By Nathaniel D’Costa
Issue no 16
At that very moment the storm hits us and suddenly it seems that Pascoal is taking on the sea itself. The waves get bigger and crash hard on the shore. ‘Leave it,’ I shout to Pascoal.
Night-Rider
This Character is Running Away
A Room in the South
By Janet H Swinney
Issue no 15
Navneen loved everything there was to love about women. Everything. He didn’t object to armpits, for example. Unlike many men, and many women for that matter, he didn’t think of them as zones of unwanted perspiration and offensive odour. When a woman raised her arms, revealing the secrets within those hollows, he always caught his breath.
The Drowning
Historical Fiction: Illicit
By Saritha Rao
Issue no. 14
Francisco de Melo Palheta surveyed the roomful of elegant people who had turned up in his honour. Only the French had the audacity to build a villa of this kind in humid Guiana, and the gall to insist on a dress code for dinner that would otherwise befit the salons of Paris.
Two Graphic Stories
Wrestling with shadows
By Yvonne Vaz Ezdani
Issue no. 14
The topic of shadows always reminded me of my childhood friend Tony. When he was in primary school Tony would sometimes punch or kick friends who teased him because he was short, shorter than the rest of his classmates. Scolding, punishment, no corrective measures worked to stop Tony from lashing out.
Issue no. 14
The Trees Have Been Here Before
By Sheela Jaywant
Issue no. 14
The old jungle trees that had stood sentinel over that little house-cum-hotel throwing inviting shade over her small property. There weren’t many flowers, but the canopy, the foliage beckoned birds, butterflies and passers-by. And they gave her solace. When the rest of the village went ‘bald’, with people sacrificing the flora for constructing houses to sell for profit, Sheena’s Home stood out
Vaastu (Abode of Joy)
By Meena Kakodkar
As translated by Vidya Pai
Issue no 13
If this whole exercise was being conducted to guide Soshakka’s soul from this world to the next one, it was all in vain, Mukta thought. Soshakka’s soul would hover about in this house, keeping an eye on everyone; it might even yell at someone if things were not up to its standards, she thought mischievously.
Lizards and Butterflies
Life after death
By Krupa Manerka
Issue no. 12
She is a little thing of twelve; filled with the zeal and curiosity that childhood demands. Sitting by the countryside river, she’s rippling its water near the shallow end. Her eyes are intense, as if she never knew anything between black and white and never spent a dull moment in her life. She is in deep thought.
The Intruder
A set of Glass Bangles
In Search of Shakespeare's Bookshop
birds
By Cordelia B Francis
Issue no. 11
He hitched his Chetak on to the main stand and sat on a nearby bench itching to get home. Earlier, while visiting his sister in Miramar he had heard the breaking news `Unprecedented numbers of migratory birds to alight on Chorao island’ flashed across the flat screen TV at Espi’s house.
