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Yeah, I am Kali

Parvati and Lakshmi are minding their business when Mahisha interrupts


Parvati doesn’t mind waiting tables as long as it puts pasta on her table and Nyx on her lips.

 

She furtively touches up on her lip gloss, her pouty lips being reflected by the frying pan Lakshmi has just washed. She curls them into a tight smile- during her break, she’d come across an article stating that it was supposed to lift your mood. It did not. Fucking psychology. 

 

Mahisha, her manager is standing next to Lakshmi as she does the dishes, chatting her up in a nasally voice. Parvati watches as his hand slowly creeps up Lakshmi’s thigh and she visibly freezes.  She takes a hasty step away but Mahisha grabs her arm in steely grip so tight, Parvati can feel like tension in Lakshmi’s bones from across the room. Mahisha smiles into Lakshmi’s eyebrows furrowed in horror.

 

Parvati quickly pushes forward the pile of pans and forks she’d just cleaned to the ground with a high-pitched clatter. A startled Mahisha jumps and quickly retreats his hand back into his jumper pocket while Lakshmi’s shoulders seem to relax a little. 

 

‘My bad’, Parvati calls out, imagining the strewn cutlery to be Mahisha’s bones. 

 

Mahisha meets her eye, probably to tell her to clean up the mess and Parvati stares him down with the same intensity of a goddess she usually spares for creeps on the street at night. It’s enough for Mahisha to clear his throat and look away. Coward, she thinks savagely. 

 

He takes quick short steps to make his way out of the kitchen and when he passes Parvati, she idly extends her foot forward and being the fool, she knew him to be, he trips and haphazardly tries to grab something to hold on to. His only companions are the aluminium utensils on the shelf next to him which follow him on the way down. 

 

Parvati smiles amiably and crouches next to him, picking up the saucepan that fell on his head. 

 

“Are you okay?” she asks in a sickly-sweet voice. 

 

“Fine,” he says, without looking at her. He begins to pull himself up when Parvati grabs a knife- granted, a butter knife- and jabs it between the gap of his stubby fingers. He finally whips his head to look at her- part outrage, part terror.

“If I see you doing that again,” Parvati continues sweetly, so sweetly that a casual onlooker might mistake the conversation for unshrouded flirtation, “I will jab that knife in your palm. And believe me, I won’t miss.”

 

Mahisha gapes at her, terror and trepidation flowing from his eyes. It was a risky move, since Mahisha could fire her on the spot, but Parvati held her ground. Mahisha simply nods and scrambles to his feet. Agni scrambles forward and asks him if he’s alright but Mahisha waves him off and walks out of the kitchen without looking back. 

 

Parvati smirks inwardly as she begins cleaning up her mess when Lakshmi walks up to her. 

 

“You okay?” Parvati asks her in a concerned voice. 

 

“Yeah,” Lakshmi answers, the ghost of a smile playing on her lips. “Yeah, I am, Kali.”

 

Main artwork produced by @prettyjosten


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About the author

Kavya is a second-year art history/psychology student whose mum won't let her pierce her nose even though she's nineteen. Her work centers around diaspora, reclamation of her culture, Fauvist tendencies and modernism surrounding WoC. Her personality traits include going to the NGV every fortnight and making excellent chai (not chai tea). Instagram: @prettyjosten

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