At 4:10 every afternoon, the kitchen belonged to Mala.

A narrow square of sunlight came through the kitchen window above the sink. It lay on the tiles for twenty minutes, then slid away behind the neighbour’s wall.

For eleven years, 4:10 had been the hour of the school bus. Mala would hear the brakes at the corner, then a bag hitting the floor.

“Ma, I’m hungry.”

That was all Arnab ever said. It was the best sentence of her day.

Now he was nineteen, studying law in Pune, and the lane stayed empty at 4:10. But Mala still stood in the light, holding a cup of tea until it went cold.

On the sill, in old Horlicks tins, grew mint, two green chillies and one marigold that had not yet opened.

Arnab had come home on Tuesday for the Puja holidays. He slept till noon and lived on his phone. Mala did not mind. She fried luchis, and he ate them without looking up.

On Friday, at 4:10, he wandered in for water. He stopped at the door.

His mother stood at the window with her head tilted toward the lane, as if listening for brakes.

“Ma? What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” said Mala, too quickly.

He looked at the cold tea. At the tins. At the lane, where no bus came any more.

He took the cup from her hands, poured it out, and made fresh tea in the old dented pan. Too much sugar.

When he came back, he set his phone face down on the counter, the way he used to drop his school bag.

“Ma,” he said. “I’m hungry.”

Mala did not turn at once. She looked at the lane first, at the corner where the bus used to stop.

Then she laughed, wiped her eyes with the end of her saree, and pointed at the sill. “The marigold opened this morning.”

“Nobody told me.”

“You were asleep.”

They stood together and looked at it, small and a little crooked. Neither of them moved until the last of the light slid off the tiles.

Scripture/Source: Inspired by Maa Kushmanda, the fourth Navadurga form, whose name tradition links to a cosmic egg and the creation of the universe with a warm smile. She is described in the Devi Kavacha, part of the Markandeya Purana tradition. Durga Puja pandals in Kolkata are built in the days before Shashthi.

This is an original modern story inspired by that tradition, not a retelling of scripture.