“It has been an assault on her senses: smells that suddenly overpower her, and heat she can taste, thick as dust on her tongue. Not only does she feel powerless in the face of Indian bureaucracy, but as further punishment, the torrential downpours also keep them trapped inside Krishnan’s parents’ flat.”

“The smell of her hair, the taste of her mouth, the feeling of her skin seemed to have got inside him, or into the air all round him. She had become a physical necessity.”

“Ross held her face between his hands and kissed her. He tasted doubt on her tongue and pain on the roof of her mouth. He swallowed these, and drank again. Consumed, she had no choice but to see how empty he was inside, and how, sip by sip, she filled him. ”

“She has no taste left to her and this makes it easier for me.The color of her where she is inside is enough to make me kill her.”

“She wore so much thick white makeup in order to conceal her naturally rosy complexion that if she turned around suddenly her face would probably end up on the back of her head.”

“She once told me that she loved me because I was the only thing she could hear. She can feel the vibration of the strings through the carved vessel of her instrument, but I am inside her. I am a song soaked into each bone of her secret body where the world has not been able to wander.”