-Shahinur Islam
“Only two more weeks
left for fall,” Rini says to me, looking out through the window, her words
striking a soft musical note of the upcoming fall colours on the chord of my
heart.
Over late-afternoon-coffee
at our dining table, we’ve been shooting the breeze. As soon as I hear her forecasting
about fall, I peep out. See a pool of reclining sunshine trying to daub warmth
on the ash-colour roof of the front house. See its warmth melting right away into
the dark surface. Also see it giving sporadic sparkles of smiles on the right-side-maple
leaves. But this fall prediction puts me down in the mouth, as summer—the
absolute guarantor of outdoor joy and enjoyment—seems to be playing the
departing note two weeks ahead.
Meanwhile, we overhear
someone knocking at the door…knock-knock…
“Our beloved son, for sure! Doesn’t eat,
doesn’t drink, only hangs out all day,” I speak up to Rini, while getting out
and opening the door. My eyes pop out when I see Antu holding two kittens.
They’ve adopted the
golden appearance of the royal Bengal tiger, but sported large black spots
instead of stripes. With their adorable and affectionate looks, they meow at me
and fidget to hop on to my lap. Are they treating me as their grandpa at first
glance?
Maybe. They also evoke
a furtive fragrance right away at leopard’s pace from a wasteland corner of my
mind, which makes me almost unbridled. Setting it aside for now, I scan Antu’s apparently
pale face, and bawl out,
“Why didn’t you come
for lunch? Where did you bring them from?”
“I ate with my
friends. Bought the kitties to keep. Aren’t they so cute?” says he.
I feel like coughing.
Spinning around, I cough twice, and walk back to the chair I was sitting on. There
I think of the fragrance awaking dad’s memories. I remember his three pet dogs
that once saved his life. Remember their unswerving loyalty to him. Remember
the haunting story of dad and his dogs that mom often told me.
Until I was ten years
old, every night I used to nestle against mom on bed. She told me dad’s story so
many nights, yes, so many nights that I still feel as if I saw it happen with
my own eyes. So lively and fresh! It had two main reasons—first, except for
being witness, I was quite familiar with the setting, the context, the materials,
the characters of the story as I’m with my own breath for my existence. Second,
the way mom narrated with her distinctive style and sense of intonation.
The story ran like
this:
Dad used to hunt migratory
birds, so he and my two elder brothers went shooting in a small boat at the wee
hours of a winter morning to the Bramhaputra River sands. Unlike now, that time
the river was teeming with water; the vessels like cargos, ships, ferries, navigated
effortlessly. Their boat being small and light, they were faced with a storm
that flipped it midway. They struggled to float against the ruffled waves and
strong current, but soon started suffering the despairing weariness. Deep
darkness descended all around. All their efforts, struggles ended almost in
vain. Now there was nothing to do but pray to the Saviour. Luckily, they spotted
a ship flashing like a firefly. The flash gave a ray of hope to the desperately
despaired souls. The sailor anchored off near them. All the while, dad and
brothers were paddling with their both hands except for the eldest one who was
holding the gun high with his left hand. But whenever the sailor sighted the
arms, he stopped and suspected they were confirmed pirates, so rescuing them
meant his own ruin. Meant digging a canal and inviting crocodiles. Meant saving
his probable killers. He was poised to steer away. His decision shattered their
last hope to the ground. As if a boat sank near the bank! As if the suffocated
dipping in air couldn’t breathe in oxygen! They beseeched; they implored; they
begged. But all their supplications just failed to convince the sailor anyway,
so when he was about to steer, he happened to glimpse the bank where three dogs
were barking, but not retreating anyway, their eyes fixed on these drowning
men. Although he couldn’t hear their barks strangled in the noise of the ship
and the storm, he could fathom their suggestive gestures. And he’d learned
before that animals like dogs don’t lie. Only then the sailor changed his mind
and rescued dad and brothers, at last!
It’s not uncommon in
a river or sea, yet as many times as I used to hear it in mom’s characteristically
attractive style of story-telling, I felt creepy, hiding my face in her breast as
the victims were my own people, my then outer world.
But I was more
flabbergasted at the common sense of the dogs than anxious and scared of
probable loss. I wondered how they got the news beforehand. Wondered how their
barking cries shot through the huge, ruffled waves, and how their doggedness made
the sailor listen to them, at last.
Who else is such
faithful? Who’s so loyal? Who can sense the danger of their master beforehand
and keep trying to save until and unless he’s safe? They’re pets, dogs in particular.
Although a kind of man might forge the same inseparable bond, it never seems
unconditional. And very rare on the conditions as well. That’s why, only, only
the pet dogs have since occupied the place of kin of soul in my heart.
Unfortunately, I
couldn’t keep any pets so far because of my unsettled life-style and fretful
living. And now such an illness has attacked me that I can’t even think of keeping
any furry animals around whereas, unbeknown to me, my other being, Antu, has brought
two kittens, though not dogs. This thing
is delighting me, my heart dancing. Making my chest and rib bones shudder with
joy. The children who make up for their
parent’s inabilities, fulfil parent’s unfulfilled dreams, are undoubtedly a
great source of delight. In fact, there’s no other such great attainment as
this.
But my joy is ebbing soon
like the feeble youth of summer that is withering away on the rooftop under the
smiling cover of maple leaves. A new anxiety engulfs me. Engulfs Rini more than
me as she knows it well, so she already left me. Left for our son’s inner room
to bring home to him how his hobby would cost him his dad’s life. Would it be
good eventually?
Antu’s jaw sags. How
come? He wonders if she’s concocted a story. Everybody here keeps pets. What
though he keeps? He decides unwaveringly to keep the kitties. Bears them under
his armpits and a packet of soft food in his right fist and returns to me.
As she doesn’t pamper
the thing, he sits by me. His kittens straighten their legs and purr and meow
at me. Seconds later, I feel like coughing once again. Turning my face, I cough
and ask him to leave them in his room. He rejoins, “Look, dad, how cute the
kitties are! I’ll keep with me as long as I’m home. Man’s not safe where
animals aren’t”
Antu may have thought
I don’t like them, nor do I let them keep. But almost anybody, at first glance,
can feel affectionate towards them. Anybody can even pant for keeping them. And
honestly speaking, I just have a soft spot for pets.
Rini comes again and
keeps swaying him, “Doctor’s forbidden to keep anything furry or hairy at home.
It’ll make your dad’s case only worse. See last month we even took the floor
carpets off!”
He sinks in the heart,
takes the kittens to his room without a murmur, and confines himself all night.
Both of us request him persistently to open the door, but he doesn’t even for
dinner.
I awake early morning
and knock at his door and try to comfort him, “Well, the kittens will be with
us,” although I still don’t know how to
keep them as keeping them means
adding fuel to my illness.
Hearing me, he opens
the door and wraps me straight in the arms for a while. After that, our eyes
meet, and I discover his eyes tear-soaked and reddish. He lowers his gaze and
says, “Dad, no more kitties with us. Please take them to the Humane Society
right away.”
I know my son: first
he’ll go his way, but eventually he’ll come our way. I’m sure he’s pondered
over what Rini said to him yesterday, and taken a whole night to wipe his
affection for the kittens. I still tell him to keep, but he still goes on
refusing.
However much he
refuses, he’s unable to wipe out his affection for the kittens, unable to rid himself
of the feeling of belonging, as his looks and airs mirror something else. He
refuses only for my sake. Now he insists me I take them to the Society. Isn’t
it a simple equation that if he can bring them, he can also take them back? But
I know he can’t, he can’t face it, so he’s also said that after he’s left home,
I’ll leave them to Society.
I just left them
without letting him know. While I was handing them over to the Society, the
kittens seemed not to leave me. They were hopping on to my lap and shoulder,
snuggling down and rubbing their faces against my body and mewing high-pitched.
As if they were insisting, “We got our shelter, our home. We don’t wanna lose
it.” And whenever I put them down on
the ground, they were rolling over and stretching their legs.
After I left them
with Society, I happened to conjure up Antu’s teary eyes, sadness-smitten face.
I couldn’t even pay the price of his hobby owing to my illness. This inability was
blurring my eyes and making my way home feel steep and impassible like a hill.
I couldn’t go straight home, so I drove to this park.
The park abounds with
trees—maples, cedars, oaks, pines, and so on. I see the late-morning-green trees
swaying in the wind and basking in the sun. Also notice a protruding maple tree
turn yellowish so early. The tree shares something with me—it’s changed its
colour fast, or has to change for its survival and can’t hold green any more as
I myself have given up food for soul for my healthiness.
I only murmur to
myself, “Rini! My fall has come two weeks earlier. Its colours have varieties,
glitters, and surprises, too, but no vividness of soul.”
