By Saskya Jain

“You’ve killed it,” Dhanesh said to Chunni.

The two children hovered over the rose stalk, which they had secretly removed from the garden and planted in a discarded earthen pot. They were hiding it behind the old stove on the terrace. The smell of big, red chillies drying on a stretch of cloth at the back burnt their throats whenever the breeze picked up. Dhanesh was nine, Chunni a few months younger. The year was 1934.

“But I didn’t even touch it!”

“You pointed at it. Don’t you know that flower buds die when girls point at them?”