Chapter 5: Chapter 5
The burnt scent of the chapati hit her a second before the smoke alarm’s shrill beep shattered the evening quiet. Priyanka jumped, fumbling with the tawa handle. “Aye, Bhagwan,” she muttered, tossing the blackened disc into the sink. It hissed under the tap.
“Everything okay?” Ayan called from the living room, his voice muffled by the cricket commentary.
“Fine, fine! Just one gone,” she replied, forcing a lightness into her tone she didn’t feel. Her fingers still trembled, and it wasn’t from the heat. All day, the memory of Sujit Kaku’s packet, his eyes dropping to the neckline of her sari blouse as she’d taken it, had coiled in her stomach like a sourness no digestive hajmola could cure.
She started rolling another chapati, the rhythmic press and turn of the rolling pin a desperate mantra. The kitchen was warm, dense with the smells of cumin and frying aloo. Normally, this was her sanctuary. Tonight, the walls felt closer.
“You seem quiet,” Ayan said, appearing in the doorway. He leaned against the frame, still in his office trousers, shirt sleeves rolled up. His smile was easy, concerned. “Long day with the little monster?”
She glanced towards the bedroom where their son, Rohan, finally slept. “No, he was an angel. Just… a lot of thinking.”
“About?” He moved behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, his chin resting on her shoulder. The familiar gesture usually melted her. Now, she stiffened, her eyes fixed on the dough.
“Nothing important. House things. Mother-in-law said the kash flowers for Durga Puja will be more expensive this year.” The lie came out smoothly, coated in domestic trivia.
“Hmm.” He nuzzled her neck, then sniffed the air. “Is that rosogolla I smell?”
“Sujit Kaku brought some this morning. Special ones from Bagbazar.” The words tasted like ash.
“Oh? That was nice of him.” Ayan released her and opened the fridge, pulling out the box. He popped one whole into his mouth. “He’s always so thoughtful. Remember he fixed our mixer for free?”
Yes, Priyanka thought. And he stood so close his breath was on my neck while I held the jar. “Very thoughtful,” she echoed.
The meal was a pantomime of normalcy. They ate in the living room, the television flickering. Ayan talked about a new client at his architecture firm; she nodded, asked appropriate questions. But her mind was in the morning’s kitchen, trapped with that silent, smiling man and his gift.
Later, with the dishes washed and Ayan dozing on the sofa, she finally opened the wardrobe. The sari Sujit’s wife had given her for her wedding still lay there, a splash of emerald green silk. She hadn’t worn it since. As her fingers brushed the material, a sudden, clear memory surfaced: Sujit Kaku, at the wedding, leaning in to congratulate her. His hand had lingered on Ayan’s shoulder, but his gaze had been a physical weight, traveling from her heavily adorned forehead, down the bridal silk, with a slowness that felt like a violation. She’d dismissed it then, chalking it up to wedding-day overwhelm.
Now, the connection clicked with a sickening finality. The mithai, the endless repairs, the coincidental visits. It was a pattern, one she’d been willfully blind to.
“You’re up.” Ayan’s sleepy voice came from behind. He rubbed his eyes. “Coming to bed?”
“In a minute.”
He shuffled over, saw the sari in her hands. “That’s a pretty one. You should wear it more.”
“Maybe,” she said, shutting the wardrobe door firmly.
In bed, she lay staring at the ceiling fan’s ghostly whirl. Ayan’s breathing deepened into sleep beside her. The apartment complex was silent, just the occasional distant hum of a scooter or the muffled TV from another flat. Her phone glowed softly on the nightstand.
An impulse seized her. She opened a blank message. Her thumb hovered over the keypad. Who could she tell? Her mother would tell her to ignore it, to be grateful for friendly neighbors. Her college friends, now scattered across different cities and lives, would demand drama she wasn’t ready to unleash. Ayan… Ayan saw a kind old man.
A floorboard creaked in the hall outside their apartment door.
It was an old building; it creaked all the time. But tonight, the sound was a needle in her spine. She held her breath, listening. No follow-up. No knock. Just the settling of old wood and brick.
But the silence that followed was worse. It felt occupied. Watched.
Carefully, she slipped out of bed and padded to the door, pressing her ear against the cool wood. Nothing. Through the peephole, the hallway was a distorted fishbowl of dim yellow light. Empty.
You are being paranoid, she told herself. This is your own mind poisoning the well.
As she turned away, her eye caught a slight shadow at the far edge of the peephole’s view. A shadow that didn’t belong to the stationary potted plant. It shifted, just slightly, and was gone.
A cold certainty washed over her. It wasn’t paranoia. The visits, the gifts, the glances—they were a language. And she was only now beginning to understand the grammar.
She returned to bed, but sleep was a distant country. She replayed every interaction, every polite namaste, every offered sweet. A prison of pleasantries was being built around her, brick by thoughtful brick. And the worst part was, she had smiled and accepted every single one.
Across the hall, in his own apartment, Sujit Ghosh sat in his dark living room, the glow from his phone illuminating a satisfied smile. He scrolled through his camera roll, past blurry photos of electronic parts and bills, until he found it: a picture taken two years ago. Priyanka, laughing at a community puja, her head thrown back, the fall of her sari pallu slipping slightly from her shoulder. He zoomed in. His breath caught, as it always did.
He heard the faint, familiar cry of a hungry infant through the walls. Right on schedule. He didn’t move. He just listened, a connoisseur of the intimate, domestic sounds of a life that wasn’t his, the sweet from Bagbazar still sweet on his tongue.