Light Enough 3

The campus was quieter than usual that morning, the kind of quiet that only Holi mornings have—where the silence is just colour waiting to erupt. Somewhere, speakers had already begun playing muffled Bollywood remixes. Someone yelled “Bura na maano Holi hai” for the fifth time in five minutes. But none of it reached the old staircase behind the library.

Sandhya sat there, cross-legged, in her faded jeans and a plain white kurta that hadn’t seen detergent in weeks. Her fingers toyed with a packet of red gulaal.

Just red.

That was intentional.

She didn’t want a rainbow. She just wanted a memory to hold still.

Behind her, Tara’s laugh echoed faintly through the corridor.

Sandhya didn’t turn.

She knew that voice too well now—warm, reckless, a little too loud for how small the college corridors were. Tara had that way of entering spaces like she belonged there more than anyone else.

“Tu yahin chhupi hai, haan?” Tara’s voice came closer, accompanied by the unmistakable crunch of her boots on dry leaves. “While the rest of the world becomes a madhouse?”

“I don’t like Holi,” Sandhya replied, not looking up.

Tara walked around and sat beside her. She had already been coloured—blue streaks in her hair, yellow on her cheek, and a small smear of purple on the side of her neck that Sandhya couldn’t stop noticing.

“Tumhare jaise logon ko Holi pasand aani chahiye,” Tara said, tugging at the red packet in Sandhya’s hand. “Introverts with hidden rage. This is the one day you get to throw things at people and not apologise.”

Sandhya smiled faintly. “I’m not angry.”

“That’s the saddest thing you’ve said all week.”

There was silence again. This time, Tara didn’t try to fill it.

Sandhya stared at her fingers, still holding the packet of red.

“Do you know,” she began, voice soft, “in some places they only play with red on Holi?”

Tara raised an eyebrow. “Bas laal?”

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