Chapter 1: The Last Guest

Aloma balanced three wine glasses between her fingers and picked up a stack of plates with her other hand. The penthouse had transformed from the crowded noise of an hour ago into something quieter. Most of the guests had already left. She could hear their voices echoing from the lobby downstairs as they called Ubers and debated which after-party to hit next.

She walked toward the kitchen. The floor was sticky in places where someone had spilled a drink. Cigarette smoke still hung in the air despite the open balcony doors. Someone had left a half-empty bottle of Absolut on the coffee table next to a phone charger that didn't belong to anyone she recognized.

The kitchen was cleaner than the living room but not by much. She set the glasses down next to the sink and dumped the plates on the counter. A few had lipstick marks on the rims. One had what looked like samosa crumbs stuck to it.

She wiped her hands on her skirt and looked back toward the living room. Kunal was still there. He'd been saying goodbye to the last handful of stragglers but now she couldn't hear anyone else's voices. Just his footsteps on the marble floor.

She pulled out her phone and opened the Uber app. The estimated arrival time kept changing. First it said seven minutes, then twelve, then back to nine. Surge pricing had kicked in. The fare made her wince but she didn't have much choice at this hour.

"You're still here."

She turned around. Kunal stood in the doorway to the kitchen. He'd loosened his collar and rolled up his sleeves. His face was flushed from the alcohol.

"Just helping clean up a bit," she said.

"Didn't ask you to do that."

"I know."

He walked over to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water. He drank half of it in one go and then set it down on the counter.

"Everyone else gone?" she asked.

"Yeah. Finally." He ran a hand through his hair. "Hosting these things is exhausting. People drinking my booze, smoking my cigarettes, acting like assholes in my home."

"You're the one who insisted on hosting."

"Company tradition. Someone has to do it." He looked at her phone. "Booking your ride?"

"Trying to. Surge pricing is insane right now."

"Want one more drink before you go? Help you decompress a little."

Her thumb hovered over the confirm button on the app. She should just book it and wait downstairs. Get out of here before the alcohol made her do something stupid.

"Just one," she heard herself say.

"Good. Come sit down. I'll pour."

She closed the app and followed him back to the living room. The leather sofa still had the indent from where someone had been sitting earlier. She sat down and tucked her legs under her. Her skirt rode up a bit but she didn't bother adjusting it.

Kunal walked over to the bar cart and pulled out a bottle of Glenfiddich. He poured two generous glasses and brought them over. He handed her one and then settled into the armchair across from her instead of sitting on the sofa.

She took a sip. The whiskey burned going down. She wasn't much of a whiskey drinker but she didn't want to seem like she couldn't handle it.

"Good party," she said.

"It was fine. People got drunk. That's all anyone wants anyway."

"Your wife would probably have made it more organized."

"My wife would have made it boring." He took a drink. "She's good at a lot of things but throwing parties isn't one of them."

Aloma didn't say anything to that. Talking about his wife seemed like dangerous territory right now.

"How long are they gone for?" she asked.

"Another week. Her sister just had a baby so she wanted to stay and help out."

"That's nice of her."

"That's one word for it."

He was looking at her in a way that made her want to check her phone again. She took another sip of whiskey instead.

"You know what I was thinking about earlier?" he said.

"What?"

"That argument we had. About reservation policies."

She groaned. "Can we not do this again?"

"I'm just curious. You never really explained why you think merit should be completely ignored in favor of quotas."

"That's not what I said and you know it."

He leaned forward in his chair. The smirk on his face told her he was about to enjoy this.

"So explain it to me again. Without the emotional rhetoric this time."

She set her glass down on the coffee table harder than she meant to. This was exactly the kind of bait she should avoid. He loved getting her worked up about politics. It was like a game to him.

But she couldn't help herself.

"Affirmative action exists because centuries of oppression created systemic barriers that merit-based systems pretend don't exist," she said. "You can't have a fair competition when the starting line is different for everyone."

"So the solution is to discriminate against people who had nothing to do with historical oppression?"

"It's not discrimination to level the playing field."

"Sounds like discrimination to me. If I lose out on a job because of my caste instead of my qualifications, how is that fair?"

"You're not going to lose out on a job because you're a Brahmin. That's the most absurd thing I've ever heard."

He laughed. "You're so sure about that. So confident that you understand how the world works."

"I understand it better than you do."

"Really? Because from where I'm sitting, you're just repeating things you read on Twitter without actually thinking them through."

She stood up from the sofa. Her hands moved animatedly as she talked and she couldn't seem to stop them.

"That's such a condescending thing to say. Just because I disagree with you doesn't mean I haven't thought about it."

"I didn't say you haven't thought about it. I said you haven't thought it through. There's a difference."

"You're being deliberately obtuse."

He refilled his whiskey and took another drink. He looked completely relaxed. She hated how much he was enjoying this.

"Let me ask you something else," he said. "All this feminism you're so passionate about. Do you actually believe in equality or do you just hate men?"

"That's not a real question."

"Sure it is. A lot of feminists these days seem more interested in tearing men down than lifting women up."

"Maybe men deserve to be torn down a little. You've had it easy for long enough."

"See? That's what I'm talking about. You can't even pretend to want equality."

"I do want equality. But equality doesn't mean ignoring power structures."

"Power structures," he repeated. "Such a convenient excuse for everything."

She was pacing now without realizing it. The whiskey had made her head fuzzy but she was too worked up to care.

"You don't understand what it's like," she said. "You've never had to deal with being dismissed or talked over or assumed to be less competent just because of your gender."

"And you've never had to deal with being blamed for everything wrong in the world just because of yours."

"Oh please. Men are doing just fine."

"Are we? Because it seems like every day there's a new article about how men are trash or how masculinity is toxic or how we're all potential rapists."

"Maybe if men stopped acting like trash, people would stop saying it."

He laughed again. The sound was infuriating.

"You really believe that, don't you? That half the population is just inherently bad."

"I didn't say inherently bad. I said socialized to be entitled and violent."

"Same thing."

"It's not the same thing at all."

He stood up and walked over to the bar cart again. He poured himself another drink without offering her one. She watched him, trying to figure out what his angle was. He never argued without a reason.

"You know what I think?" he said.

"I'm sure you're about to tell me."

"I think you like feeling morally superior. It makes you feel good to believe you're on the right side of history."

"That's not—"

"But deep down you know it's all bullshit. All this performative activism. You post the right things on Instagram and argue with people at parties but what do you actually do? How have you actually helped anyone?"

Her face flushed. The comment hit closer to home than she wanted to admit.

"I do plenty," she said.

"Like what? Be specific."

"I volunteer. I donate. I use my platform to raise awareness."

He snorted. "Your platform. You have like two thousand followers and half of them are bots."

"Fuck you."

"See? Can't handle a little pushback without getting defensive."

She wanted to leave. She should leave. This whole conversation was pointless and he was clearly just trying to provoke her.

But instead she kept standing there. Kept letting him get under her skin.

"You just hate that women have opinions now," she said. "You're threatened by it."

"Threatened? That's hilarious. Why would I be threatened by someone who weighs about forty kilos and couldn't win an argument if her life depended on it?"

"I'm winning this argument right now."

"You're really not."

He was smiling. Actually smiling like this was all some kind of joke.

She checked her phone. It was past two in the morning. The Uber prices had gone up even more.

"Do you have a problem with body hair?" he asked suddenly.

She blinked. "What?"

"You know. Feminists are always going on about how women shouldn't have to shave. I'm just curious if you practice what you preach."

Her face went hot. She couldn't tell if it was from anger or embarrassment or the alcohol.

"That's none of your business."

"So that's a no then. You shave."

"I do whatever I want with my body."

"Which happens to align with patriarchal beauty standards. Interesting."

"You're such an asshole."

"And you're such a hypocrite."

She grabbed her purse from the side table and drained the last of her whiskey. The glass made a sharp clink when she set it down.

"I need to leave," she said.

"Probably a good idea."

She pulled out her phone again and opened the Uber app. Her fingers felt clumsy on the screen. The alcohol was hitting her harder than she'd realized.

She heard Kunal stand up behind her.

"Wait," he said.

She paused but didn't turn around.

"You should sober up a bit more before you book that," he said. "It's late. Not safe to travel alone dressed like a slut at this hour."

The words hung in the air. She stood completely still. Her hand gripped the purse strap tighter.

Her stomach did something strange. Heat pooled low in her belly and she hated herself for it. She should be furious. She should tell him to go fuck himself and walk out the door.

Instead she just stood there. Processing. Trying to understand why her body was reacting this way.

She turned around slowly. Kunal was watching her. His eyes scanned deliberately down her body and back up. The smirk on his face said he knew exactly what he'd just done.

Her breathing got heavier. She couldn't seem to control it.

This was wrong. Everything about this was wrong. He was her boss. He was married. He was everything she claimed to hate about men.

But she didn't move toward the door.

She walked back to the sofa instead. Her movements were slow and deliberate. She sat down and set her purse next to her.

Kunal picked up her abandoned glass from the coffee table. He walked over and held it out to her.

She took it. Their fingers touched for just a second.

He stood there looking down at her. Neither of them said anything.

The penthouse was completely silent except for the distant sound of traffic from the street below.