The trunk nobody wants to be the first to open
It smells like her. That is the first thing. Before you have even lifted the lid all the way, the smell reaches you, naphthalene balls and something underneath them, something that is just her, the particular warmth of a woman who wore these sarees to weddings and funerals and ordinary Tuesdays. You stand there longer than you mean to.The trunk has been there for years, maybe decades. A steel Godrej box, or a wooden one with a brass latch gone green at the edges. It held her good sarees, the ones she didn't wear every day, the ones she was saving. For what, exactly, she never said. You assumed she would always be there to tell you.
