Chapter Text
“Is everyone ready?” Bharadwaj’s sister Charu looked around, counting heads.
“Who has the water?”
“I put it in the hopper already.”
“Make sure the extra gloves get packed last so we can get to them right away.”
“Hey! Hands off the pakora, they’re for later!”
The sun was out, the air felt clean and fresh, they’d all be working together with picnic lunches, it was exactly the kind of outing that Bharadwaj normally enjoyed.
Yesterday she’d made a news video designed to stall her friend’s kidnappers, communicate the truth to SecUnit if it happened to see, and conceal the truth from her family and friends. Her mind kept racing, tracing along the timeline of which ship would take the news to which station.
Today she was planetside, helping her family repair storm damage to the irrigation system. She’d done as much as she could for her survey friends, and her station friends had shoved her toward the shuttle with orders to rest and refresh herself.
Gurathin’s words replayed in her head like a loop. Everything is so far away. She’d hugged all her friends and she wished she’d hugged them all ten thousand times more. She had nothing to do but wait and hope. And try not to think of the bodies she’d shown the Council.
Her nephew Tej touched her elbow. She flinched and spun to face him, though his touch had been gentle. She’d been too deep in thought.
“Is everything all right?” he asked in a low voice.
“Yes,” she said automatically, then added a more honest response. “Mostly. There’s some things going on I can’t talk about. Council business.” She smiled. Possibly her smile looked a bit forced, but her appreciation for Tej’s thoughtfulness was sincere.
He gave her arm another pat. Then thankfully he dropped it and began lugging more supplies out to the hopper.
#
Tracing drainage lines and digging up damaged tubing kept Bharadwaj busy enough for a while. It took an effort to stay focused. Her mind felt syrupy and slow, the way she’d been after SecUnit left.
The sky felt too close and too open all at once. Anything could happen out here. She knew Preservation had no underground predators but she kept thinking of the worm.
Probably this was a sign that her station friends were right and she needed to spend more time in the fresh air. She was all right as long as she kept eyes in front of her. She focused on her hand-held moisture sensor, the dirt under her knees and the small puzzle of finding the right tubing segments.
She kept at it until lunch time. Then she stood and felt momentarily light-headed. Suddenly it was all too much. The sky pressed in, her chest felt heavy, and she needed to be somewhere else.
While her family spread blankets on the ground, Bharadwaj headed for the trees. Planted as a wind break, they also served as a place to rest in the shade. Today the weather was cool enough so her family had chosen a sunny spot. Almost instinctively she moved to a place where the trunks came between her and the others, minimizing visibility. She didn’t notice her niece Bashi following behind.
“Aunt Jui?”
She whirled to face the unexpected noise. Then as if in response to the extra jolt of adrenaline, her vision began to sparkle. She sat down gracelessly, unable to do anything better than make sure she didn’t fall.
“Aunt Jui!” Bashi rushed over and sat next to her. Bashi was Charu’s oldest and would soon leave to attend college out of system. Bharadwaj would miss her while she was away. “What’s wrong?”
Bharadwaj smiled at her.
“I’m fine, I’m just a bit light-headed.”
It was more than that. She could smell the worm. Her head swam and she felt as if she was falling. Hopefully it would pass quickly.
Bashi frowned in concern. “What brought it on?”
“Just stress. I’ll be fine in a minute.”
“Are you sure you don’t need to go to a MedCenter?”
“I’m sure.” Her chest felt tight and getting the words out was a struggle. She didn’t want to do this here. Not in front of Bashi. She tried to exhale slowly. Bashi looked over at the rest of the family.
She’d missed whatever else Bashi had been saying. She could smell the stupid worm and she knew it wasn’t real but she couldn’t make the smell stop. She grabbed a handful of grass, held it to her nose, and crushed it in her first. She tried to inhale the sharp clean grass scent.
Someone was singing.
Bashi, of course. Bashi was singing. Quietly enough so the others wouldn’t hear over the family chatter.
That helped, both the song and the knowledge that Bashi had figured it out. She really was a lovely young woman. Bharadwaj sat and waited. Eventually breathing came easier.
“Bashi, that was lovely. Thank you for looking after me.”
“Are you feeling better?”
“Yes but I think I should go back to the house.”
“I’ll just tell the others…”
“I’d like to leave quietly. Can you take me? I’ll tell them later.” She couldn’t deal with the pressure to share, not when she literally couldn’t reveal Mensah’s kidnapping for fear of putting her in more danger. And her thoughts felt too sluggish to figure out how to say enough but not too much.
She’d talk to them later, after she thought up a way to communicate that didn’t involve sharing restricted information.
Bashi looked a little uncertain.
“It’ll be fine,” Bharadwaj said firmly. Bashi hesitated a moment longer, then nodded. Together they walked toward the hopper.
But the others noticed. Bharadwaj kept her posture casual, hoping no one would question her intentions.
Darsham spotted her and began walking over. Bharadwaj quickly got in and fastened her safety belt.
“Let’s go.” Bashi had them in the air before she even noticed.
#
She felt so much better once she was inside. The hopper ride had let her rest a bit, although she kept an eye on the controls in case Bashi needed assistance. Now there was plenty to do at home. Grandma Eswari and Grandpa Anady put her to work in the kitchen washing and chopping vegetables. Neither of them asked her questions. It was a pleasant afternoon.
It’s good that I came back, she thought. This visit is supposed to be restorative.
And then the rest of the family came back in a flood. Chattering, unloading the empty picnic baskets, rushing about. The calm she’d felt earlier gave way to creeping anxiety.
It’s just my family, she thought.
Thankfully no one asked her to explain her early departure. The only comment came from Bashi who quietly told her she hoped she was feeling better. Bharadwaj relaxed a little and listened to everyone chatter over food. She retired early.
#
“I’ll stay home,” she told the others the next morning. She didn’t want to be stuck out there if she started feeling strange again.
Darsham frowned. “Is everything all right? You left early yesterday too.”
“I’m fine. Just dealing with some stress.”
“What about? Tell us so we can help.”
Charu rolled her eyes. “Darsham! Leave it, I’ll talk to her later.” Bharadwaj felt a wave of affection for her sister.
“We can talk about it,” Darsham said firmly.
“We can talk about it,” Bharadwaj echoed reflexively, then added, “but not now. Charu and I will talk privately.”
Darsham kept pushing. “You came to visit your family, and then you shut yourself up alone. Whatever you’re going through, let us help.”
There was no point in her life where she’d have preferred to tell a crowded room full of people her troubles all at once rather than confiding privately in her sister. She was going to have to tell everyone something though.
“I’ll talk to Charu,” she repeated.
“I know the injury was traumatic. But you’re safe now, and you’re here back home. Everything is all right now.”
“It’s not,” she said sharply, part of her knowing this was a mistake but another part of her unable to bite back the words. “My friends are still in danger. Nothing will be all right until they all come home.”
“The survey’s over. Nothing bad is going to happen now.”
“You don’t know that!”
“You told us yourself, the company came to rescue you—”
“You don’t know! You weren’t there!” Her voice was rising. “Have you ever been off world? Have you ever been to Rim space? Tell me some more about the things you know for certain because you lived through them! Tell me how safe it all is! I’m the one who watched them collect the bodies! I can still smell them!”
She was yelling. She hadn’t meant to yell but she was yelling.
Darsham looked taken aback. Dismissing her as overwrought rather than questioning himself, she thought bitterly.
“It really feels like you’ve let yourself get stuck in the past. I’m glad you’re finally sharing these fears so we can help you realize how improbable—”
After that she wasn’t sure what she said, only that it contained swear words.
Her sister’s arm was around her, guiding her back to the couch. That was good. She collapsed and let herself drift for a bit. Someone else was raising their voice too. Not yelling. A lecture. No one was making her sit up so she ignored it.
When she opened her eyes, the room was empty except for Grandma Eswari.
“Upstairs with me.”
Nobody argued with Grandma Eswari. Bharadwaj dutifully followed her up the stairs.
The house (which was for the most part a two-story house) had one small room tucked into the attic, an oddly-shaped space with a sloped roof which you had to reach by steep stairs. Originally it had served as storage space, and then it had been claimed by a rotating roster of kids old enough to descend the stairs safely if they had to pee in the middle of the night but young and short enough not to hit their heads on the ceiling.
And then at some point Grandma Eswari had claimed it. She had outlived all her marriage partners and the bulk of her siblings. She had outlived her second child. She mainly dealt with things by bossing the household around and never slowing down, but at some point she said she needed the quiet. Bharadwaj thought she needed a space to let show the things she wouldn’t show her family.
Someday either Grandma Eswari would have to give up the room or the family would have to put in a lift. But for now, she could still manage the stairs.
“Lie down,” Grandma told her.
So it wasn’t a lecture. Grandma gave her an oversized shirt. She’d just slept but her head still felt fuzzy. And no one argued with Grandma Eswari. Obediently she changed into it and got into bed. Something about this felt so comforting, like she was a little girl again, rocked to sleep by her mother.
“They don’t understand but I do,” Grandma said.
Tears filled Bharadwaj’s eyes. Tears both at the kindness and at imagining what Grandma had been through herself. Bharadwaj herself had no children. She couldn’t fully imagine what it would be like to lose one.
#
She woke to a mostly quiet house. Someone was using the stove but she heard no voices.
Bharadwaj dressed. She struck her head on the ceiling and swore. Minor head bonks were an old ritual for any adult making their way up here, except of course for Grandma herself who had internalized every inch of the space.
Most of the house was empty. Grandma was in the kitchen. Bharadwaj felt like a giddy girl, yet also a little anxious about what might come later.
“They’re going to be so mad,” she said.
“They won’t. I gave Darsham a lecture. Everyone knew it was for them too. But we’re not going to talk about that. I saved you a plate. You eat lunch, and then we’re making besan ladoo. You record, and then you can make an instructional video.”
“Besan ladoo? Really? There’s nothing we’re celebrating right now.”
“We need a little sweet with the bitter.”
Bharadwaj grinned. Preservation’s feed-accessible storage already held many such videos on how to make every kind of food Bharadwaj had ever heard of, but she didn’t care. Wasn’t this how students learned, by imitating what had already been done? Besides, this would be her grandma, not somebody else’s. Grandma Eswari had such a large voice in the household and yet rarely liked to put herself forward in pictures and videos.
“I need a little time to put the cameras in position.”
“Don’t take too long about it.”
Bharadwaj hastened to set things up. She put one camera on a kitchen counter. It needed to angle downward so she carefully folded a towel into a wedge shape. She would have liked a top-down view but she didn’t have a way to affix a camera to the ceiling on short notice. Instead she held the second camera and smiled conspiratorially at Grandma Eswari.
“You can tell me to do things, but then you have to hold the camera,” she said.
“You don’t have one of those hover drones?”
“Those are for fancier projects. You have to reserve them in advance and explain what you’re using them for. Did I tell you a bird ate ours, during the survey?”
“A bird? Poor thing.”
“Yes, it’s a shame. I can’t say I spared it much sympathy in the moment though. It really picked the worst possible time!”
Bharadwaj caught as much as she could on camera. When she got pressed into stirring or rolling, she tried and failed to persuade Grandma Eswari to help film.
When the family returned, Darsham sought her out looking sheepish. “I’m sorry I pushed you,” he said.
Bharadwaj wanted to tell him that it was all right, that she understood. But it was as if the time filming Grandma Eswari had taken place in a bubble, and now the bubble popped. Her throat closed up. She forced a smile and gave him a brief nod.
Later that evening she edited the lighting, trying to balance the brightness of the two cameras. The project drew her in and she blinked in surprise when she realized it had grown dark outside.
The video came out nicely. Not professional, but real. Her family, her home.