Bicycles and Paint Cans

Priya Chen-Patel adjusted her Cartier watch—a partnership gift from the firm—and realised she'd been staring at the same Excel cell for seventeen minutes. Outside her corner office, Singapore's financial district glittered with the kind of geometric perfection that made architects weep and investment bankers feel alive.

She felt neither.

Yesterday's partnership announcement should have felt like vindication. Equity partner at thirty-six. Youngest in the firm's history. Everyone had clapped. Someone handed her champagne she didn't drink. She'd smiled the smile she'd perfected and felt the particular hollowness of getting exactly what you aimed for.

Her phone showed a text from Mum: "Didi's birthday. Today. 2pm."

Didi. Meera. Her older sister who'd committed career suicide at twenty-four by marrying a youth pastor with zero financial prospects and having six children in a two-bedroom flat in Ang Mo Kio whilst their parents pretended she didn't exist at family gatherings.

Priya had told Raj she'd be an hour. Just showing face.

She drove her Mercedes through neighbourhoods that got progressively less impressed by German engineering, until she pulled up outside a flat where children's bicycles colonised the common corridor and someone had started a herb garden in recycled paint cans.

The door opened before she knocked.

"Auntie Priya!" Small humans engulfed her knees. A girl of about seven with Meera's intelligent eyes sat reading something about quantum physics. A boy in a Superman cape conducted an invisible orchestra.

"Shoes off," Meera called. "We just mopped."

The flat smelled like cardamom and something baking. Every surface bloomed with children's artwork and library books. Meera appeared in an apron that said "Blessed and Stressed" in Comic Sans. She'd gained weight. Her hair showed silver. She wore no makeup. She looked, Priya noted with something like vertigo, happy.

"You came." Meera's surprise was genuine.

"Where's Raj? The kids?"

"Piano. Mandarin tutor. Swimming."

"It's Saturday."

"Exactly. Prime lesson time. Competition for spots is—" Priya stopped. Something about the way her sister was looking at her made the words taste like ash.

The kitchen was smaller than Priya's walk-in wardrobe. The quantum physics girl sat at a scratched wooden table with siblings, storytelling about dinosaurs.

"You don't ice a cake before it cools," Priya observed.

"I know that now." Meera gestured at a lopsided creation that had experienced frosting landslide. "But I was operating on faith and poor timing."

The cake tasted incredible.

"You always could bake." Priya said it like an accusation.

"Not a marketable skill according to Dad's PowerPoint on Career Trajectories. Remember? He made slides."

The Superman cape boy—Kai—climbed into Meera's lap and started braiding her hair whilst humming off-key. Meera kept talking like this was normal.

"Everyone told me I was throwing my life away. Stanford acceptance. Corporate training programme. And here I am, thirty-eight, never felt like I'm performing someone else's script."

"You could have done both. Career and family—"

"Play stupid games, win stupid prizes." Meera's voice was gentle but immovable. "Just cos it's Taylor doesn't mean it's not right."

The phrase landed like a slap. Priya had everything. Corner office, compensation package, gifted children, accomplished husband. Everything that felt like nothing.

"When's the last time you actually laughed?" Meera asked. "Not that wind chime thing you do at client dinners."

The question hung there.

Priya searched for her last genuine laugh. Found nothing.

"I have a good life. Partnership track. Kids in gifted programmes—"

"Did you have fun in the Maldives?"

"It was relaxing."

"That's not what I asked."

Kai held up his completed braid. Meera praised it, then he was gone, and the sisters sat with twenty years of choices between them.

"I made equity partner yesterday," Priya said. "Everything I've worked for. And I sat in that meeting feeling nothing except empty."

The admission surprised them both.

"What did you expect to feel?"

"Like I'd proved Dad's taxi driving meant something. That their sacrifices weren't for nothing."

"You can't pay back love with achievement." Meera's voice was gentle. "They didn't sacrifice so you could sacrifice too."

The quantum physics girl appeared. "Auntie Priya, do you think consciousness collapses the wave function or does decoherence happen independently?"

"She's asking if reality needs watching to be real," Meera translated. "Tell her later, Zara."

"Adults are always talking. Rarely saying anything interesting." Zara wandered off with the confidence of someone who'd decided most grown-ups were intellectual disappointments.

"You just let her be herself?" Priya stared. "Children don't need optimising. They need seeing." Meera dried her hands on a tea towel that said "Keep Calm and Curry On." "Uncle Lim told me this Hokkien phrase—'kia si lang'—someone so afraid of losing face they've lost their face already. That's what optimisation is."

The doorbell rang.

An elderly Chinese man in a Manchester United shirt appeared with curry puffs. More children arrived. Someone started playing guitar badly. The flat transformed into barely controlled chaos.

"That's Uncle Lim," Meera explained. "Retired. Comes for dinner Tuesdays and Saturdays. Says our chaos helps him remember what living sounds like."

Uncle Lim raised his curry puff at Priya. "Your sister tells me you're important. Big job. Very impressive."

"My son is also successful. Surgeon in London. Sends money monthly. Haven't seen him in three years." He took a contemplative bite. "Your sister is the smart one. Poor, but rich."

They sang happy birthday in three languages. The lopsided cake disappeared. No one mentioned Priya's designer handbag or asked what she did for a living.

Then it happened.

Zara came running, tears streaming, holding a doll with one arm hanging by threads. "Mummy! Mei-Mei's arm came off!"

Meera barely looked up. "I'll take her to the shop next week, get her mended."

Priya's hand shot out—grabbed Meera's wrist. Too forceful. Everyone noticed.

"Or don't."

Meera looked at her sister. Really looked. Something passed between them—recognition, memory, twenty-five years collapsing.

"Don't take her to be mended," Priya said, urgent now. "Please."

"But her arm's coming off," Zara said, confused.

"Does that make her less yours?" Priya asked.

Zara considered this seriously. Looked at Mei-Mei with her wonky eye and damaged arm. "No. She's still mine."

"Then maybe she doesn't need fixing. Maybe she's perfect as she is."

Meera stared with something like wonder. "Priya—"

"We lost her. We took her to be mended and lost her. And I've spent thirty-six years trying to be the mended version. The fixed version. And I'm so tired of being perfectly mended and completely lost."

The doorbell rang.

"That'll be Raj and the kids," Meera said. "You texted them to meet here after swimming."

Priya had forgotten. She'd been so numb she'd forgotten her own plan.

"I can't—"

But Daniel was at the door, letting them in.

Raj appeared, expensive watch catching light. Anika and Arjun behind him, hair damp from the pool.

He took one look at his wife—tears on her face in this cramped kitchen—and his expression shifted.

"What's wrong?"

"Everything. I don't know."

Zara quietly disappeared with her doll. Uncle Lim busied himself with curry puffs.

"We should go," Raj said carefully. "The Hendersons—"

"I don't want to go to the Hendersons'." The words came fierce. "I don't want dinner with people I don't like, performing success I don't feel. I just made partner and feel nothing, and she's happy—" she gestured at Meera, at the chaos, at everything their parents saw as failure, "—actually happy. When's the last time we were happy?"

Raj stood trapped between leaving and staying, between the life they'd built and whatever this moment offered.

"Not here—"

"Why not here? When, Raj? In our empty house where children practice scales like jobs? When do we talk about winning that feels like losing?"

Meera shepherded Anika and Arjun out. "Your parents need a minute."

Raj closed the door. Leaned against it.

"What's happening?"

"I don't know who I am without spreadsheets. Without metrics. Without optimisation. And Zara doesn't want her doll fixed because it's hers as it is, and we lost ourselves to mending, Raj. Took ourselves to be perfected and never came back."

He was quiet. Then: "I laughed yesterday. Started to and stopped because it felt wrong. Like breaking protocol. When did laughing become against protocol?"

"The Hendersons' dinner—" He stopped. "I don't want to go either. Never do. But we perform. We network. For what?"

Meera returned. "Sorry. Not eavesdropping. Moving your handbag before someone spills juice." She set it down. "But yes. For what?"

Raj looked at Meera—really looked. "You're happy."

"Most days."

"How?"

"I stopped waiting for permission. Stopped measuring myself against Mum's anxiety and Dad's spreadsheets. It was terrible at first. But at least it's mine."

Raj pulled out his phone. Stared at it. Started to dial and stopped. Started again and stopped.

"I can't cancel on the Hendersons. They're on the Changi Airport approval committee. Three hundred million—"

"I know what it's worth."

They stared at each other. The guitar had stopped. Someone was reading a story now.

"Go," Priya said. "Take the kids. I'll get a taxi."

Raj looked at his phone. At his wife. At the door.

Then put the phone down.

"No. I'm so tired. Tired of treating people like infrastructure. Tired of optimising children into resentment." His voice cracked. "My father died at fifty-three. Heart attack at his desk. Never took holiday. Died closing a deal. Everyone said what a great man. What dedication." He picked up his phone again. "I'm forty-one. That's twelve years to become him."

"Or not," Priya said softly.

He dialled. Put it on speaker.

"Henderson? Raj Patel. Something's come up. Family matter. We won't make dinner."

"Tonight? We've had this scheduled—"

"I know. I apologise."

"The Changi presentation is Thursday—"

"We'll align Monday. Right now I need to be here."

"Everything alright?"

"No," Raj said. "But it might be. Eventually."

He hung up. Set the phone face-down like afraid it might ring back.

"He's going to tell everyone we're unreliable."

"Probably."

"We might lose the project."

"We might."

Staying was harder than expected.

Meera brought them back where children had built an elaborate cushion city. Anika and Arjun sat on the edge like anthropologists.

"You can help," Kai announced. "We need a corrupt but funny mayor."

"Are we staying?" Anika asked her father.

"Yes."

"For how long?"

"I don't know."

This satisfied her more than a specific time. She stood, brushed off her designer activewear. "Okay. But I've never been corrupt. You'll have to show me."

"Easy," Kai assured her. "Take bribes and make terrible decisions but everyone still likes you."

Arjun looked at Priya. "Mum, are you okay?"

"I don't know. But I'm here."

He considered this. "Can I really take my shoes off? Like not worry about keeping them near the door?"

"Yes."

He grinned and ran to join the chaos.

Daniel appeared. "Fish head curry for dinner. Fair warning, acquired taste."

"We'd love to stay," Raj said formally, catching himself. "Thank you."

"No speeches required. Just show up."

Dinner was excruciating.

Not because the food was bad—the curry was excellent, complex in ways that made expensive restaurant meals taste like air. But sitting at the scratched table with seventeen people in a space for six required proximity Priya had spent her adult life avoiding.

Uncle Lim sat beside her, smelling like Tiger Balm and old soap.

"You made partner," he said in Mandarin.

"Yes."

"What does a partner do?"

The question was genuine. "I advise clients. Strategic initiatives. Help companies buy other companies."

"Important work."

"Is it?"

He looked at her with rheumy eyes. "Is it?"

"In chess," Uncle Lim said, scooping rice, "queen is most powerful piece. But sometimes smart player sacrifices queen to win game. Give up most powerful piece. Seems crazy. But sometimes crazy move is only true move."

"I don't play chess."

"No. But you play something. Question is whether we choose the game or game chooses us."

Across the table, Raj talked with a Malay woman who worked at childcare and had opinions about Montessori being bourgeois nonsense designed to make parents feel superior about children's inability to follow instructions.

Raj, who'd paid forty thousand for Anika's Montessori preschool, looked like he was having a religious experience.

Meera ladled more curry without asking. "Too spicy?"

"Perfect."

"Liar. Your nose is running."

Priya wiped her nose with the back of her hand—something she hadn't done since childhood—and laughed. Actually laughed.

Meera heard it. Their eyes met. Her sister's expression said: See? You remember how.

After dinner, the children performed a play they'd written that afternoon. Dinosaurs and Victorian detectives and a murder about stolen biscuits. Anika played the corrupt mayor with unexpected comic timing. Arjun was a stegosaurus barrister tripping over his tail.

Priya sat squeezed between Raj and Uncle Lim, watching her children be silly without monitoring for optimisation. Just watching.

Raj leaned over, whispered: "Did you know Anika could be funny?"

"No."

When the play ended, children bowed elaborately, then immediately argued about the next one.

Zara approached with Mei-Mei, arm held on with a safety pin and hair tie.

"She's better," Zara announced, climbing onto the sofa uninvited. "Not fixed. She's herself again."

"Why were you crying earlier?" Zara asked.

"Because I remembered something. That some things don't need fixing. Just keeping."

"Like Mei-Mei."

"Like Mei-Mei."

"Are you going to keep yourself now?"

The question was so direct Priya couldn't breathe.

"I'm going to try."

"Good. You're better not-fixed too. More real."

She said it casually, stating obvious facts, then disappeared.

Uncle Lim chuckled. "Too smart for her own good."

"Or smart enough," Priya said quietly.

"Maybe." He stood, joints creaking, pulled out his chess set. "One game. You and me."

"I don't play."

"Then I teach you."

Uncle Lim taught her whilst chaos continued. He explained each piece patiently. After instruction, Priya made her first move. Lost spectacularly within ten moves.

"Terrible. Again."

They played again. She lasted twelve moves.

"Less terrible. Again."

She lost her third game in fifteen moves.

"Better. You're learning."

"Learning to lose?"

"Exactly. Most important skill. Learn to lose with grace and you can learn anything." He packed pieces away. "My wife used to say I was terrible at losing. Had to lose her to learn."

His hands stilled.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. Be grateful you're learning whilst people you love still here." He looked directly at her. "You sacrificed your queen tonight. Cancelled important dinner. Started losing face. Good. Keep losing. Lose until you find yourself."

By nine, chaos had settled. Children lay in piles watching tablets. Priya found herself at the sink beside Daniel, drying plates.

"Thank you for staying," he said after a while.

"Thank you for having us."

"Not having. Letting you be here." He handed her a bowl. "Meera worried you'd chosen the other path completely."

"She chose this. I followed the script."

"Script written by who?"

"Everyone. That voice that says worth equals achievement."

"That voice is a liar. Good liar. But liar."

"How do you turn it off?"

"You don't. You stop believing it. Slowly. One choice at a time." He said it simply, like describing toast-making. "Then you ask for help."

"From who?"

"Whatever's bigger than your fear. God, universe, love—pick your word. What matters is admitting you can't do this alone."

"Surrender."

"Yes. Not quitting. Stopping fighting wrong battle so you can fight right one."

They left after ten. Children sleepy and confused but happier than Priya had seen them in years.

At the door, Meera hugged Priya longer than comfortable. "Come back. Next Saturday. And the Saturday after. Learn to be broken in front of people who love you anyway."

Priya nodded. Smelled cardamom and dish soap. Remembered being seven and nine, sharing everything, before divergence and calcification.

"I don't know if I can."

"I know. That's why you come back."

In the car, key in ignition, Priya didn't start it.

"I lost her. The doll. Our doll. Mum took her to be mended when the eye came loose. I was nine. That toy shop on Orchard Road that closed. We never saw her again." She gripped the wheel. "And I never cried. Just moved on. Became someone who doesn't cry over dolls."

"And now?"

"Now I've been taking myself to be mended for twenty-seven years. I think Zara's right. I'm better not-fixed."

She started the car.

They drove through Singapore's geometry of ambition.

"I'm going part-time," she said.

"Okay. I'll do the same."

"Your parents—"

"Will have opinions. They'll survive."

At a red light, he took her hand. "I don't want to die at my desk. I want to know what my children sound like when they really laugh."

The light changed. Behind them, someone honked. She drove.

At home, the house felt enormous and museum-quiet. Priya stood in their designer kitchen, looking at marble countertops and German appliances and the fruit bowl that had never held bruised fruit.

She opened the precisely organised fridge. Poured milk. Drank it standing like a teenager. Left the empty glass in the sink.

Small rebellion that felt enormous.

Raj came down. "What are you thinking?"

"That this house has never heard real laughter. That we spent four hundred thousand on a kitchen we perform in but never live in."

"So what do we do?"

"Make a mess."

Raj opened the freezer. Pulled out three-month-old ice cream they'd never opened. Got two spoons.

They ate standing at the counter. No bowls. No portions. Just two people learning to be inefficient together.

"This is terrifying," Raj said.

"I know."

"We'll probably fail. Wake up Monday and fall back into performance."

"Probably."

"So why does this feel like the first true thing I've done in years?"

Priya didn't answer. Just ate another spoonful of ice cream. Set the carton on the counter. Left it there, not putting it away.

The kitchen could wait.