When I was twenty-eight and had rejected the three matches that my mother had deemed perfect for me, she asked her sister, Radhika Chikkamma — Chikki, as we called her — to take my horoscope to Ramana Uncle.
And so the three of us — Chikki, my brother Ravi, and I — navigated the narrow lanes of Banshankari to land at Ramana Uncle’s ancient house, and we waited with bated breath as he perused our charts.
After what had been an unusually long silence, Chikki spoke up, “What does Sarita’s chart say?”
Ramana Uncle, who had been intensely peering at the charts, looked up at me over his glasses and said, “She has an interesting horoscope; it shows rather clearly here that she will be governed by her desires.”
Radhika Chikki frowned. “What does that mean? When will she get married?”
“And that is the only question that matters,” Ravi whispered into my ear.
My aunt shot him a sharp look.
“I’m sure your job matters too,” I whispered back.
“It means she will do as her heart dictates,” Ramana Uncle said. “It’s not a bad thing.”
It was not the answer my aunt was looking for.
Ravi’s horoscope, or horrorscope, as my non-astrologically inclined father had called it, fared better. My mother’s chief complaint had been his salary. Ramana Uncle pronounced, “You’ll go abroad soon, and you’ll also rise in the organization.” A straight answer that satisfied everyone.
No straight answers for me.
Desire. What did I desire?
I had always desired words. I had held on to that desire right from the time I was eighteen.
And here I was, an editor at a publishing firm at twenty-eight.
Now my horoscope said desire. I just wanted a man who understood what I meant when I quoted Frost or Dickinson. I needed him to read sequels and prequels and then discuss with me what he thought.
I never found anyone like that.
My mother’s idea of a good husband was someone who earned well and took care of me.
As thirty-one approached and Ravi became thirty-three and announced his wish to marry Marian, an Aussie girl, my mother exploded. “You children will be the death of me — one doesn’t want to get married, the other wants to marry some white girl,” she wailed.
“Amma,” both of us chorused, and my father, who preferred not to take part in these fights, had to step in.
“Manjula, be happy. Ravi is getting married; Marian is a very nice girl. And Sarita will get a compatible match soon — you know it’s not her fault that her horoscope seems to have so many problems and the boys’ families are so insistent,” he said.
She still sulked.
In a moment of impulse, I told Ravi, “I’m just going to marry the next man I meet.”
He laughed. “You know that guy will say something grammatically wrong, and that will be the end of it.”
But I was tired. The grind of the matchmaking wheel had worn me down — I was done wearing a saree, pinning jasmine in my hair, and serving coffee to strangers. It had been enough to make me switch to tea as my drink of choice.
Ravi’s wedding was held on a pleasantly beautiful Bangalore day. Between the strains of the nadaswaram, the incessant chatter of a hundred relatives dressed in rustling silks and sipping hot filter coffee, and a smattering of Aussie accents and Marian’s relatives dressed in Indian outfits, I met Akhil.He was tall and slim, with fine curling eyelashes and light-green eyes. I had to admit I was attracted to him that instant.
Radhika Chikki made the introduction. “Sarita, come here,” she beckoned over the din. “Look who I’ve met — my childhood friend Anita and her husband,” she said, waving at the couple who sat smiling pleasantly. “And you know what? Their son Akhil works with Ravi.”
Not in Australia, I learned later, but in their Indian office; he had come to deliver the gift the office had pooled for. His parents had tagged along on their way to a nearby temple, and Radhika Chikki — faster with face recognition than an iPhone and a bloodhound for matrimonial opportunities — had made them stay.
Akhil was about a year older than my brother, which made him four years older than me.
“The perfect age gap,” my mother declared when Chikki told her about the match.
“Akhil wants to meet her outside the house; his parents will come home to meet us,” Chikki said.
“That’s not really the convention,” my mother said, eyebrows raised, but I was more than ready.
“Oh, Akka, it’s quite common now — let her go.
”Akhil chose a coffee shop near my office — already an indication of the quiet consideration that I would come to know as his trademark. When we entered on a Friday evening, the shop was just filling up. Tables were dotted with couples from different generations and a few families with children grabbing a snack before heading home. The air smelled of coffee, cream, and sugar, and the hiss of the machine punctuated our conversation.
“Do you read?” My most important question was met with a shrug.
“Articles, scientific journals…” He trailed off, noting my expression. “And code — that must count, right?” he added, with an awkward grin.
I laughed. But I had to admit that he spoke flawlessly (though I did hear a trace of an Australian twang), and his eyes were ever so captivating.
When I asked if he had ever been involved with anyone, he shrugged again.
“I always hoped to fall in love,” he said. “But then, we can grow into love, can’t we?”
I had not considered this. I shrugged. “It’s a possibility,” I replied, sipping my insipid cup of masala chai. I liked this man. More than anyone I had ever met. I could envisage a compatible life with him.
Maybe he did not check all the items on my list, but he made me stop and think. He made me flush, not with the desire for words or thoughts, but with desires of a very different kind. I wondered how it would feel to hold his hand and how it would be to kiss him.
The months between the time our parents settled our match and the wedding date flew by.
“Did I tell you that when your aunt beckoned to you at the wedding, my mouth went dry, and I prayed you wouldn’t notice I was sweating?” Akhil texted, making me smile on the metro ride home. He picked me up from the office to eat pastries at Smoor and bought me books at Blossom.
He liked to play chess. Akhil was a patient teacher, and we played each other for interesting stakes.
Kisses were much sought-after prizes.
He pushed his mother to give me my choice. “Take her along to buy her sarees, Amma,” he told her.
Akhil came home and told my mother, “Aunty, please teach me how to make your saaru.” I had mentioned to him that the tomato and drumstick rasam my mother made was my comfort food.
He played chess with Ravi, whom I had thought was a genius at it, and beat him solidly.
When I looked at our reception photos, though my red saree was overly bright, I loved that Akhil’s hand never let go of mine.
Our little house was my favourite place. My publishing job demanded strange hours, but Akhil picked up the slack. He was famous for his strong filter coffee after dinner parties, while I still drank tea.
But he didn’t read. Not like I wanted. Not enough to discuss like I did with the people at work. And I had wanted that – desired it.
Once, almost as a joke, he said, “I tried to read that book you are editing, Sari, but I dozed off.” I suppressed the sharp anger that arose when he said that.
Akhil was funny and generous, and I could forgive easily, but there were parts of us we kept from each other, and there were topics we didn’t broach.
But I wasn’t unhappy.
Our daughter was born the year I turned thirty-four. Akhil held Ankita the moment she arrived. “Look,” he said, “she is just like you!” Through the haze of pain and joy, I saw a tear roll down his cheek.
Ankita was a lot like me, but she had his pale-green eyes, and something about her smile reminded me of him. Her name, too, was derived from ours, and Akhil often whispered conspiratorially, “She is the best of us both.
”And so our lives ran. When Ankita began school, we lived by a routine: I packed the dabbas, Akhil got her ready, and we both waved goodbye from the bus stop before hurrying to work.
“You got lucky with Akhil,” Chikki said when we met.
We hardly met; there was never time on weekdays, and weekends usually meant getting ready for the week ahead. But on rare occasions, when the stars aligned, I went to Jayanagar to meet her.
“And he with me,” I replied promptly, sipping my chai, knowing that Chikki would always favour the nephew-in-law over the niece who made the effort to visit her.
“So do you have everything you ever desired?” she asked flippantly, sipping her filter coffee. Ramana Uncle’s words had not been forgotten — that horrorscope of mine.
Desire.
Ah! There was that word again.
What else had I desired but a companion who loved me, a beautiful child, a home? Even if I had not ticked every item on my list when I married Akhil, I felt I had everything anyone ever wanted.
My other desires were long forgotten.
And yet, some days, I’d read something, and something would stir in me…
I had worked at my publishing firm since my post-graduation. I was the senior editor in the fiction department, and my days were spent researching, checking, and editing books for my authors.
On a cloudy July day, lightning illuminated the skies, thunder disrupted my audiobook, and the rain decided to fall the moment I stepped out of the metro. There was no escape. When I arrived at my desk, water dripping off my hair, wanting to run into the ladies’ room, Venu was standing there, with a young man.
“Sarita,” Venu, my editor-in-chief, said, “meet Harish Rao. He is joining your team as a senior editor. Can you show him the ropes?”
Harish Rao had a head of curls that looked as though they had never been brushed. His moustache curled at the ends, and his handshake was firm and warm. He looked less like an editor and more like a typical South Indian movie villain — except for his generous lips, drawn into a genuine smile, and his eyes that twinkled with humour.
I showed him his desk, helped him configure the software, introduced him to the team, and told him about the lunch options. He smiled each time, and said, “Where are the best bookstores in this town?” Harish sat across from me. He was reading something I’d wanted to read. And he’d smile when he noticed me looking.
One afternoon, we both attended the book club. Venu loved holding it once a month, when we discussed books by authors we had published.
That day, we were reading popular fiction – a celebrity author. I hated the book, but Venu had wanted it published.
“Celebrity novels are the ones that sell.”
And then Harish spoke, “This is the most pedestrian book I’ve read in a long time.”
I almost gasped, and my eye caught his.
“Don’t you think so, Sarita?” he asked. I just nodded.
Harish now smiled when I entered the office and showed me what he was editing.
“I wish I could sit this author down and explain how grammar works!” he said, with a smile that urged me to laugh.
We discussed techniques, advice for authors, and places to buy books.
He loved poetry and quoted freely. When I was once on leave for a few days, he sent me a text:
“Where are you?
I hunt the house through
we inhabit together.
Heart, fear nothing, for, heart, thou shalt find her —
next time, herself!”
I had not thought about Browning in a long time, and my heart gave a small lurch recognizing a poem I had loved in school.
He passed me books he loved. “You must read The Goblin Emperor; the world-building is excellent,” he said, pressing a well-thumbed copy into my hands. I read it and loved it. His margin notes — “A woman swordsman — impressive!” “Why do all these dishes sound Chinese to me?” — made me smile and laugh.
One day, just as I was leaving, he asked, “Where do you stay, Sarita?”
“Vijayanagar,” I said.
“Oh, I’ll come with you.”
As we passed a Chai Time outlet near the station, Harish looked at me. “Are you a coffee girl? Or would you like a cup of tea?”
“A cup of masala chai any day,” I replied, smiling.
“Did you read Leigh Bardugo’s The Familiar?” he asked, as we got on to the metro.
I had.
The carriage was crowded, and people talked all around us, and yet he was all I heard as we discussed the messiness of miracles. His character read was different from mine, and I was so invested that when my station approached, I wished I didn’t need to get down.
“Do you write?” Harish asked as we neared my stop.
“Just a little,” I said shyly.
“I don’t believe it’s just a little,” he said as the train halted. “See you tomorrow.”
When I reached home that night, I was thinking of all the words that had existed between us. A pool of warmth enveloped me, and I just felt alive.
Akhil began a conversation about office politics, but I could not concentrate. Fortunately, he became busy packing Ankita’s bag, and I managed to escape.
That night, I tossed in bed as Akhil slept beside me.
The word I thought I had forgotten slipped back into my consciousness — desire.
Harish Rao began to dominate my thoughts.
At work, he was always around, especially now since we were editing a duology together. The fantasy was very Indian yet suitable for a global audience, and it was especially fun to compare notes.
We ended up eating lunch together — I with my home-bought dabba of rice, sambar, and palya, and he his cook’s roti-sabzi — until one day he dipped into my box and praised me to the high heavens.
From then on, I packed a little extra lunch and cooked with more care.
Akhil noticed and praised me too, though he said, “Nice pulav, Sari.” Harish said, “I’ve never eaten any pulav that is so light and fragrant and yet has this depth of flavour.” It mattered somehow.
Every evening, Harish boarded the 7 PM metro with me because it was less crowded. Our conversations ran long; one evening, when I got off, Harish called me, and then we continued until I reached home.
When I realized I had taken half an hour to reach home from the metro station, I felt a sharp prick of guilt. Ankita complained, “You don’t have time for me, Mummy!”
Akhil consoled her, “Mummy is working on a very important project. She is busy. Once that’s done, she’ll be able to spend more time with you.”
I said nothing. What could I say? That at forty, I was brimming with yearning.
Akhil noticed the change.
“This colour suits you,” he said as I got ready for work. I blushed. I had dressed for Harish, and my husband had noticed.
I had to admit it to myself at least. I longed for Harish. When he laughed, I felt myself dissolving. He spoke to me with poetry I loved. I knew when he was joking and teasing me, and I knew when he was encouraging me.
I had shared my written work with him, half afraid that he would mark the margins in red, but he had returned it with, “You have a novel that will do very well in here, Sarita — you need to write it.” He was honest that it needed edits, but he was also positive about the way I had written it, and it was high praise coming from him.
I had fallen.
And Harish? I couldn’t be sure about love, but I knew he liked adrak chai, the karela fry I got every Friday, Thara Kelahar from Witness for the Dead, Emily Dickinson, and me.
We were eating lunch with the extended team when Venu asked Harish about the rentals in JP Nagar.
I wrinkled my nose. “How would he know that?” I asked.
“Because he lives there, Sarita!” Venu replied. “And I thought you guys were close friends?”
I almost forgot to swallow the food I was eating.
I could feel the heat rising through my body, but my palms went cold. I looked at Harish, but he looked away. For a moment, I thought maybe he had lied to Venu, but he confidently gave the rents and talked about areas he could only know if he stayed there.
Shock, anger, embarrassment, and realization all registered in my mind, and hopefully not on my face.
Harish lived in JP Nagar, and instead of getting off at Majestic to change lines, he travelled with me all the way to Vijayanagar. And he never got off there either.
He travelled the wrong way, just to be with me.
I didn’t speak to him when we returned after lunch, and I gave clipped answers to all the professional questions he asked.
Instead of leaving at 7 PM as had become my habit, I left hurriedly at 5:30 PM, seizing the moment when Harish was absent from his desk.
The platform was full. I wasn’t used to it being so crowded. The train was arriving when I heard Harish call my name. In that brief moment before I entered the packed compartment, I thought about staying back — but it was too late; the crowd carried me in.
I stood there in a carriage packed to the max when I heard Harish’s voice near my ear. I thought for a moment that I was hallucinating, but there he was.
As he reached overhead to hold the handhold, his fingers grazed mine. I felt a current course through me, and I saw a spark light up his eyes.
We didn’t say anything — we just stood there, among the crowd, until it was time for me to alight.
Harish followed me off the train. Standing at the tea stall outside the metro, sharing a half cup of tea, I said, “What were you thinking?”
“Are you sure you want to know?” he replied.
I looked at him, his desperation mirroring my own.
“I am…” I began, but he cut me off.
“I tried not to, Sarita — trust me, I did. I knew I could never really tell you, and what would I say really. But the heart wants what it wants,” he said, and I recognized Emily Dickinson’s line from her letters.
I turned away and walked without saying goodbye. I had known this moment would come, but now that it was here, what was I supposed to do?
When I reached home, Ankita was playing music on Alexa. The lyrics reverberated through the house: “When you know you know…”
I called in sick for the rest of the week. I had never taken sick leave; even Venu called to ask if I was okay.
“Viral fever,” I replied, almost wishing it was.Akhil stayed home. I had hoped he would go to office and leave me alone, but he came by with cups of tea, made me soft upma, and toast with jam.
“You know, you’ve never fallen ill like this before,” he said.
“It’s not something I wanted.”
He paused, tucking a curl behind my ear.
“Sometimes, we fall without knowing, and sometimes that fall…,” he shook his head. “Do you think you can get up on your own?”
I didn’t understand what he was saying. I closed my eyes and willed him to leave.
For all four days, I saw the dots rise and fall on the chat app that Harish and I used. We didn’t say a word.
When I reached the office on Monday morning, I found a summons from Venu on my desk.
I knocked and entered his office. Venu was his usual blustery self.
“You look pale,” he said.“Yes, the fever. No need to worry, I’m not contagious.”
He laughed weakly.
“I want to share some news,” he said.
“Okay.”
“So congratulations! Management has decided to promote you to Executive Editor!”
“Oh!”
“Yes, yes — so Harish is being promoted too.”
“Oh!” I said again.
“Yes, the work you both did on that duology was brilliant. You both deserve this.”
“Thank you,” I said as I rose to leave.
“Oh, and he is being transferred to Pune.”
I must have gone a shade paler, because Venu looked concerned. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, just surprised at the transfer.”
“Oh, that. Yes, we can’t have two executive editors in one location. And we won’t move you; we know you are from here.”
“And he has accepted the offer?”
“Yes — he leaves tomorrow, in fact; my secretary is organizing the farewell.”
I nodded and left his office.
The day passed in a blur. Harish was nowhere to be seen, mostly finishing the exit formalities.
My colleagues congratulated me and commented on my pale face.
I said nothing. I felt numb.
The farewell dinner was at the company’s favourite Chinese restaurant. There were toasts to both of us and farewell speeches.
Harish smiled and even managed a laugh, talking about missing Bangalore traffic. I watched the steam curl up from the tomato soup, which I couldn’t swallow. When I was asked to say something, I just said, “Congrats” and “Thank you.” A departure from my usual eloquent self.
It began to rain, and people began to disperse.
I was leaving when Harish found me alone.
“Come away with me,” he whispered urgently, eyes not meeting mine, face flushed and shoulders slumped.
For a second, I thought of it — it was what I’d always wanted. Words, conversations, books, and him. My brain buzzed with a fear and a high.
And then I thought of Ankita’s first smile, her first step, her first tooth, the promise of a chocolate donut she extracted from me this morning. Of Akhil holding my hand all through my prolonged labour, of his patience, his laugh echoing through our house, and how he made sure the kitchen was cleaned at night. I felt as if a bucket of cold water had been dropped on me. After several months of being in a dream, I finally felt I had woken up.
“I can’t,” my voice broke.
He looked at me, lips quivering, and his hand rose. For a moment, I thought he would caress my cheek. Instead, he stopped himself and patted my shoulder.
“Write the book; I will edit it.”
I nodded, and then I fled.
I’m not sure how I got home. Tears fell unbidden from my eyes. The lights in the metro carriage blurred, and I lost sense of time and announcements until I was at Kengeri — the last stop.
Poetry, books, and words had filled this last year of mine, and now I felt a strange emptiness. No one would ever travel with me, three stations in the wrong direction. And now I was at the wrong stop - I had to travel back.
By the time I reached home, the rain was falling in sheets, and it was already 9:30 p.m.
I was glad for the drops — they hid my tears as my kajal ran.
Ankita was tucked under her pink blanket, and her bag was packed for tomorrow.
I showered and let the warm water wash over me. I cried some more. I didn’t want any more of this sharp pain in my heart, I thought. I was done.
Akhil had made my favourite saaru, which smelt of tomatoes, drumsticks, and my mother’s saarin podi.
I crumbled the crisp papad over the soft rice as Akhil spooned in some ghee, just the way he knew I liked it.
“I’ve just been promoted for the work I did on the duology,” I told him.
“Oh, congratulations!” Akhil said. “What about Harish?”
I bit my lip. Of course, Akhil knew his name — I had spoken of him at home. “He got promoted too, and transferred to Pune.” I could feel a new wave of tears arising.
We finished dinner, and I sat in the hall when Akhil came in with a cup of tea. It had ginger and lemongrass — it was the first time he had made me an after-dinner chai.
Akhil sat beside me and, with gentle touches, began to massage my neck and shoulders. I leaned into him, a stray tear escaping the corner of my eye.
“You know, Sarita, I don’t say this enough, but I’ve loved you since I met you. I can’t live without you.”
I turned and looked at him. His eyes were full of unshed tears. “I know, maybe that, I’ve not been the partner you wanted — but I can try harder.” he said.
“Why this now?” I asked.
He looked at me. “In love, we fall, and we rise. Because the heart wants what it wants.” Twice in one week, Emily Dickinson was speaking to me.
In that moment, I knew he knew I had wandered. Maybe not far, but he knew. He had talked about falling, and I had.
“You should have said something sooner,” I whispered.
“I was so afraid of losing you,” he replied softly.
Something in me broke. I leaned my forehead against his; our tears merged, and his lips found mine — I tasted the sea.
We had to learn again what it was to be us. To make an effort to care beyond the mundanities of our ordinary lives. To speak when there was doubt.
Love was making the tea, and reading a book, but also it had to be rebuilt every day.
It’s not all easy. There is learning. Some days there is this wish it came naturally. Some days though there is also an acceptance.
Akhil came to all my book readings and sat in the front row, and if he dozed off, I didn’t take it personally.
I went to his chess tournaments and cheered him on, though I didn’t understand a single move, even after classes.
When I finally wrote my book, about a young woman and her heart, he read my first draft. The whole thing, patiently. And said, “Nice.” I protested, but I also understood.
When my book was published, Akhil, Ankita, and my parents stood proudly by me on the dais. Chikki cheered from the front row. My brother called me, and we spoke about the book and the story, and how much we missed each other.
On the eve of publication, I received an anonymous gift, a volume of Emily Dickinson’s poems, with the words — “I am glad the book got written, congratulations” — overleaf.
Akhil looked at it lazily, “Don’t you have this book already?” he asked. I did.
And yet I kept it on my desk, a reminder.
My horoscope had said I’d be governed by my desires. I had been. And they were all mine.
Sruti Sagaram writes contemporary Indian fiction about love, family, and the hidden complexities of ordinary relationships. Her work explores work, friendship, marriage, and the way love survives the mundanity of life. She lives in Bengaluru and writes technical documents when not dreaming about other people’s fictional lives.