Kabir

I fell to my knees in the snow and stayed there. I heard them drag him away. ‘We’ll dump him at his father’s door,’ said my brother.

Still, I knelt unmoving in the snow. I heard my brother say, ‘Leave that one be. He is no longer my brother. He is a traitor. Let him be. He is nothing to me now. Aazadi does not need traitors.’

I heard them walk away. I could not move. I knelt there until the day bled away into night. Then I got up and began to walk. I never looked back once. I could not bear to see the stain on the white snow.

The snow was falling. I walked on with the darkness thick before my eyes. I was lost in a world of night with no path before me. Everything around me began to vanish. There was nothing left except darkness and bitter cold. I was shaking with my cold and grief. There was no point in carrying on. I lay down in the snow and looked up at the stars. They were so beautiful.

A house of stars. I’d dreamed of it so often. Drawn it so many times that my mother laughed at me. ‘You’ll have to put on a roof,’ she always said. ‘Or the snow will get in.’

And I always asked, ‘But then, how will the stars get in?’

I gazed up at the sky and knew that I had finally found the house of stars that every man finds at the end.

Then I heard his voice in my head. ‘Get up. You have to get up or you will die.’

I laughed. ‘But I want to die, Amanbhai.’

‘You cannot,’ he said. ‘You made a promise you have to keep. You have to find her.’

‘She is too far away,’ I said. ‘The stars are closer. Leave me here. I am going to count them.’

‘You called me bhai. You cannot break your promise to me.’

‘You are dead, Amanbhai. I want to be with you.’

‘No. I need you to be with her. She is alone now. Get up.’

‘Please, bhai. It is so peaceful here. No more killing. No more pain.’

‘Get up.’

‘I hate this world, Amanbhai. People kill other people. I hate it. I won’t be part of it any more.’ I lay there and told him all about my pain. ‘I left my mother and father. Today I left my brother. I lost you. I have no one. The world has taken every scrap of love I ever had. I lost two brothers today. If I stay here, at least I can join one.’

But Aman only said one thing again and again. ‘Get up. Keep your promise.’

At that moment, I had a choice. I knew what I wanted with all my heart. I wanted to lie in the snow, peaceful at last. There was such peace alone out there in the woods under the stars, with the snow falling and the world holding its breath. But I had made a promise, and I chose to keep it.

Struggling back to my feet was the hardest thing I have ever done. The snow was still falling as I began to walk, putting one foot in front of the other. Aman stayed with me at every step. We walked together through that long, long night.

After that, he never left me. Not for a moment. It was his voice that gave me courage. That kept me going.

We hid together. We lied and stole food and just kept going. And we talked about love.

‘What is the point of your letter? You are gone.’

‘I want her to know I loved her. And love never goes away.’

‘Lies! Lies!’ I shouted. We were on a train. Heads turned to look at the madman talking to himself in the doorway. ‘It all goes away. Nothing good stays. Only hate and killing and blood remain.’

‘No,’ he whispered. ‘Love never goes away.’

We were in the back of a truck that was travelling through fields touched with a fuzz of green brought by the spring.

‘You’re dead. What use is your love?’

‘Love is never wasted,’ he said.

We were in a deserted bus stand in an unknown town, late at night. ‘What is death, Amanbhai?’ I asked.

‘Knowing you can never again be with the one you love.’

‘I have been dead for so many years, Amanbhai,’ I said. ‘No one has ever loved me.’

We argued and fought and talked. Every step of the long way, he was there. And he led me to her.

Now I am in a mall, waiting to die. And Aman is gone. He left me. He led me to the girl that he loved, and he left me.

‘He led me here,’ I say. ‘From Kashmir to Mumbai is a long way. I came to keep my promise. That was the only atonement that I could make. So, I came to find you.’

She looks at me as if I’m a monster. She looks at me as if I’m telling lies.

‘Aman is dead,’ says Diya. Her voice is blank.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I’m sorry. I am so sorry.’

‘And you are a terrorist.’

‘They call themselves freedom fighters. I don’t call myself anything. I don’t want to fight. I don’t understand freedom that is built on violence. It took the death of Amanbhai to make me understand that.’

‘Aman is dead,’ she whispers. There are tears seeping into her voice now.

‘Read the letter,’ I say. ‘I came all the way to give it to you. He made me promise, and I had to keep that promise.’

She looks down at the letter in her hands. Aman’s words. The last thing he’ll ever say to her.