It was close to midnight on my watch. I listened to the waves as I waited for a mechanic to show up. I was headed home when my car suddenly decided life wasn’t worth living anymore, sputtered and threw up all the fuel in its tank. I had turned my emergency lights on, called a mechanic and my wife in that order. We were married for 6 years now and had reached that stage where we didn’t have to talk anymore. Our world was one of silences, but comfortable and uncomfortable, interrupted by the enthusiasm of our five year old son. I was on the board of a up and coming startup and the future looked good. It had taken a slight toll on the family, I had not gone home in three days, getting through the technicalities of a deal that would put us on the map. The negotiations had dragged on for longer than I had expected, but in the end, all parties were happy, and all’s well that ends well.

The mechanic called me again. He told me that he was held up and it would take him a while to get there. I sighed in frustration, but there was really nothing I could do and quite frankly, I was taxed. I called the mother of my child and gave her an update. She didn’t seem very worried. Time slowed down to a crawl. The night was cold and foggy, and I decided to take a walk along the beach. The mechanic could always call me when he reached. The mist hung over the sea like a spidery web, glinting and gleaming as the waves broke along the shore. I was careful to not get my feet wet. When we were newly married, we used to stand knee deep in the water, hand in hand, staring into the sunset. We’d dodge fortune-tellers and hawkers alike and take photographs of our footprints in the sand, and when nobody was looking, steal a furtive kiss.

Movement to my right shook me out of my reverie. I turned to see a woman walking in my direction. I don’t know where she came from, she could have sprung out of the ocean for all I know. She could have been anywhere between 20 and 60, dressed in a red saree draped around her in a style I couldn’t place. She was as dark as coal, beautiful in the dusk. She had a regal air of arrogance about her, her aquiline nose complemented perfectly by her high cheekbones. Her most striking feature, however, was her nosering, a stone set in what I think was silver. It was a kaleidoscope, reflecting different shades of the moonlight with every movement.

She stood next to me and regarded the sea. I asked her if she was lost, it’s not everyday you meet someone like her during the witching hours. She smiled a mysterious smile and said she wasn’t, she was from those parts. I figured she was from one of the fishing hamlets nearby, but I couldn’t place her there. She smelled more like the sea than a fisherwoman, if you know what I mean. We stared at the sea together, two strangers content in each other’s company. And then, the waves froze in time.

I wasn’t aware of it in the beginning, the mist hid everything. It began with the stillness and the sudden muting of sound. It was so quiet I could hear my heartbeat. The stillness enveloped me, crawling over my skin like an incurable itch. I felt goosebumps along my arms and my breath came out in short sudden gasps. Panicking, I turned to the lady in red to ask her if she could feel it too. I turned to her to see her smile. She seemed benign, almost peaceful, her saree fluttering in a non-existent breeze, and that is when I knew that it was her. “What are you doing?”, I gasped, each word more painful than the next. She laughed, her eyes sparkling with childlike innocence. “Nothing at all”, she said, “No more than what is necessary.” Her pupils were dilated, her smile discomfiting me. At that moment, it was just the two of us in the stillness of the night, a circumstance constructed by powers I couldn’t see, but definitely feel.

She turned towards me, extending her hand. Her eyes were emeralds and rubies and crystals and diamonds, changing colours like a shattered mirror with the stone on her nose-ring. The more I looked, the more I could see. I could see the seas rising claiming the land for its own. I saw widows mourning over the corpses of their slain spouses in a nuclear wasteland characterized by the debris of chariots, elephants and ancient weaponry. I could see as the world was overrun by greed, pride and envy. I saw the creation and the death of planets, stars and universes. I saw multiple parallel universes, the beginning and the end, stories from my past, present and future lives. I could see them all, reflected in her eyes.

She didn’t talk as she led me back to my car. I sat in the backseat, unsure, a guest in my own car as she moved inched towards me, her movements betraying nothing. She smelled of the sea, her hair felt like smoke and her lips tasted of blood. She guided my hand to her naked waist, pulling me closer and at that moment, nothing mattered anymore. I was a mere insignificant speck of sand, blown about in her universe, and in the moment, all the pretence died. Sea and salt. Sand and waves. Dust to dust.

I don’t know how long it was before I fell asleep, but when I woke up, daylight was streaming through the windows. The night felt like a vivid dream, but the water lily on the dashboard told a different tale. I turned the ignition and the car spluttered to life. Maybe she had a few miles left in her. I drove home, feeling ridiculously light and terribly guilty at the same time. I honked twice to announce my arrival, but nobody came to open the gate. I walked into an empty home to a 15 page long letter. My marriage was over. 15 pages on text, neatly written, explaining why she couldn’t live with me anymore, every word of it true. Had this been yesterday, I would have called her back, explaining things to her, making promises we both knew I would not keep. But things were different now. I read her letter twice, called my sister and asked her to come over. I looked around at an empty house. Nothing in it belonged to me anymore. I walked around in a daze, coming to a halt near the pooja room. The idols were missing, but then again, she was the believer in the house.

I placed the waterlily in the centre of the pooja room and lit a lamp and stood there rather aimlessly. And that is how my sister found me, muttering a forgotten prayer to an ancient goddess in a language I did not know.