Page 41 of Scars and Crowns

She pours the tea herself. Not the attendant waiting discreetly nearby. Her own hands. She passes one cup toward me with an apologetic little smile. "I remember you." I look up. "You were always with Yuvaan." A laugh escapes her. "The two of you rarely arrived anywhere clean."

I can't help smiling. "We got into trouble quite a lot."

"You certainly did."

I lower my eyes. "I probably caused most of it."

She looks at me over the rim of her teacup. "No." The answer comes without hesitation. "You got him out of far more trouble than you ever got him into."

I stare.

She smiles knowingly. "You look surprised."

"I . . . "

"I knew my son." She stirs her tea slowly. "He was lonely." The word settles quietly between us. "No amount of tutors, etiquette lessons, or responsibilities ever changed that." She sighs softly. "I kept trying to prepare him for the crown." Her smile turns bittersweet. "But what he needed wasn't another lesson." She looks directly at me. "He needed someone who looked at him and saw a boy. Not a prince. Not a future Maharaja. Simply . . . Yuvaan. And you did."

A lump forms unexpectedly in my throat. "For years . . . " She smiles to herself. "I watched it happen before I finally understood what I was seeing."

I don't know how to answer. Every response feels too small. So I simply wrap both hands around my teacup, letting its warmth anchor me. She notices my silence immediately. "You don't need to be uncomfortable." She sighs, "I'm not scolding you." She laughs softly. "I never did. Even when people whispered." My eyes lift to hers. She reaches across the table and gently takes my hand. Her grip is warm. Steady. Only the faint tremor in her fingers betrays the passing years.

"Amma Saheba . . . "

"Thank you." The words stop me completely. She squeezes my hand once. "Thank you . . . " Her smile grows gentler. " . . . for coming back." Time seems to hesitate. For a second, I simply look at her.

The kindness in her voice washes over me before the meaning catches up.

Then . . . The sentence settles properly.

Thank you for coming back.

My breath catches. Something deep inside me stills. She didn't say I'm sorry you had to come back.

She didn't say I'm glad you're here.

She thanked me. As though I'd returned by choice. As though this meant something more than unemployment, unpaid bills, and having nowhere else left to go. As though she'd been waiting. She has already turned back toward Sara now, smiling as my daughter proudly adds another block to the increasingly unstable tower she's building.

The conversation moves forward naturally. But mine doesn't. I sit quietly, my tea slowly cooling between my hands, replaying those five simple words again and again.

Thank you for coming back.

The sentence refuses to leave me alone.

Because people don't thank someone for returning unless they've been hoping they would.

And suddenly . . . I can't stop wondering.

What exactly does Amma Saheba know . . . that I don't?

DIRECT INSULTS

YUVAAN

The council chamber has always rewarded the man who speaks last. I learnt that long before I inherited the chair at the head of this table. People rush to fill the silence. They reveal more than they intend to. And if you wait long enough, they usually tell you what they actually came to say.

So I wait.

My hands rest flat against the polished teak table, exactly as they do in every meeting. My posture is relaxed, my expression unreadable. To anyone walking into this room, it would look like another ordinary council session.