Winter came early, sneaking in with a chill that made her shiver. On her birthday, a package landed at her door brown paper all crinkled, twine knotted like he'd fumbled it. Inside was him, in bits and pieces: a green scarf he'd knitted, all wonky and perfect; thirty-seven origami cranes, one for every month they'd been wrapped up in each other; and a key, cold and shiny, with a note: "Mere ghar ka, Cassette. Jab chahe aa jana."(My house key, Cassette. Come whenever you want.)
She held that key till it got warm, imagining his world his toothbrush propped up by the sink, the dip in his pillow where he'd slept, books piled up in a way that'd drive anyone else crazy but made sense to him. She didn't ask where he lived. That wasn't their thing. She just slipped the key into her pocket, grinning like she'd stolen something precious.
That night, they video-called, and he swung his camera to the snow outside—big, fluffy flakes drifting down. "Dekh, Cassette," he said, his voice all warm and goofy, "teri wajah se patang uda raha hoon." (Look, Cassette, I'm flying a kite for you.) His hand stretched out, bare in the cold, pulling at an invisible string.
She laughed and did the same, her fingers wiggling in the air. Out there, between them, that kite flew—bright and silly, made of nothing but them. She could almost see it, flapping against the snow, and her heart felt so full it hurt.
But the next day, something weird happened. He texted her, all tense: "Kal raat kuchh bura hua, Cassette. Tu thik hai?" (Something bad happened last night, Cassette. You okay?) She'd woken up with a bruise on her arm, small but sore, no clue how it got there. "Haan, bas ek chhota sa nishaan,"* she wrote, her hands shaky. (Yeah, just a little mark.) "Tu?" (You?) His reply took ages: "Meri wrist pe bhi hai." (On my wrist too.) They didn't push it, just let it hang there, a quiet little mystery that made her smile—proof they were tangled up in ways nobody could untie