11-11-2025, 10:40 PM
Episode 3 – Tangent Lines
The next morning Arjun reached college twenty minutes early.
He told himself it was because he wanted to finish the homework Meera had given on page 47.
The truth was simpler: he wanted to watch her walk in again, to see if yesterday’s purple miracle had been a dream or a theorem that would repeat.
He took the first bench, right under the fan, heart drumming louder than the blades.
Vikram slid in beside him, yawning.
“Macha, since when do you sit in the danger zone? Teacher can see your every move here.”
Arjun shrugged, eyes fixed on the door.
“Better view of the board.”
Vikram snorted. “Board, my foot.”
The bell rang. Students trickled in. The usual noise—bags zipping, someone humming Badshah, Sneha arguing about yesterday’s chemistry answer key.
Then the door opened.
Meera stepped in wearing a light-blue cotton saree the colour of a Bangalore winter sky just before rain.
The fabric was soft, almost weightless, printed with tiny white lotuses no bigger than a rupee coin.
It clung to her body the way gentle functions cling to their axes—neither too tight nor too loose, just enough to remind you they exist.
She greeted the class with the same quiet “Good morning” that somehow silenced thirty-five restless souls.
Today her hair was in a looser bun; a few strands had already escaped, curling against her cheek like stray integrals waiting to be evaluated.
She placed her bag on the table, turned to the board, and began writing.
Topic: Tangents and Normals
Equation of tangent to y = f(x) at (x₁, y₁) is…
She reached high to write the formula.
That was when it happened.
The pallu of her saree—light, disobedient cotton—slid off her left shoulder with the slow inevitability of a derivative approaching its limit.
It didn’t fall completely; it caught on the curve of her elbow, hanging there like a reluctant curtain refusing to close the show.
And there, for the first time, Arjun saw the shape of her breast.
Not naked—no.
The blouse was cream, same shade as yesterday, modest round neck, short sleeves.
But the cotton saree had shifted just enough to reveal the gentle, perfect swell of her left breast rising proudly against the fabric.
It was fuller than he had imagined in his fevered sketches—round, symmetrical, the soft weight pressing forward as though gravity itself had decided to be kind only to her.
The blouse cupped her like a loving integral, the stitching along the seam tracing the exact point where the curve began its ascent.
A single lotus print on the saree had settled right at the apex, as if the universe had placed a decimal point on the most beautiful coordinate he would ever plot.
She kept writing, unaware.
Her arm moved; the breast moved with it—slow, hypnotic, rising and falling with each breath.
The fabric stretched, relaxed, stretched again.
Arjun’s eyes traced the radius: from the soft shadow beneath to the point where the blouse met skin, a distance of maybe four inches, maybe forty light-years.
He felt his mouth go dry.
His pulse became a step function—zero, then suddenly infinite.
Meera turned slightly to address the class.
“So, the slope of the tangent is nothing but the derivative at that point. Yes, Rahul?”
Rahul was asking something about alternate forms.
Arjun heard nothing.
He was calculating.
If I approximate the curve of her breast as a circle… centre at… radius approximately…
He abandoned the circle.
Too crude.
It was more like y = √(r² – x²), the upper semicircle, but softer, warmer, alive.
She walked to the first bench—his bench—to collect yesterday’s homework.
The pallu still hadn’t returned to its proper place.
Now she was right above him, leaning forward to take Vikram’s book first.
From this angle the view was merciless.
The neckline of her blouse dipped just enough to reveal the shadowed valley between her breasts—two perfect parabolas meeting at a minimum he wanted to spend the rest of his life locating.
A thin gold chain disappeared into that valley, glinting whenever she breathed.
He could see the gentle rise of both now, the right one still half-hidden, playing coy, but the left one fully declared, proud, unapologetic.
She reached for his notebook.
Her fingers brushed his.
For one suspended second her breast hovered inches from his face—so close he could see the faint texture of cotton, the tiny thread that held the blouse together, the soft rise and fall like a slow tide.
“Thank you, Arjun,” she said, voice low, unaware that she had just handed him a lifetime supply of midnight fuel.
She straightened.
Only then did the pallu slide back into place, as if the universe had decided the preview was over.
But the image was burned into him now—high-resolution, permanent.
The rest of the period was a blur of equations he copied without seeing.
Meera spoke about point of contact, about how the tangent kisses the curve at exactly one point.
Arjun wrote in the margin of his book:
She is the curve.
I am the tangent.
And today we touched.
When the bell rang, students surged out.
Arjun stayed seated, pretending to pack slowly.
Meera was erasing the board.
He watched the way her body moved under the blue cotton, the way her breasts shifted with each stroke of the duster—left, right, left—like a slow cosine wave he could ride forever.
Vikram slapped his back. “Earth to Arjun. Lunch. Maggi. Move.”
Arjun stood up, legs unsteady.
He walked past the teacher’s table.
Meera turned, smiled politely. “Don’t forget to attempt the tangent problems at home.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he managed.
As he reached the door, he glanced back one last time.
She was adjusting her pallu properly now, fingers smoothing the fabric over the very curve she had unknowingly revealed.
The cotton settled back into place, hiding the treasure again.
But Arjun had already memorised the equation.
He had the slope.
He had the point of contact.
And tonight, when the lights were off and the house asleep, he would differentiate that curve a thousand times until the numbers dissolved into soft blue cotton and the sound of her breath.
He stepped into the corridor, the bell for lunch ringing somewhere far away.
The tangent had kissed the curve.
And calculus had never felt this close to god.
![[Image: 1762880748085.png]](https://i.ibb.co/FLPRx0n2/1762880748085.png)
The next morning Arjun reached college twenty minutes early.
He told himself it was because he wanted to finish the homework Meera had given on page 47.
The truth was simpler: he wanted to watch her walk in again, to see if yesterday’s purple miracle had been a dream or a theorem that would repeat.
He took the first bench, right under the fan, heart drumming louder than the blades.
Vikram slid in beside him, yawning.
“Macha, since when do you sit in the danger zone? Teacher can see your every move here.”
Arjun shrugged, eyes fixed on the door.
“Better view of the board.”
Vikram snorted. “Board, my foot.”
The bell rang. Students trickled in. The usual noise—bags zipping, someone humming Badshah, Sneha arguing about yesterday’s chemistry answer key.
Then the door opened.
Meera stepped in wearing a light-blue cotton saree the colour of a Bangalore winter sky just before rain.
The fabric was soft, almost weightless, printed with tiny white lotuses no bigger than a rupee coin.
It clung to her body the way gentle functions cling to their axes—neither too tight nor too loose, just enough to remind you they exist.
She greeted the class with the same quiet “Good morning” that somehow silenced thirty-five restless souls.
Today her hair was in a looser bun; a few strands had already escaped, curling against her cheek like stray integrals waiting to be evaluated.
She placed her bag on the table, turned to the board, and began writing.
Topic: Tangents and Normals
Equation of tangent to y = f(x) at (x₁, y₁) is…
She reached high to write the formula.
That was when it happened.
The pallu of her saree—light, disobedient cotton—slid off her left shoulder with the slow inevitability of a derivative approaching its limit.
It didn’t fall completely; it caught on the curve of her elbow, hanging there like a reluctant curtain refusing to close the show.
And there, for the first time, Arjun saw the shape of her breast.
Not naked—no.
The blouse was cream, same shade as yesterday, modest round neck, short sleeves.
But the cotton saree had shifted just enough to reveal the gentle, perfect swell of her left breast rising proudly against the fabric.
It was fuller than he had imagined in his fevered sketches—round, symmetrical, the soft weight pressing forward as though gravity itself had decided to be kind only to her.
The blouse cupped her like a loving integral, the stitching along the seam tracing the exact point where the curve began its ascent.
A single lotus print on the saree had settled right at the apex, as if the universe had placed a decimal point on the most beautiful coordinate he would ever plot.
She kept writing, unaware.
Her arm moved; the breast moved with it—slow, hypnotic, rising and falling with each breath.
The fabric stretched, relaxed, stretched again.
Arjun’s eyes traced the radius: from the soft shadow beneath to the point where the blouse met skin, a distance of maybe four inches, maybe forty light-years.
He felt his mouth go dry.
His pulse became a step function—zero, then suddenly infinite.
Meera turned slightly to address the class.
“So, the slope of the tangent is nothing but the derivative at that point. Yes, Rahul?”
Rahul was asking something about alternate forms.
Arjun heard nothing.
He was calculating.
If I approximate the curve of her breast as a circle… centre at… radius approximately…
He abandoned the circle.
Too crude.
It was more like y = √(r² – x²), the upper semicircle, but softer, warmer, alive.
She walked to the first bench—his bench—to collect yesterday’s homework.
The pallu still hadn’t returned to its proper place.
Now she was right above him, leaning forward to take Vikram’s book first.
From this angle the view was merciless.
The neckline of her blouse dipped just enough to reveal the shadowed valley between her breasts—two perfect parabolas meeting at a minimum he wanted to spend the rest of his life locating.
A thin gold chain disappeared into that valley, glinting whenever she breathed.
He could see the gentle rise of both now, the right one still half-hidden, playing coy, but the left one fully declared, proud, unapologetic.
She reached for his notebook.
Her fingers brushed his.
For one suspended second her breast hovered inches from his face—so close he could see the faint texture of cotton, the tiny thread that held the blouse together, the soft rise and fall like a slow tide.
“Thank you, Arjun,” she said, voice low, unaware that she had just handed him a lifetime supply of midnight fuel.
She straightened.
Only then did the pallu slide back into place, as if the universe had decided the preview was over.
But the image was burned into him now—high-resolution, permanent.
The rest of the period was a blur of equations he copied without seeing.
Meera spoke about point of contact, about how the tangent kisses the curve at exactly one point.
Arjun wrote in the margin of his book:
She is the curve.
I am the tangent.
And today we touched.
When the bell rang, students surged out.
Arjun stayed seated, pretending to pack slowly.
Meera was erasing the board.
He watched the way her body moved under the blue cotton, the way her breasts shifted with each stroke of the duster—left, right, left—like a slow cosine wave he could ride forever.
Vikram slapped his back. “Earth to Arjun. Lunch. Maggi. Move.”
Arjun stood up, legs unsteady.
He walked past the teacher’s table.
Meera turned, smiled politely. “Don’t forget to attempt the tangent problems at home.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he managed.
As he reached the door, he glanced back one last time.
She was adjusting her pallu properly now, fingers smoothing the fabric over the very curve she had unknowingly revealed.
The cotton settled back into place, hiding the treasure again.
But Arjun had already memorised the equation.
He had the slope.
He had the point of contact.
And tonight, when the lights were off and the house asleep, he would differentiate that curve a thousand times until the numbers dissolved into soft blue cotton and the sound of her breath.
He stepped into the corridor, the bell for lunch ringing somewhere far away.
The tangent had kissed the curve.
And calculus had never felt this close to god.
![[+]](https://xossipy.com/themes/sharepoint/collapse_collapsed.png)