Before the world knew of us, before Mark Kumar Roy entered my life with such disarming gentleness, there were only echoes. My childhood was marked by dreams of romance shaped by songs and stories — ideals of love that promised more than mere companionship. I imagined love to be like the white light I once saw in meditation: enveloping, purifying, infinite.
Yet the years took me elsewhere. Life, as it often does, taught me with shadows before granting me light. I, Manisha, entered a marriage that became a cage, gilded on the outside but corroding my spirit within. From that union came my son — my greatest gift, my reason to endure, proof that even in a barren field, one flower may bloom.
Mark's path carried its own trials. His marriage was beautiful, filled with tenderness and mutual respect, but shadowed by grief. Miscarriage after miscarriage tore at the hope within their home, until at last a child was born — his daughter Hillary. Yet fate struck cruelly, and his wife was taken from him, leaving him to raise Hillary alone.
Mark's story was shaped by his heritage: the son of an Indian father and an American mother. His parents had shared a love that was both cultural harmony and deep companionship — an example he quietly longed to emulate. Though he leaned towards an American way of living — straightforward, individualistic, expressive — he held close to certain Indian values: reverence for marriage, family bonds, and the sanctity of vows.
Two lives. Two ledgers. Both scarred by loss, both marked with lessons that felt, at the time, unbearably cruel.
And yet — in the silent accounting of the universe, these were not punishments but preparations. For every mark of sorrow had its balancing entry of strength. Every lonely night was written against a future of belonging.
It would take years before we would meet again — before I would look across a table, deliver a red report, and unknowingly open the first page of a new ledger. One not of numbers, but of love.