Part 3

What Remained Unspoken

Chapters 8–10

Chapter 8
What Was Never Said

Inside, Rohan was still questioning the guide about the next morning. Mahira adjusted her blue shawl. Vineet searched for something ordinary to ask.

“How are your younger brothers?” he asked. “Dwij and Tanish?”

Mahira turned towards him.

“You remember their names?”

“I do. What are they doing now?”

“Dwij works in banking. Tanish runs his own business. Both have families.” She paused. “We’ve been seeing more of each other lately. We lost our father a few months ago.”

Vineet moved his cup aside.

“I’m sorry, Mahira. I didn’t know.”

“How could you have known?” she said gently. “Mum’s still getting used to it. So are we.”

He nodded. For a while, they listened to the rain.

“And your sister?” Mahira asked. “Anuja. Did she become a doctor?”

He looked up.

“A dentist. You remember her?”

“You brought her to the school exhibition. She told everyone what she planned to become.”

He smiled. “She probably asked whether your teeth hurt.”

“She asked whether I was afraid of injections.”

They laughed. Vineet could picture his little sister doing exactly that.

“I’d forgotten that day,” he said.

“I hadn’t.”

Mahira’s smile lingered a moment, then she lowered her eyes to her cup.

Vineet glanced towards the lounge. Shreya was leaning over the map with Leena, listening to the guide.

“Shreya knows how I felt about you,” he said.

Mahira turned back to him. “You told her?”

“A few years into our marriage. We were talking about our school days. I told her about Priya—our common friend, your college classmate—and the message I asked her to convey.”

“And today?”

“I told her you were the girl I’d spoken about.”

Mahira looked towards the doorway again.

“I wondered,” she said quietly.

Vineet rested his hands on his knees.

“After I came home from hospital, I began making a list. Things I’d postponed. Things I’d almost forgotten wanting.”

“What was on it?” Mahira asked.

“Mountains. A proper night under the stars.” He smiled briefly. “Things that looked considerably easier from an armchair.”

He paused, turning the cup slightly on its saucer.

“There was one more. Meeting you.”

Mahira watched him.

“Meeting you was the difficult one.” He paused. “I didn’t even know where to look. And now here we are.”

She waited.

“I used to imagine having half an hour with you. Perhaps an hour. No friend carrying messages. Just time to remember those days and tell you myself.”

Mahira ran a finger along the handle of her cup.

“And now you have it,” she said.

For a moment, he could not answer. He had imagined the difficulty of finding her. He had given less thought to what it would mean to have her sitting beside him, willing to listen.

“I know our lives have moved on,” Vineet said. “I’m happy with Shreya. I wouldn’t want this conversation to hurt what either of us has.”

“Then tell me about then,” Mahira said gently.

He looked at her.

“I loved you. At least, that was what I understood love to be then. For a long time, there wasn’t a day when I didn’t think about you.”

Mahira became still.

“Everyone in my college knew how I felt,” he continued. “They’d ask why I behaved as though I was committed when you hadn’t agreed to anything.”

He smiled faintly.

“Sometimes they laughed at me. I didn’t have much of an answer. I couldn’t imagine beginning something with anyone else.”

He could hear someone inside folding the map.

“Priya spoke to me,” Mahira said at last.

“She told me you didn’t believe in love,” Vineet replied.

Mahira gave a small, almost embarrassed chuckle.

“That sounds like me.”

“I understood it as a no.”

Her smile faded.

“You couldn’t have understood much else. I hadn’t given you much to go on.”

“What would you have said if I’d asked you myself?”

Mahira looked at him for a moment.

“You’re asking me rather late, Vineet.”

He smiled, but she had already lowered her eyes.

“We were very young,” Mahira said. “Our homes weren’t places where we could discuss these things openly. Accepting a proposal—even agreeing to talk—felt like a big step. If my family found out, I didn’t know what would happen.”

She shook her head.

“Now children have a name for every stage of a relationship before they’ve finished school. Situationship is the latest one, apparently.”

She chuckled.

“We couldn’t even manage a conversation,” Vineet replied.

They laughed, easing the stillness between them.

“Perhaps we should have been born later,” he said.

“Perhaps you would still have sent Priya.”

He laughed again, then grew quiet.

“I didn’t want to trouble you after your answer. We were in different cities, and there was no easy way to meet. I thought I should wait until I could approach your family properly.”

“About marriage?” Mahira asked.

He nodded.

“I was still studying, so I knew we would need time,” Vineet said. “If you and your family agreed to wait, I imagined you might pursue a master’s in design in the city where I was studying—if that was what you wanted.”

Mahira looked at him. “You’d thought that far?”

“Much further than I’d ever spoken,” he said. “I asked someone to take a marriage proposal to your family. Before they could approach your parents, they learned your engagement had taken place a few days earlier.”

“My parents were looking for a match after graduation,” she said. “You were still studying.”

“I knew. But I couldn’t promise when I’d be settled.”

Mahira looked down at her cup. Her lips parted, but she said nothing.

Vineet waited.

Inside, someone drew a chair across the floor. After a moment, she looked towards the sound.

“Sameer and I were only beginning to know each other then,” she said.

“Was it difficult?” he asked.

“Sometimes. He was patient with me. We learned.”

She glanced towards the lounge, where her husband was speaking to Rohan.

Vineet followed her glance, then looked down at his hands.

“When I heard you were engaged, I kept asking whether they were sure. As though somebody might have made a mistake.”

Mahira said nothing.

“I’d imagined so much without ever asking you. Losing it felt real, even though we’d never had it.”

His voice had become quieter. He stopped, surprised by how clearly he could remember the hostel room, the untouched meal, his impatience with anyone who asked a simple question.

“Did you have anyone to talk to?” Mahira asked.

“Sandeep. My college friend. One night, I told him I didn’t want to live anymore.”

Vineet paused.

“He sat beside me until morning. Didn’t sleep at all. Whenever I went quiet, he checked on me. The next morning, he helped me see the college counsellor. He kept turning up afterwards too.”

Mahira pressed her lips together.

“I didn’t know.”

“You couldn’t have,” he said. “I’m not telling you because you were responsible. I’d imagined an entire future without ever asking you.”

“We were young,” she said.

“Very.”

They sat quietly. The rain had softened, and voices from the lounge reached them more clearly.

Shreya called to the owner, asking whether an extra shawl could be found for Leena. Vineet turned towards her voice.

His wife stood in the doorway, listening to the reply. She caught him looking and raised her eyebrows slightly, checking whether he was all right.

He nodded.

The familiar gesture brought him fully back to the evening. He remembered her across their first Bengaluru dining table, offering the advance from her commission when salaries were due. Then her hand around his on his first evening home from hospital—holding too tightly before she loosened her fingers.

Mahira followed his glance.

“You’re happy,” she said.

Vineet looked back at her.

“Very. I haven’t always been good at showing Shreya how much.”

“I wanted to marry her,” he added. “But there were years when I called something our decision and let her do most of the adjusting.”

“Sameer might recognise that complaint,” Mahira said.

They smiled, and he felt himself settle into the chair.

“I’m glad you told me,” Mahira said.

Vineet smiled. For the first time that evening, he was no longer preparing his next sentence.

He glanced towards the lounge.

“But I don’t want us to keep returning to what might have been through private messages.”

“Neither do I,” Mahira replied.

He glanced towards the lounge. “I wouldn’t want that to hurt anyone.”

“Nor would I.”

For a while, they remained seated. When a chair scraped inside the lounge, Mahira picked up her cup.

“We should go in,” she said.

Vineet nodded. For the first time that evening, he did not need another minute.

Chapter 9
The Doorway

When Vineet and Mahira came into the lounge, Shreya was standing beside Leena. She looked up and managed a smile.

A moment earlier, she had stopped at the veranda doorway.

“I wouldn’t want that to hurt anyone,” Vineet had said quietly.

“Nor would I,” Mahira had replied.

Shreya had stepped away before they saw her. The relief surprised her; it did not quite settle everything.

“What did we miss?” Vineet asked.

“Rohan wants the sun to rise later,” she said.

---

In their room, Vineet sat on the edge of the bed while his wife searched for her lip balm.

“Thank you,” he said. “For the time.”

Shreya closed her bag.

“I heard the end.”

He looked up.

“I came to call you. Then I stood there a moment.”

Vineet nodded and made room beside him. When she sat down, he told her about the conversation: the remembered names, Priya, the proposal he had asked someone to take to her family. He did not repeat every word or make her ask for the difficult parts.

“What did she say?” Shreya asked.

“Very little, when I told her about the proposal.”

She looked at her hands.

“And now?”

“I’m glad we spoke. I don’t need another conversation about it.”

Shreya was quiet for a while.

“I wanted you to have that conversation,” Shreya said. “Then I spent half the time wishing I hadn’t left.”

Vineet turned towards her.

“I kept wondering whether you were finding out you’d missed the better life.”

“Shreya—”

“I know. It sounds unfair when I say it.”

“It doesn’t.”

“I wanted to marry you,” he said. “I still want the life we’re making.”

Shreya kept working the zip of her bag.

“It’s closed,” he said gently.

“I know.”

She looked at him.

“I know that too,” she said. “Knowing didn’t stop me feeling jealous.”

He reached for her hand. She let him take it, but remained sitting upright.

“Do you want to ask me anything?” he said.

“Probably. Not tonight.”

“All right.”

He stayed beside her. After a while, she leaned against his shoulder.

When he woke during the night, the bedside lamp was on. Shreya was looking at her phone. She put it down and moved closer when he reached for her.

---

After the shortened morning walk, the six of them stopped at a tea stall near the lodge. Sameer and Mahira were leaving after breakfast. While they waited for their tea, Sameer showed Vineet an old photograph of his first office: a borrowed desk and two plastic chairs.

“Three of us ran it then,” he said, enlarging the photograph.

“Only two chairs?” Rohan asked.

“We held very short meetings.”

Back at the lodge, Mahira offered to send Shreya the furniture reference they had discussed over dinner. Shreya gave her number. Mahira sent a brief greeting so they could save each other’s contact.

At the farewells, Shreya paused before embracing Mahira. They stepped apart with small, uncertain smiles. Vineet shook Sameer’s hand, then told Mahira he was glad they had met. She said she was too.

As they prepared to leave, Shreya was searching her bag for her scarf.

Vineet lifted it from the back of her chair.

“And we’re stopping at that old house you mentioned,” he said, handing it to her.

“You remembered?”

“You said you wanted to see the windows.”

She wound the scarf around her neck, smiling.

Chapter 10
An Unlikely Friendship

Three weeks after the holiday, Mahira wrote from her office in Hyderabad with the supplier’s number she had promised Shreya and a photograph of a chair.

Ask for a fabric sample before believing the photograph.

Shreya thanked her, then asked how her project was progressing. A client had changed his mind after the order was placed. Mahira’s description made her smile.

She asked another question.

At first, the exchanges gave Shreya a way to understand the woman who had unsettled her on a forest path. She trusted Vineet, but sometimes she read Mahira’s replies twice. Mahira answered courteously and asked little. Weeks passed without either writing.

Then Shreya sent Mahira a photograph of a low sofa she was considering for a client’s waiting area.

What do you think?

Looks lovely, Mahira replied. But will an elderly visitor be able to get up comfortably?

Shreya checked the seat height in the specifications.

You’ve just made more work for me.

You did ask.

Shreya smiled and reopened the furniture catalogue.

---

Months later, Shreya returned from a site visit unusually quiet. A cupboard door could not open fully without striking a light fitting. Both positions had been approved on her drawings.

Vineet listened while she described the afternoon. Later, she sent Mahira the drawings and called.

“Don’t tell me everybody makes mistakes,” Shreya said.

“Did you check these together?” Mahira asked.

Shreya began explaining the measurements, then stopped.

“No.”

They discussed the correction. When Mahira asked a further question, Shreya had to swallow before answering.

“Are you eating?” Mahira asked.

“Cold roti.”

“That explains the silence. I thought you were angry with me.”

“Only the roti. Give me time.”

Mahira laughed. By the end of the call, Shreya had too.

Their conversations began to include parents, difficult clients and unfinished dinners. Sometimes one forgot to reply until the following week. Neither required an explanation.

---

Nearly a year after the lodge, Mahira sent the programme for a craft and design event.

Are you going?

Shreya checked the dates. I could. Shall we?

They travelled from their respective cities and met there. Extending the visit by two days was a decision they made together.

On their second evening away, they sat with tea in a courtyard. Mahira was trying to steady the table with a folded receipt.

“At first, I wanted to understand what he’d seen in you,” Shreya said.

Mahira stopped, then sat back. “I wondered.”

“Was I that obvious?”

“Sometimes.”

Shreya looked down at her tea. “I kept comparing myself with someone he remembered from school. Ridiculous, really.”

“Not ridiculous,” Mahira said.

She waited before adding, “I was a chapter he imagined but never wrote. You and he have written a whole life together.”

Shreya looked up. “It didn’t feel that simple that evening.”

“I know.”

Shreya was quiet for a moment.

“Then I started calling because I wanted to speak to you.”

Mahira smiled. “Even when I disagreed?”

“You rarely wasted an opportunity.”

The table shifted as Shreya reached for her cup. Mahira bent to adjust the receipt again.

“We could ask for another table,” Shreya said.

“Now you suggest that?”

They were still laughing when a fresh pot of tea arrived.

---

Back in Bengaluru, Vineet was preparing for another walk. His notebook lay open beside the equipment. There were dates against some wishes now.

Against Everest, there was still a question mark. He opened his calendar and entered the training dates he had been considering.

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