the bed was covered with rose petals arranged in the shape of a heart, and Poornima wondered who’d done that: shaped them into a heart. It was a gesture so enchanting, so unexpected, that she wanted to sit on the edge of the bed—gingerly, so as not to disturb the petals—and look at it. Just look at it. But Kishore seemed not at all interested in the heart, because without prelude, he pulled her onto the bed, tugged at the folds of her sari, and burrowed his head, his wet lips, into the dip of her blouse, his fingers stabbing at her breasts like the ends of a potato. In the ensuing confusion, Poornima missed whatever it was that lanced into her. She let out a whimper, too scared to scream, but by now, Kishore was grunting away on top of her. She couldn’t decide—as she watched his face, its grimace, its shudderings—what hurt more: the thing coming in or the thing going out. But then it ended. Just like that. After one final push, Kishore looked down at her and smiled. A true smile. And she thought, Yes, after all, yes, you are the one I belong to now. Then he rolled off her, and in the dark, just as Poornima felt for the first time the velvet of the rose petals against her back, cool and forgiving like rain, he said sleepily, “I like two cups of coffee. One first thing, when I wake up, and one with tiffin. Do you understand?”
She nodded into the dark. And tried her very hardest to understand.
4
At the end of their first month of marriage, on a Sunday, Kishore took Poornima and his sister Aruna, seventeen and younger than Kishore by six years, to Vijayawada. His other sister, Divya, who Poornima saw for the first time at the wedding, was ten years younger than him, and studious. She was quiet, the opposite of Aruna, and didn’t want to come along to Vijayawada because she had exams. So Poornima and Kishore and Aruna set out after breakfast. Poornima wore her best sari, an orange one with a pink border that she’d gotten as a wedding gift. They ate masala dosas at a restaurant near the bus station. Aruna and Kishore didn’t enjoy their dosas—Aruna said the curry was flavorless and that the waiter was insolent; Kishore added that the restaurants near the company where he worked, on Annie Besant Road, were far better—but Poornima had nothing to compare hers to; she’d never been to a restaurant before. Afterward, Kishore took them to the cinema.
This was also a first for Poornima.
Her eyes warmed with tears as she and Aruna waited for Kishore to buy the tickets, wishing she were here with Savitha, as they’d once planned, but Poornima gasped and forgot all about her when she entered through the balcony doors. She’d never seen a room so big. It was like entering an enormous cave, but one that was chiseled and glamorously lit. She stood in awe—looking at the red plush seats, some of them ripped but still luxurious, and the droplets of golden light along the walls where the lamps were hung, and the crowds of people, rushing to find seats. Kishore and Aruna must’ve been to this theater before because they pushed past Poornima to a row of seats in the middle of the balcony.
Then the curtain parted, the screen filled with light, and Poornima was astonished again. The people were huge! They seemed to be bearing down on her, ready to lunge. Her eyes grew wide, a little afraid, but when she looked anxiously at Kishore and Aruna, they were already engrossed in the film—a sad tale of two lovers separated by the disapproval of their parents, especially the girl’s parents, because the boy was penniless, and he had no job (as far as Poornima could tell), but he was strikingly handsome, and he had a handsome motorcycle, even though he was poor. The girl’s parents, in an effort to keep them apart, went so far as to lock her up in a remote mountain home. It was sad, but there were song and dance sequences of the lovers in Kashmir, and Shimla, and Rishikesh, dancing and frolicking in the snow. The actress was wearing only a shimmering, diaphanous blue sari against the white of the snow, and Poornima leaned over and asked Kishore, “Isn’t she cold? Isn’t snow supposed to be cold?” He ignored her, or maybe he didn’t hear.