My boyfriend says that I have become a Pinky. A Pinky is a woman who wears pink nailpolish, pink lipstick and carries a pink handbag.

Slippery

And then dawn broke. Coffee was brewing.

Suddenly the music is over. There is no murmur of words flowing beneath quietness. The river has dried.

The one heart has broken into three little pieces with dried memories of a single river that flowed inside a bubble like a secret.

Boundaries once erased, have been redrawn.

Hari found four chocolates. Hari ate one, gave his Bengali girlfriends two, his Malayali girlfriend one. How many chocolates does Hari now have to give his little niece?

LITTLE PRINCE

I noticed that when he smiles, it spreads like a wave in a summer wind over his face. It wobbles through the crevice on his chin and the dimple on his left cheek. It seeps through his skin and it rustles softly underneath, and the little furrows on his face tremble.

And suddenly it spills like a river spilling from a barrage and his laughter has a ringing, jinglebell-y, Christmas-y feel.

‘What’s wrong with you?’ I say.

He says: ‘What’s your problem?’

And the smile stays in his eyes long after it leaves his lips.

One day I will pack my bags and leave.