[UnSpokenPages19]

Chapter 7 - When Talking Became Routine - Between Good Morning and Good Night

The grand wedding slowly dissolved into a hazy, beautiful memory, joining the archives of family history. For a few days immediately following the event, life reasserted its usual, unyielding rhythm.
I buried myself completely in work. Complex architectural drawings and structural blueprints replaced wedding decorations; endless client meetings replaced formal family gatherings; and the persistent, sharp ringing of office phones took over where the joyous wedding music had left off.
It felt as though everything had settled back into its neat, predictable routine. Or at least... that is what I tried to convince myself.
Then came a quiet Tuesday morning. I had just stepped into my office, pulled out my desk chair, and placed my bag down when my phone vibrated in my palm.
I tapped the screen. A single text from Pooja.
"Reached office?"
I smiled without even realizing it, a sudden rush of warmth breaking through the dull morning office haze.
"Just did."
Barely a few seconds later, her reply flashed.
"Good."
That was all. Nothing dramatic, no grand pretence. I slipped the phone back into my pocket and got to work.
The next morning, right as I pulled up to the office parking lot, my phone buzzed again.
"Reached?"
I replied immediately.
"Yes."
A few moments passed, the three dots flickering.
"Had breakfast?" "Yes." "What?" "Poha."
A laughing emoji appeared on the screen.
"Again?" "Office canteen doesn't believe in variety." "Poor you."
I let out a quiet laugh, locking the screen while holding the device a little closer than necessary.
By the end of the week, those brief exchanges had quietly transformed into an indispensable, electric routine.
Every morning at 9:00 AM: "Reached office?" Around noon: "Lunch?" By evening as the sun dipped: "Left office?" And almost every night: "Reached home safely?"
Sometimes the conversations lasted barely two minutes. Other times, they stretched, unspooling into easy, teasing banter. Neither of us questioned why this unspoken ritual had begun. It simply became the central pulse of my day.
__________
On Sunday afternoon, I made my usual visit to Abhi's house.
The house was warm and quiet, bathed in golden afternoon sunlight filtering through the sheer curtains. Abhi was sprawled on the sofa, engaged in a losing battle with a television remote that refused to cooperate, while his little daughter was absorbed in her colouring book in the corner.
The inner curtain pulled back, and Pooja walked into the living room carrying a brass tray with three steaming cups of tea.
My breath hitched in my throat the moment she stepped into view.
She had shed all formal attire for the weekend, wearing a soft, sleeveless pastel-pink cotton kurti paired with form-fitting leggings. The lightweight cotton kurti clung smoothly to her upper body, accentuating the natural, supple curves of her frame.
Because the kurti was sleeveless and tailored with broad armholes, her bare golden arms and biceps were completely exposed, glistening subtly under the warm afternoon light. The deep, rounded neckline revealed the smooth, sun-warmed expanse of her collarbones and the top of her chest, while the side slits of the kurti offered glimpses of her waist as she moved. Her dark hair was loosely clipped at the back, leaving her smooth, fair neck bare, with loose wisps fluttering gently against her cheeks.
She stepped over, leaning down slightly to set a teacup on the wooden side table next to my chair. As she bent forward, the subtle scent of her skin—warm, sweet, and faintly floral—swept over me.
She handed one cup to me, one to Abhi, and kept the third for herself, sitting down on the single armchair opposite me. She crossed her long, slender legs, the soft cotton fabric pulling neatly across her thighs.
She looked directly into my eyes, a subtle, knowing spark in her dark gaze. "You survived another week?"
I took a slow sip of the tea, leaning back while maintaining eye contact. "Barely."
Abhi barked out a laugh from the couch, finally slapping the remote against his palm. "Is your office still trying to kill you with deadlines, Aashu?"
"Every single Monday," I replied smoothly.
"Then why do you keep going back?" Abhi teased.
"I have a bad habit of liking to eat three meals a day," I shot back.
"Fair point," Abhi conceded.
Pooja laughed softly, a rich, melodic sound that seemed to settle directly into my chest. Her glass bangles chimed as she took a sip of her tea. "I don't think anyone truly enjoys Mondays."
"I've met people who do," I noted, watching the way her soft lips touched the rim of her cup.
She raised an eyebrow, amused. "Really?"
"Yes. And frankly, they're dangerous people. You shouldn't trust them."
She shook her head, a glowing smile illuminating her entire face. "You and your ridiculous theories."
For the next two hours, the conversation flowed with effortless, intoxicating ease. We drifted seamlessly from cricket scores to local politics, from neighborhood gossip to Abhi complaining about rising petrol prices, with Pooja playfully teasing him for checking fuel rates far more often than the weather forecast.
Sitting across from her, watching her laugh, watching the effortless grace with which she carried herself, the entire afternoon vanished before any of us even realized it.
_______
The shift happened on a humid, late-summer evening while we were deep in the middle of a lingering, aimless conversation. We had been talking about nothing in particular—just the quiet rhythm of the day winding down—when her voice faltered, stopping abruptly mid-sentence.
"Aashu..."
The name hung in the quiet space between us. A sudden, pregnant silence followed—lasting only a second, but heavy enough that both of us felt its weight immediately.
She let out a soft, nervous laugh that vibrated gently through the receiver. "I... I’ve never called you that before."
I leaned back against my headboard, a slow, warm smile spreading across my face in the dark. "Most people do."
"I know," she whispered, her hesitation palpable. "I hope you don't mind."
"Not at all," I replied, letting the quiet certainty in my voice settle over her.
A long, soft sigh of relief escaped her lips—a sound so intimate it felt like a warm breath against my bare neck. "Good."
After that evening, she never called me Akshay again. To her, I had simply become Aashu. The change felt so seamless, so undeniably natural, that within a few days, even I had forgotten she had ever called me anything else.
_______
The digital rhythm only intensified as the new week began.
On Monday morning, my phone vibrated on the bike dashboard before I had even turned the ignition key.
"Ride safely."
A slow grin spread across my face as I typed back.
"Yes, madam."
Almost instantly, the reply flashed back.
"Don't 'madam' me." "Okay." "Ride safely." "Better?" "Much."
A few days later, right around noon, my phone buzzed again on my office desk.
"What are you eating today?"
I unlatched my stainless-steel lunchbox.
"Chapati, bhindi, and curd." "Trade?" "With what?"
A crisp photograph popped up on my screen. A bowl of rich, homemade paneer curry garnished with fresh coriander.
"Unfair," I typed back. "I know." "Now I don't even want my lunch." "Too late." "Next Sunday I'll save some for you." "Deal."
As the days turned into weeks, those short digital check-ins expanded into deep, fluid streams of conversation. Office deadlines transformed into detailed discussions about difficult clients; she shared stories about her daughter's college art projects; I vented about city traffic; she laughed at my dry humor, and I found myself waiting eagerly for her voice, her words, her presence.
Some evenings involved nothing more than two or three quiet, reassuring messages sent before sleeping. On other nights, forty minutes would disappear in the blink of an eye as we texted back and forth in the dark.
Without a single grand announcement, the silent wall that grief had once built around her had completely crumbled—and the distance between our lives was closing, hour by hour, message by message.
I was halfway through an intensely critical project review meeting on a Tuesday afternoon when the familiar, dull rumble of my phone vibrating against the wooden conference table broke my concentration.
I glanced down subtly, saw the screen light up, and immediately ignored it, tapping the side button to silence the ring. Two minutes passed. The screen lit up again—a second call. Before the meeting chairperson could finish outlining the quarter’s structural estimates, it vibrated for a third time.
My pulse quickened slightly. Three consecutive calls during work hours usually meant an emergency. The moment the meeting concluded, I gathered my sketchbook, stepped out into the quiet, dimly lit glass corridor of the floor, and dialed her back instantly.
She picked up on the very first ring.
"Hello?" her voice came through the receiver, clear and slightly breathless.
"Everything okay?" I asked quickly, leaning my forearm against the cool glass window, my heart thumping against my ribs.
A brief, heavy silence stretched over the line for two seconds. Then, a rich, melodic laugh bubbled up through the speaker.
"Yes," she said softly.
"You called three times, Pooja," I said, letting out a sharp breath as the tension slowly drained from my shoulders. "I stepped out mid-meeting. I genuinely thought something serious had happened."
"It did," she replied, a teasing lilt in her tone.
I waited, resting my forehead lightly against the windowpane, picturing her standing in her kitchen. "I'm listening."
"The gas cylinder finished," she announced with absolute gravity.
I blinked, staring blankly at the reflection in the glass. "That’s the big emergency?"
"I couldn't find the agency number anywhere on the fridge magnet," she explained, her voice carrying that intimate, domestic warmth that always seemed to undo me. "I remembered you saved it on your phone when you helped Abhi set up the local utility contacts last month."
I couldn't help the low laugh that escaped my chest. "You really scared me for a second."
"I'm sorry," she murmured, though her tone held zero actual regret. "I totally forgot you'd saved it in your directory until I was sitting on the kitchen counter staring at an empty stove."
In my mind's eye, I could see her clearly as if I were standing right there in her flat: relaxed, domestic, completely at ease. She would be wearing her dark olive-green lounge t-shirt—a soft, oversized cotton piece with a wide neckline that slouched casually to one side, exposing the smooth, fair curve of her right shoulder and the sharp, delicate ledge of her collarbone. Below, simple grey palazzo trousers hung low on her hips, the wide, fluid fabric fluttering against her slender legs as she shifted her weight. Her skin—bare, unadorned, and glowing with the quiet routine of a quiet afternoon at home—seemed almost tangible through her voice. The short sleeves of her oversized tee left her soft, golden arms completely bare, her skin smooth and unmarred as she balanced the phone between her cheek and shoulder.
I pulled up my contacts list, scrolled down to the vendor details, and read out the ten-digit number slowly.
"Got it," she said, repeating the digits once to confirm. "Thank you, Aashu."
"No problem at all. Don't go blowing up the kitchen."
Just as I was about to lower the phone and end the call, her voice dropped an octave, turning quiet and remarkably tender against my ear.
"I knew you'd answer once you were free."
The statement hung in the air between us, weighted with an unspoken trust that felt almost intoxicatingly intimate.
"I always do," I replied softly.
Neither of us acknowledged how naturally, how completely without defense, those words had slipped from my lips.
______
A few weeks later, a torrential monsoon downpour blanketed the city in a thick curtain of grey water. My office floor was unusually quiet; the fluorescent lights had been dimmed, and most of my colleagues had cleared out early to beat the flooding streets.
I stayed behind, leaning back in my office chair, watching the rain strike the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, listening to the rhythmic, hypnotic patter against the frame.
My phone vibrated on the desk.
"Still in office?"
I picked it up, a smile touching the corner of my mouth as I typed back.
"Waiting for the rain to slow down. The streets below look like rivers." "Same here." "You're stuck out in this storm too?" "college called an hour ago. Had to pick up my daughter and her huge art project before the roads got blocked." "How did the project turn out?"
A second later, a photograph downloaded on my screen. Her daughter stood proudly in their living room beside an elaborate, multi-tiered handmade paper castle held together by glitter and cardboard.
"Tell her it looks amazing. She’s a genius builder." "She'll be so happy you said that."
A minute later, another photograph arrived.
This time, the camera was focused on a sheet of heavy drawing paper held up by two tiny hands. At the bottom of the page, drawn in bright, chaotic wax-crayon strokes, were three stick figures standing hand in hand.
One was labelled Mama in blue crayon. One was labelled Me in pink. And the third figure—painted with broad, tall strokes right next to them—simply said...
Aashu Uncle.
I stared at the screen for several seconds, the quiet hum of the rain outside fading into a background whisper. A strange, swelling warmth surged in my chest, a mixture of fierce affection and a deep, pulsing awareness of how deeply I had been woven into their lives.
I replied slowly:
"Looks like I've officially been adopted."
Three laughing emojis appeared instantly on the screen.
"She insisted you had to be in the family portrait." "I wasn't even there!" "Apparently that wasn't important to her." "Tell her I'm deeply honoured." "I already did."
Then, a third photo popped up—a quick, candid selfie she must have taken right after coming inside from the rain.
My throat went completely dry.
She was standing in her small hallway, drenched from the storm. She was wearing a traditional maroon kurti paired with black fitted leggings. The heavy downpour had thoroughly soaked her—the damp, dark fabric of her kurti was clinging intimately to her skin, outlining every graceful contour of her upper body. The wet cotton stuck fast across her upper back, revealing the sharp, natural curve of her spine and the delicate arch where her waist narrowed above her hips.
Her dark hair was wet, gleaming, and pinned loosely, with damp strands clinging to the pale column of her throat and dipping lower toward her chest. Because the kurti was soaked, the fabric traced the full, supple shape of her body with uncompromising clarity. Below, the tight black leggings were drenched, clinging like a second skin to her long, shapely legs, highlighting the smooth curve of her calves and thighs as she stood barefoot on the cool tile floor.
Her skin, gleaming with tiny droplets of rainwater, looked radiant—flush with warmth despite the chill of the storm outside. The sheer visual impact of her standing there, wet, breathless, and casually sharing such an raw, unfiltered moment with me sent a slow, heavy pulse through my veins.
_____
One quiet evening, while the city outside slept and we were lingering on the phone talking about nothing in particular—mindless banter about evening traffic and tea preferences—her voice suddenly dropped into a softer, more reflective tone.
"Aashu...?"
"Hmm?" I murmured, adjusting my pillow as I lay in the dark room, listening to the subtle sound of her breathing over the line.
"Do you remember that rose?"
For a fraction of a second, my mind went blank, searching through the library of shared moments. Then, a vivid memory flashed—a bright red rose bought months ago from a street florist on a chaotic afternoon.
"The one from the florist near the tea stall?" I asked quietly.
"Yes."
I smiled into the darkness of my bedroom. "What about it?"
"It finally dried," she said gently.
"Did you throw it away?"
She let out a soft, breathy laugh that felt like a quiet stroke across my skin. "No... It's pressed inside one of my thickest notebooks. Right between the pages."
Silence stretched across the line. A long, heavy, beautiful silence. I lay still, holding the phone close to my ear, picturing her sitting on her bed, running her fair fingers over the delicate, dried petals of a flower preserved purely because it came from my hands. The realization hit me like a quiet wave—she hadn't just saved a flower; she was holding onto a piece of us.
"I didn't expect you to keep it," I said, my voice lower than usual.
"Neither did I," she whispered back softly.
Another small, electric silence followed, thick with everything we weren't saying out loud. Then, almost casually, as if stepping back over a line we weren't yet ready to cross, her voice shifted back to its light, everyday rhythm.
"So... how was work today? Did you finish those client layouts?"
The conversation continued for another half hour as though nothing significant had been said. Yet somehow, in the quiet spaces between our words, she had shared something infinitely more personal, exposing a vulnerable corner of her heart that changed everything.
_____
Weeks slipped by almost unnoticed, dissolving into a steady, intoxicating rhythm. Without ever holding a formal conversation or setting expectations, our daily interactions quietly carved out permanent spaces within the fabric of the day.
A quick text in the morning before the engine started. A photograph of a ridiculous office memo during lunch. A complaint about an annoying supervisor. A reminder to eat on time. A simple, grounding: "Reached?"
Sometimes we replied within seconds, the texts flying back and forth like a silent, private dialogue. Sometimes hours passed while we dealt with our respective worlds. Neither of us demanded explanations; neither felt the need to apologize for delays. We simply picked up the thread right where it had been left hanging. It no longer felt like effort. It felt as natural as breathing.
And perhaps that was the most subtle, dangerous part of it all: neither of us could pinpoint the exact day we had become each other's central thought. We only knew that if a day passed without one of those familiar notifications lighting up the screen, the entire day felt subtly out of alignment—incomplete and hollow.
Somewhere along the way, another small change slipped into our interactions, so quietly neither of us caught it happening until it was already there.
It happened on a warm Saturday evening when I swung by her house to drop off some architectural sample catalogues Abhi had asked for. Abhi was out running errands, leaving just Pooja and me in the softly lit apartment.
She opened the door, and the breath caught instantly in my throat.
She was dressed in a traditional, rich indigo-blue printed saree—a dbang she had wrapped casually around herself after a family function earlier that afternoon. The lightweight chiffon fabric clung to her figure in a way that felt devastatingly deliberate.
The pallu was dbangd loosely over her shoulder, intentionally left sheer, revealing the soft contour of her waist. On her left side, the saree sat slightly low on her hips, completely exposing the bare, smooth skin of her midriff and waist—a expanse of fair, radiant skin that glowed under the warm yellow light of the hallway lamp.
Her blouse was a deep, sleeveless cut made of dark silk. With no sleeves to obscure her, her entire arms—from the delicate slope of her shoulders down to her smooth biceps and slender wrists—were entirely exposed. The dark silk blouse was low-cut at the back, secured only by thin, delicate ties, leaving her smooth, upper back bare, showing the subtle play of muscles every time she turned or reached for something.
"Come in," she said softly, stepping aside. Her voice held a quiet, velvet richness that made the quiet apartment feel infinitely smaller.
As I stepped past her into the living room, the subtle scent of jasmine and warm vanilla drifted off her skin, wrapping around my senses. She walked ahead of me, the delicate pleats of her saree sweeping against the floor, her bare waist shifting gracefully with every step.
"Abhi will be back in twenty minutes," she said, turning around to face me, placing one bare hand gently against her hip. The open curve of her waist caught the light, smooth and untouched, drawing my eyes before I consciously forced myself to look back up into her dark, knowing eyes.
"I can wait," I said, my voice dropping into a register that was thicker, deeper than I intended.
She looked at me, her lips parting slightly, noticing the sudden shift in the air, the unsaid tension pulling tightly between us. She didn't adjust her pallu. She didn't step back. She simply stood there in the warm quiet of the room, letting me look, letting the silence burn between us.
The boundaries had shifted. The unspoken space between us was no longer just about friendly messages or shared routines—it was heavy, charged, and undeniable.
_______
Gradually, without either of us planning it, the text messages that had anchored our daily routine began transforming into spontaneous phone calls. Instead of the familiar, polite text asking, "Busy?", my phone screen would suddenly light up with her name and ring out.
The background noise of her calls revealed the raw, intimate rhythm of her domestic life.
Sometimes she called while folding freshly dried laundry in her bedroom. I could hear the crisp rustle of cotton fabric, picturing her sitting cross-legged on the bed, wearing a lightweight silk nightgown that slipped easily off her fair shoulders.
Sometimes she called while standing in her kitchen, waiting for the heavy brass pressure cooker to whistle on the stove—the sharp hiss of steam punctuation marks between her words. During those calls, she described standing in the warm kitchen heat, wearing a soft, sleeveless cotton house-dress with a deep scoop neck. I could almost see the light sheen of perspiration glistening on her collarbones, the smooth skin of her bare biceps exposed as she stirred the pot, her fair arms moving with easy, domestic grace.
Other times, she called while sitting beside her daughter, helping her navigate primary college homework.
And on my end, I would call her while sitting on my parked motorcycle outside the office complex, watching the glowing red taillights of the evening traffic slowly thin out before starting my ride home.
Neither of us ever suggested that messages were no longer enough. The connection simply became richer, more intoxicating when we could hear the subtle shifts in each other's breath, the quiet pauses, and the genuine warmth of our voices.
Our conversations wandered wherever they pleased. Some evenings we dissect work stresses; other days we laughed over Abhi’s endless habit of misplacing his house keys; and on certain afternoons, we engaged in passionate, playful arguments over which roadside stall in the city served the best misal pav. If one of us grew busy, the other never questioned it or demanded apologies. The conversation simply paused, waiting to be picked back up as if no time had passed at all.
_______
It was a late Friday night when her call came through, just as the clock crossed ten. I answered on the second ring, pulling the phone to my ear as I lay across my bed.
"What are you doing?" she asked, her voice low, velvety, and relaxed.
"Nothing important at all," I murmured, smiling into the dark room. "Just staring at the ceiling."
"Good."
"Why? What's on your mind?"
"I don't feel like sleeping yet," she admitted softly.
"So you've called me to cure your boredom?"
"Maybe," she teased, her tone rich with unspoken familiarity.
I let out a low laugh. "I really should start charging consultation fees for midnight company."
"You'd overcharge."
"I absolutely would. Premium rates after ten."
Her laughter trickled through the speaker, warm and infectious.
For the next two hours, the outside world ceased to exist. We drifted effortlessly from one topic to another without any set direction or hurry. We talked about old Marathi classic cinema, childhood festival memories, collegeyard stories, and our absolute favorite late-night roadside snacks. We fell into an endless, passionate debate about whether homemade cardamom tea was superior to the thick, sugary brew sold at the neighborhood corner stall.
Eventually, as it always did, the conversation found its way to Abhi.
"You know," she said between soft giggles, "he still forgets major family birthdays."
"He forgot mine twice in a row," I added, shaking my head.
"I completely believe that."
"You shouldn't encourage him!"
"Hey, I've seen worse memory lapses from him."
She laughed again, a pure, uninhibited sound that seemed to linger in the quiet space of my room.
Then, after a long, quiet pause where only the soft rhythm of our breathing remained, she spoke again, her tone dropping into a quiet, velvet whisper.
"Aashu..."
"Hmm?"
"Look at the time."
I shifted on the bed, glancing over at the glowing digital clock on my nightstand. 12:17 a.m.
"When did that happen?" I asked, genuinely surprised by how effortlessly time had slipped away.
"I have no idea," she murmured softly.
For a long moment, neither of us spoke. It wasn't an awkward silence, nor was it distant. It was profoundly comfortable, thick with an electric, quiet intimacy that stretched over the line between us.
I imagined her lying in her dark room, curled under a light sheet, wearing a thin sleeveless camisole that left her smooth shoulders, her long, fair neck, and the delicate valley of her collarbones completely bare to the night air. The mental image was vivid—her soft skin glowing in the faint light of her phone screen, her breathing slow and measured, her dark eyes looking at the screen as if she were looking directly at me.
Eventually, she broke the stillness, her voice barely above a whisper.
"You should sleep, Aashu."
"So should you," I replied gently, my voice thick with lingering warmth.
"I know."
Another brief, heavy pause lingered on the line—a reluctance from both sides to break the connection.
"Good night, Aashu."
"Good night, Pooja."
The call disconnected with a faint beep, leaving the room in deep silence. Even long after the screen went dark, I lay there in the quiet night, catching myself smiling at the ceiling for no reason at all before finally reaching out to switch off the bedside light.
_______
The following Sunday, the afternoon sun was beginning to soften into warm golden hues by the time I reached Abhi’s ancestral house—a little later than my usual hour.
The courtyard was bathed in light, a breeze carrying the faint, comforting aroma of freshly brewed ginger cardamon tea. Abhi’s mother was moving gracefully among us, serving hot tea from a traditional brass pot, while everyone sat together on the wide stone veranda.
As I settled onto the edge of the woven cot, Abhi looked up from his cup, his eyes darting deliberately from me to Pooja, and then back to me with a narrowed, mock-suspicious glance.
"I’ve noticed something," Abhi announced, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
I looked up, taking a cautious sip of my tea. "What?"
"You two talk more than either of you talks to me these days," he declared, pointing a index finger between us.
Pooja, sitting on the opposite bench, raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow, a playful glint in her eyes. "So?"
"So?" Abhi echoed dramatically. "I’m your brother!"
A mischievous, radiant smile spread across her face. "Then you should call me more often."
The courtyard erupted into spontaneous laughter. Abhi’s mother shook her head fondly, while I couldn't resist joining in, taking the opportunity to poke fun at him.
"He’s jealous," I teased, grinning at him.
"I am not!" Abhi shot back instantly.
"You definitely are," I insisted, leaning back.
"I'm definitely not!"
Abhi’s mother smiled gently as she handed him another warm cup of tea, patting his shoulder. "At least someone has the patience to listen to both of you nonstop."
Even Abhi couldn't maintain his stern facade and burst out laughing. Within a few moments, the lighthearted banter naturally dissolved, the conversation drifting effortlessly toward upcoming family wedding invitations, routine grocery shopping list disputes, and the evening’s cricket scores.
Nobody brought up our closeness again. Perhaps because, to everyone else in the family, there was nothing unusual or out of place about it.
And maybe... to us as well.
Life had changed so quietly, so seamlessly, that neither of us had noticed the exact moment the shift had occurred. There had been no grand, cinematic confession. No dramatic, heart-stopping realization. No explicit promises of anything beyond deep, comforting friendship.
Yet every single morning, before I even opened my work emails or started my bike, I found myself instinctively checking my phone, wondering if it would vibrate with one of her familiar messages. Every evening, before setting the device on my nightstand, I half-expected it to ring one last time with her voice on the line.
And somewhere else in the city, tucked into her own routine, she had unknowingly begun expecting exactly the same thing from me.
Somewhere in the quiet space between "Reached office?", "Have you eaten?", and "Good night, Aashu...", we had quietly, undeniably become the core of each other’s everyday lives.
_______
Three weeks later...
For the first time in months, I wasn't spending my Sunday afternoon at Abhi's house. The monsoon heat lingered outside, while inside my apartment, the television played softly in the background. I lay sprawled on the leather sofa, only half-paying attention to a quiet movie broadcast, the quiet apartment feeling unusually spacious and slow.
Suddenly, the screen of my phone lit up on the glass coffee table, accompanied by a quick vibration.
Pooja.
I reached over and answered on the very first ring, resting the receiver against my ear as I sat up.
"Hello?"
"Aashu..." Her voice came through the line brighter, richer, and more velvety than usual.
"Hmm?" I replied, a soft smile automatically forming on my lips at the sound of her breath.
"What are you doing right now?" she asked smoothly.
"Nothing at all. Staring at the ceiling."
"I knew it," she said with a quiet, satisfied chuckle.
I laughed quietly into the empty room. "How could you possibly know that?"
"Because you answered on the first ring," she pointed out, her tone dripping with playful triumph. "You were completely bored."
"Guilty as charged. I was bored."
"So am I," she confessed softly.
A short, deliberate silence settled over the line—a pregnant pause filled with a subtle, electric charge that made my pulse quicken just a fraction. When she spoke again, her tone was strikingly casual, yet every word seemed measured.
"My parents have gone to visit my aunt in the suburbs for the weekend..." she began slowly.
"Okay..."
"Abhi’s stuck at work covering a double shift until tonight..."
"Right."
"And my daughter is spending the whole day with her grandparents..." She paused, letting the information sink in before adding, "The entire house is completely quiet."
I smiled into the phone, leaning my head back against the cushion. "Sounds peaceful. Isn't that what you usually ask for?"
"It was peaceful..." she murmured, her voice dropping an octave, "for about an hour."
"And now?"
"Now I'm bored out of my mind."
I let out a low laugh. "I can hear the absolute desperation in your voice."
Another brief, heavy silence stretched across the line—thick with unspoken anticipation, lingering between us like a physical presence—before she asked the question directly.
"Will you come over for a while?"
The answer left my lips almost automatically, without a second of internal deliberation or hesitation.
"Give me twenty minutes."
"Okay," she replied smoothly, a noticeable warmth blooming in her tone. "I'll make tea."
"Just promise me no burnt tea," I teased.
She laughed so hard and so genuinely that the rich, melodious sound echoed sharply through the speaker, forcing me to pull the phone slightly away from my ear with a wide grin.
"I'll try my best," she promised, breathless. "Drive carefully."
"See you soon."
The call ended with a faint click. I tossed the phone onto the cushion, stood up, and picked up my motorcycle keys from the entryway counter without giving the impulse a single second thought.
Neither of us knew it right then... but that ordinary, sun-drenched Sunday afternoon would quietly mark the very first day we spent together simply because we wanted to be near each other.
Twenty minutes later, I pulled my bike into her quiet residential lane. The afternoon heat was thick, the streets deserted as most neighbors retreated indoors.
I walked up the cool stone stairs and knocked gently on her wooden door.
Within seconds, the lock clicked, and the door swung inward.
The breath caught in my throat, my entire body going rigid for a split second as I took in the sight of her standing in the threshold.
She was dressed for a lazy, private afternoon at home, wearing a stunning sleeveless crimson red chiffon saree dbangd with a breathtaking, casual intimacy. The sheer, lightweight crimson fabric was wrapped loosely around her hips, sitting low—decidedly lower than usual—exposing the entire left side of her bare, smooth waist and midriff. Her skin was a fair, golden porcelain, glowing softly under the warm yellow hallway light, utterly unblemished and radiating a natural, intoxicating warmth.
Her blouse was a matching deep crimson silk, minimalist and sleeveless, held together by tiny structured seams. Because it was completely sleeveless, her soft, rounded shoulders and smooth biceps were fully visible, the skin supple and golden against the rich red silk. The front cut of the blouse possessed a wide, gentle scoop neck that framed her sharp collarbones and the upper swell of her chest, while her bare waist stretched seamlessly from her ribs down to the low rise of her saree petticoat.
As she stepped back to let me inside, she turned slightly, and I caught a view of her back—the blouse had a wide, low-cut square back secured only by two delicate, thin cloth ties with gold tassels, leaving a vast expanse of her smooth, fair back exposed to the open air, the line of her spine dipping gracefully toward the waist of her dbang. Her long, dark hair was piled into a messy, high bun held loosely by a clip, leaving her long, slender neck and delicate jawline completely bare, with a few stray, wispy curls clinging softly to her skin.
"You made good time," she said softly, her voice carrying a sultry, low resonance in the quiet foyer.
"Traffic was light," I replied, my voice sounding a tone deeper than I intended as I stepped over the threshold.
As the door closed behind us with a soft click, the quiet of the empty house settled over us instantly. The subtle, breathtaking scent of her skin—a delicate mix of sandalwood soap, warm vanilla, and sweet sweat from the afternoon heat—drifted over me, heavy and intoxicating.
She walked ahead of me toward the living room, the sheer red chiffon of her saree fluttering gently against her thighs, offering glimpses of her long legs through the semi-translucent dbang, while the open expanse of her waist and bare back moved with a fluid, hypnotic grace with every step she took.
"Have a seat," she said, turning around to face me near the center of the room. She rested one bare, golden hand lightly against her hip, her fingers pressing into the soft skin of her exposed waist, completely unbothered—or perhaps completely aware—of how much of her beauty she was displaying.
"I'll head to the kitchen and put the tea on," she added, her dark eyes locking onto mine, holding my gaze with an intensity that made the quiet air between us feel thick, heavy, and electric.
"Take your time," I murmured, watching the subtle rise and fall of her chest as she smiled—a slow, knowing smile that made it abundantly clear that this Sunday afternoon was no longer just about passing the time.