So naturally, when I sat down to read the works of writers and artists I wanted to solicit, I realized how I had unconsciously been using the word “desi” to exclude too: no, I hadn’t really thought to include Sri Lanka—how profoundly awful of me!

Senna Ahmad, Hafsa Ashfaq, Anum Awan, Nazish Chunara, Nahal Hashir, Mariam Jajja, and Seyhr Qayum talked about their artwork, collaborations, process, and inspirations on WhatsApp over a period of multiple days.

Feroz Rather and Aditya Desai talked about “Raid on Madras” via email.

Tara Isabel Zambrano and Chaya Bhuvaneswar talked about “Gast Station” over email.

Abeer Hoque and Nur Nasreen Ibrahim talked about “The Death of a Glacier” over the phone.

asanthika Sirisena talked to Ahsan Butt about “The Installation” over WhatsApp.

Ahsan Butt and Aatif Rashid spoke about “ Grand Tour” and Aatif’s debut novel Portrait of Sebastian Khan in person.

Palvashay Sethi and Feroz Rather discussed “A Strange Call From the Mountain” on Google Hangouts, in two parts.

Chaya Bhuvaneswar talked to Hasanthika Sirisena about “Escape to Buzzkill Falls” over email.

Aatif Rashid and Devi S. Laskar talked about Devi’s excerpt “Second Midnight” from her debut novel The Atlas of Reds and Blues over WhatsApp.

Devi S. Laskar and Tara Isabel Zambrano talked about “Alligators” over WhatsApp.

Sarah Thankam Mathews and Palvashay Sethi talked about “Barri Ammi” over WhatsApp.

Nur Nasreen Ibrahim and Abeer Hoque spoke about Abeer’s story “Fuck All Gall” over the phone.

Aditya Desai and Sarah Thankam Mathews spoke about “The Storms” over WhatsApp.

Kalpana had been struck by that Indian butler character, since that late night when the movie was on television, and she’d already seen the Star Trek re-run on the other channel.

Waiting for his assignment, Wally was pulled to the newsfeed. A teenager in Jackson Heights went to a roof, jumped to her death.

She has pockmarks blooming across her surface. Blotches of grey, brown and black interrupt the creamy white. She has melted at an astonishing rate.

She can see only as far as her headlights, not that there’s much to see. At some point, the road becomes unmarked and lane-less, liable to end without warning. Zayna rolls slowly. Not out of care, just no longer mindful of her speed or time. The radio—on since she left Jeffeh—strains for a signal. It seems lost in static for good, but so it had countless times—always returning to a late-night call-in show that went on and on.

Masood stood under the monument to Christopher Columbus in the sweltering heat of a Barcelona summer evening, staring down La Rambla and waiting for Lauren, the tall column rising above him into the darkening sky, the conqueror pointing out across the glittering water, when he remembered why he never liked visiting cities twice.

For several days, he steers his battered lorry through the Ganga’s plains. Without delivering the load of 300 apple crates he ferried over the shoulders of the Himalayas to Hindustan, he decides to return home.