"Chhalka Chhalka Re Kalse Ka Paani
Chhalka Chhalka Re O Aankhna Maani"
~Chhalka Chhalka Re: - Mahalakshmi Iyer~

~Five Days Before The Wedding~

The morning of the Haldi ceremony, I woke up to the sound of the haveli already in motion.

Somewhere below, his mother was organizing. I could hear her voice—clear and certain—directing the arrangement of things, the preparation of spaces. The kitchen smelled of turmeric and sandalwood drifting up through the window. Someone—Ziva, from the register of the shriek—had found the flower arrangement and was expressing extremely strong opinions about it.

I lay in bed for a moment.

Five days.

Five days until I was married.

The thought was still new enough to feel unreal. Not frightening—just enormous. The way big things feel when you are standing inside them.

My door opened. Aadya appeared with a cup of chai and the expression of someone who had been awake for two hours and had already formed a plan.

"Get up," she said. "The women are gathering in the courtyard in an hour, and Ziva is very upset about the marigolds."

"What's wrong with the marigolds?"

"There are not enough of them, apparently. I have been dispatched to fix this." She handed me the chai. "Drink. Move. Today is yours."

~

The Haldi ceremony gathered itself around Kashvi the way important things do—gradually, and then completely.

The inner courtyard had been transformed overnight. Marigolds everywhere—Ziva had indeed solved the marigold problem, by some means no one questioned—in cascades of orange and gold. Low wooden seating draped in yellow fabric. The scent of haldi paste mixed with rose water and sandalwood, made fresh that morning by Dadi's hands and Mahika's recipe.

The women arrived one by one.

Dadi, first, with the quiet authority of seniority and the specific grace of a woman who had performed this ceremony many times and understood its weight.

Mahika with her warmth and her loud laugh and the ability to make any room feel like a celebration.

Aadya, who sat immediately beside Kashvi and took her hand and held it for the first ten minutes without saying a word.

Ziva, who had strong opinions about the ceremony proceedings and delivered them to everyone in turn until Dadi gave her a particular look and she sat down.

Ritika, who had attended precisely zero haldis before this one and was approaching it with the focused attention of a person determined to understand the procedure.

Aashika, who had her camera and was documenting everything with the instinct for beautiful light that made her particularly suited to a gold-washed courtyard at mid-morning.

And Devika.

And Kritika.

~

I had not expected the haldi itself to feel like this.

I had expected it to be warm and messy and festive—and it was all those things. But I hadn't expected the weight of the moment when the first application of turmeric touched my skin. The specific quality of hands, each one different.

Dadi's hands were gentle and deliberate. She applied the paste with the focused care of someone marking something sacred. She said a blessing in a voice too quiet for anyone else to hear, and I didn't catch all of it but I caught the last word:

khush raho.

Be happy. Said like a command. Like she had the authority to make it so.

Aadya's hands were quick and warm and she made a joke while applying it and laughed at her own joke and then apologized for laughing at her own joke and I laughed too.

Ziva applied hers with the focused expression of someone treating this as a design problem to be solved well.

Ritika was very precise and also took notes for some reason, which I chose not to question.

Aashika took photos in between and her hands smelled like the turmeric she'd already accumulated from everyone else.

Mahika aunty sang something under her breath. An old song, something I half-recognized from somewhere deep in my childhood. I didn't ask what it was. I just listened.

Devika aunty applied the haldi last, on my right cheek, with the palm of her hand pressed warm and steady against my face.

"Meri bahu," she said softly.

My breath caught.

She smiled at me.

And then Bua stepped forward.

~

Bua sat in front of me and took the bowl of haldi paste.

She looked at me for a moment before she did anything.

The courtyard was noisy around us—Ziva had started a disagreement with someone, Mahika Chachi was laughing, Aadya was attempting to manage everything simultaneously. But in the small space between Bua and me, it was very quiet.

"My mother applied haldi to me," Bua said. Very low. "The day I would have gotten married."

I went still.

I had not known this.

"I didn't—" I started.

"I know. I've never told you." She looked at the bowl. "It didn't happen. For reasons I'll tell you about properly someday when we have time and good chai." She paused. "But I remember her hands. And I remember thinking—someday I want to pass this gesture on. Not as grief. As something forward-moving."

She looked up at me.

"So." She dipped her fingers in the paste. "Here."

Her hands on my face were completely steady. Not shaking—I had expected them to shake. But they were steady and warm and absolutely sure.

I managed not to cry for approximately thirty seconds.

Then I stopped managing it.

And Bua, without saying anything, simply put her arms around me and held on while the rest of the courtyard politely pretended not to notice.

Devika aunty, I saw through wet eyes, quietly refilled Bua's chai and set it beside her.

Nothing was said.

Everything was said.

~

Ivaan appeared at the courtyard entrance at approximately eleven-thirty.

He had been explicitly, categorically, with multiple repetitions, told he was not to enter the women's Haldi ceremony.

He entered the courtyard anyway.

"I just wanted to see—"

"OUT," Aadya said.

"I'm not going near the haldi paste, I'm just—"

"I will remove you physically—"

"Kashvi bhabhi LOOK you look so beautiful—"

"Ivaan Rathore GET OUT OF THIS COURTYARD—"

Rishvik materialized from somewhere, took Ivaan by the collar, and removed him.

The sound of Ivaan's protests faded down the corridor.

The courtyard returned to its ceremony.

Kashvi, turmeric-golden and laughing so hard she nearly spilled the chai Bua had just handed her, thought:

Three years ago, I was in a hospital bed convinced I would never make anything again.

I am sitting in a courtyard in Jodhpur surrounded by people who love me and there is turmeric on my nose and Ivaan Rathore has just been physically removed from the premises and I cannot stop laughing.

Three years ago, I could not have imagined being this alive.

~

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