He sat on the elaborately carved wooden chair with the old cushion wedged under his ass as if it was all that kept him balanced precariously between slumping back into ennui and leaping forward into action. One leg up, heel balanced on the edge of the seat, elbow against the inside of the knee like some paradoxical Escher woodcut of sinew and bone. Unruly hair breaking the clean angles of his limbs into a fuzzy outline in the warm orange glaze of the evening light shining through the narrow iron latticework of the windows. The phone lit up with a notification, and he checked it, only to let out a soft breath of frustration and thumb it dark again, before taking a sip of the chai gone cold since his wife brought it out to him.
His shop had been shut for months now; and sneaking out to wander the streets had become tangled in complications and flimsier excuses over time. He had no desire to brave the policemen and their lathis during the day or slip through the increasingly crowded night as people used the pandemic to throw off their diurnal chains. It was time to take direct action, and he was running out of time this week to make the delivery. The phone lit up again and he let himself get distracted for a few minutes scrolling through the family group chat, before standing up abruptly, and stepping away from the dining table to walk over and see how his daughter and son were doing with their homework.
What did he know about Hindi conjugation or whatever they did to teach children about history. Meera was the best person for this sort of thing - all he could do was make sure the kids didn’t try too many tricks to get out of doing their work.