New Year’s Eve night, 1979. The Neelachal Express is hurtling down the tracks at full speed. Other passengers are having dinner or getting ready for bed—my mother is looking out of the window at the cold, black expanse outside. She calls her children to her and tells us to look up. The sky is filled with a million twinkling stars. My mother says it must be a New Year card from the heavens. I look out again and the stars are hanging a little lower, shining a little brighter—it is going to be a very happy, new year!
Alaknanda Sengupta is a homebody living in Mumbai, India. She likes pottering around the house and thinking her thoughts. She writes Around the House on Substack.