Page 33 of A Thousand Painted Hours

I clutched him close to me. In the same language, I said, “Hamesha. Hamesha.”Always. Always.

After a time, we pulled undergarments over us, but wove our legs back together while we ate, replete and starving. He offered a bit of biscuit, and I gobbled it with my lips, making both of us laugh, and we could not help dipping into a kiss, over and over. I tasted sugar on his lips, and licked it playfully. He captured me in return and kissed me deeply.

“Are you all right?” he asked, biting a fat apricot.

“Yes.” I inclined my head. “Are you?”

He grinned. “Yes.”

I said slowly, “I do fear that we shall injure each other somehow with all this.”

“As do I. You are where I feel most myself. Without our connection, I should feel unmoored.”

“How will we preserve it?”

For a long moment, he looked out toward the water, and I wondered what he saw there. Then he looked at me and took my hand. “I shall always do my best to help you be happy,” he said at last, and pressed a kiss into my palm, as if for safekeeping. “If you vow the same, we will take care of each other forever, and always be—what we are, no matter what else happens.”

“Our own sacred invention,” I said. “Not siblings, not just friends, notonlylovers. I vow it, too.” I pressed a kiss to his palm.

“True friends are one soul in two bodies.”

“Yes.” I leaned in to kiss him, lingering in the taste of sweetness on his lips, refusing to imagine a time in the far distant future when I would not be able to indulge my longings so easily.

Unfortunately, it was much sooner than either of us knew.

An Empty Cup in the Sunshine

September 1940

London

—16—

September 12, 1940

London

[In Urdu]

Dear Tanveer,

You are right to suggest that my letters will be censored less if I write in Urdu. Although I am somewhat rusty (is that right?), it is good for me to have something to focus on.

It’s terrible here. The Dark One has bragged that invasion is imminent, and it’s hard not to believe it could be true. So many bombs every night! Endless, loud, designed to unnerve and demoralize us. It’s working. We’re all afraid, wincing at the sirens, ducking at every noise. I haven’t slept in a week. Mother and Peter seem to be able to sleep in the daytime, but I find I cannot let down my guard. I lie there and listen intently for any small thing that might alert me to danger.

Betty is missing. I sent her to see her family after the early round of bombs on the first night, and she has not returned. That was almost a week ago. I fearshe might have been killed, but I cannot seem to get through to anyone who might know. The number I ordinarily ring goes unanswered. I’ve twice thought I should make my way over there to see if I can find her, but that would mean leaving Mother alone for too long. Peter is in one of his states, and unreliable. I rush out to get rations when I can, but else, I stay here. Waiting for the next bomb, or the invasion, or whatever awful thing might be coming.

It makes me furious. Furious! Did our generation not give enough to war already? How many women never had the pleasure of a home or a husband because so many young men were wiped off the earth? And I know it matters less to you, but how many of the great old piles were abandoned or left to crumble when there was no one to inherit, or if there was, no funds to keep them up? It seems a terrible loss, just as the crumbling of palaces in India are a terrible loss, the stories they hold disappearing like the stories the dead soldiers will never live.

England will be the last of Europe to fall to the Nazis, and I fear we cannot hold them off forever. I constantly think of how to plan in case of invasion. What will we eat? How many resources will they take for themselves? My cellar is stocked with carrots and onions and various other root vegetables, and the larder is filled with jars and jars of lentils, chickpeas, and white beans. I am hoping to find some chicks. Nina has a few in her garden, and the eggs are a boon.

We shall not starve if they leave the food to us, but what if they take it for themselves? How will I care for my mother?

It’s impossible to know. For now, I live day to day, hoping that dreadful thing will not occur. The government and RAF and navy are determined to hold them off, and perhaps I’m an ostrich, but I cannot live in that place of terror every single day. One prepares, then lets go. I must live in this day, where they have not yet invaded.

One small beauty: a painting I made of a little scene in the kitchen one morning, an empty cup in a puddle of sunshine, the garden a hint beyond.

The moment was the beauty. Stillness and quiet amid the madness. And painting was the beauty as well, making something in defiance of the darkness, recognizing that there are, even now, moments of peace.