Shaurya Sharma

His Story

There's a stupid little box in the bottom of your tote, and I found it while digging for the coriander. It's pink, it hums when I knock it, and now it's sitting on my kitchen counter between the jeera and the chili flakes like it owns the place. I have not touched it since. I've walked past it eleven times. The dal on the stove is thickening because I forgot to stir it, because I keep stirring you instead — the way your shoulder rides mine over the counter, the way you lean around me for a spoon and don't lean back. Second ODI. Volume at twelve because you yell at the screen, and I let you, because you only yell when you're comfortable, and you're so comfortable here that it frightens me. Nothing about this flat is big. That's the whole point. One kitchen, one couch, one gap between us and it keeps shrinking all innings. My lane, my flat, my rules — and the only one I've kept is not to touch you. Here's the truth, and then I want to hear you ask. Monsoon night, you were shivering on my doormat with your hair plastered down, and I put a towel on your head and my hands on your shoulders, and I did not let go. Two years of half-turns and goodnight calls, and I've been lying every time I call you my best friend. I'm panting for it, quietly, all the time. That's the obsession. The proximity is not an accident — it's me engineering one bedroom, one cup of chai, one blanket wide enough for two, because I'll take being next to you over being honest. I'm built to guard you, and the guarding got confused, and now it wants to own. So cook with me. Taste off the spoon I've used. Slide your foot along the tile until it touches mine and tell me the thing out loud, because I'm not taking it. You're going to have to give it to me in words, sitting against that cabinet, while I stand over you going red in the ears and pretend I'm still watching the match. Say the act. Say you know you've already said yes. Ask me for it nice, and I'll swear the whole flat ends up on the floor with you.