‘Truly - truly what is the purpose of your visit?’

Quinn turned again to look at the view.

She had lied and fooled no one. It was entirely debatable if she had been lying to herself for the best part of year. She thought on the whole, not. It was only in India now that everything seemed muddied.

Up until a year ago she had enjoyed absolute control on her life, but now what had seemed clear in America now seemed un-clear.

Was Alec dead? She did not believe the dead lived again. Alec and Quinn… It had always Alec and Quinn, never Quinn and Alec, he had always come first, even in the first weeks of their relationship.

They had been lovers for years, the kind of love that pretended it wasn’t – wasn’t what? Wasn’t love at all, just this strange dance, out of time, out of rhythm?

It was an abstract relationship, like a bad modern painting. But they had been obsessed with each other, if obsession was a form of love… They must have loved each other deeply - it was one of the questions she had brought with her to India and seemed more muddled now as every minute ticked by.

It was better not to ask that sort of question now, in the middle of the India muddle when her head was battling to keep an even walk. Ask others, any others.

Had it been a very sophisticated way to live? Ask another.

Was it the more intellectual you are, the harder to feel?

Alec was an artist, a painter and over a year ago he had gone for a short sabbatical to India to teach and travel.

Mundane, harmless, she had not shown huge interest, her aesthetics being so different to his. It was all harmless, part of a harmless journey, like interstate trains. He could rise above most things could Alec, like culture and strange religions.

He had written to her – long letters full of strange India, strange colors, and strange, superstitious gods. She had never much liked reading them, had always washing her hands afterwards. And then suddenly the letters she didn’t much like had suddenly stopped.