Priya had been in Pune for six weeks when the monsoon arrived.
She was in her hostel room on the third floor when she heard it — a low rumble, then the smell of rain before the rain, then the sound of it hitting the roof of the building like applause.
She went to the window.
Back home in Lucknow, the first rain of the season meant her mother would make pakoras. It meant her father would drag the old plastic chairs to the balcony and they would all sit there watching the water collect in the street below. It meant her younger sister would insist on going outside to stand in it until their mother gave up and let her.
Here there was no balcony. Her roommate had gone home for the weekend. The hostel kitchen was locked after eight.
Priya watched the rain for a long time.
Then she opened her window and stuck her arm out. The rain was warm and coming fast. It soaked her sleeve immediately.
She left her arm there.
Her phone buzzed. A message from her mother — a photograph of the balcony at home, the plastic chairs with puddles on them, her sister standing in the courtyard below with her arms spread out.
Priya looked at the photograph. Then at the rain. Then at her wet sleeve.
She typed back — same.
Her mother sent back a string of emojis and then a voice note of the rain at home, thirty seconds of it, nothing else.
Priya played it three times.
Outside her window, the rain kept falling. Somewhere below, she could hear other girls from the hostel shrieking and laughing, running out into the courtyard.
She closed her laptop and went downstairs. ✦
