Aika sat beneath the blossoming boughs of a cherry tree catching falling petals in the palms of her outstretched hands. Her lips trembled as she hummed a tune of her own creation. It was as light and lovely as the gentle breeze that kissed her cheeks, an expression of joy, a celebratory song of reaching her tenth birthday. The bright red kimono she wore was a birthday present sent to her by her sobo who lived in Fukushima, a city she heard her parents talk about, but had never been there herself. She imagined that any place where a kimono as beautiful as the one given to her by sobo could be bought must be a wonderful place to live, a magical place with Shinto shrines in the clouds and where streams filled with speckled amago flowed from the rocks. She had not seen her sobo in three years but…
The gentle waves of the Yellow River tapped against the sides of Wang Wei’s sampan, producing shallow reverberations, like fingers drumming arrhythmically on the…
The fragrance of wet earth had floated around deliciously since they had arisen. This had induced Father to take several deep breaths. The outcome…
“How could he do this?” thought Subrat. “He’s such an intelligent boy.” He looked at his watch and shook his head. It was five…
Adi smiled. He darted towards the corner table, evading the subtle, curious gazes of the other guests. His eyes gleamed, reflecting the soft, golden…
It was two weeks since Dinesh Nair died from an overdose of sleeping pills. No one had any answer. Akanksha took off her glasses…
Piyush Chawla flashed his boarding pass to the security guard at the airport entrance. It was noon – an hour and forty-five minutes for…
Yash reached home from work at 2am. A little after midnight, Preetha had sent him two disparate WhatsApp messages, one after the other. He…
Yes, I am the hare who lost. No, I did not get lazy or complacent. Let me explain. I was hopping over the meadows…
