Reading Time: 2 minutesAyaan was not scared. He was just very, very awake. He lay under his dinosaur blanket staring at the ceiling fan. Round and round. The apartment was quiet. The city outside was doing its usual night things — a horn here, a dog somewhere far away, the low hum of
Reading Time: < 1 minuteThe night Meera caught her first firefly, she was seven years old and wearing her grandfather’s oversized kurta as a nightgown. It was summer. The kind that smells of wet mud and marigolds. Dadi’s village house had no air conditioning, only two ceiling fans that clicked on every third rotation
Reading Time: 2 minutesRohan was twenty-two years old and had just failed his third job interview. He sat on the steps outside the office building, his rejection letter folded in his pocket, watching the city move around him. Everyone seemed to be going somewhere fast. Suits and briefcases and phones pressed to ears.
Reading Time: 2 minutesThe night was dark and rainy. Inside a prison in Mathura, Queen Devaki sat quietly on the cold floor. She was about to have her baby. Her husband, Vasudeva, sat beside her. Heavy chains were tied around his hands and feet. Outside the prison, thunder rumbled in the sky. Devaki
Reading Time: 2 minutesNarayan had been a sculptor for thirty-one years. His hands knew stone the way a mother knows her child’s cry — by feel, by instinct, by something that could not be taught. The village temple had three of his statues. The raja’s courtyard had two more. When people wanted something
Reading Time: < 1 minuteThe Moon had a problem. He could not remember his favourite lullaby. He had searched the whole sky. He asked the stars — but they only twinkled. He asked the wind — but she only sighed. He asked the clouds — but they had already fallen asleep. “I have heard
Reading Time: < 1 minuteHigh above the Sahyadri hills, a small cloud named Megh was holding its rain. He had been holding it all day. The other clouds had already let go — their rain falling in soft curtains over the rice fields below. But Megh kept his pulled close, grey and tight. “What
Reading Time: < 1 minuteArjun could not sleep. His eyes were tired. His body was tired. But his mind kept running. “Amma,” he whispered. “I don’t want to be alone in the dark.” His mother kissed his forehead. “You are never alone at night, little one. Close your eyes. The Bedtime Train is coming.”
Reading Time: < 1 minuteChotu was a baby elephant who was afraid of the dark. Every evening, when the sun dipped behind the mango trees, he pressed close to his mother and whispered, “Amma, the dark is too big.” His mother did not laugh. She lowered her great grey head and said, “Come. I
Reading Time: 3 minutesArjun arrived in Varanasi on a Tuesday evening with two suitcases, a new comic book, and absolutely no intention of waking up early. He was eleven. It was summer holidays. That combination, he felt, earned him the right to sleep until nine. His Dada disagreed. The old man was up
