Juned Subhan

Murderer! You son of a dog, murderer!

            Rishitesh Mukerji’s heart sank and he wiped the grit from his stinging, damp eyes. He narrowly missed being thumped in the chin by a factory worker as a pair of security guards at the New Market Garment Factory in the outskirts of northwest Dhaka in an industrial estate, escorted him to the company headquarters. They squeezed their way through the heaving crowd of labourers sizzling with anger. “Murderer!” they repeatedly yelled, grabbing onto the metal bars of the gates, rattling them and the gates bulged forward, the thick metal chains clanking like a bag of loose coins. The guards clamped the gates shut with the assistance of several police officers who struck the crowd with their batons to push them back. Rishitesh brushed the dust off his shirt, noticing the tear along the seams on his right shoulder where someone had yanked the collar. A top button from his shirt had come off and there were scratches on his neck and the side of his face as if he’d been grazed by a pack of wild cats. He breathed slowly, his back and armpits clammy with sweat. He’d bitten his tongue and the tang of rusty blood slivered down his throat when he swallowed.

            Nervously, he glanced back. The crowd continued to yell at him: women chewing paan spat globs of saliva towards his direction, waving their fists in the air. Plumes of sandy dust rose in the air, billowing in hazy clouds around the crowd and for a moment, Rishitesh could barely see anything. The entire industrial estate appeared barren, a wide wasteland apart from the tall, white tower blocks in the distance smeared with swipes of dirt due to the sultry weather, as though over the years the grime and grief of the city had soaked through them.

            “You son of a bitch!” a man yelled, flinging a rock. “You should have died instead of that woman! On the Day of Judgement, you’ll burn in hell along with the rest of those bastard managers!” A female employee who worked on the shop floor sewing garments had died in the factory after being overworked. Though managers had tried to veil the death as an accident, the story had leaked into the local press followed by being plucked up by the foreign media, including a leaked video on Youtube exposing the dire working conditions men, women and young children had to put up with, often working in the dark for long hours sewing clothes for international brands. As the floor manager for one of the sites, it surprised Rishitesh how swiftly the news had spread. Dhaka garment factory pays its workers less than a cup of Starbucks coffee, blared one headline in a prominent British newspaper. Several women report being sexually harassed and even raped, screamed another one while one media channel announced, Modern day hell for the poor in Bangladesh, urging its viewers to stop buying clothes from the high street where shirts, jeans and dresses had been sewn by the suffering hands of the destitute.

            Rishitesh turned round, facing the headquarters. The guards nudged him forward and before he stepped inside the building, he looked up at the August sky, and the sun, the colour of golden wheat, blazed fiercely in a marble-white sky. The sound of the crowd thinned and once inside, the guards followed him up the winding staircase to the seventh floor to the executive office. The steep, wooden staircase creaked and shafts of light knifed down through the thick windows. Rishitesh noticed surfs of white dust swirling in the air like freckles of glitter. The heavy air weighed down on him and his ears still stung with the shouting outside. He stopped for a second, clenching the dusty banister. His heart pinched with a sharp pain.

            “I need the bathroom,” he said to the guards on the fifth floor. “Please…”

            “Fine, but don’t take long,” one of them with a thin moustache stated.

            Rishitesh turned into the narrow corridor, towards the toilets. He caught sight of his office, his desk, the bundles of files and a monochrome photograph of his wife Mira and daughter Kejal beside his desktop computer. He’d taken the photograph in Mirpur Botanical Garden when Kejal was in her final year at Saint Matthews Girls’ High School near Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, prior to attending Dhaka University to study dentistry followed by a year abroad at New York University’s College of Dentistry. Mira smiled, strands of hair like black silk billowing over her bright face in the breeze. A handful of his co-workers rustled about in the office and a female colleague spotted him. She appeared startled with a pinched mouth. For a second, Rishitesh anticipated his colleague would strike a conversation with him, but instead she flicked the other way, shutting the door. 

            Quietly, he entered the dingy bathroom which reeked of urine and faeces from the squat toilet in the corner. Mosquitoes buzzed through an opening in the cracked wall and after urinating, he washed his hands and splashed cold water over his oily face. Rishitesh stared at the mirror, briefly not recognising himself, the dark circles under his eyes and the wrinkles ingrained along his forehead. A loud knocking on the door jolted him.

            “Hurry up!” one of the guards said, sounding irritable.

            “Yes, I won’t be long,” he answered, sighing. He exhaled.

            Rishitesh made his way up to the boardroom, a place he’d barely visited in his entire career. This is where management hid away from the ground floor where everyone busied themselves working whilst the ones at the top did little in big, empty offices except stare down at the people below. Everyone must appear miniscule from up here, he realised. He passed a junior office clerk who walked by without making eye contact. The click of his shoes echoed down the staircase and the young clerk reminded Rishitesh of his younger days in the company which didn’t seem that long ago. He found it odd how during his youth the future seemed irrelevant and distant, but now he felt it encroaching upon him. Then, one of the guards thrust his arm out like a sword in front of him outside the large, heavy walnut wooden doors of the executive suite. 

            “You wait here,” he said, as if addressing a child and not a fifty-seven year old man. 

            Rishitesh strained to hear what was being said beyond the doors but couldn’t determine anything. The guard came out and said he could go in. He slipped inside. A dozen board members, all men, dressed in brown suits sat stiffly around the long, rectangular mahogany table. A few of them bit their lips and a musky odour lingered in the dimly-lit room. Photographs of former factory directors were pinned on the walls and the thick, beige curtains had been pulled in, blocking the view of Dhaka outside. The ceiling fan whirred, its cables poking out of the plastering like a twist of worms. Swirls of dust hung in the air and due to the low lights, the directors appeared smeared in blurry haze. One of them coughed loudly, clearing his throat as if licks of dust coated the lining of his throat.

            “Take a seat Mr. Mukerji,” the chief executive said and Rishitesh pulled a chair and sat down, hands on his lap, under the table. The chief executive turned over a piece of paper from a file in front of him while another director whispered in his ear. Rishitesh felt his shirt collar tighten around his neck like a rubber band, pressing into his skin. They all had glasses of iced-water in front of them, though no one offered him one. He found it bemusing to think that all these men individually earned more than the every other worker on the ground level collectively put together. Slowly, they shifted their beady eyes over him like svelte, sharp blades. 

            “We don’t believe in wasting time Mr. Mukerji,” the chief executive said, “time is after all money. I’m sure you know because of what’s happened, we are forced to make a difficult decision.” He paused then shoved a piece of paper across to him. Rishitesh scan read the first half of the document, his eyes resting over the title, Termination of contract – immediate dismissal. He didn’t bother to read the small print.

            “Because of your errors, we face losing a number of foreign contracts,” another director seated at the end of the table said in a raspy voice. Rishitesh could barely distinguish his face as though he wore a white mask. “A British retailer is flying out one of their inspectors to check the factories. In all my years in this company, never has this happened.” He sucked in his lips. “What I don’t understand is, how the hell did someone manage to take a mobile phone in with them? It’s your job as a manager to make sure no one does. That’s what we pay you for. I still don’t understand how these shits can afford mobile phones. They’re screaming outside that we don’t pay them enough, yet the whores always have the latest phones. I say we pay them too much. Either that, or the men are whoring their wives and daughters in some back street brothel.”

            “I don’t know,” Rishitesh answered. “We always did our checks… Sometimes these things happen.”

            A few of the directors sniggered. “We don’t want to waste any more time,” the chief executive said. “We have decided to dismiss you from your role. The guards will take you out through the back door.”

            “What about my things in the office?”

            “They will be posted out to you. You are to not go anywhere else in this building or speak to anyone. Now, please go.”

            The double doors groaned open, the guards tapped his shoulders then escorted him down, through the murky basement and outside where the waste disposal bins lay huddled together. The guards shoved him forward then slammed the metal doors shut. Rishitesh stared ahead, towards the back alleyway. Leaves of paper lay scattered on the ground. He suddenly found it funny that whereas once these pieces of paper held a degree of importance in his life, they were now utterly useless. An image of his wife flashed in Rishitesh’s mind, as in the black and white photograph. He could hear her laughter fading out like a whisper. Don’t worry my love, eventually everything slips through our fingers, ourselves included. His head, weary of certain thoughts and memories, started to hurt. His feet became numb and he felt he wouldn’t be able to move. Wiping his eyes, Rishitesh took off his blazer and walked out. 

            A dirty, disembowelled mattress lay tossed down the side of the path with an emaciated dog curled on top of it, panting in the heat. The dog had patches of fur missing from its body, revealing raw, wet skin. Further up, a trio of boys stood against a wall in front of a colony and urinated, spraying straw-coloured urine in gushing angles. They snickered, dressed in torn vests and ripped shorts. As soon as they saw Rishitesh, they scurried away. Ropes of grey smoke spiralled up from the colony with the choking stench of burning wood, being used in clay ovens for food preparation. He heard women yelling and the rancid smell of open latrines drifted past. He covered his mouth and to his left, down a narrow path, piles of rubbish lay heaped in tangles of plastic and a girl and a woman rummaged through them.

            Later, as Rishitesh made his way to the train station to catch a train home to Mirzapur, he realised this would be the last time he’d ever catch a train home from work. He inhaled; his scalp tingled. Pensively, he gazed at the rail tracks and in the back of his mind, he saw himself trapped in a winding, dank tunnel. A gust of cold air flurried up towards him while a necklace of white, screaming lights seemed to go one forever. Ahead, he saw a figure walking down the tunnel, their footsteps reverberating as they walked further away from him, growing smaller and smaller until the figure vanished.

            “Babu! Babu! Many, many English books!” a young boy hollered repeatedly at him on the platform, trying to sell him foreign, romantic novels with covers depicting men and women in amorous embraces in flowery, pink backgrounds, as well as snacks, dried banana chips and roasted peanuts. The boy smiled, his eyes gleaming and Rishitesh bought a pack of peanuts and gave him twenty taka instead of five. The boy scurried away to a group of other sellers who looked over at him and Rishitesh lowered his gaze in the crowd, not wanting to be recognised as he waited for the train. The mid-afternoon sun burnt like a bright disc in the sky, pressing down on him, the sticky air as hot as a red furnace. Still, the station bloated like a giant lung with commuters, men dressed in suits and women in shalwar kameezes, saris and black burqas. Rishitesh stood sandwiched in between a bulge of people as the train rumbled up to the platform with a line of travellers squatting on top of it. He noticed a pair of rats, fat as cats, scurrying around the tracks, and disappearing along the side of the tracks. Passengers from the roof of the train willowed down as a bubble of people tumbled out, knocking and bumping against him. He felt someone’s elbow jab against his chest like a pointed stick. Rishitesh squeezed into one of the carriages, nuzzling into a seat next to the window as other passengers rushed in. 

            “Babu! More English books!” another male seller said to him, waving a book at him against the window and a flurry of other sellers joined him rapidly, forming a circle. “Special books from England, only three hundred taka!” He stared at Rishitesh, almost pleadingly, and though he didn’t recognise the title, for a second he felt tempted to buy it to make him go away. 

            “Oi! Move away!” the burly train conductor suddenly said, hulking into the carriage.  He banged a stick against the window, nearly hitting the boy’s knuckles. 

            “Why? Is this your dad’s place?” the boy said. “You don’t own this station.”

            “Neither does your dad,” the conductor argued. “Now get lost before I have one of the police officers ring you out like a dish cloth!”

            “Ish babu!” the boy said, grinning. “Why you call the police? They might take you away because of how much you scream. In fact, you scream more than my eighty-three year old grandmother who’s stuck in a wheelchair. You always do this and because of you, business is going down!” He stuck his tongue out like a lizard and the other sellers chortled.

            “Showing me your tongue! Get out!” the conductor yelled, banging his stick against the train and they whizzed off. “Bloody idiots,” he hissed under his breath than gawking at Rishitesh he said, “Ticket?” 

            “Excuse me?”

            “Your ticket.”

            “Oh…,” Rishitesh replied, fumbling in his pockets. “I did buy one…”

            “No ticket, you have to leave the train.”

            “No, no, I did buy one,” he said patting his chest, “just one minute…” 

            “Here,” a fellow female passenger said, picking it up from the floor. “You must have dropped it.”

            “Thank you,” Rishitesh said, avoiding direct eye contact.

            The conductor snatched the ticket from his hand, squinting, the clicked it with a hole puncher and returned it to him. Rishitesh heard a loud whistle; the train lurched forward, rattling like a set of loose teeth, before gaining speed and swerving away from the station. He watched a married couple sat huddled in front of him eat together from a silver, steel tiffin. The smell of fried shallots and mustard lifted in the air. He thought about Mira and how she used to prepare his lunch for him in a tiffin to take to work every day. He could see his wife in the kitchen now, dressed in a yellow silk sari with a gold border, humming to herself while she prepared mishti doi, tomato chutney, curried potatoes with okra and boiled rice. She’d kiss him just as he left, handing him the tiffin. Make sure you ring me soon as you get to the office, she’d say.  I don’t want you to be like other men in offices who chase young secretaries! He always chuckled when she said that, teasing her that maybe one day he would. Thinking about her words now, they sounded distant to him, as if they were being whispered to him by a ghost. 

            Rishitesh’s gaze drifted away from the married couple as the train reached one of the main city bridges in Dhaka, arching like a bow over the Burigana River. Greenish-brown waters snaked under the bridge, extending for miles past the southern regions of the city. He noticed the poor families that lived on the side of the river in tiny huts made out of rusty tin and mud. A lip of sewage foamed along the river’s fringes and squatting women washed clothes in filthy water, bashing them against slabs of stone while children paddled and swam in the river. Despite monsoon rain and wind every year, it never ceased to amaze Rishitesh how the huts remained intact and boats sailed along the waters with fishermen flinging their wide nets to catch the daily fish. Still, as the train rattled on through towards the south of Dhaka, it passed villages and rice fields, gleaming green and Rishitesh’s eyes returned back to the married couple. They’d fallen asleep, their bodies rocking side to side, gently, along with the sway of the train and the man rested his head in the curve of his wife’s neck. Then, a flood of harsh sunlight seeped into the carriage. Rishitesh felt his eyesight fade momentarily, as he saw only a canvas of harsh yellow light, until the train screeched through the dark tunnel and he shut his eyes.

            Later, he drank a glass of hot chai at a vendor on College Road, not far from Mirzapur Station, along with other office workers on their way home from work. A number of the men were young, and looking at them reminded Rishitesh of his younger days, of being married and going to and from the office. He didn’t strike a conversation with any of them, hearing them speaking about their families and wives. He then walked all the way home, not returning until the evening. Further up College Road, he walked past the bazaar selling fish, fried snacks and stalls selling spices, huge jackfruits and golden mangoes. The Rose Garden Shopping Complex brimmed with families out for the evening, eating foreign chocolate cakes in cafés and Rishitesh noticed the cinnamon sky bruised with flecks of orange as if tainted with the city’s dying embers. Rickshaws, tuk-tuks and motorbikes clogged the roads and the towering white buildings appeared shapeless, and a hint of hazy pink light tinged the edges of them. The call for evening prayer from a local mosque resounded in the air and a flock of swifts swooped past the mosque’s dome.

            Rishitesh walked slowly as he reached Old Mission Road, lined with rain trees. Only a few empty rickshaws tinkled past him, though a few stalls remained open. He moved tentatively as he approached his house. The smell of incense and jasmine from one of the homes wafted past and his nose itched. The trees sweeping up the road resembled giant limbs, towering over the buildings with drooping branches and inches away from his house, Rishitesh had the same vision again, of walking in a tunnel with an indistinct figure walking ahead of him and getting smaller and smaller as they moved further away. With trepidation, he opened his gates, sneaking into his own front yard. If anyone witnessed him now, they’d believe he was acting like a thief in his own premises. Through the gap in the bushes he saw his neighbours, Mr. and Mrs. Chandra speaking to guests leaving their home. Their eldest son had recently married a girl from a family of prominent architects in Dhaka and twists of marigolds from the wedding day still dangled down from the façade of their large, three storey house. Mrs. Chandra had distributed boxes of mishti to local residents, yet Rishitesh had felt embarrassed accepting them, considering he’d never offered any treats to his neighbours in the past. 

            “Congratulations on your new daughter-in-law,” one of the female guests said. “I predict in nine months you’ll be a grandmother of six grandsons Mrs. Chandra!”

            “Oh! Two will be enough!” Mrs. Chandra replied, coyly. “Otherwise I’ll have to build another floor in my home.”

            “Well, if you do that, people will start saying your son is keeping you downstairs while he’s enjoying himself upstairs with his wife!” another guest joked, making everyone laugh. 

            “Your’re right,” Mr. Chandra said. “That’s what young people are now doing in Bangladesh. Everyone now wants their own home. Young people want too much freedom. After they finish university, they forget their family and want to do their own thing!”

            “Absolutely correct!” Mrs. Chandra said, in agreement with her husband. “I blame all those American television shows. In my day, we didn’t get anything but now you have everything. Who knows what people are watching? Someone told me you can now watch television on your phone, may the Almighty forgive us.”

            Rishitesh sighed listening to their conversation. Despite wanting to sneeze, his nostrils itching crazily, he pinched his nose and crept up along the path and round to the back of the house. The ground crunched as he tiptoed; a twig snapped under his foot. He bit his tongue. Rishitesh snuck inside then leaned up against the kitchen door, taking a deep breath to calm himself down and enable his heart rate to return to normal. The silence weighed down on him and he didn’t bother to switch the lights on. He presumed many of his neighbours probably knew about his situation; most likely they’d discussed it during dinner. He shifted about in the gloom, poured himself a glass of cold water from the fridge and sank in the couch in the lounge. He imagined if he turned up for work tomorrow, the guards would boot him out of the building. Rishitesh shuddered, tears gathering in the corner of his eyes. He thought he heard the tinkle of ankle bracelets in another room. He listened. Mira used to wear ankle bracelets, he remembered. 

            “What are you doing sat in the dark, Baba?”

            The lights in the lounge flashed brightly after Kejal switched them on. She stood at the doorway, dressed in an olive-green shalwar kameez and a silk scarf wrapped in a pleat around her neck. She entered using her own key Rishitesh had given his daughter. Married to a doctor, she lived with her husband and eight year old son Xavier twenty minutes away in the west of Dhaka. 

            He rubbed his eyes. “Sometimes it’s better to sit in the dark than in the light.” He leaned his head back. “Lately, I’m wondering if it’s better to remain in the dark.”

            Kejal shuffled around, readjusting the cushions and drawing in the curtains. Just like her mother, he thought, pottering about when something was brewing in her mind. 

            “Darkness doesn’t last forever, Baba. It’s not supposed to. There’s always certainty of light in the morning, no matter how terrible things might be.” Kejal stared at her father, a glint in her eye and Rishitesh glanced up, a smile on his face. It still seemed like yesterday when she was a little girl, gambolling around the house, playing, while Mira called them both to eat their lunch in the dining-room. Shall we make your mother wait? he’d whisper in Kejal’s ear and they’d nod together, doing their best not to giggle. You go and hide and I’ll tell your mother I can’t find you, he’d say and later when Kejal would pop out of a hidden corner to scare her mother, Rishitesh would burst into a fit of laughter. Mira bemoaned that he was worse than a child, saying she’d be surprised if he’d ever grow up. Rishitesh wondered what happened to that laughter of his. 

            “Your mother once said the same thing to me,” he said.

            She sat down next to him, taking her father’s hand in hers. “Mama said a lot of things.” She paused then went on, “I heard what happened, Baba. A woman from your office called when I was here earlier. She told me to remind you that your belongings will be posted out.”

            “It’d be better if they threw it all away,” he said, eyes downcast. “There’s nothing of much value there.”

            “It’s cruel what they’ve done but you mustn’t blame yourself. You didn’t murder anyone.”

            “We don’t have to murder someone by killing them with our own two hands, do we? Isn’t doing nothing also murder? I didn’t do anything to help that woman who died…”

            “What could you have done, Baba? The sad thing is, this happens all the time in Bangladesh and it always will. If you say something, you’re in trouble and if you don’t, you’re still guilty. You can’t win either way.”

            “It’s the poor that pay the price, Kejal. I wonder why I didn’t do anything? What was I so afraid of?” His mind turned dark; he envisaged himself in the tunnel again. She hugged him and affectionately planted a kiss on his forehead. 

            “After your mother’s passing, I feel everything’s slipping through my fingers. Maybe this was the final thing to slip through. Your mother used to say this happens to all of us eventually.” 

            “That’s nonsense Baba,” Kejal said, waving a hand in the air. “If Mama was here, I’d tell her off myself.”

            “Yes, and then she’d have a go at me saying I encourage you.”

            They both chuckled a little; Rishitesh rubbed his eyes again. “She did used to complain that you spoiled me too much,” Kejal remarked then mimicking her mother’s lilting voice, she said, “Wait, you’ll see, one day that girl will have you dancing on her every whim on her little finger, then you’ll be sorry! Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

            “Well, she wasn’t wrong there was she?” he said, a change in his voice and the tint in his face lifted. She felt glad he smiled.

            She pinched her father’s cheek, jumped up from the couch and pulled her father’s arm in the same way she used to when she was little and pestering him for something. “Baba, you have to get up, you look like you haven’t washed in a week. Come on, get up! Go and have a wash and put some fresh clothes on. I’ve bought food, I’ll set everything in the dining-room.” She whisked away into the kitchen, clattering the dishes and Rishitesh breathed in, looking around the lounge. He switched the lights off and stood in the dark for a few minutes, as if it felt comforting and sheathed him like a velvet glove. He turned to his bedroom, peering at the bed, thinking of Mira, of holding onto her as they lay in bed together until he had to let go, a twine of her fallen hair on the pillow. He found it strange how death makes you fearful almost of holding onto someone. He could still hear the clink of her glass bangles, the distant echo of her giggles. A photograph of her with white flowers laced through her long hair hung on the wall. Rishitesh had taken it in Sylhet in his ancestral village when she’d become pregnant with Kejal. Looking at it now, he recalled they’d bickered, playfully, over what they’d name their child if it was a boy or a girl, and eventually he’d succumbed to his wife’s insistence of naming their daughter after Mira’s great grandmother. Back then, Rishitesh had wished they’d had twins, a boy and a girl, then he would have given his son a name of his picking. Nevertheless, Mira probably would have won that battle against him as well. Looking closer at the photograph, he noticed a shimmer of the village pond in the background. He touched the frame; it felt cold. He saw the outline of his own reflection against the glass like a shadow, a ghost lingering behind him. He turned away from the picture.

            “Baba,” Kejal called out, “rice is ready!”

            Rishitesh yawned into the dining-room having washed and oiled his body with almond oil. He dressed in a lilac cotton lungi pleated around his waist and a loose fitting shirt. Kejal had set the table with steaming rice, koi fish in mustard oil gravy, okra bhajee and a goat curry with green chillies and potatoes. She’d pulled out her mother’s finest bone china plates rimmed in a gold leaf pattern, a wedding gift from Mira’s side of the family in Sylhet. During their marriage, Mira had only used them on special occasions such as Eid or for their wedding anniversary. Kejal placed a vase of red roses in the centre of the dining-table with a trio of burning candles. Rishitesh stared at the plates. In his wife’s absence, they appeared to have very little value. He didn’t understand why he hadn’t gotten rid of them by donating them to a local charity like The Sunrise Old People’s Home near the district, government hospital. The widows and widowers there would be able to make good use of them. Rishitesh, now, would be content with an ordinary bowl, plate, and cup and saucer for his tea. 

            “What’s all this for?” he asked, suspiciously, pulling a chair and taking a seat. “Romantic dinner, is it? Or have you got a surprise for me? You know I hate surprises. I hope you haven’t invited the whole neighbourhood to join us for dinner.”

            “No, Baba, I haven’t,” Kejal answered nonchalantly, not making direct eye contact.

            “Ei! Are you hiding something from me? You haven’t got another man on the side have you, that I don’t know about and who’s going to appear in front of me like magic?” He rolled up his sleeves, his mouth watering slightly at the smell of food.

            Kejal laughed. “No, Baba, but trust you to say such a thing! I see you haven’t lost your childishness. I wanted to treat you. Is it so wrong for me to have a nice meal with my own father?” She placed a hand on his shoulder and served rice and fish first on his plate before her own.

            “So why the flowers? And why have you taken out these fancy plates?”

            “Mama would have wanted me to.”

            Rishitesh sighed, not saying anything, squishing rice and fish together using his fingers. There was no point in being vexed with her and she sat next to him.

            “Have you washed your hands, Baba?”

            “Of course I have!” he exclaimed, blushing, realising he’d forgotten to and she gave him a wary look. 

            “So what will you do now, considering you’re a free man?”

            He shrugged. “I don’t know about being free… To tell you the truth, I have no idea… Perhaps I never really knew. It’s funny that, isn’t it, how you get to my age and you realise, actually, you never knew anything. Everything you thought you believed in turns out to be false. Maybe we’re all being fooled.”

            “You sound like one of those holy men on the streets, Baba.”

            “They’re just idiots,” he said.

            “My offer still stands, Baba,” Kejal said, a twinkle in her eye. “We’d love you to move in with us. Xavier would be delighted, he’s always saying how he’ll build a tree house with his Dada in the garden.”

            Mouth agape, Rishitesh said, “Not a chance! If that’s the last thing I do. If I move in with you, I’ll have to live with yours and your husband’s rules. No thank you!” He paused and looked at his daughter, noticing the creases of a smile gathering in the corner of her mouth. “Ah, now I get why you prepared this romantic meal! You thought by sweet-talking me with your mother’s style of cooking, you’d entice me to move in with you. Let me tell you young lady, I’m not a boyfriend you can fool and wrap around your finger. I should have known you’d do this but let me remind you my dear, you are my daughter, but I’m your father. I came first!”

            “It would be odd if you hadn’t come first, Baba,” Kejal said, trying her hardest not to laugh. She rolled her eyes up at the ceiling. “Honestly, I’m being serious. Xavier’s father and I would love for you to move in with us. You’d have your own double room and study. We wouldn’t bother you so you’d have your privacy and independence.”

            “That’s what they all say,” he said, chomping. “What will you do when I’m incontinent and you have to clean my urine from the floor, huh?” Seeing his daughter grit her teeth, Rishitesh continued, “You see, doesn’t sound very glamorous now, does it? Plus, I know when you’re trying to trick me, you always roll your eyes up at the ceiling, just like your mother. Now come on, finish your rice. If your mother was here now, she’d skin us both alive for letting our food grow cold.” He shook his head. “Are you sure you haven’t invited the neighbours to suddenly walk through my door? There’s a lot of rice in this bowl, unless you’re trying to fatten me up.”

            “I don’t like you being here on your own Baba,” Kejal said gently, studying her father’s face, noticing the wrinkles across his forehead as if they’d been scoured in with a sharp pencil. He looked older all of a sudden which exposed a tinge of fragility in him, more than she’d recognised before. “Is it so bad to want you to live with me and look after you? Even if you were incontinent?”

            He stared at her compassionately then briefly glanced away as if he expected Mira to be by the doorway. Rishitesh reached out and touched his daughter’s hand. “I’m absolutely fine here on my own, Kejal,” he said. “You have to lead your own life, you don’t want an old, doddering man like me to be a burden on your shoulders. Just imagine, having to carry someone like me to bed every night, it’ll be worse than putting a baby to sleep! That’s funny as well, my grandmother used to say when we become old we turn into babies again, so we’re born as babies and die as babies. Make sure you stock up on buying me Pampers nappies, toddler size!” He laughed and Kejal nodded her head, rolling her eyes. He became silent, not desiring to eat for the moment then said, “Your mother never wanted to leave our village in Sylhet. I was the one who forced her to move to Dhaka. She was pregnant with you then… I remember when she told me she was pregnant, we spent weeks arguing whether you’d be a boy or a girl…” He looked at Kejal directly, winking. “I wanted a boy.”

            Playfully, she jabbed her father’s arm with a finger. “Thanks, Baba,” Kejal said, without smiling.

            “Got you!” he said, laughing and his daughter did too. “Now come on, stop blabbering, let’s finish this meal. So much for a romantic meal, everything’s gone cold! Ish! I hope you bought some gulab jamuns with pistachio ice-cream for dessert!” He nodded at Kejal, watching her eat, thinking how when she was a child, he or Mira would feed her rice and fish using their own hands but those days had long gone. In the back of his mind, Rishitesh saw himself back inside the tunnel and one by one, the lights started to fade out. 

            The following week on Saturday, the morning edition of The Dhaka Tribune caught his attention. Rishitesh read a two page feature article on the factory scandal with hordes of employees going on strike. He felt relieved his name hadn’t been printed in the article. The journalist described how factory bosses had tried to bribe and intimidate workers to keep their mouths shut as foreign investigators conducted their inspections and safety checks. Rishitesh dwelled upon the years he’d dedicated to his job in the factory and a twinge of guilt clenched his heart. Over across another page, a large headline stood out, highlighting the multiple stabbing of a gay blogger, murdered in broad daylight in his own home in central Dhaka, for posting blogs about the way liberals, gays and those who’d abandoned the Muslim faith were being persecuted by extremists in Bangladesh. The photograph showed a handsome, young man with dusky skin and almond-shaped eyes wearing spectacles, his long, curly jet-black hair brushed back behind his ears. Rishitesh wondered what his family must be going through. The hypocrisy of the country, he thought, that while the educated and free-thinking are being obliterated, miserly factory owners practically get away with murder. He never remembered Bangladesh being this way; a secular country, it never used to be this terrible but now he felt ominous forces were stirring beneath the grounds. With each passing month, the city felt less and less safe.

            The doorbell jingled and he jolted back in his seat in the lounge.

            “I’ll get that, Baba,” Kejal said. She’d arrived early to clean the house and cook though Rishitesh insisted there wasn’t any need. He knew how to cook rice and fish, he said. “The last time you cooked, you burnt the fish,” she’d laughed and he’d replied, “I wouldn’t have done if you hadn’t distracted me!” Kejal shot back by reminding her father that he was only like other men, soon as something went wrong, they’d find an excuse to blame a female.

            She breezed into the lounge, carrying a large, battered brown box. Rishitesh raised his eyebrows, folding the newspaper away on the coffee table. “The postman was very rude today,” she griped.

            “Why? What happened?”

            She shrugged. “Don’t know, it’s the way he spoke and looked at me as though I’d done something bad.”

            “Oh…” He glanced away from her. “It looks like the box from my office. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve planted a time-bomb inside it.”

            Kejal rolled her eyes. “Trust you to say such a thing, Baba.” She kneeled beside him as he clawed the box open, taking out his belongings. They appeared so useless now, these small trinkets he’d accumulated over the years. Rishitesh couldn’t fathom what use he’d have now for any of this junk. Strange how in the office they seemed valuable, but here these items were completely pathetic like discarded items of plastic. Rummaging through, Kejal found a tube of Germaloids cream and an old condom wrapper. He quickly snatched them from her hands, his cheeks turning bright pink. Rishitesh cleared his throat, pretending to cough frenziedly. He slapped his chest while Kejal suppressed her laughter.

            “I didn’t know you still had this picture,” she said, holding the photograph of herself and her mother. “Look at those ugly braces! I remember kids in school would tease me about them. I used to hate smiling. No wonder I became a dentist. I thought you and Mama had forced me to get them to punish me.”

            “Clever girl!” he answered and Kejal gently slapped her father’s knee.

            “She was beautiful, wasn’t she?” she said, touching her mother’s face with a finger.

            “She certainly was,” he sighed. “Why don’t you keep it?”

            “No, Baba, I couldn’t.”

            “Don’t be silly, I want you to have it,” he insisted and Kejal thanked her father and said she’d keep it by her bedside table. Rishitesh remarked the sight of the box from the office made him feel sick; he wanted it to be discarded.

            Then, a loud crash made their hearts freeze for a second. The clatter of broken glass pulsed in the air. “Wait here, Baba,” she said, unnerved. Her face grew pale and she slinked out of the lounge. Rishitesh followed her and saw the lump of rock lying in the corridor; a spray of smashed glass glittered like silver across the floor. 

            “What in Allah’s name is this?” Kejal murmured and she stepped outside but saw no one hanging around near the house. Yet, seeing the broken glass, Rishitesh felt nothing as if he’d anticipated this would soon happen.

            “Oh, no Baba,” Kejal said, stepping back inside, aghast. She covered her mouth with her hands. She stood up against the wall in the corridor while he went outside and saw for himself. Someone had spray painted in red the word murderer in Bengali on the front gates. “Who would do such a thing?” she asked, outside again, resting a hand on her father’s shoulder. A rickshaw wallah cycled past them with a appalled expression on his face. “Why are you gawping like a fish, huh?” she said to a neighbour nosing in from the opposite side of the road. “Are you at a zoo? Go and mind your own business!”

            Rishitesh grabbed Kejal’s arm, pulling her inside. “Leave it,” he said, speaking in a low voice. “It’s no use, just forget it, it doesn’t matter. It must be the neighbourhood kids messing about.” He looked away, not knowing where to look or which direction to turn. 

            “Whoever did this wasn’t a child, Baba,” she said, breathing audibly. “Believe me… I mean, how dare they do this?” She flicked her hair back, sucking in her bottom lip.

            “Well, at least they didn’t write the word pimp on the gates,” he said. “There are plenty of them in Dhaka.”

            Folding her arms over her chest, she said, “This isn’t the time for jokes, Baba. I’m calling the police.”

            He regarded her uneasily then shifted away, past the smithereens of glass, appearing not to notice them. He moved into the lounge which seemed to have grown gloomy as if veiled in ink. Rishitesh unhooked the phone. “I don’t want you to call the police.”

            Kejal stared at her father, distraughtly. “But Baba, you can’t allow someone to get away with this. Today they’ve done this, what if tomorrow they do something else? I dread to think…”

            He stood silently, looking out of the windows in the lounge, seeing the flecks of silver light shimmering through the plum tree in the yard. The white sky hung low, mushroomed with clouds. A lump formed in his heart as though a sick feeling churned in the pit of his stomach. Rishitesh shook his head. “I said no, Kejal,” he said, “and that’s final, I don’t want any police officer coming into this house, never.” Though he didn’t turn around, he imagined she had a surprised expression on her face whilst biting her lip. He lowered his head.

            “You’re not a murderer, Baba,” she said, standing closer to him by his side, “and I won’t tolerate people thinking that about you. Never.”

            He glanced up at her then rubbed his eyes, as if his vision became hazy. “Maybe I’m worse than that Kejal,” Rishitesh said. “At least a murderer may eventually own up to his crime… Day in day out when I worked in the factory, I put workers on shifts knowing too well it would be too much for them, and for what? Only a pittance. That’s what happened to that woman who died, she was already sick and I put her on a shift that even a healthy person wouldn’t have coped with.” She sensed the pensiveness in her father’s voice and the way he stood hunched gave her the impression that a heavy weight pressed down on him. His eyesight started to blur again, shadows flickering by his side and a long, dark tunnel stretched in front of him. Kejal touched her father’s hand. He drew in a deep breath, looking out. 

            “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m feeling tired. For the past few days, I’ve been feeling really exhausted for some reason.” He shut his eyes.

            “You’re not a murderer, Baba,” she said, gently, “and you mustn’t believe that. It’s those rich, greedy factory owners who are the real murderers. They’re the ones who feed off the poor like leeches, they’re the ones with blood on their hands, killing the poor every day while their own stomachs get bigger.”

            “People outside don’t see blood on their hands,” he said. “They see it on mine.”

            Quietly, she withdrew from him, saying she’d clean the mess and paint over the gates. She urged her father to rest and not be vexed; she’d prepare tea for him later. Rishitesh turned round once Kejal left. Suddenly, he grew uneasy in the room as though he wasn’t in his own home but in an unfamiliar place where nothing seemed to belong to him. The lounge appeared to stretch and shrink while his legs grew cold, numb. Pieces of glass clinked as Kejal swept up the debris from the floor. The shuffling of her feet echoed in the corridor. Through the window, he watched her paint the gates. Yet, once the damage has been done, he thought, no matter how much you paint you use, it fails to conceal the reality of what lies underneath. He remembered Mira saying to him, It doesn’t matter how much fine silk you wrap yourself in, it doesn’t transform you no matter how hard you try to hide beneath it.

            Later, re-entering the house, Kejal nodded and smiled at her father. “I’ll call someone to fix the door Baba,” she said. “Why don’t you come and stay with me for a few days?”

            “Thank you,” he replied, “but I’ll be fine here.”

            “Fine,” she said, exhaling, not arguing with him. “I’ll make some tea.”

            Shortly afterwards, she sauntered back in the lounge, clutching a bundle of papers. “Baba, when were you going to tell me about this?”

            He gazed at her. “Ah, you found the deeds to the house. I was wondering where I’d put them.”

            “Are you planning on selling the house?” she asked with raised eyebrows.

            “I’ve been thinking about it.”

            “For how long?”

            “Ever since your mother died.”

            He shifted his face to the side and Kejal said nothing for a minute. Her eyes moved around the room; she saw herself as a little girl playing in this room, her mother chasing her round the table and during cool evenings, resting her head on her mother’s and father’s lap as they stroked her head and hummed her to sleep. She cocked her head back, thinking she’d heard something, a low murmuring noise. Rishitesh stood still in the same spot.

            “You’re serious about this, aren’t you Baba?”

            “I’m only thinking about it,” he said, scratching his chin. “Now, where’s that tea you promised me?”

            They stood quietly then she said, “Where would you go?”

            He shrugged. “To Sylhet, back to my ancestral village.”

            “Sylhet? That’s hundreds of miles away from here. I wouldn’t be able to see you everyday.”

            “I’m still in Bangladesh,” Rishitesh said, clearing his throat. “I’m not going to the moon, am I?” Glancing sideways and detecting the hurt in his daughter’s face he went up to her and held her hands. “I’m only thinking about it, Kejal.”

            She embraced him, resting her head on his shoulders, holding onto him for a while and he patted her head. “Silly girl,” he said, “just like your mother, overreacting to everything.”

            She pulled back. “Would it be wrong Baba if I said I don’t want you to sell the house?”

            “No,” he answered tenderly.

            Kejal nodded her head and he brushed a few strands of hair away from her face, noticing a tear under her eye. “Nothing here will last forever,” he said, “so what use is it struggling to hold on to this place and the memories it contains. Best to let it go.”

            “They’re our memories.”

            He said nothing, a pinch of grief in his expression. 

            “Do you still want your tea?”

            “Yes, of course!” Rishitesh exclaimed. “Let’s pray your mother isn’t cursing us now because of the sugar you’re putting in my tea! She never did like me eating sweet things though I think I’ll enjoy myself now and eat as much sugar as my stomach craves!”

            She laughed and Rishitesh slipped his hands in his trouser pockets and smiled.

            By the end of the month, shocks of heavy rain gave way to long, humid days of heat, the air sticky with sloth. Still, at least the van Kejal hired with a driver for their journey to Sylhet had an internal, air cooling system. Rishitesh wore a pair of loose fitting, beige trousers and a shirt with leather sandals on his feet, and turning back, he smiled at Kejal as she sat in the backseat with Xavier who played on his game console. She rolled the window down; a fresh, sparkling breeze swallowed inside the van. Rishitesh stared out at the miles of rice fields, men ploughing the earth with cows and the green tea gardens along the sloping hills as they drove out of Dhaka.

            “Bloody bastard!” he yelled, abruptly, at another driver. “No wonder there’s so many road accidents in this country! Bloody fools don’t know how to drive or what lane to drive in. They even zoom past the red lights!” He looked at the driver who tried to hide his grin. “Keep your eyes on the road, alright, I don’t want anything to happen to my daughter and grandson. No wonder foreigners think we’re crazy when they see how we drive.”

            Four hours later, at The Keane Bridge, the main gateway to Sylhet, traffic came to a gridlock over the Surma River. “This is even worse than Dhaka,” Rishitesh mumbled. “Look at them, they can hardly afford pants but they all have mobiles,” he went on, squinting at the crush of beggars combing around the side of the bridge and begging for money while on their phones. “Who the hell do they call? Pimps or other beggars I bet to tell them to come here and harass drivers.” His eyes dilated. “Quickly! Close the windows, a group of them is coming towards us!”

            Kejal and the driver rolled up the windows. “You’re on full blast today, Baba,” Kejal said. “You’re the one who insisted we come to Sylhet and now you’re saying this is worse than Dhaka.” She leaned forward and whispered in her father’s ear, “There’s still time to turn back and go home.”

            “Mmmmh,” he grunted, looking back. He smiled at Xavier and patted his grandson’s knee. Soon enough, the traffic decongested and the driver steered through the old quarters of the city which had been regenerated, past swarming crowds and bustling bazaars. He remembered using these roads and the journey he’d taken out of the city with Mira. Now, so much had changed in Sylhet with its newly built apartment buildings in western fashion, shopping complexes with American coffee shops, fast food restaurants and big houses with swimming pools and garages with electric gates. Near one of the city’s intersections, close to the old railway station no longer in use, Rishitesh asked the driver to stop outside an ice-cream store, Fudge & Cream, he recognised from his youth. He and Mira would often sample their delights when going to the cinema together. The building still appeared the same, despite the refurbishment and glossy, modern interiors with mirrors. He popped out, pleased to see they still stocked his favourite, pink guava sorbet with swirls of lemon drizzle, and he bought a few scoops for himself and banana and pineapple ice-cream for Kejal, Xavier and the driver. Rishitesh stood outside by the car, eating his ice-cream. He watched his grandson eat, and they looked at each other and grinned. He wondered what Xavier thought about during his quiet moments though given his age, he doubted his grandson dwelled on the future. For the moment, he felt happy simply being in the place he was in.

            “Dada, here,” Xavier said, the window rolled down, offering his tub of ice-cream.

            “Seeing it’s from you, I won’t say no,” he answered, trying a spoonful. He flicked his hands through his grandson’s hair. He then glanced up at the sky; a triangle of swallows sailed past the pallid-blue sky, vanishing behind a towering office block. Continuing on their journey, they arrived by mid-afternoon near his ancestral village in Shekpur towards the southern region of Sylhet. At one point, the van nearly toppled into a ditch near a paddy field as it rumbled along the bumpy road. Tall tamarind and bamboo trees arched over various villages, enclosing around them like giant arms. Rishitesh’s heart tightened as the van approached the old, cracked pink gates outside his own family village. Areca and coconut trees lined the edges of the pathway curving into the courtyard. Kejal rested a hand on her father’s shoulder and he held onto her. The van eased inside the grounds, parking several yards away from the large, central bungalow.

            Rishitesh spotted the elderly caretaker, perched on a wooden stool smoking a cigarette and dressed in a jumper and a grey, striped lungi.

            “Have you forgotten me Rishitesh babu?” the caretaker asked, standing up and grasping his walking-stick. 

            “Of course not!” he said, blushing, unable to recall the caretaker’s name. Kejal whispered in his ear and Rishitesh said, “Ah, yes! Alam Miah!” but the caretaker pulled a face, looking perplexed. “How’s everything been here?”

            “Same, same,” he said. “There were weeds growing in the flowerbed and graveyard near the pond, but I’ve cleared them.”

            “Good, good!” he said, looking across at the bungalow, noticing the lofty guava tree pregnant with fruit slanting by the side of it, its branches bending over the bungalow’s roof. He stood silently, recalling Mira had planted the tree and Kejal, Xavier and the driver explored the grounds with the caretaker leading them in the right direction. He wandered to the pond located by the front of the village and sat on the grey, stone bench adjacent to the rutted, mossy steps leading into the waters blanketed in flowering, pink water lilies. The family cemetery lay beyond the pond in a far corner on a patch of land, beside the mango trees and Rishitesh imagined the gravestones of his grandparents would be weathered now. A silvery catfish slicked up to the surface of the pond then dived back down, creating ripples. 

            “Is this where you and Mama used to swim?” Kejal asked, nestling next to her father.

            “Sometimes,” he answered. “What do you think of the village?”

            “It’s pretty. The air’s cleaner but I still prefer Dhaka.”

            “I knew you’d say that. Where’s Xavier?” He glanced over his shoulder.

            “I left him with the caretaker and the driver. He’s showing them his computer game.”

            “Are you sure you told me that man’s correct name?”

            “Sorry Baba, I made it up,” she answered with a giggle. “I didn’t want you to stay tongue-tied.”

            “No wonder he looked at me like I’d gone mad.”

            She chuckled.

            After a moment’s silence, Rishitesh peered up and said, “After your mother’s death, each time I used to go to work, I’d pray I’d get hit by a bus or that something would crash on top of me. I used to stand by the road thinking it would be so easy…” 

            Kejal stared at her father, unblinking, not saying a word for a minute. Her face turned pale and remorseful. She nuzzled closer, resting her hand on his and they both stared ahead, towards the surface of the pond and the beams of light glittering over it. A tepid breeze rustled through the trees and the leaves shivered. She then reached into her bag and pulled out the tiffin, placing it in between them. Rishitesh glanced down, a smile on his face.

            “Your mother’s tiffin,” he said.

            “Wait till you see what’s inside,” she said, opening it and he saw she’d filled it with his favourite fried snacks, mutton samosas and aloo chops with onions and boiled egg, just as Mira used to make them. They ate together and Kejal asked, “How long do you plan on staying here?”

            “A few weeks.”

            “And the house, you’re still considering selling it Baba?”

            “I haven’t decided,” he said, inhaling, crossing one leg over the other. “I’ve learned it’s best not to plan too much for the future, just let it be. But don’t worry, you’ll be the first to know.”

            She rested her head on his shoulder and he stroked it. “There’s still hope then,” she said.

            He nodded.

            “It’s peaceful here,” she commented.

            “It certainly is,” Rishitesh answered, looking ahead.

            “Come on, why don’t you show me yours and Mama’s old bedroom?” Kejal said, springing on her feet. “I’d like to see it.”

            “It’s probably filled with cobwebs!”

            They meandered back into the courtyard, seeing Xavier playing with a ball with the driver and the caretaker sat down, waving at them and smoking another cigarette. 

            “What’s his name again?” he asked in a low voice.

            “I honestly don’t know, Baba,” she said, covering her mouth. “You should know, he’s your caretaker. I just made up a name to stop you losing face.”

            Shaking his head, Rishitesh said, “Maybe he isn’t the caretaker then and is a beggar who’s claimed this as his home!”

            “Well, he seems harmless enough,” Kejal chuckled. 

            They stood outside the wide, double doors of his former bedroom in the middle of the bungalow. The blue paint had flaked off, revealing cracks and he decided he’d get all the doors repainted. Together, they pushed the door though it didn’t open instantly. 

            He panted. “What’s that English saying about doors? Your mother sometimes used to say it.”

            “When one door closes another one opens.”

            He blinked. “The English do have some funny sayings, nah? They should try opening one of our doors in Bangladesh, their backs will break like a twig just trying!”

            She laughed and after a final push the doors squeaked open and they almost tumbled inside the musty room. His former wooden bed still lay positioned in the corner with a bedside table and the metal wardrobe with a mirror up against a wall. He remembered Mira standing in front of it every morning when fixing her hair and draping her sari around herself. Looking around, Rishitesh realised as a younger man the bedroom appeared big to him, but now older, it felt so tiny. Kejal sat on the bed, swinging her feet then lying down, she closed her eyes. Briefly, the tunnel he’d previously imagined flashed in the back of his mind and the figure in front of him turned round and smiled as the years of accumulated dust finally escaped and rays of sunlight eased in, illuminating the room.