MaNan : Love is Just a Word

3. Red Desert

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The sound of water fills the apartment.

Nandini removes her shoes, steps into her house slippers, sheds her jacket and bag, and follows the sound. She patters down the hallway and the noise becomes clear, splashing and fast-paced babbling, a softer voice over it, someone snoring underneath.

Aarav is being an outright terror in the bathtub, toys bobbing along the water's surface. He splashes and kicks, bubbles kissing the top of his head like a cap, his chin and cheeks. The front of Mukti's shirt is soaked. Abhimanyu is propped up against the toilet, mouth open as he dozes.

Nandini watches from the door and the phantom weight she's been carrying all day lessens, transforms into warmth.

Aarav spots her first. His eyes zero in on Nandini, an ecstatic yell punching out of his lungs as he pounds the water with open palms.

Mukti looks over a damp shoulder. Says, "Hey, kid. How was class?"

Five words and Nandini is five, being picked up by a thirteen-year-old Mukti on her walk home from middle school. She's seven and Mukti is fifteen, Nandini's school bag is perched in the basket of Mukti's bike. She's eleven and Mukti is nineteen, already home, her bags packed and stacked by the door, the haunting rumble of the car still running in the driveway the impending doom that Nandini's life would never be the same again.

"Class was class. How was work?"

Mukti looked at Nandini before answering with a shrug, "Work was work. What's that?"

"Oh," Nandini says, hands suddenly heavy with the book in his hands. "Extra credit."

She gives a dramatic gasp which doesn't come out naturally, "Ah. Nandini Murthy. Always the overachiever."

Nandini flips through the manga without looking and watches the puddle forming at the base of the tub. Listens to Abhimanyu snore. "How was he today?"

Mukti picks up a red truck, fills it with water, and carefully pours it down Aarav's back. Aarav does that thing where he pretends to be the Energizer Bunny or a navi, and vibrates so hard his little shoulders quake.

"He's been fine with me, but I think he gave Abhi a hard time." Mukti throws Abhimanyu's sleeping form a glare without heat, too much softness in her eyes, "He was supposed to be helping with bath time."

Abhimanyu yawns and his jaw cracks, the weight of his head making the toilet cover creak.

"Abhimanyu works hard. Let him sleep. He's gonna be mad you let him get all toilet germy though."

Mukti scoffs, tries to calm a fussing Aarav by offering her rubber panda as a peace offering. "He's already mad at me." At Nandini's raised eyebrows, she adds, "I have to go to Bangalore next week."

Nandini blinks. "Again?"

"Yeah."

The younger frowns not understanding, "But that's a good thing, right? It means the songs are doing well."

Mukti sighs, "If you're a normal person like you and me, then yes, it's great. But to Mr. Marxist Manifesto over there, I'm a rung below corporate hack. Out of the two of us, I was supposed to be the communist, but still. He doesn't have to throw a pissy tantrum considering he hit the jackpot and gets to work from home."

And Nandini smiles wide, "Just because Abhi believes in socialism doesn't make him a communist. His wardrobe does."

Mukti grins, shaded and mocking, the array of Abhimanyu's ethically hand-woven cardigans surely flashing before her eyes the way they are Nandini's, and it's startling how much she and Mukti look alike when they smile like this, that jagged edge of mean, but Mukti's is a pillow cloud. Candy shaped. There's no bite to it, no actual mockery. Just that faraway look. Those dreamy eyes people get when they think about someone, honey warm and endeared and in love. Nandini's smile just looks jagged-edged, endeared but mostly mean.