“Building group has eighty-three messages,” she said, voice trembling. “Mrs. Deshmukh sent it. To everyone.”
Divya fumbled for her glasses with shaking hands. The room felt too small, too airless.
“It’s nothing, Maa. Just gossip. They twist angles...”
“Twist?” Her mother’s voice cracked. “His hand is on you. And that look on his face...”
“What look?” Her father’s voice cut in from the doorway.
He stood behind her mother, already dressed despite the hour, hair neatly combed. Five AM discipline untouched by scandal.
Her mother thrust the phone toward him. “Look at this.”
He took it without reacting. Swiped once. Twice. Studied each frame with the same careful attention he gave his newspaper. His face revealed nothing.
Divya wished he would shout. Anger would be easier than this measured silence.
“Explain,” he said finally.
Her throat felt tight. “He walked me to the car. That’s all. I was leaving early to work on my thesis. He was being polite.”
“Polite.” Her mother repeated the word like it tasted wrong. “Men like that aren’t polite to girls like us without reason.”
The statement landed like a slap.Girls like us.The division was clear. Them. Us. Lines that shouldn’t be crossed.
Divya’s phone vibrated again. Another message. Then another. Then ten in rapid succession.
Her brother burst into the room, still in sleep clothes, hair wild. “Di, have you seen.” He stopped, reading the room. “Oh. You know.”
Her phone continued buzzing. Messages from college friends. From distant cousins. From people she hadn’t spoken to in years. All asking the same questions with the same thinly veiled excitement.
“I believe you,” her father said quietly, cutting through the noise. “If you say nothing happened, nothing happened.”
The simple statement struck her harder than accusations would have. Trust when she’d expected interrogation. Faith she wasn’t sure she deserved given how his touch had made her feel.
Her mother wasn’t as easily convinced. “What will people think? The neighbors are already talking. Mrs. Apte from third floor called to ‘check if everything is okay.’ As if we’re having some family crisis!”
“Enough.” Her father’s voice carried finality. “Divya says nothing happened. That’s the end of it.”
But it wasn’t the end.
By seven AM, her mother’s phone rang constantly. The kitty group had transformed into an emergency newsroom.
“Arre, we’re just asking out of concern, na?”
“Is it serious between them?”
“He looks very involved in those photos…”
Concern dripped with curiosity. Sympathy masked gossip.
By eight, Aditya emerged looking half horrified, half thrilled. “My college group is insane right now. They’re saying you’re the reason he stopped being seen with Riya Sharma.”
“That’s ridiculous.” The words came automatically. “He and Riya were never really.”
She stopped mid-sentence.
Her brother looked up. “Never really what?”