Bougainvillea

Rus­tam was the only grown up from the out­side world who was our friend.

He was the arm wrestling cham­pi­on of our street in Ram­pu­ra; the street where Usma­nia orphan­age was locat­ed in a cor­ner. And he had nev­er been beat­en. He was soooo pow­er­ful and big, and brave!

Brav­ery was a big deal in our street.

All the lit­tle boys want­ed to be brave, and espe­cial­ly, we in the orphan­age.

When Rus­tam won the inter-moha­la arm-wrestling cham­pi­onship and the big boys car­ried him home on their shoul­ders, we saw the show from our kitchen win­dows, and the gaps in the out­er gate. ‘Is a lion! Is a lion!” they were chant­i­ng, “Our Rus­tam is a lion!” And the great Rus­tam was up, above their shoul­ders, smil­ing and laugh­ing and gig­gling, as he waved and kissed his sil­ver tro­phy.

He gave that tro­phy to us!

It stood there, on the tall cup­board in the com­mon hall, where we slept at night – all fifty of us – in one long file; where, there wasn’t any light. When we were scared, our gazes would shuf­fle in the dark, locat­ing the tro­phy, and find­ing it would make us feel stronger, as though, we had found Rus­tam.

So when Gulu told me about the Well of Death – Gulu was Rustam’s broth­er – and I thought that, I would nev­er be see­ing one in real life, it was Rus­tam who took me to see it. And though, the cars in the wood­en cup were fast and rum­bus­tious, and the whole con­trap­tion, shaky, I knew I was safe with him.

He always wore an invin­ci­ble smile. And there was some­thing about him, I thought, some­thing deep inside him, which could nev­er be bro­ken.

He was the only grown up from the out­side world who was my friend.

Yes, I was always out to prove that I was quite brave myself, and so it was no sur­prise that on that hot, qui­et, June noon, I went to fetch that ball from the house of the Bougainvil­lea, only to cheer Rus­tam up.

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We were told that the Bougainvil­lea was sleep­ing, and that it must not be roused, espe­cial­ly, on hot sum­mer noons when the war­den was sleep­ing, and we were not allowed out­side. Then, they said, it grew limbs, and turned.

That house was a ter­ri­ble sight, with weath­er worn walls over­laid with pur­ple wastes of Bougainvil­laea flow­ers, and grey vines dying away along the rusty drains, and the tall man­go tree in the yard with its qui­et and sin­gle shad­ow, cast like a spell on the frayed, lat­ticed para­pets, and rain marred columns. Just the sight of it made our lit­tle hearts rush, like mice hearts.

And now the ball was there.

I, Lalu, Gulu and Moo­di, who’d been play­ing crick­et on the roof of the orphan­age, were look­ing from over a wall, across the roof of the com­mon hall behind it, at the house which was on the far side, and all we could see was the man­go tree and parts of the great Bougainvil­lea which was sleep­ing, it seemed.

“Some­body has to go,” Gulu said sud­den­ly.

Being Rustam’s broth­er, Gulu was a bit of a boss to us. And since we had not seen Rus­tam in weeks, he was our only infor­mant about him. He had been telling us that Rus­tam had been shrink­ing and going sick and pale; that, they were afraid that he was being eat­en out from inside, because his strength was wan­ing, and all in all he was being ‘lan­guorous’ – Gulu quot­ed a big word which he had heard from his father. He quot­ed a lot, and some­times in the voice of the per­son he was quot­ing. But we didn’t believe him about Rus­tam, real­ly, it was all too unbe­liev­able.

“What does it mean for a Bougainvil­lea to wake up?” Lalu asked all of a sud­den, his mouth open and eyes out.

“My broth­er was say­ing,” Gulu said, “no boy must ever go there.”

“Rus­tam?” I con­firmed. “He said that?”

Gulu nod­ded.

And I won­dered why Rus­tam would say that. The great Rus­tam? If he wished, he could take that whole Bougainvil­lea in one hand, and swing it around and toss it into the riv­er, if he wished!

“Yes, Rus­tam told me this – he said, ‘Gulu, it’s not right to go there. It’s not a nice place.’ ” Gulu twist­ed his lips and scratched his head. “But I think, a real­ly brave boy…maybe? Oh, I don’t know. Besides, Rus­tam is not well. He’s in a real bad way. ”

Gulu was old­er than us. I mean, he was twelve going to thir­teen and we were not yet eleven, and he knew a hell lot of things. He said, “Now, I’m going to tell you kids one thing, which you’re not going to tell any­one. And it is this: My broth­er Rus­tam is in love.”

“Love?” all three of us said togeth­er, thrust­ing our heads for­ward, our jaws down.

“Of course,” Gulu said with a shrug, “love!”

All of three of us gasped. “Oh?”

“With that girl, Kalsoom.” Gulu revealed. “Well, Rus­tam doesn’t say it. But we know.”

“Baji Kalsoom, who’s get­ting mar­ried?” Moo­di asked. This Moo­di was anoth­er boy from the street, and he was the one who’d been bowl­ing to me ear­li­er. He had bowled a bounc­er which I’d hooked: the ball had tak­en the edge of the bat and lobbed up, over the wall, then tipped across the roof of the com­mon hall, and fall­en into that yard.

“Shhh, qui­et!” Gulu frowned. “Yes, Kalsoom. Doc­tor Sahib’s daugh­ter, who’s mar­ry­ing that mouse.”

“Mouse?”

“Don’t be like you don’t know. But maybe you don’t,” Gulu shook his head. “You boys live in here. You have no idea of what’s going on out there.” He point­ed with his thumb toward the street. “He’s a boy down the street who’s going to be a den­tist. Moo­di knows.”

“Nomi bhai?” Moo­di said, sud­den­ly remem­ber­ing some­thing which made his face con­tort, as in revul­sion. “He’s so small!”

“Why would Kalsoom baji say yes to him, over the great Rus­tam?” I asked. I hat­ed this Kalsoom Baji for mak­ing Rus­tam sick and weak, and all those things Gulu said, though, I knew it must be tem­po­rary, what­ev­er it was. And I didn’t real­ly believe Gulu. But who does she think she is? I thought. If Rus­tam wished…

“I think, Rus­tam is going to die.” Gulu announced with a sigh.

Silence ensued. I felt – as, per­haps, did Lalu and Moo­di – that some­body had punched me in the heart. “You’re always mak­ing things up,” I spat out at Gulu.

“Boy, you’re just a kid,” Gulu said cool­ly. “What do you know about the ways of elders? He’s not eat­ing at all, my broth­er Rus­tam.”

Gulu loved to be dra­mat­ic, so now, he was whis­per­ing. “He closed him­self in a room for three full days. He did not eat. Did not speak a word. And my Amma was mad! You know, how my Amma goes mad? Only today he went out after so many days in that room. Now, the wed­ding is com­ing, but he said he won’t be attend­ing it. Now tell me this, Mr. Ein­stein, who doesn’t attend a wed­ding in their own street? Besides, I heard Amma, when she was say­ing to Abba, ‘I’m telling you, Rusti’s Abba, your boy has a thing for Kalsoom!’ ” Gulu start­ed mim­ic­k­ing his mother’s sharp, whiny voice, and it was so much like real thing that it made our eye­brows stick up, and heads bow down in her respect. “‘Why you didn’t tell me this before, Rusti? Why you nev­er tell me any­thing? I’d have gone to doc­tor sahib’s house, and I’d have begged him, I’d have grabbed his feet – if I had to! We’re not poor peo­ple. We’ve got our own land, back in the vil­lage. Why you nev­er tell your moth­er any­thing? Why’re you so qui­et, Rusti? Look now, how late it is now. But it’s their fathers who fixed this mar­riage, do you know that? We could’ve fixed it too, if you’d told me! Tell me now, tell me, do you still want me to go, son? But lis­ten, Rusti, there will be oth­ers. Oth­er girls, pret­ti­er than Kalsoom. Now, Rus­tam did not like this. He grunt­ed, like this: Umh! And he got up on his feet and walked off, to the door and out.”

“Umh!” I heard that in my head, and I imag­ined Rus­tam smil­ing that invin­ci­ble smile of his, up on the brim of the wood­en cup of the Well of Death. Then I saw him on the shoul­ders of the boys, gig­gling like a child. I thought, nobody can beat the great Rus­tam, least of all a mouse.

Gulu pout­ed and shook his head. Amma was like, “Do you still want me to go? Why you nev­er tell me any­thing? You are such a nice boy Rus­tam, you have so much love in your heart for every­body … but what’s wrong with you? Now lis­ten to me, boys. He’s my broth­er but I’m say­ing this. He’s sick. He’s lost his pow­er, too. And he’s get­ting small­er! I think… he’s going to die.”

Silence ensued. No. Rus­tam can’t die. I thought. Could he?

Lalu start­ed cry­ing. And I heard, what he had said ear­li­er. What does it mean for the Bougainvil­lea to wake up?

I remem­bered the ball. I thought, If the great Rus­tam said that some­thing couldn’t be done, and then, if some­one were to do it, what would it mean? And, what if Rus­tam were to know that some­body went to the house of the Bougainvil­lea, and brought back the ball? Wouldn’t he be so proud? Soooo proud? I began to con­tem­plate the pos­si­bil­i­ty of climb­ing the wall, cross­ing the roof, and going down the lad­der.

Then, as if, he had read my mind, Gulu said, “If a boy were to go there, and get that ball, it might even cheer Rus­tam up.”

And Lalu and Moo­di said simul­ta­ne­ous­ly, “Yes, yes!”

And all three were look­ing at me.

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The whole street must have been asleep, because the silence seemed to belong to some unin­hab­it­ed island in a for­got­ten waste of the sea, except that, there was no sound of waves, or rus­tle of wind through the trees. There was no air, in fact, and every­thing was absolute­ly still.

What does it mean for a Bougainvil­lea to breathe? I thought, with a swal­low. And then imme­di­ate­ly, Could Rus­tam real­ly die?

I climbed over the wall of Usma­nia orphan­age, walked across the roof of the com­mon hall, with beads of sweat crawl­ing down my neck, back and legs. I reached the rail­ing around that roof, and looked down from over it. The tall bam­boo lad­der stood against the wall of the emp­ty house with its feet in the yard, and seemed very, very long. But still, the man­go tree rose above it, and not a leaf was mov­ing on it.

And all around it sprawled the green and pur­ple mon­ster. “Sleep­ing,” I told myself.

Oh, and it was soooo enor­mous! I’ve nev­er seen a Bougainvil­lea that big ever again in my life. It cov­ered the top of the entire out­er wall – the one with a fad­ed, pad­locked, wood­en door; and it made almost a cir­cle around the yard, with the only gap being where the lad­der stood against the wall, down which I was look­ing.

It was all over the lat­ticed para­pets above the wall oppo­site to where I was stand­ing, and it fell through the gaps in those lat­tices like water­falls, all the way down to the two arched entrances to a cor­ri­dor. A part of it turned into the cor­ri­dor, and crept along the ceil­ing, toward the inner rooms, and cor­ners I couldn’t see.

On my side, to the left of the lad­der, it bur­geoned in a mis­shapen arch over an open latrine, branch­ing and crawl­ing hor­i­zon­tal­ly over the door of this latrine, so that it turned into a roof of sorts. And last­ly: on the wall between the cor­ri­dor and the latrine it was so thick that I couldn’t see what was behind it.

In parts, this Bougainvil­lea was dry and twig­gy, but in oth­ers it was green and full and loaded with bun­dles of pur­ple bells, with pale flow­erets on the pis­tils.

There was a flight of stairs, with old, moldy steps, along the mid­dle wall – one which was cov­ered, begin­ning from the mouth of the latrine and going for the roof, but break­ing off at half point because rest of it had caved in. And now the Bougainvil­lea was cas­cad­ing up these half stairs and falling down from there to the yard, like a woman’s long hair.

At this point, I was still up there at the rail­ing, at the top of the lad­der look­ing down, and sud­den­ly, I felt the urge to turn and go. But as I looked back, I saw the three small heads of Moo­di, Lalu and Gulu, eye­ing me from behind the wall of the orphan­age – the one I’d hopped over. Even from a dis­tance, Lalu’s cheeks looked stained from the tears he’d shed. Rus­tam is going to die? No, Rus­tam is the arm wrestling cham­pi­on of our street! I told myself. I’ll go slow on the lad­der. If I see or hear any­thing strange, I’ll climb back up, quick­ly!

Every step made a squeak, but a small, dull one. The upper half of the lad­der which was in the sun, was so hot it singed my hands, but as soon as I got to the low­er half, in the shade of the man­go tree, the rungs became cool­er. The whole atmos­phere was cool­er down there. The man­go tree was very dense, and taller than oth­er man­go trees. It umbrel­laed over the entire yard so that the sun was faint on the floor; and so many dead leaves lay there, in all shades of green, brown and yel­low, and between them, the lilacs, the pur­ples of the Bougainvil­lea, which were also gath­ered in small heaps in the cor­ners.

Once in the yard, I decid­ed I’d not be look­ing up, at the Bougainvil­lea. Instead, I’d keep my eyes down on the floor, or on oth­er things. I will not look at it.

But is it look­ing? The thought was there, always at the back of my mind.

There were four rather slen­der flowerbeds in the yard, hedged by bricks with patch­es of a white­wash, like all the oth­er walls; and these flowerbeds brimmed with wild Por­tu­la­ca that tru­ly seemed to be the only liv­ing res­i­dent of that desert­ed place. One of these flowerbeds lay along the out­er wall. One ran along the wall of the latrine, and the last two flanked the two entrances of the cor­ri­dor, between which – but at some height above them – there was a rust­ed rod with a bulb sock­et pro­tect­ed by a large, hol­low cup, also rust­ed, where a spar­row had made its nest.

The spar­row was out some­where.

What does it mean for a Bougainvil­lea to turn? Some­thing cold moved in me.

Once again, I was seized by the desire to bolt. But I knew now the lad­der was tall and the way it had creaked, I couldn’t go too fast on it. In fact, I didn’t want to hur­ry. Of course, I was scared. I was, but my fear was con­fined to myself. And that seemed impor­tant. I didn’t want my pres­ence felt. I didn’t want to hur­ry, because, I didn’t want it to hear…. I didn’t want to wake it up. Is it watch­ing? I was breath­ing fast. I was smoth­er­ing the sound of my breath.

There’s noth­ing here, noth­ing here, I was recit­ing in my head. I’ll just go slow and qui­et­ly and nothing’s going to hap­pen. But if I see any­thing, like a shad­ow, I’ll run. But oth­er­wise, I’ll be qui­et. Qui­et. Qui­et­ly, I will look for the ball.

There were a few oth­er balls there, but they were cheap and bust­ed, and I couldn’t see our ball: the brand-new, orange one.

When I had looked every­where, includ­ing the flowerbeds, the Por­tu­la­ca growths, the leaves and heaps in the yard, the parts of the cor­ri­dor that I could see, and, along all the walls, only the Bougainvil­lea remained. And I could no longer not look at it. It was there, any­way. Not that my not look­ing was going to make it go away.

I will look under it quick­ly. I thought. It’s just a plant. Just a plant. What will Rus­tam think, when I tell him about it? He will laugh. But… I will not look at all of it at once … it’s alright, I’ll tell Rus­tam about it lat­er.

I start­ed slow­ly.

I walked like air under the vine, look­ing up every now and then, to see if the ball was stuck inside. But there was no sign of it. How­ev­er, the search­ing process took my mind off the sur­round­ings and relaxed me a lit­tle.

I was con­stant­ly remind­ing myself, It’s alright… it’s alright… only two more min­utes now, just a minute and some more… one minute and a few sec­onds… then I’ll show Rus­tam what I’ve done. How brave is this? Rus­tam will wink and smile too. But where… where, where could it go? It’s not in the yard and not in the Bougainvil­lea. Sure­ly, it couldn’t have hopped onto the tree!

I went over to the latrine door; a flim­sy, tin con­trap­tion blue with flaky paint. It was ajar, oth­er­wise, I wouldn’t have risked open­ing it, because, it was cer­tain to make a cry­ing screech. I peered in through the gap in the door. The whole place was clut­tered with pur­ple-green waste; dead leaves had lain a thick car­pet on the floor, the walls were black and green with mold, and right in front of the door was an old dis­col­ored sink, now a waste bas­ket of rot­ten lilac. The drain pipe was bro­ken, and under it lay three loose bricks, moldy as well. Above the sink was a cracked mir­ror with brown spots on it, in which I caught a glimpse of my face but didn’t linger on it, as I still didn’t want my pres­ence felt, even to myself.

At this point, I was about to turn and go, when I saw the ball. And I won­dered, How did I miss it when I was look­ing down from the top of the lad­der? The orange ball was stuck in a dry part of the Bougainvil­lea in the cen­ter of twig­gy roof of the latrine. It was a dry clut­ter of brown branch­es where it was sit­ting.

A sun­beam that had man­aged to steal in through the foliage of the man­go tree fell on exact­ly this con­fu­sion of twigs, as though, set­ting it on fire, and the orange ball was in the cen­ter, like a lit­tle sun itself.

I still didn’t want to open the door. And luck­i­ly, I was lit­tle and very thin, and once I had expelled all the air from my lungs it was pos­si­ble for me to sidle in through the gap that was there, and so I did. I wasn’t shak­ing. I wasn’t afraid. I even had the sense to pick up those bricks from under the sink and stack them at the cen­ter of the latrine. And that was all I need­ed, because the car­pet of leaves was already quite thick. And then, I stood on top of this stack, on my toes, and got the ball in the tips of my fin­gers. It slipped out once, but only to roll down to a low­er pock­et in the branch­es, from where I picked it up eas­i­ly.

Yes, I think, I should’ve left then. I have thought about this … that had I left then, then maybe I wouldn’t have remem­bered any of this inci­dent of my child­hood. After all, what’s so spe­cial about going to an old house to fetch a ball, and haven’t we all done it – or some­thing like it – and for­got­ten all about it? But I didn’t leave, just then.

As I grabbed the ball, and brought it down, I saw what had “grown” from under it. And I say grown, because, it hadn’t been there ear­li­er, or maybe, I hadn’t seen it, because the ball had been sit­ting on it.

What an extra­or­di­nary flower! A big, pur­ple bell, with three ten­der flow­erets in its heart, ensconced in that cush­ion of dry twigs. How can it grow in the mid­dle of these dead branch­es? I asked myself. And the Bougainvil­lea was still sleep­ing. The sun­beam fell on the bell and made it glow.

The whole thing looked like anoth­er world, on fire, with a cold and pur­ple sun fall­en on it. It was stun­ning, real­ly. Per­haps, hyp­no­tiz­ing is the word for it. Cer­tain­ly, it cast a spell on me. I wan­dered off in it.

Yes, I had lost all sense of fear in that moment, because, I must’ve stood there for three min­utes and more, and nev­er once thought about the Bougainvil­lea. I had stood and stared, as the pur­ple flower glowed in that burn­ing nest of orange.

That is when I heard Rustam’s voice.

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The Bougainvil­lea was sleep­ing, and the whole place was silent.

They had stepped out to the yard from one of the rooms in the cor­ri­dor. I reck­oned they had walked over to some­where near the latrine door, but I only saw shad­ows.

“You do under­stand what I’m say­ing? You have noth­ing to fear!” Rus­tam was say­ing. “You can’t go through with this wed­ding. Look, don’t you trust me? Please trust me!” He was des­per­ate.

I heard my heart in my throat first and then, my mouth, and it was flut­ter­ing not beat­ing, pump­ing air, not blood. So real it was, that it wasn’t real. Loud! And yet it was soooo dis­tant!

I thought I, too, was some dead part of the Bougainvil­lea. A twig. I didn’t move lest I snap, but my grip around the ball was so severe that it could be an exten­sion of myself. Though, I was in a dis­con­nect­ed frame of mind I had the sense to stay put. Nobody could see me in the latrine.

What is Rus­tam doing here? I thought. Then I remem­bered what Gulu had told us on the roof, in his mother’s voice. “Why don’t you tell your moth­er any­thing? I would have grabbed his feet. Do you still want me to go? Why don’t you tell me? You are such a nice boy Rus­tam, you have so much love in your heart for every­body … but what’s wrong with you?”

“But you don’t under­stand,” said anoth­er voice. A man’s voice. “This… what we do… this… nobody will tol­er­ate this.”

“But Nomi!” Rus­tam plead­ed. “Look. No one will know. Look, just come with me.” He was forc­ing. He was a wrestler. I remem­bered that chant, “Is a lion! Is a lion! Our Rus­tam is a lion! ” But the lion was a shad­ow, and sound­ed crushed, and on the edge of a cry. “I have loved you for eight years.”

Years lat­er, when I’d be a big boy myself and hear my fel­lows about the sud­den dis­ap­pear­ance of the leg­endary Rus­tam Aziz on the night of Kalsoom’s wed­ding, this voice would ring in my mind; this one on the edge of a cry, and sud­den­ly I would be hear­ing Gulu in my ear, imi­tat­ing his moth­er on the roof of the orphan­age, “You are such a nice boy Rus­tam, you have so much love in your heart for every­body … but what’s wrong with you?”

“Don’t you read the papers, Rus­tam?” Nomi was afraid. I was a child but I had been afraid, too, and I could sense fear in that voice. He paused. “Didn’t you hear, those two heads they found in the swamp?”

Sud­den­ly, I had this weird feel­ing that the Bougainvil­lea was speak­ing too – whis­per­ing, rather, echo­ing every­thing those two were say­ing. Low and rustling was its voice, “Those two heads they found in the swamp.”

“The boys who car­ried you on their shoul­ders will spit on you,” Nomi was say­ing, “and I have an uncle, Rus­tam. A very pious man, with a fol­low­ing.’

“I will not let…!” Rus­tam was being hero­ic. I heard the chant­i­ng, “Is a lion! Is a lion! Our Rus­tam is a lion!”

“No,” Nomi cut him off. “Oh God. Nobody must know, until the end!” Then sud­den­ly he asked, in the voice of some bewil­dered child, “Why am I like this, Rusti?”

Silence – except the echo, “Why am I like this?”

Yes, I think the Bougainvil­lea was echo­ing – and mov­ing! For the first time, the lit­tle twigs had closed into tiny fists, rotat­ing like tight­en­ing screws, and the leaflets had begun to thrill. It seemed, as though, a great snake was uncoil­ing. The silence was long, and I sensed the shad­ows mov­ing.

A while must have passed before I heard that abrupt “What?” Rustam’s voice. “What’s the mat­ter, Nomi? What is it?” The vicious whis­per echoed, “What is it?”

I fig­ured it out lat­er, that Nomi must have seen me in the mir­ror on the sink, my cracked face between those brown dots. I was stand­ing close behind the door and the mir­ror was to my side, and all Nomi had to catch was a shad­ow.

Rus­tam was the one who opened the latrine door. And it did make a loud cry. And, I couldn’t believe what I was see­ing. He was half the size I remem­bered him being; those great shoul­ders had caved in, and that full face had turned sal­low. He seemed on the brink of col­lapse. Even I believed Gulu now. He was going to die. He real­ly is going to die! I thought and felt nau­seous. “Going to die!” said the evil echo.

“You?” he said, rather he qua­vered it out.

Every­thing was alive, but I was frozen. Has it wok­en up now? Is it star­ing at us? Some­how I stam­mered out, “I.. I’m…I …ball…” And I showed him the orange ball.

Behind him, Nomi was scram­bling to put on his pants. Then, he was run­ning. He was lit­tle, like they said, and he was hys­teric, “No! No, No, No!”

“Nomi, please, stop Nomi!” Rus­tam was beg­ging him.

The echo whis­pered lin­ger­ing­ly, “Nomi!”, and the echo was fol­lowed by the sounds of break­ing twigs, and move­ment.

Nomi was not going to stop.

Rus­tam looked at me, stunned. What a wreck he was too, that gaunt-faced, hol­low-eyed, shell of a man, who fell on his knees before me.

The ball dropped from my hand and bounced. The sounds of the tips on the floor were like the steps of some­one approach­ing me from behind, on all fours.

I could feel it breath­ing, right over my shoul­der.