TOUCH

Chapter 1

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AURELIA

There are pasts that you want to scratch over with a permanent marker. There are pasts that you want to store in the deepest part of your memory and pretend to have alzheimer. And there are pasts that you want to rip and cut out from your soul like scissors running on a tightly held cotton cloth.

When I was told to move here, I hoped that those scissors would help me shed my past too.

But now that I have set my feet in this foreign land, I'm not so sure.

Yes, there are a lot less people. Yes they are too busy with themselves and their luggages that they don't spare me with a judgemental eye. And yes the men here have no resemblance to the monsters of my past. But they are still that- Men.

There is a life changing experience happening here, and look at me getting in the way with my flustered self.

Someone drops their bag by my side and I yelp, almost curling in myself. The person- the man, give me a look that is half curious half concerned about my mental health, and moves further away.

My face instinctively relaxes and I look around, partially too take in how it feels to be here and partially to avoid any such sudden encounters.

This is America.

If this was three years ago I would have fainted from the mere excitement of leaving India and living in a foreign country. I would have flaunted it on Instagram and gushed about it amongst my friends circle. I would have shopped...hell I would have shopped anything and everything thinking what if i need it just in case.

I would have been ecstatic and nervous but hopeful all the same. I would have felt something.

Anything.

"I'm here!" ,a familiar voice ring in my ears .

I follow it to find my maternal aunt standing along with the crowd of people,just like her, who came to pick up someone. I move towards her only to be pulled into a bear hug that lasts too long and qualify as awkward for me.

But again she don't know me anymore.

Like my feelings, I last saw my aunt three years ago. I was a hugger then.

Suddenly my clothes feel like they are suffocating me.

She is a tiny woman with short brown hair and fair complexion,fairer than the time when she was in India. The Sun must be less harsh here. She sports a kind smile and eyes that give the deception that she could cry any time. Thyroid has been cruel to her and her hands and neck looked swollen.

After the traditional greetings of Namaste we move towards her car.

"How was the flight? Did they give you food?" She asks. A classic worry of every parent and guardian regardless of the country.

I nod a yes to only answer the second question.

"Hmm", she says, her eyes narrow, rightfully suspicious.

...

It take us 40 minutes or so to reach the house that is supposed to be my new home. I look at it and feel a little shame that my mother had asked for her brother's wife's help even though it's been a whole year since he died of heart attack.

The house is a mansion;at least for me it is. And it seems justified because uncle used to  work in some kind of business and when he died he left behind a lot. Aunt is a doctor of lungs or something and her patients are famous celebrities from what I have heard. So all in all she was happy when my mother asked if I could move here with her for studies.