By Selma Carvalho
The Friday they leave for a weekend in Belgium, Anju discovers Freddo is cheating on her. She doesn’t share her knowledge with him. What she should have said was, ‘Freddo, I’m tired of this shit. This time, I’m leaving.’
Her heart feels like it is going to stop breathing all on its own, distinct from the rest of her. The pain is so intense, she realises it is possible for the rest of her body to survive the carnage, while her heart, expelled from her being like a refugee, would simply die.
By Jessica Faleiro
Angelica D’Sa is depressed. She’s the baby of the family. I couldn’t say she’s ever been overlooked, but it’s obvious to us that she’s been like this for a very long time. I first noticed it when she was twenty-two. Roxy says twelve. Mama insists that she was always a quiet child. It’s possible that we’re all right. More likely, we’re all wrong.
By Cordelia B. Francis
Verek’s eyes searched the horizon for the slightest sign of rain. Her old dog Balu crouched next to her, calm and alert. The horizon was a flat line. It shimmered in the afternoon heat. It had been this way, unchanged for years. The day Verek’s husband and son died, along with most of the men of the village, was also the day the land and the sky drained of colour.
By Sheela Jaywant
I had not seen Jesus’ photograph in anyone’s house before. He was Goanna’s god; you know, some worship Shiva, others Vishnu, or Hanuman or Manguesh/ Subramanium/ Durga/ whoever. Up on the wall, framed in a picture, like the others, He wore no jewels, no silk clothes, no colourful mukut on His head, had no weapons or musical instruments in His hands, no animals or trees around him. The “photograph” showed His face drooping, a halo around the head, eyes closed; not in good health, I thought. No garlands, no bright flowers, no rice, no coconut, no halad-kukum, no incense burning before Him, nothing cheerful.
By Nilankur Das
She always remembered the last time she celebrated Christmas, as if the memory itself refused to dissolve into the blur of other nights, as if the cold air of Jharkhand had been preserved in her chest, ready to rise each December when in Goa the Mendonca family draped lights over their balcony and set out cakes heavy with rum and nuts, and she found herself not in the tiled kitchen scrubbing brass or carrying trays but on that hillock far away, with the banyan tree looming and the chapel glowing under the moon
By Epitacio Pais
Translated by Paul Melo e Castro
Issue no 24
Conceição had been happy once, but nothing in this world could bring that feeling back. What did return were her memories, of João’s savage kisses, his strange way of loving, animal-like but gentle, harsh but tender, veering between the platonism of words and the basest passion, his magic touch that brought either pain or maddening ecstasy, she was never quite sure which. His velvety words and jealous Cyclopean rages. His blazing eyes and tears of feeble subservience.
By Edith Melo Furtado
Issue no 24
Mali had a dual personality. No, not the kind that psychology and psychiatry classify as dual, split or whatever. She was perfectly healthy but with an underlying sadness and an overt cheerfulness that could laugh irrepressibly and loved humour. A slender little girl, her sharp features stood out in her thin face. The whiteness of her skin, almost unhealthy, despite the scorching sun over us, made me wonder if she was a descendente (descending from the Portuguese) or a mestiça of mixed parentage.
By Damodar Mauzo
Issue no 24
While reading a book, I came across a thought. Quite a profound one. That nudging thing would not let me sleep. No matter how hard I tried, it didn’t give up, so I simply decided to sleep with it. When I woke up in the morning, I found that the thought had sprouted, so I rushed with it to my front yard, in order to plant it. However, I knew that the soil in my own yard was not quite productive while my neighbor’s land was very fertile. Besides, he liked gardening. So, I crossed over the fence and carefully planted the tiny sprout there.
By Mrinalini Harchandrai
Issue no 24
On his way to the Apostolic Palace for the ecumenical council meeting, Cardinal Roberto Cacciavillan stopped at the chapel to stand in front of Jesus. A sumptuous summer of colour burst forth in holy ecstasy from the surrounding walls and ceiling, but it was the tableau in front of him that never failed to emboss his soul. Unlike most of the other imagery in the Sistine Chapel, in this particular fresco at the altar, the Saviour looked powerful.
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
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.
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.
By Augusto R. Rodrigues
Translated by Paul Melo e Castro
Issue no. 10
Sancho Serapião do Santo Sepulcro Costa Paredes Malcorado, son of old Nicomedes, the sacristan of Santa Eufrásia, had just entered his twentieth year. He had rudimentary schooling, a basic knowledge of music, and knew how to assist at Mass.
By Ulrike Rodrigues
Issue no. 9
She felt confused and nauseous, and she realized she didn’t know Marcus very well at all. She’d believed him when he spoke about being sensitive to local culture. Did that sensitivity not apply to women? Was he just another Vodka and Chang—white men satisfying an appetite for exotic delicacies on the cheap?
