When she’d kissed him, she had surprised herself. It had been such an impulse – the way she sometimes reached out to catch a stray leaf on the wind, or jumped a puddle on a rainy day – something done without thinking or resisting, something pointless and harmless. She had never done anything like that before and never would again, and looking back on it, she would forever be surprised at herself, and a little shocked. But at that moment she had known, with a certainty she would never feel about anything else in her life, that it was right, that she wanted this man in her life. Something inside her said, “he understands what it’s like to be different.”

Celeste NG

Close to Lost – A Memoir

The light’s a dim yellow. Just the way you liked. I leave it that way. Each night. For seven hundred and thirty one nights. Exactly two years. I stare at the ceiling, and then some at the walls. They stare back. Blank. They’re lost too. At times, they move. The window panes on the ceiling,…

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Day 662: When Dad Left for his Maker

There is this song that makes me miss you so much. The song I speak of is Alone by Alan Walker. I do not know who’s the singer. But something is different about the music. It takes me to a place I so want to be. And I know that place is nowhere. Because no…

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Day 547: When Dad Left for his Maker

Dear papa, Your father. Your brothers. Your uncles. Same faces. Similar voices. Their presence. Your absence. Tearing chaos. Overbearing silence. I don’t want to meet them. I want them all gone. Even for an hour, I can’t stand them. You stare back from those faces. You speak in their voices. You are there, yet not…

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Day 365: When Dad Left for his Maker

Dear papa, You’re gone a year today and you’ll want to know this. I don’t cry today. I don’t look back. I don’t ponder over the ifs and whys? I don’t think it matters. I don’t curse anyone. Nor do I regret life. But let me tell you this, I also feel I don’t have…

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Day 282: When Dad Left for his Maker

Imagining life without someone, when have we ever given that a thought? I was the same. But with you gone, life has taken an unexpected turn. I am now looking at things, I never gave a thought. I am reminiscing over events, that once craved my attention. I am lusting for certain aches, that once…

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Rebury this Soul…

walking down familiar lanes never realised they had changed withered, eroded muddied, faded trees lining street-ends had grown dustier leaves rattled by storms had grown mustier walking down familiar lanes never realized how I had changed never stopped to care even when omens lay bare as the last grains of the hour glass called for…

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घर

दीवारों की दरारों मेंछुपी ज़र्द यादेंपास जाकर देखाकभी मेरा बचपनसतह पर तैरताकभी दादी का बुढ़ापाकनखियों से झाँकताखिड़कियों के पार सेसन्नाटे ताकतेकभी होली में रंगेमाँ-बाबा की झलकतो कभी बिदाई में सजीअन्नू का अक्सखाली कमरों में गूंजतेहँसी के पटाखेकभी पापा के ठहाकेतो कभी दादा केकहानी-किस्सेएक एकड़ उस ज़मीं मेंहज़ारों यादें दफ़्नकभी वो मन बहलातेतो कभी कितना तरसाते

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The Hate I Harbored

Time wasn’t on our side. Today, when it is too late, I convince myself thus. Maybe I wasn’t the right age to understand. Maybe you were too harsh that I suffered in vain. Maybe I comprehended you wrong. Maybe you misunderstood me much. I believed you knew what you were doing. Unleashing a world of…

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The Blind Date – A Short Story

“That’s enough! I quit,” and I stormed out of my manager’s office. I was done taking blames for things I’d never done, or rather for what others had done. “Don’t take shit, ever,” dad had always said. Once again, more than anything, it was father’s perpetual absence that nipped me at every point in life.…

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Day 170: When Dad Left for his Maker

There are nights I wake up in a haze. My eyes travel to your rocking chair at the end of the room. Is it truly rocking or is it my mind playing tricks? It is difficult to say in the dark of the night. I stare hard and long as if staring longer would make…

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