”
The question was casual, tossed like a cricket ball.
Arjun opened his mouth to say “no one,” but the image that flashed was Meera leaning over the blackboard, purple pallu slipping a fraction, waist curve glowing.
His stomach flipped.
Girlfriend?
The word felt too small, too ordinary, for what he was beginning to feel. Yet the thought of calling her that—of holding her hand in a theatre, of texting good-night, of introducing her as “my girl”—sent a current through his veins sharper than Red Bull.
He swallowed. “No girlfriend.”
Rohit laughed. “Liar. Your face is red.”
“Global warming,” Arjun muttered.
They dragged him for photos, for dance, for more sweets. The function stretched—speeches, photo sessions, lunch, tea, more photos. By the time they piled back into the car, it was past eleven at night. Bangalore’s roads were empty, streetlights blinking yellow. Arjun pressed his face to the window again, counting hours until morning.
He reached home, brushed teeth, fell on the bed still in his kurta.
Tomorrow. I will see her tomorrow.
That single thought wrapped around him like a blanket. He slept smiling.
He woke to sunlight slicing through the curtains and the wall clock screaming 9:03 a.m.
For one confused second he thought it was Sunday. Then panic hit like cold water.
“Amma!” He bolted upright. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
Lakshmi appeared at the door, wiping her hands on a towel.
“Beta, you came so late yesterday. Let you sleep. One day rest won’t kill you.”
“One day? Amma, I have to go! Today is important!”
“Important how? Since when do you cry to go to college?” She laughed softly.
“Yesterday you were begging to skip.”
Arjun was already in the bathroom, toothbrush in mouth, shirt half-buttoned.
“Amma, please. I’m getting late.”
“Arjun, listen—”
“No, Amma, I’m fine. I’m going.” He spat, rinsed, grabbed his bag. “I’ll eat in the canteen.”
Lakshmi watched him sprint to the door, shoes in hand. “At least take idli parcel!”
“Bye, Amma!”
She stood in the doorway, puzzled.
“Ayyo, this boy… suddenly toppers’ disease?”
Arjun ran. He caught an auto, promised the driver extra twenty rupees for speed. The auto flew—Silk Board, Forum Mall, Hosur Road. He reached college at 9:27. Second period was ending in three minutes.
He took the stairs two at a time, tie flapping, bag bouncing on his back. Corridor empty. 12-A door closed. Through the glass panel he saw her.
Ms. Meera.
Same purple saree. Same low dbang. Same gold border catching the tube light like a secret. This time with a loose hair
She stood at the board, marker in hand, writing:
Slope of the tangent = lim (Δy/Δx) as Δx → 0
She underlined the word slope, turned slightly to address the class, and the saree shifted.
The pleats tightened across her backside, outlining the perfect, generous curve of her ass—two symmetrical parabolas meeting at the base of her spine. The fabric dipped into the small hollow above her tailbone, then rose again, smooth, endless, like the graph of y = x² rotated and made flesh.
Arjun froze at the door.
In his head, numbers danced.
If I consider the curve of her ass as a function f(x)… the slope at the point of maximum curvature…
He visualised the tangent line kissing that curve at exactly one point, the way a derivative kisses its function.
Instantaneous rate of change of my heartbeat: infinity.
Someone inside the class noticed him. Vikram waved frantically.
Arjun snapped out of the trance, knocked once, pushed the door.
“Excuse me, ma’am.”
Thirty-five heads turned. Meera lowered the marker. Her eyes—those wet-earth eyes—found him.
“Yes?”
Arjun stepped in, bag slipping from his shoulder. “I… I’m late.”
Meera raised an eyebrow.
“Very late. Name?”
He was still half-lost in the after-image of that curve. It took a second to remember language.
“Arjun. Arjun Rao. We had a family function last night… came home late…”
The bell rang—shrill, final. Students started packing.
Meera capped the marker. “Arjun Rao. See me after class tomorrow if this repeats. Go to your seat.”
He walked down the aisle, pulse loud in his ears. Vikram whispered, “Dude, where were you?”
Arjun didn’t answer. He reached his bench, dropped into the chair, and looked back at the front.
Meera was erasing the board. The saree stretched again as she reached high, revealing that same handspan of waist—smooth, glowing, the tiny fold above her navel moving like a slow integral sign.
She finished, picked up her books, and walked out without another glance.
The classroom exploded into noise—bags zipping, benches scbanging.
Arjun sat still, disappointment and joy fighting inside his chest like two opposite vectors.
Disappointment: he had missed the entire period.
Joy: he had seen her. Even for thirty seconds, he had seen her.
He exhaled, long and slow, and felt the disappointment melt.
Thirty seconds was enough.
Tomorrow he would have forty-five minutes.
Tomorrow the limit could approach infinity.
He smiled, packed his bag, and followed the crowd out—lighter, hungrier, and absolutely certain that calculus had never been this beautiful.
![[+]](https://xossipy.com/themes/sharepoint/collapse_collapsed.png)