Chicken Noodle Soup

Ever since Sonia had tasted the chicken noodle soup at the new Nepali restaurant down the road two months ago, she’d wanted to try more.

And so one fine day, when her depression lifted enough for her to brew a pot of steaming Colombian magic instead of the tepid instant coffee on her shelf, and enough to respond to all of her messages in her awful inbox, Sonia finally succumbed to her aching wish. Her brother wanted to see her again this week despite his 4-hour commute to her city, and what better place to take him to than Aangan.

He'd always loved a good broth, she knew, because it reminded him of home. If he didn’t enjoy the spicier version of their mom’s Thukpa at this blessing of a restaurant, Sonia vowed to change her name.

Be there in 10 she tapped out to him and slipped on her sneakers, re-applying her gloss before smacking her lips in satisfaction and pouting at the mirror. Adjusting the brown smocked top which her brother had gifted her—in an endearingly embarrassed way last Christmas, when he'd claimed to have no clue what women wore to look good these days, despite knowing more than all of the best fashion students in New York City combined—Sonia fluffed her hair, snapped a quick selfie and walked out the studio with newfound panache.

The commuter traffic to Aangan was unforgiving for the distance it covered. Tourists clambered down large hissing buses right at the crosswalk of Aangan’s street, and, in this flaming heat, brought with them the unmistakable smells of body odor, babies and festival beer. Along the sidewalk were the regular commuters, poker-faced yet annoyed, rushing back to work after their constrained lunch hour. A couple of art students carried portfolio cases bigger than them to their Fine Arts building, busy in chatter and an overall summertime cheerfulness. Sonia envied them. Her own days as a college student seemed like a millennium away. She knew it was clichéd to wish she were young again, but it certainly wasn’t untrue.

The last several years out of college had only been swamped with bills to pay and jobs to work, all for a roof over her head. Rent wasn’t terrible with four other roommates, but it did chew up the savings she was planning to use on her culinary dreams. And she couldn’t possibly stay with her brother all the way in Newport, for god’s sakes. He lived with his pregnant fiancé. More importantly, Newport wasn’t New York City.