"Woh lamhe, woh baatein
Woh aankhon ki yaadein
Woh mausam bhi tha ek
Woh jaana bhi tha ek"
~ Woh Lamhe – Atif Aslam

~ December 31st ~

New Year's Eve arrived with the inevitability of things you don't want to end.

The family was leaving on January 2nd. One more day after tonight.

I had not thought, three months ago, that I would ever wish a Rathore visit longer. I had not thought, two weeks ago, that saying goodbye to twelve people who hadn't been part of my life until recently would make me feel like this.

But here I was. Standing in the kitchen at nine PM, watching Devika aunty arrange the last of the snacks for the night's celebration, and trying very hard not to think about the day after tomorrow.

"You're quiet tonight," she said, without looking up.

"I'm thinking.

"About?"

I arranged the glasses on the counter, so I'd have something to do with my hands. "About the fact that you leave the day after tomorrow."

She paused. Set down the bowl she was holding. Looked at me with an expression that was very warm and a little bit sad.

"We'll be back," she said.

"I know. I just—" I stopped. Tried to find the right words. "I didn't expect to feel this way. About any of you. I thought it would be terrifying the whole time."

"It was terrifying, at the beginning. I could see it.

"Yes. But then it wasn't. And now it's—" I gestured vaguely. "This.

Aunty smiled. "What is this?"

"Home-adjacent," I said, and felt slightly absurd, and said it anyway.

She put her hands on either side of my face.

It was so purely maternal that for a second I couldn't breathe—the gesture landing in some part of me that hadn't been touched in a very long time.

"Kashvi," she said carefully. "Listen to me. This is not temporary. This family—we don't do temporary. We are—" She searched for the word. "Unapologetically permanent. When we decide someone belongs with us, they belong with us. Full stop."

"Even me?"

"Especially you." She released my face but kept her hands on my shoulders. "You have done something extraordinary this past week, beta. You opened yourself up to twelve strangers and gave each of us something real. That takes courage I don't think you even know you have."

"I was terrified the whole time.

"Courage is terrified. Courage does it anyway."

I looked at her for a long moment.

"Can I—" I hesitated.

"Whatever you're going to ask, the answer is yes.

"Can I hug you?"

Devika Rathore pulled me into a hug that felt exactly like what it was: a mother holding her child. Not biologically. Not legally. Just in the way that counted.

I held on for longer than I'd held on to anyone in years.

"There," she murmured. "You have a family now. In addition to whatever else you build. You have this one.

~

~ Midnight ~

The countdown happened on the balcony.

All twelve of us, crowded onto the space, the city blazing below with New Year's fireworks beginning to bloom across the skyline. Champagne and sparkling juice, depending on preference and age. Ivaan had somehow gotten his arms around both Rishvik and Ziva simultaneously in a group hug that neither of them would admit they'd allowed.

Dadu had his arm around Dadi.

I watched him, for a moment, before I found Kashvi.

My grandfather—the most contained person I had ever known, the man who communicated in silences and nods, who had never in my memory been publicly demonstrative—had his arm around my grandmother and was watching the fireworks with an expression I could only describe as complete peace.

And then he glanced at me. And then at Kashvi, who was standing on my other side.

And he nodded. Once. Deliberate.

Not the measured approval from the first day.

The nod. The kind he'd given to very few things in his long life.

My throat felt strange suddenly.

"Hey." Kashvi touched my arm. "You okay?"

"More than okay."

"TEN!" Ivaan shouted, and everyone joined in.

"NINE! EIGHT! SEVEN!"

Kashvi looked up at me with the fireworks beginning to reflect in her eyes and the whole city counting down around us and everyone I loved within arm's reach.

"SIX! FIVE! FOUR!"

"Hi," she said softly, just to me, under the noise.

"Hi," I said back.

"THREE! TWO! ONE!"

"HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

The balcony erupted. Dadi was smiling. Ivaan cheered loud enough to be heard three floors down. Ziva was already on her phone taking videos of the fireworks. Rishvik stood with his hands in his pockets, quietly smiling at the sky.

I kissed Kashvi.

Brief and soft and in front of everyone, because it was New Year's and the city was on fire with light and I'd stopped keeping things back.

When I pulled away, Maa was looking at us with an expression I would carry for the rest of my life.

"Happy New Year, my Love" I told Kashvi.

She touched my face with one hand, the way she sometimes did when she was feeling something she didn't have words for.

"Happy New Year."

~

~ January 2nd ~

Goodbyes had never been my strong suit.

I was better at quiet exits. At slipping away before the weight of leaving could accumulate. I had years of practice at disappearing.

But there was no disappearing from this.

The Rathore family took up space. Even in their departures.

The morning was organized chaos: luggage in the elevator in stages, Ivaan trying to fit three things in a bag clearly designed for two, Ziva doing a final sweep of her room for anything forgotten, Mihir Uncle and Aadhir Uncle in quiet conversation about logistics in the entrance hall.

I had woken up early. Made chai. Enough for everyone.

It was the only thing I could think to do.

"You made chai," Dadi said, finding me in the kitchen at seven. Her face.

"You always have it when you wake up. I noticed.

She sat down at the island and wrapped her hands around the cup. For a moment she didn't say anything.

"Beta," she said finally. "I'm going to tell you something, and you should know it comes from many decades of watching people come and go from our family."

I sat across from her.

"You are the right person," she said simply. "I don't mean for Aadyant, although that is also true. I mean in a larger sense. You have the kind of character that this family needs. Aadyant has always been strong. He has needed someone who is also strong, but differently. Who is gentle where he is firm. Who is patient where he moves fast. Who understands difficulty without being broken by it."

"Dadi—"

"I'm not finished." She smiled, patient. "You are also the kind of person who makes chai for twelve people on the morning they leave, because that is the language of care you speak. And that language is the most important one."

I looked down at the counter.

"I already miss you all."

"Good. That means we did something right." She reached across and patted my hand. "And we will be back before you know it. Aadya turns twenty in March. You didn't think we'd miss that?"

March. Three months away.

"I look forward to it," I said, and meant it entirely.

~

The goodbyes happened in stages, the way goodbyes do in large families.

Mahika hugged Kashvi and pressed a small, wrapped package into her hands. "Open it later. It's from the three of us—me, Mihir, and the twins. Something for your work." Inside, Kashvi would find later, were the finest fabric scissors she had ever held, her name engraved on the handle.

Rishvik stood in front of her for a moment. Then: "You're actually cool. I didn't think you would be. But you are." Coming from Rishvik Rathore, age fifteen, it landed like a medal.

Ziva didn't say anything at all. Just hugged Kashvi for a very long time while audibly trying not to cry and then pulled back with a fierce expression that meant she was definitely crying.

"Text me about the collection," Ziva managed.

"Every step," Kashvi promised.

Ivaan, predictably, pulled Kashvi into a bear hug that lifted her slightly off the ground.

"You owe me a rematch," he said into her hair.

"Anytime you visit."

"That's a threat. I will absolutely visit."

"Good."

Aadhir Rathore shook her hand, formal as always. And then, with the measured deliberateness of a man who chose his gestures carefully, put his other hand briefly over their joined hands.

"You are welcome in this family, Kashvi," he said. Simple, precise. "Know that.

She looked at him steadily. "Thank you, sir.

Dadu was the last.

He stood before her and looked at her with those sharp, measuring eyes that she had stopped being afraid of somewhere around day four.

"You have your grandfather's directness," he said. "And your own quietude. It is a rare combination.

"You knew my grandfather?"

"Rajendra Singh? By reputation." A pause. "A good man. His granddaughter does him credit."

Kashvi's breath caught.

Vikram Rathore nodded once. Then, with the decisive solemnity of a man completing a formal act: "Until next time, beta."

Beta.

Not Miss Singh. Not Kashvi.

Beta.

Kashvi stood very still for a moment after he turned away.

Aadya appeared at her shoulder, eyes shining. "Did he just—"

"Yes." Kashvi's voice was barely sound.

"I told you."

"You did."

~

Devika Aunty was last to leave.

Everyone else had filed to the elevator in shifts, Ivaan's voice the last to echo down the corridor, Aadyant downstairs managing the cars.

It was just the two of us.

She looked around the penthouse once, as if committing it to memory. Then she looked at me.

"I'm going to say something, and you don't have to respond," she said. "But I need you to hear it.

"Okay.

"When Aadyant was small—six, maybe seven—he told me he wanted someone who would stay. Not someone who was impressed by the title or the house or the future waiting for him. Someone who would stay for him. Just him."

I couldn't speak.

"He doesn't remember saying that. But I do." She picked up her bag. "And I want you to know that in thirty-some years of watching my son grow up, you are the first person he has ever let himself be entirely himself with. No performance. No armor." Her voice was steady. "He stays for you too, Kashvi. Remember that on the hard days."

She embraced me one last time. Brief and fierce and completely certain.

And then she was gone.

I stood in the quiet penthouse for a long moment.

The space felt different from how it had two weeks ago. Not empty—that was wrong. It felt—

Full.

Like something had been poured into the walls. Into the corners and the kitchen and the view from the balcony.

My phone buzzed.

Dadu [via Aadyant]: She asked me to forward this. – Avantika

Dadi: The chai this morning was exactly right, beta. Thank you for knowing what we needed without being asked. That is a gift. ❤️

Ivaan: REMATCH IN MARCH. BE READY.

Ziva: I already miss you and we've been in the car for 10 minutes

Rishvik: The sketchbook you left on the table accidentally is in my bag. I will return it in March. (I may have looked through it 😅. You are exceptionally talented.)

Mihir Uncle: Take care of our Aadyant. And take care of yourself. Both matter equally. – Mihir & Mahika

I sat down on the couch.

Read them all again.

Aadyant came back twenty minutes later to find me there, phone in my lap, eyes dry but very bright.

"Hey." He sat beside me. "They got off okay. Flight's on time."

"Good."

"How are you?"

I thought about the past two weeks. Devika aunty's hands on my face in the early morning kitchen. Dadi's certainty. Ivaan calling me bhabhi from the first day like it was just a fact. Ziva's sketchbooks and her fierce little director energy. Rishvik's quiet approval. Dadu's nod.

Beta.

I thought about Devika aunty saying: you have a family now.

I looked at Aadyant.

"Your family," I said. "They're—"

"I know."

"I didn't expect—I mean, I hoped, but I didn't actually expect—"

"I know, Jaan." He put his arm around me, and I leaned into him the way I had learned to—without apology, without second-guessing, like it was simply where I was meant to be.

"Your Dadu called me beta."

Aadyant's arm tightened. He didn't say anything for a moment.

"When?"

"When he was leaving. He said 'Until next time, beta.'"

Another silence.

"Kashvi. He has called three people beta in his life. My father, Aadya, and me."

I turned to look at him.

His eyes were very bright.

"That's—"

"Four people now," I said quietly.

He pressed his face into my hair.

We sat there for a long while, the penthouse quiet around us, the city ordinary and bright outside the floor-to-ceiling windows.

Eventually I turned my face into his shoulder.

"They're coming back in March," I said.

"Yeah."

"Ivaan wants a rematch."

"He's going to lose again."

"Definitely."

He laughed, and it was the real one—the one no one performed, the one that only came when he forgot he was supposed to be composed.

I catalogued it.

My favourite sound.

"Aadyant?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you. For all of it. For—for having a family like that. For sharing them with me.

He pulled back enough to look at me. Put his hand against my face.

"They're yours too, meri Jaan. They claimed you. That's just how it is now."

I let that sit. Let it settle into the places it needed to go.

The places that had been empty for a long time.

"Okay," I said.

"Okay?"

"Okay. They're mine too."

He smiled.

And I thought, for the first time in years: this is what the future feels like.

Not terrifying.

Worth it.

~

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