January 9, 2023

We were on the 12th floor and the dogs were barking because they wanted to jump across to the neighbor’s balcony. My parents were talking about the next generation and how my cousin’s daughter was showing an interest in photography. I watched her with a camera in her hands, trying to take a shot of our dogs from the balcony railing. I had only looked away for a brief moment before she had suddenly disappeared. A pair of green shoes lay where she had once stood.

I felt a deep sense of dread in my chest as I realized what must have happened. “I can’t look”, I thought as I tried to restrain myself from looking down from the edge. I closed my eyes and buried my head in my arms but all it took was one peek below to see her small body on the pavement. I screamed.

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I was watching a Bollywood film which had a dance sequence set to classical music. We were only 1 hour into the 3 hour movie and it was already 5:30 PM so I texted my dad that I wouldn’t be back for dinner. However it didn’t feel like I had been watching for that long and I became unsure about the passage of time. I unsent the message.