He could imagine it. By next week, he would have fought ten men and possibly arrived on horseback.
Naina leaned closer. “And you really said that? About the future Thakurain?”
“Naina.” He tapped her forehead. “Stop being dramatic. You and Maa have been expecting this for days. Don’t act surprised.”
She punched his shoulder. “Of course we knew! We’re not blind!”
Her expression softened. Her hand rose, pinching his cheek. “But knowing and seeing are different.”
She whispered, holding his face now. “I’m proud of you.”
The words settled deep.
“For being yourself,” she added. “Not the version that hides behind work and control. This one. Honest. Open.”
She tilted her head. “A hero.”
“I’m not a hero,” he said quietly, meeting her eyes. “I’m just being honest about what matters.”
Naina studied him, then smiled. “Same thing.”
She brushed damp hair back from his forehead. “Come. Maa is waiting.”
He looked past her.
Sarita had not taken her eyes off him. She rose. The smile on her face was the one he remembered from before. From a time when it had come easily in this family.
She crossed the room and wrapped her arms around him. The smile broke against his shoulder. He felt her cry. Tears soaked into his shirt as her hold tightened.
His jaw set.
He had been so careful for so long. The perfect son. The perfect heir. A man who arrived on time, left on time, turned grief into numbers, deadlines and efficiency. He had lit his father’s pyre and kept moving because stopping had never been an option he allowed himself.
He had a mother.
He had a sister who laughed too loudly, argued without fear, pinched his cheek, and watched him fold into himself without knowing how to reach him.
They had all been grieving. And he had carried his grief alone.
His arm tightened around his mother.
She exhaled against him. In relief.
The person his mother had been watching from a distance, the closed-off, controlled version of her son, had softened in these weeks. He had stood in the rain and laughed. Sat shoulder to shoulder with workers in a rattling van. Pressed his palm to his father’s name and allowed himself to feel it.
Meera had done that.
This Haveli had done that.
Sarita drew back after a long moment, her hands rising to his face, holding him tenderly. Childhood lived in that touch. A scraped knee. A broken arm. A boy too intense for his own heart.
Her eyes searched him, wet yet clear. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
The answer came without hesitation.
Her breath eased. Her smile returned, stronger now.