I had come prepared for nostalgia.
I had not come prepared for arithmetic.
The moment the colony gate closed behind me, subtraction began. The road bent sooner than it used to. The buildings stood closer, like relatives after reconciliation. Balconies that once floated somewhere near the clouds now seemed available for conversation.
How had we needed bicycles to conquer this distance?
I walked toward the playground with the caution reserved for reunions. Surely this would resist reduction. This had been our parliament, our battlefield, the birthplace of loyalties we revised before dinner.
I sat on a swing.
My feet touched the ground.
I pushed anyway, hopeful that memory might intervene where physics would not. It didn’t. The sky remained adult — far, reasonable, unwilling to be negotiated with.
The slide was gentler. The seesaw less philosophical. I crossed the entire stretch of sand in under a minute.
I stood in the middle of it, faintly betrayed.
“Ridiculous,” I muttered. “We were giants here.”
“Excuse me?”
The voice arrived from behind the slide.
I turned.
And there they were.
Anu, her chin already prepared for defiance. Karthik practicing a courage he might or might not deliver. Meena storing moments she would later retell with artistic liberties. Dust on their knees. Urgency in their debate. The afternoon circling them like a loyal moon.
They were choosing teams.
No one had informed them that twenty years had walked into the playground.
I moved closer, careful not to hurry the miracle.
Karthik spotted me first. His eyes narrowed in polite enquiry. “Aunty, are you looking for someone?”
Aunty.
Time, distilled.
“Yes,” I said, surprised by my own calm. “I used to live here.”
Anu shrugged. “Lots of people did.”
And just like that, I was filed under history.
They returned to their argument, loud, wholehearted, instantly repairable. Alliances shifted like sunlight. Betrayals expired within minutes. Forgiveness required no ceremony.
I watched, my chest full of a language I could no longer speak fluently.
I wanted to warn them.
Stay longer.
Memorize each other.
One day you will search entire cities for a face that laughs the way this one does.
But advice from the future is a very soft sound. It rarely survives childhood.
So I kept quiet.
Meena ran past me, then paused, as if curiosity had tugged her braid. “Aunty,” she asked, “are you coming tomorrow?”
For a reckless second, I believed I could.
Tomorrow. As though time were a neighbour you could borrow sugar from.
I smiled. “I already did,” I told her.
She nodded, satisfied. Children are generous with impossibilities.
They sprinted toward the open-air auditorium, and as they did, something extraordinary unfolded.
The playground grew.
The slide recovered its altitude. The swings reopened negotiations with the sky. Distance returned, dramatic and breathless. Even the neem tree seemed to rise, pleased to be necessary again.
Nothing here had shrunk.
It had simply changed hands.
I understood my role at last. Not owner. Not resident.
Witness.
I walked back toward the gate, careful not to disturb the expansion behind me. Anu was protesting something. Karthik was pretending something. Meena was already forgiving someone.
Perfect.
I left before they could finish becoming memories.
At the exit, I allowed myself one last look — not to mourn, but to confirm the transfer.
And there it was, vast as ever, opening itself for those who still believed it was infinite.
