# The Mark of Sand in Water The river had turned grey. Not the grey of monsoon clouds or the grey that comes before storm—this was a different grey, the colour of indifference, of something that had given up arguing with the world. Shambhu stood at the edge, watching the water churn past without looking at him. "It's higher than last year," said Renu, coming up beside him with the basket balanced against her hip. "The embankment won't hold." Shambhu didn't answer. He was thinking about the sand. Underneath all that water, somewhere in the depths where the current twisted like a living thing, there was sand. His grandfather had shown it to him once—how to read the river by its moods, how to know where the sand accumulated and where the current had scraped the bed clean. A man who knew the river's language could predict where she would strike, where she would swallow the land whole. But Shambhu had stopped listening long ago. "We should move the things from the lower room," Renu said. She had a way of stating facts that made them seem inevitable, like gravity, like death. "The water came up to the second step last year." "The water doesn't remember," Shambhu said. Renu shifted the basket. Inside, he could smell the cardamom and turmeric—she was making something for the festival that wouldn't come for another three weeks. His wife planned as if the world were a thing that could be held in the palms of her hands, measured out and arranged. "No," she said finally. "But we do." That night, he dreamed of sand. Not the sand of the riverbed, but fine sand, the kind that gets into everything—under your nails, between your teeth, in the creases of your skin. In the dream, he was trying to wash it away, but the more he rubbed, the more it appeared, until his hands were bleeding and the sand was still there, still there, still there. He woke gasping. Renu was asleep beside him, her face turned away. Outside, the river made its patient, terrible sound, the sound of something working on a problem it had all the time in the world to solve. Shambhu got up and went to the window. The moon was nearly full, and in its light he could see the water more clearly—that same indifferent grey, now silvered at the edges. His grandfather had taught him about patience. The river is patient, he used to say. She doesn't rush. She doesn't need to. Everything comes to her eventually. Everything falls into the water, and the water keeps moving. The old man had died thirty-seven years ago. The embankment he built had lasted twenty-three seasons before it failed. When it did, it failed completely—not gradually, not with warning, but all at once, a sudden capitulation, as if the earth had decided to surrender without further argument. Shambhu had been there. He was fourteen. He remembered the sound it made, like something vast sighing in its sleep. After that, he had refused to learn anything more about the river. No more reading the signs. No more trying to outwit water that had been outwitting men since before men had names to call themselves by. In the morning, Renu was already up, moving things from the lower room. The brass vessels, the old trunks, the baskets of stored grain. She worked methodically, without hurrying, as if this were simply another task among many tasks, no more significant than sweeping or churning butter. "Help me with this," she said, pointing to the heavy wooden chest. He helped. Together they carried it up the narrow stairs, and he was surprised by how light it felt, or perhaps he had simply forgotten how to gauge weight, how to measure things. When they set it down, Renu opened it and looked inside—old clothes, quilts, things that had belonged to her mother. She closed it again without taking anything out. "We should go to the market," she said. "We need rice." "The water won't reach the market." "Perhaps not. But we still need rice." They went in the afternoon, walking the path that had hardened into a rut by repeated footsteps. The river ran beside them, and Shambhu tried not to look at it, though it was difficult. The river wanted to be looked at. It demanded attention the way a sick child demands attention—not out of malice, but from an absolute conviction that it was the center of the world and everything else revolved around it. At the market, there was talk of evacuation. The official from the district office had come with news. The monsoon was early and heavy this year. They were asking people to move to higher ground, at least temporarily. There were shelters being prepared on the plateau, three miles north. "We'll go," said Renu. Shambhu bought the rice. Two sacks, more than usual. When he turned to leave, he saw the shopkeeper watching him with an expression he couldn't quite read. Pity, perhaps. Or recognition. They had both lived through the break of '87. The shopkeeper's son had drowned. They carried the rice home in silence. That night, it began to rain. Not the soft rain of early evening, but a persistent, determined rain, the kind that settles in for the long term. Shambhu lay awake listening to it drum against the roof, and he thought about his grandfather again—not the story of his death, but the life before that. A man who had stood against the river and believed, truly believed, that he could win. That if you understood the river's language, if you paid attention to the signs, if you worked hard enough and thought clearly enough, you could make a compact with her. You could say: go here, not there. You could draw lines on the earth and expect them to hold. It was a kind of faith, Shambhu realized. A faith in the power of human will to bend the world to its purposes. He had lost that faith when he was fourteen years old. By morning, the rain had not stopped. Renu moved more quickly now, packing with a kind of quiet urgency. Clothes in one bundle, food in another. The photographs wrapped in cloth. The small statue of Durga that had been in the family for four generations. She worked as if her hands knew what needed to be done without waiting for her mind to tell them. "We'll leave this afternoon," she said. Shambhu went to the river once more, alone. The water had changed again. It was darker now, almost brown, carrying things—branches, scraps of cloth, things he couldn't identify. The current had become visibly faster. He could see how it moved, how it had weight and intention. He stood there for a long time, trying to feel something—anger, fear, regret, anything. But there was only a kind of emptiness, a hollowness that had grown steadily over the years until it was almost companionable, almost like a friend. A mark of sand in the water. That's what his grandfather used to call the small islands and banks that formed in certain seasons. They were temporary, he said. The river moves them, and one day they're gone. But while they last, they're solid. You can stand on them. You can build on them. You can believe they're real. Shambhu turned away from the river and walked back toward the house. Renu was waiting with the bundles stacked by the door. She had also prepared food for the journey—rice cakes and dried fruit, a jar of water. Practical things. Necessary things. "Are you ready?" she asked. He looked at the bundles, at her face, at the house that had sheltered them for twenty-two years. At all the arrangements that had become so familiar he scarcely saw them anymore. "Yes," he said, though whether it was true or false, he couldn't say. "I'm ready." They left as the rain intensified, walking north toward higher ground, toward the plateau where others were gathering, where people believed that elevation and distance could protect them. Behind them, the river continued its patient work. It had already begun to breach the lower fields. By nightfall, the water would reach the market. By morning, it would lap at their door. But they would not be there to see it. Renu walked slightly ahead, her bundles balanced carefully. Shambhu followed, listening to the rain, to the distant sound of running water, to the world rearranging itself as it had so many times before, would so many times again. And in his mind, he kept returning to that image—sand in the water, marked and real for a moment, then slowly dissolving, returning to the endless, patient current that carried all things forward, whether they were willing or not.

 
Momen Bhai. He is my cousin. They are four brothers, three sisters. Momen Bhai is the youngest. The youngest in a family never truly grow up, no matter how many years pass — they remain small forever, small even in their old age.


Momen Bhai's family is a notable one in the village. Land, ponds, a semi-brick house with a sprawling courtyard. In short, they want for nothing.


Enamul Bhai is Momen Bhai's eldest brother. He has three younger sisters, then two more brothers, and last of all comes Momen Bhai. Enamul Bhai is an educated man. Everyone respects him. Since educated men are scarce in the village, Enamul Bhai is much sought after. But his younger siblings never pursued their studies seriously. The sisters were married off, the brothers sent to Kuwait — all by selling off land, parcel by parcel. In those days, land had little value. Even when they sold a great many plots, they got only a pittance in return. This is how, piece by piece, the land was sold to send one brother after another abroad. The sisters were married off in grand style.


Enamul Bhai stayed behind in the country. He runs a small dispensary. Besides that, he has his earnings from farming. His brothers send money every month from abroad. With that money, the sold lands are being bought back. There is no want in the household.


Momen Bhai is growing up. Of the few things in this world that he truly despised, study was one of them — so much so that if freed from the burden of schooling, he would have gladly taken on any number of other detested tasks without the slightest objection. That boy, if needed, would plough the fields, tend cattle, work as a mason's helper, dig earth, harvest rice — anything but study. Racing from one end of the village to the other, roaming from house to house, playing cards, playing cricket and danguli with his gang, rolling old tire rims down the lanes with a stick, stealing jackfruit from the countless trees that lined the big pond, eating them with salt and chilli powder amid raucous laughter with his friends, then running away when caught — these were Momen Bhai's daily pursuits.


Every day, complaints came pouring in from all the houses around. One day it was stealing jackfruit, the next day it was plucking unripe mangoes. One day he threw stones at someone's tin roof, the next he stole coconuts from a neighbor's tree. The complaints never ceased, day after day, from every direction.


Momen Bhai's mother was our aunt. After dusk fell, as punishment for all his mischief, our aunt would beat Momen Bhai — almost every day. While beating him, she would pull his ears and make him swear that he would never steal or misbehave again. Momen Bhai, crying and trembling, would hold his ears and take the oath, promising that from tomorrow he would do none of these things. He would stop throwing stones at houses, stop stealing coconuts from so-and-so's tree, stop plucking mangoes from the mango tree, stop even walking past the orchard ever again.


Then our aunt would rub oil on the welts on his back, trying to hide the tears in her eyes. If she didn't punish him, the boy would go to ruin. But he never mended his ways. At night, beaten and bruised, he would weep himself to sleep after swearing his oath. But the moment morning came, Momen Bhai would be back to his old self — as if nothing had happened in the night, as if no oath had been taken. Soon enough, he would be back to his robberies in gardens here and there, hurling stones at rooftops, roaming from street to street, trampling someone's sown seeds, tearing flowers from another's garden. Breaking one boy's bones, bloodying another's face — these were the deeds Momen Bhai wore like a crown.


Our aunt was at her wit's end with the boy's wild recklessness.

# Momen Bhai

Aunt would sometimes beat Momen Bhai until she herself burst into tears, crying and wailing in her rage and sorrow, saying, “It would be better if a wretch like you died. I’ll kill you today—when you’re gone, the whole neighborhood will have peace.” But as she beat him, aunt would grow weary herself. Yet Momen Bhai showed no sign of exhaustion or remorse from such thrashings. After beating him fiercely, aunt would feed him tenderly, cradle him in her arms, and fall asleep. Sometimes, kissing the sleeping boy’s forehead, she would think: he’ll grow up someday, this wild Momen will become a responsible householder, he’ll have a family of his own, one day this foolish Momen will be a father. Lost in such thoughts, dawn would break, and with the morning, Momen Bhai’s mischief would resume. That restless Momen seemed incapable of peace.

Days pass, months pass, years roll by. Momen Bhai’s wildness only grows. Aunt beats him in the mornings until exhausted, then Enamul Bhai thrashes him in the evenings. The eldest sister beats him at noon, the middle sister in the afternoon. Though everyone grows weary of beating him, Momen Bhai never tires of taking blows, never shows remorse. One moment he’s crying from a beating, tears streaming down his face; the next, he breaks into a grin. He’ll take a beating for one misdeed while mentally preparing for the next—this is the mischievous Momen’s way.

Everyone is disheartened by his restless nature. Deeply disheartened. Momen is growing older, but not maturing—only his years are passing. And in studies, there’s one certainty: failure. Two years in the same class, then teachers, out of annoyance or pity, would promote him. He couldn’t go far this way. By the time he should have moved from class six to seven, he destroyed the very foundation of his education and became the prince of troublemakers.

Everyone worries about Momen Bhai—everyone except Momen Bhai himself, who seems free of worry, sorrow, pain, regret, or remorse. Though his family frets and fumes, not a single line of anxiety ever creases his forehead. Let the world turn upside down—it makes no difference to him. Like clockwork, nothing changes. Days pass, Momen Bhai grows older, and the family’s anxiety multiplies.

The neighbors jokingly ask him, “What’s wrong with you, Momen? No work, no studies—you just wander around all day. How will anyone give you a bride like that?” Momen Bhai, picking dirt from between his teeth with a stick, answers with lazy sarcasm, “Oh, rubbish! Some bride must be waiting in a corner of the world. One day I’ll just go and snatch her, brother.” Everyone roars with laughter.

At any gathering, Momen Bhai is the center of attention. With him around, people laugh until their bellies ache. He could weave together the wildest tales, mixing truth and lies so skillfully, presenting any event with such wit and charm. Though he torments his own family, outsiders find him quite likeable. Around Momen Bhai, gatherings turn merry. His presence means the world seems to have no suffering—just eat, fool around, take a beating, lie there stunned, get up, and do it all again. This cycle spins endlessly. It’s a vicious circle of mischief!

Momen Bhai is no longer the boy who took beatings as before. He’s grown now, strong and broad-shouldered. Yet he has no real objection to being beaten—he’s quite accustomed to it.

# Momen Brother

If someone wanted to hit him, he would bare his back, pull his shirt off, and laugh while saying, “Go on then, hit me!” The ones who wanted to beat him had the most objections. They felt embarrassed now, hitting such a grown boy.

The family’s worries were mounting. The wild, reckless Momen would not settle down in any way. This time his older brothers decided together: Momen would be sent abroad. Everyone agreed, but Momen’s heart felt heavy. What would a foreign country be like? Would he like it there? Could he manage? Do the people in that land know how to love? Even beaten and bruised every day, at least he could stay near his people, at least he could see their faces. They loved him! There was no one close to him in that distant place.

No, Momen would not go abroad. He would stay here, take the beatings, let them curse him, kick him, hit him—whatever they did—he simply could not bear to leave them for that faraway land. But his older brothers’ decision was final. Better that he leave the country than stay here tormenting everyone.

As it happened, the date for his departure was set. The destination: Kuwait. Momen still had a smile on his face. He embraced everyone goodbye, and even as he was leaving, laughing, he thrust his back forward and called out, “If any of you feels like hitting me, go ahead! You won’t be able to hit me for so many long days!” Hearing this, his aunt pulled Momen to her chest, held him tight, kissed his forehead and face, and with a breaking voice said, “My son, whatever beatings I give you, we suffer a hundred times more pain for it.” For the first time, Momen quickly tried to pull away from his mother—not his face, exactly, but his eyes.

The ever-smiling Momen was crying now. But he would not let anyone see those tears. He quickly freed himself from his mother and got into the car. His aunt cried out loud. She was thinking: my son has grown up now, he has learned to hide his tears. He has learned to cry.

Momen, who had learned to cry, left for Kuwait.

Day after day, the world’s age increases, and day after day, our time on this earth decreases.

Now Momen was not in the house. The whole home had somehow become a desert. There were no more complaints coming in, no one’s fruit was being stolen from their trees, no one’s roof was being pelted with stones.

When those who make such a noise and chaos, who fill the house with commotion, go far away, the heart cries much more for them, and the depth of emptiness keeps growing. A hushed silence fills the entire house, as if without Momen, the house itself was just a small desert.

Time passed this way. Then many years went by. Nearly seven years.

The communication technology back then was not as advanced as it is now. Letters carried the exchange of feelings. Slowly, mobile phones came. Nokia 1100. Not many people had them. One minute of conversation cost seven or eight takas. For however many minutes you talked, that many times seven or eight takas would be on the bill. Back then, even ten takas was a lot of money. Once or twice a month, Momen would talk to his aunt on the phone. Sometimes not even that.

In the meantime, all the weddings in the family had taken place. Now it was Momen’s turn. Now the aunt’s wish was to get the wild Momen married, to make him settle into family life. She wanted a simple, homely bride for the ever-smiling Momen. When he heard this, Momen agreed, bashfully. He would come home from abroad, and a bride would come to the house.

Momen sent a lot of money from abroad. His income was quite good. A mobile phone was bought for the house. A big building was constructed. Since Momen was the youngest, he had built a four-room house for himself, saying he would live with his mother. There he would stay with his mother, his bride, and himself. Everything was proceeding according to the wedding plans.

# Girls Being Seen

By then, mobile phones had become quite commonplace. Nearly every third or fourth house had one. There was constant communication. Auntie was looking at girls every day. The boy would be coming home. The plan was to fix the girl before he arrived.

People from over there usually got six months’ leave when they came back home, not more. Auntie had found a girl she liked. The daughter of a distant relative of hers. Quite beautiful, homely. The girl’s family was agreeable too. They had already seen the boy. The two families knew each other. The matter was settled. Momen Bhai would be returning next month. After seven years. A whole, full seven years had passed in between. So much had changed in those seven years.

Everyone was excited—Momen Bhai was coming home. That Momen—the wild one, the mischievous one, the impish one, always laughing—Momen Bhai was coming home.

Everyone wondered: what did little Momen look like now? Did he still steal if he felt like it? Did he still hit people on a whim? Did he still have that habit of flicking pebbles this way and that? Did he still laugh while crying? Did he still laugh for no reason, just like before? Had he grown up? Or was he still small as ever? Was he still as reckless as before? Or had he become terribly quiet now?

Oh, so many questions would be answered next month. Momen Bhai was coming home. After seven years, a whole seven years! Everyone’s beloved Momen Bhai was coming home. They had fixed the wedding for the week right after he arrived in the first week of next month. It was 2008. Momen Bhai would arrive on July twenty-first. The wedding was set for the twenty-eighth.

Meanwhile, the bride and groom were spending all day talking on the phone. How would they set up the household, how would they live their life, if there were quarrels and misunderstandings how would they manage, who would apologize first, what did each of them like and dislike, what names would they give their children, and a thousand other sweet conversations.

Gold ornaments had been made and sent for the bride. A burka had been sent. Along with all manner of cosmetics. So that they could rush through the wedding arrangements as soon as he returned home, they were sending necessary things in advance. Everything the bride needed and wanted had been sent, nothing was left out. Everything the mother, sisters, and brothers needed had been sent. Momen Bhai had already sent all the money for the expenses. Everyone was happy. Very pleased. Momen Bhai was coming home. In just three days, on the twenty-first, he would return, and on the twenty-eighth, the wedding. Everyone in Momen Bhai’s house was joyfully shopping. There was festivity all around.

Over there, Momen Bhai thought, nothing much had been bought for himself. This time it was his turn to shop. He bought prayer beads for his mother, a prayer mat, perfume, all kinds of cosmetics and other things, and came out of the shop. Shopping done. He smiled to himself. He thought, oh, after all these ages he would finally see his dear ones. Listen, would mother embrace him and cry a lot when she first saw him? Would she keep anxiously touching his face and kissing him again and again? How long it had been since he felt his mother’s affection, how long since he had been hit by his mother’s hand. Momen Bhai thought that the moment he saw her, he would say to her, “Mother, here, take this chest, hit me once and sharpen your hand on it—you’ve let it go so dull all these years without using it!”

Perhaps this is what Momen Bhai was thinking, smiling to himself. Would his sisters embrace him tightly? Would they cry out loud? What did they look like now? Would his bride-to-be be so shy she’d hide her face on first meeting? How would she start the conversation? Would she speak first, or would he?

# The Last Journey

What did his eyes look like? Did he wear kohl? Did dimples appear when he smiled? Did he sometimes lower his gaze in shame?

Moemen Brother was lost in thought again—ah, what colorful, mischievous days those were! Would the houses whose roofs he’d pelted with stones still recognize him? Did the jujube trees on the other side of the village still stand, or had they chopped them down? Was anyone still stealing mangoes from Paru’s orchard? Did the coconut trees still bear fruit like before? Did village boys still steal coconuts? This time, which garden could he raid without getting caught? Would he meet his old friends? Or had they all become too busy with life’s demands?

Moemen Brother’s mind kept circling back to his village. Seven years away, and now—the joy of homecoming danced in the corners of his eyes. It was a joy beyond words. Lost in these thoughts, a small smile playing on his lips, he crossed the street. Halfway across, a large lorry came hurtling from the opposite direction and crushed him. His body was mangled beneath the wheels like a cockroach, flattened in an instant. One living being. One man. Moemen Brother. Gone silent in a heartbeat.

Before dying, Moemen Brother had screamed once: “Oh Mother, Mother…”

At that very spot, his entire body was torn apart. Limbs scattered, severed from one another, strewn across the pavement. Blood fountained in arcs, washing the surroundings. His brain spilled out, sticking to the tar with a wet, sickening sound. The gushing stream of blood erased all the dreams that had been alive in a living man, washing them away into nothing.

Moemen Brother was dead. Killed instantly. Not even time to blink. He had no chance to speak another word, no opportunity—only that one cry: Mother.

His limp, lifeless body lay plastered in the middle of the road. No one would ever know whom he’d wanted to see one last time. What final words had he meant to speak? Which particular sorrow in his heart had doubled as life drained from him? What had the pain been like? When those heavy, crushing wheels pressed down on his chest, had Moemen Brother been gasping for breath? Had a desperate will to live flared in his eyes and face? When the impact knocked his teeth loose, when fragments of glass shattered inside his eyes, what had he felt? We would never know the answers.

A few men ran over and gathered the scattered pieces of his body, rushing them to the hospital. The tar-paved road was soaked red with blood. Yet in just a few more days, there was supposed to be a crimson celebration—a wedding. Moemen Brother, who had returned home with pockets full of old stories to tell, whose mouth now had no teeth left—they’d been scattered across the pavement, ground into dust.

The hands meant to hold his bride’s hand lay shattered, bones splintered into fragments. The chest meant to embrace his mother, to weep and cry out against her—those ribs were crushed, the soft innards pulped and hanging out. The legs that used to run and leap, earning him daily beatings from his mother and elder brothers—one of them now lay detached on the road. These feet would never run again. No more dancing, no more bounding. Brother was still now. Lifeless. Dead.

# Lifeless Eyes

Lifeless eyes, a body broken and mangled.

Just days ago they were arranging his wedding. And now the groom-to-be has become a corpse, complete and utter. So many dreams, so many schemes, so much hope, so many desires, so much joy—all of it snuffed out in an instant! Everything had come to an end along with that one body.

Momen was dead. Word reached home. Everyone was told the truth. Everyone except his mother. She was told that Momen’s car had been in a slight collision, that he was fine. Yet her anxiety only grew.

The others in the house began to cry in hushed corners. When his eldest sister suddenly broke into loud sobs, suspicion hardened in his mother’s mind. She became restless, frantic. She kept trying to speak to Momen. How was he now? Was he in much pain? Was it bad? Where did it hurt? Could he eat anything? Was it difficult for him to talk? He hadn’t called all day—not even once. Why hadn’t he? He was never like this! Even if it hurt, make him talk to me a little, my heart’s going wild not knowing! Let me hear his voice, tell me where all he’s been hurt!

Saying all this, his mother wept. Then Momen’s eldest brother, steeling himself, held her by the shoulders and said in one urgent breath, “Mother, Momen is gone. There was an accident. He died instantly.” Before he could finish, his mother collapsed like a sack to the ground, unconscious.

Slowly, relatives began gathering at Momen’s house. The entire house came crashing down in grief. On the very day Momen had promised to return home, he did come home. But not alive—his body shattered, cut, stitched together crudely. Two days after the accident, after the postmortem, Momen was kept frozen and sent back to his country.

Hundreds of people began gathering from all directions. The crowd grew eager to see Momen one last time. The vehicle arrived. His coffin was placed in the courtyard. The lid was left open, giving everyone a chance to look. There was a rush among the crowd to see Momen once more. The scene after death is always a clamorous one.

They brought his mother—who had lost consciousness several times—holding her up, to the front of the coffin. Seven years! A full seven years since mother and son had seen each other. Now they faced each other. The young Momen had returned. That wild, mischievous, restless Momen was now still, silent, unmoved, frozen, at peace. Yet there was supposed to be so much to say when they met. He wasn’t smiling now the way he used to, pulling off his shirt to show his back and saying, “Mother, look, go on and hit me—see how hard you can hit!” That ever-laughing Momen, who used to tell jokes and make everyone laugh—he wasn’t laughing now, wasn’t saying a word, wasn’t making anyone smile with his wit.

His mother stood gazing at Momen’s face, yet Momen gave no sign, no response. For the first time, Momen wasn’t being mischievous or playful. Once, they had to beat him every day just to make him sit still and be calm. That Momen was calm now. And this very calmness of his was tearing apart his mother’s chest, her eyes, her heart. Wailing and crying, his mother, restless and distraught, ran her hands over his eyes and face again and again, kissing his face over and over.

Nothing of Momen was shown except his face.

# The Marks on His Face

Seeing a few cuts and scars on his face, Auntie lets out a cry that seems to tear her chest open. She kisses those marks again and again, saying, “My darling boy, my precious one, my golden child—whose beautiful face has been scarred? My Momen, my dear, you are hurt!”

Auntie keeps trying to see the wounds on his chest. But those carrying the coffin won’t show her the ravaged body. She goes on wailing, insisting now with force that she must see her son’s chest. She tugs at the white shroud, trying to unknot it. Finally, they yield—they unwrap part of the cloth and expose his chest to her. I don’t know what that terrible sight did to Auntie. No sound comes. No scream, no outcry. No movement at all. Within a moment, she crumples—*dhapas*—and falls to the ground.

Today, the chest she was meant to hold against her own for hours, clasping him close, lies mangled instead—carved and scarred beyond recognition. How long these wounds will remain etched in Auntie’s heart, no one can say. No one ever will. Perhaps she is remembering all the times she beat restless Momen senseless, trying to make him sit still, nothing ever worked—and now, as if he has taken his final revenge, he lies perfectly still forever.

Momen’s brothers and sisters are all crying, their chests heaving with sobs. Today was meant to be a day of wild joy. But instead, turning the whole world aside, the restless Momen has become quiet. He lies still, his body riddled with countless cuts and gashes, row upon row of broken wounds. Dear Momen, who came home brimming with love, his chest is crushed, shattered. Before the day could even end, Momen drowned in the wrong hour.

The coffin reeks. The smell grows stronger by the moment. They must bury him soon.

Momen’s bride-to-be has been brought. They are to meet today. This first meeting will also be the last. The bride-to-be cries silently, her lips pressed together, watching. Perhaps she thinks: an unlived life lies on this stretcher. Perhaps she thinks: how many untold stories hung on this life that never was—so much happiness, so many dreams, so much joy and delight and tenderness that should have been woven into this body. So many words were meant to be spoken, but they remained unspoken—and now never will be. With this mutilated body, they will bury two people’s unfulfilled home, their shattered nest of dreams. First meeting, first face-to-face, first touch that will never come—what cruel deprivation comes before even possession! And then: every first becomes the last. Oh… life.

Momen is being taken away. To his real address. When Momen was small and couldn’t walk, his older brother would lift him onto his shoulders and carry him from room to room, from courtyard to courtyard. Momen would sometimes giggle with delight; sometimes he would demand to go further, asking for more. Today too, that same older brother has lifted Momen onto his shoulders to carry him to his permanent home. But this time there is no giggle on Momen’s lips. There is no request, no plea for more. Everyone watches in silence as Momen rides, voiceless, motionless, still, lifeless, dim, indifferent.

In the garden, the brightest, blood-red flower that bloomed last fell first. The lamp that burned brilliantly went out suddenly before all others. Today, the brightest lamp in the house will be lowered into the dark grave.

The stretcher is lifted onto shoulders. The wailing grows louder. Auntie, as consciousness returns, comes running through her lament. She grabs the foot of one of the bearers with all her strength, trying to hold them back, desperate to see Momen one last time. Two or three women hold Auntie, keeping her from the stretcher. As it moves farther away, her lamentation only grows.

As Momen Bhai was carried further away, Aunty’s struggle to free herself from their grip only intensified. Then, abruptly, the wailing stopped.

Momen Bhai was being taken to the graveyard on his elder brother’s shoulders. Behind him, an unfinished story left incomplete. Along with him, another death. The work of the gathered mourners grew heavier still. Before one fresh sorrow could even dry, another newly born grief appeared before their eyes. The world’s deepest truth enacted simultaneously on the same stage. Momen Bhai had granted his mother eternal release from all tears, all torment, all suffering. Through the rebirth of old bonds, the seeming conclusion of the story stretched a little longer.

There are some things I want to write about. Before I write them, let me say this: there is not a grain of vengefulness in me. I have many stories to tell people—stories of wrongs I’ve suffered—and I don’t need to live by seeking revenge on anyone.

Momen Bhai’s mother had once called my father to settle a land dispute concerning their property. My father was a village arbitrator, he helped everyone, and everyone respected him. Another faction had forcibly seized Momen Bhai’s family’s land. While trying to resolve their problem, my father was murdered—though he had no stake in it, no gain to be had. He had simply gone to speak for them. After Father’s death, it was decided in the arbitration that Momen Bhai’s family would look after our family. Until our brothers came of age, they were given a small plot of land in the settlement to be farmed by our family. Six months after Father died, they took away even that meager piece of land. They never provided us any real help, yet my father had to die for them. They owned much land, yet they wouldn’t even let us farm that little plot. Now Momen Bhai’s family is no longer what it was. It has crumbled into pieces.

Before Momen Bhai went abroad, he had gone to play cricket with my elder brother and quarreled over who should bat first. In anger, he struck my brother’s head with a cricket bat, cracking his skull. After that, my brother remained abnormal for many years. Even now, the effects of that blow linger in his brain.

When Momen Bhai died, I felt a small sorrow. Death is a perfectly natural thing. One should never see death through the lens of revenge. My elder brother was among those who carried Momen Bhai’s stretcher. That day I saw clearly how my brother cried out loud in tears. The two of them were friends, nearly the same age. Momen Bhai was only somewhat older than my brother.

Momen Bhai’s mother was terribly miserly, yet never treated anyone badly. They had property, wealth, influence—everything except a conscience. Those people had no compassion in their hearts. Though they were rich in money, they were poor in spirit. Not everyone in this world can be wealthy; some are poor people with money, and they were very much like that.

I never saw my mother treat anyone with disrespect. My mother’s sense of honor is ten times greater than mine. Those who live by their self-respect in this world—others never get the chance or occasion to dishonor them. Without Father, Mother had to live frugally, cook less, live very simply, it’s true. But I never saw her beg at anyone’s door. She ran the household by operating a sewing machine. Momen Bhai’s family were wealthy people who were poor in spirit, while my mother was a poor woman who was rich in spirit. That is where the difference between us lay.

# If My Mother Were in Their Place

If my mother had been in their position, all the responsibilities of that family would have fallen to her. I’m not saying this just because she’s my mother—my mother’s heart is larger than the sky itself. Even in such poverty, she would help others, give them shelter. There was so much want in the village those days, though people don’t lack as much now. I never once saw a hungry, destitute person come to our door and leave unfed.

There’s something else. That day, I didn’t cry much myself. I don’t know why, but the tears wouldn’t come. I’d felt an aversion to that family since childhood. While others in my family mingled with them, I never did. My heart wouldn’t consent to it. I still don’t. Yet they still visit us. They come especially to ask about me. They keep urging me to visit their home. They speak to me with genuine respect. Why, I don’t know. But the problem is this: once aversion has hardened in me, it never melts.

Our family had no father, and we were poor besides. A mother from such a family can be told anything. But my mother—you could never say anything you pleased to her. You still can’t. She has no grievances against anyone. She’s a devout woman, and devout people should have no complaints about anything at all.