Anoushka Singal

I have a garden of about 12 flowers. A few of them come and go with the seasons, and the rest bloom yearlong. 

Stir-fried tofu with broccoli is a simple meal. A meal you don’t even need a recipe for; a meal we’ve shared countless times.

You have yourself — intact, whole — and you have me — twisted and turned into a second-hand version that vaguely resembles you. A spare, of sorts. The world is dangerous, so it’s good to have spares.

Gray. The color of the fog and mist over the water, clouding my view of everything I have ever known. I fear that one day I will forget. I don’t want to forget.

It feels like I’ve always been cold. I remember freezing since I was as young as 10 years old. It only got worse from there. No matter how many winter coats or heaters or hot packs I bought, the cold would not leave me.

The garage lies in shambles before me, and I can see myself lying in the rubble — just another victim of the collapse. Just another victim of my insistence on zeroing in on the bad and never on the good.

Inspired by Italo Calvino’s “The Castle of Crossed Destinies,” seven of the Weekender’s staffers came together to write short pieces based on the same set of five tarot cards.

The ground is flat up till your house now, and it reminds me that we found solid ground after our tough times. We found an intersection.