Monsoon Hearts

Chapter 5: Letters from the Past

That afternoon, while Arjun went to the village for supplies, Meera decided to go through Nani’s things. She’d been avoiding it, but the cottage seemed to be waiting for her to uncover its secrets.

In the carved wooden chest at the foot of her grandmother’s bed, she found bundles of letters tied with faded ribbons. Her own letters from university, full of academic excitement and homesickness. Letters from her mother, dutiful and brief. And then, at the bottom, a collection she didn’t recognize.

The handwriting was masculine, passionate, in English mixed with Hindi phrases that made her heart skip. They were love letters, dated over forty years ago, signed simply “R.”

My dearest Kamala,

The rains have started early this year, and I think of you dancing in the courtyard as the first drops fell. Do you remember that day? You laughed and said the monsoon was welcoming you home. I think about that laughter every day here in Delhi, where the rain just makes everything grey and hurried.

I know we agreed it was better this way. Your family, my obligations, the impossibility of our different worlds. But some nights I dream of building you a house where every room has windows to watch the rain, where we could grow old listening to storms together…

Meera’s hands trembled as she read letter after letter, each one painting a picture of a love affair she’d never suspected. Her widowed grandmother, who’d seemed content with her solitary life, had once been desperately, completely in love with someone she couldn’t have.

The letters spanned two years, growing more wistful and finally ending with what seemed like a goodbye:

Kamala, my heart,

I’m getting married next month. Asha is a good woman, and she’ll make the kind of wife my mother expects. I wanted you to hear it from me first. I’ll carry you with me always—not as regret, but as the woman who taught me what it means to love fearlessly.

Be happy, dearest one. Find someone who deserves your extraordinary heart.

Always yours,

At the bottom of the chest was one more item—a newspaper clipping, yellowed with age. An obituary for Rajesh Sharma, prominent Delhi businessman, survived by his wife Asha and three children. The date was just six months ago.

Meera sat back on her heels, the letters scattered around her. Nani had kept these for forty years, had loved someone completely and then lived an entire lifetime with that love locked away. And now, just months after his death, she too was gone.

Had she been waiting? Had her heart really “finished its work,” or had it simply been ready to join the love it had never forgotten?