Kabir had four rupees and a problem.
The problem was Sharma Uncle's sweet shop at the corner of the
main road in Berasia, where the bus from Bhopal stopped and the
evening crowd gathered to drink chai and argue about cricket. The
shop had a glass case that ran the full length of the counter,
lit from beneath by a tube light that made everything inside glow
like treasure.
Jalebi — golden, sticky, coiled like sleeping snakes, still warm
from the oil. Four rupees for a plate.
Gulab jamun — dark brown, floating in syrup so sweet it made
your teeth ache just looking at it. Four rupees for two.
Rasmalai — pale, soft, sitting in a pool of cardamom cream with
slivers of pistachio scattered across the top like green confetti.
Four rupees for one.
Kabir pressed his nose against the glass. His breath fogged a
circle on the surface. "Jalebi," he said.
Sharma Uncle reached for the tongs.
"Wait — gulab jamun."
The tongs paused.
"Actually, rasmalai." Kabir's eyes were darting left and right
like a sparrow deciding which wire to land on. "No. Jalebi. The
fresh ones in the back."
"Take your time," Sharma Uncle said, but his voice had the
patience of a man who had watched this exact scene play out with
this exact boy at least thirty times before.
Nandu stood behind Kabir, his own four rupees already spent on a
plate of jalebi that he was eating one spiral at a time, licking
the syrup off his fingers. He watched his friend ricochet between
the three options — jalebi, gulab jamun, rasmalai, jalebi again
— like a ball in a pinball machine that never finds a slot.
Five minutes passed. The evening crowd shifted and thickened.
Three men pushed to the front and ordered quickly — "Two plates
jalebi, one gulab jamun" — and Sharma Uncle served them without
looking at Kabir, whose face was now pressed so close to the
glass he could count the pistachios on the rasmalai.
Then the bus honked. Kabir's mother was on that bus, and if he
was not at the stop when it arrived, he would have a bigger
problem than sweets.
He ran. Four rupees still in his fist. Nothing in his stomach.
Nandu finished his last jalebi and licked his fingers clean.
"He does that every time," Sharma Uncle said, shaking his head.
