by Feroz Rather
‘My father must have told you what followed, the extravagant story of my failure. You must have heard that I was rusticated from the schools in New Delhi and the schools in Islamabad. I had my stance and I stood by it, no matter what. I got into heated debates until I became so fervid and eloquent that my counterparts felt I was insulting them. I was expelled from these damned cities and, hell yeah, it gave me immense pleasure. Truth be told, over the past many years, it has deepened in me the sense of who I am – a Kashmiri and nothing else.
‘I’m impudent and cheeky. That’s my gift and my curse. As Father must have told you as you two joined hands in blind faith inside the mosque, I fart from my mouth. People find my words nasty and blasphemous. But, inside me, every night when I return to my bedroom, sniffing at the grime, I feel a longing as though my heart is a dry stone craving water. A feeling akin to what I had felt for a fleeting moment as I looked at the gilded words of the Qur’an on the shroud over the saint’s grave. I had leaned to gather the dead bodies of the pigeons by my feet, the pigeons – their eyes wide open and pleading – that I had felled with a single bullet of the soldier’s gun. I articulate what I believe in, and I believe in what I articulate. War is as real as death. And I shall not pretend, Mohsin, I am done with keeping my face and acting as though all is hunky-dory, as though they ever were hunky-dory: my dear, I am terrified of death.
‘What was I telling you? Yes, after the pigeons left, I stood by the window watching the sun disappear behind the Wall and the darkness fall. I stood there brooding in the stagnant dusk. I longed for something dramatic and extreme. I longed for death and I wanted to kill someone. I was so frustrated, I wanted to go inside the bathroom and cut myself until I began to bleed. I wanted to jump out through the window into the kitchen garden which was already in shambles. I wanted to throw a stone at the Wall. I should have seized the frightening bliss of that moment; I should have dived headlong into the muddy stream.
‘Mohsin, my dear friend, you are exactly like me, fortuitous and frail. I know you think I am crazy in my head. But trust me, one rarely achieves originality and splendour in one’s life except in the moment like the one I experienced right after the pigeons left me. One goes on living and looking at the Wall. One is not spared the pain and defeat and degradation. One is not spared the silent horrors of boredom and banality. But had I seized that moment, I’d have been spared the ordeal of living in this dungeon, and the curse of living in the besieged city of Srinagar at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
‘Mohsin, you look dubious. You probably think that I’ve lost my sanity with the beatings that Force 10 gave us. Allow me to explain. I know you think I am completely wrong in my conception of the world and after-world. The only thing I cannot accept is your claim that you’re unafraid of death because you are. And you think if Force 10 kills you, you’ll become a martyr and live eternally in a world that is just and lasting. Bullshit. What kind of fool’s paradise are you living in? And how dare you think of paradise when Kashmir still exists on earth. Why the fuck don’t you understand that the occupation itself is the deepest circle of hell and there is no hell beyond it? Remember one thing: men and women are merely men and women, and whenever and wherever they are shackled, their movement curtailed and their freedom taken away, they will rebel and launch a hailstorm—’
The door opened at that moment and interrupted Tariq’s rant. Force 10 moved towards them in the semi-dark, the keys clinking in his hand. He directed the light of his torch at their faces, piercing their eyes with the sharp beam of light. Then he grabbed the manacle that shackled the boys together and unlocked it.
‘If you move or open your mouth, I will drill holes in your head,’ he warned them and dragged Tariq to the door and tied him to the bar in the centre. Then he came back to Mohsin and said, ‘Follow me.’
In the hallway, Mohsin saw Force 10 more clearly. Dressed in khaki overalls and lumberjack shoes, he had marked his forehead with three lines of charcoal. Mohsin gave him a sharp sideways glance, recalling how Force 10’s mouth had frothed when he had beaten him with his belt. Force 10’s determination to break Mohsin’s body was so strong that each blow he delivered was harder than the one that preceded it. As they approached the washbasin fitted into the wall to their right, Force 10 halted.
‘Put that shirt on,’ he said, gesturing to the side of the mirror tacked onto the wall. A white, long-tailed shirt, without any spots of blood, hung from a nail.
Mohsin put it on and stood before the mirror, looking at the bottom of the washbasin which contained broken teeth, saliva and blood.
‘Wash your fucking face,’ Force 10 said.
Mohsin obeyed, but with his eyes shut, unable to look at himself after three days of torture and relentless beatings. He did not want to see the defeat in his eyes and a broken body covered with innumerable gashes. He glanced away from his reflection and looked at Force 10 who gestured to him to walk to the Tunnel.
Past Café Barbarica, Force 10 opened a door to his right and pushed Mohsin into the office that was suffused with sunlight. The walls were washed white and supported a high-vaulted ceiling.
‘Stand there in the middle,’ Force 10 ordered Mohsin and walked out through the front door.
Inspector Masoodi was seated behind the table, resting his arms on the soft arms of a leather chair. Rumour had it that Masoodi believed in the same God that Mohsin did, the God about whom Tariq was sceptical. About Inspector Masoodi it was said that wherever he was posted in Kashmir, he built an opulent mosque where he prayed five times a day from the front row. He was a clean, uniformed man with a florid face and a thick, groomed moustache. With his black baton, he tapped the wooden table top, and Force 10 entered with Mohsin’s mother.
‘Inspector Sahib, please let Mohsin go,’ she pleaded in tears.
‘Sit down and be silent,’ Inspector Masoodi commanded, pointing to the chair across him.
As she sat down, she glanced at Mohsin’s swollen and bruised countenance. ‘What has become of you, my son,’ she choked.
Inspector Masoodi gazed coldly at Mohsin. He placed his baton on the table and folding his arms across his chest, he sat back in his chair.
‘Your son is a miscreant,’ he said to the weeping woman. ‘He has strayed from the path that God ordained for us in the Qur’an.’
‘Is it I who has strayed?’ Mohsin shouted indignantly. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing. He felt the pain of the beating seeping into every inch of his body.
‘Mohsin, shut up,’ his mother said.
‘You can see for yourself that this kid has no manners,’ Inspector Masoodi said. ‘It’s all the same – he who breaks the law of the land, breaks the law of God.’
‘He’s innocent,’ the woman protested.
‘He is a miscreant,’ Inspector Masoodi said.
‘I beg of you, please let him go.’
‘I will let him go if he recites from the Qur’an,’ Inspector Masoodi said, leaning forward, his elbows on the table. ‘I will let him go if he recites the chapter, Al Fatiha, the line: Guide us on the straight path.’
‘Mohsin, please do whatever he says,’ his mother begged him.
‘Do you honestly expect me to recite the Qur’an in front of this man?’ Mohsin asked, incredulous. ‘Does he even know how perverse he is?’
‘Do whatever he says, Mohsin,’ his mother repeated.
‘Where does the recitation of the Qur’an fit into the business of custodial torture?’
‘Mohsin, your mother begs you.’
‘Mother, not on my life, not in front of this hypocrite,’ said Mohsin.
‘Then you will rot in this prison,’ Inspector Masoodi said, rising. He pointed the tip of his baton towards Mohsin’s chest.
‘Inspector Sahib, he is innocent,’ his mother wept.
‘Mother, I’m anything but innocent. I throw stones at the soldiers and police. I’m a criminal and my crime is that I am besotted with the spectre of freedom. I won�
�t stop pelting policemen like him until all of them have been driven out of Kashmir.’
‘Inspector Sahib, please forgive him, he doesn’t know what he’s saying,’ she entreated, pressing her palms together and bowing towards the policeman.
‘Silence!’ Inspector Masoodi shouted furiously, striking the table with the baton. Force 10, standing in the lawns, came in running. ‘Take this woman away and throw this boy back into the cell.’
As Force 10 led Mohsin back through the Tunnel into the hallway, they could hear Tariq singing:
Bring me back my moment,
bring me back my pair of pigeons.
My friend has gone mad, Mohsin rued in his heart. Who could possibly remain sane in this theatre of cruelty? As he walked in through the door, his eyes met Tariq’s and there was a moment of acknowledgement. Mohsin wanted to tell Tariq, ‘I don’t believe in Inspector Masoodi’s God. His God is very different from mine.’
As they approached the washbasin, Force 10 asked Mohsin to remove the shirt. Mohsin peeled it off and hung it back on the nail. He looked into the mirror and his blood-shot eyes stared back at him. His lower lip was torn; his face was grotesquely swollen.
Force 10 stood behind him and looked on impassively. Inside the cell, Tariq continued his insane singing.
‘Can I have some water?’ Mohsin asked.
‘Okay, but hurry up,’ Force 10 replied. Mohsin was taken aback by Force 10’s inexplicable lenience. He leaned over the basin and turned the faucet. Force 10 stepped away to lean against the wall behind him. He lit a cigarette and took a drag and the smell of burnt tobacco and dry weed filled the chamber.
‘Stop singing that damn song,’ Force 10 coughed, ‘or I’ll wring your neck and tear your lungs out.’
Tariq stopped singing. Force 10 dialled a number on his cell phone. Mohsin washed his face and drank a palmful of water. As he placed his hands on the sides of the washbasin, he felt it move slightly. Mohsin looked at Force 10 in the mirror. He was engrossed with the phone and had turned away. Mohsin saw the shaved nape of his neck. Wrapped in the pleasant odour of the smoke, Force 10 laughed luridly and clicked his tongue. He seemed to be talking dirty to a woman.
Mohsin grabbed the washbasin with both hands and moved it. With one swift motion, he tore it off the wall and turned, holding the ceramic basin aloft.
Force 10 fell to the floor, unconscious. His eyes were open, the blood gushing out of the wide wound in his head. There was a long silence until Tariq resumed his song.
Bring me back my moment
Bring me back my pair of pigeons.
8
The Stone Thrower
A
tall, young car-washer in grease-smeared blue jeans and a white T-shirt was on his way home from the market. He walked straight on the dust road towards his home, looking ahead intently, across the wooden bridge with wooden railings. The house was at the end of the street, small and shoddy, with cracked clay walls and a crumbling, rust-eaten roof.
As he stepped on to the bridge, he saw his mother, squatting on the bank of the stream. Dipping the bucket in her hand into the water, she glanced up.
‘I bought spinach and tomatoes,’ Mohsin said matter-of-factly, slightly raising the plastic bag that he held in his hand.
‘I’ll get the cheese later and make you your favourite dish,’ his mother said and smiled. There was pain in her eyes.
As the bucket filled with the water, it pulled at her arm. She resisted the tow, pulling the bucket up and out. Her snood, a thin, worn rag of white cotton, came loose, exposing her grey, discoloured hair. But before it could slide down to her shoulders, embarrassing her before her son and other passers-by, she grabbed hold of it. Placing the bucket on the slippery bank between her feet, she pulled the snood by its ends, wrapped it around her head and tied a secure knot. Then she picked up the bucket and stepped on to the thin strip of tall grass and reeds by the road.
Mohsin was about to offer to carry the bucket home, but she waved him to go on ahead. ‘Tea is ready in the kitchen,’ she said.
Mohsin nodded and was about to continue in the direction of home when he heard a noise – the hiss of a firecracker tearing through the air before hitting what sounded like a heavy sack of rice.
The bucket fell from his mother’s hand and tumbled on to the broken tarmac. He turned and ran back across the bridge. His mother ran after him.
A boy, whose name turned out to be Amir, had fallen on the grass verge by the road, his face turned skyward. He wore a white school shirt and grey trousers. His skull was split. Blood and brain matter had trickled out on to his face. His satchel was flung on the tarmac, in the middle of the road. The smoke shell was by his feet amidst the notebooks and pencils that had spilled out of the satchel. A plume of acrid smoke rose from it.
Mohsin’s mother gave a cry of horror. Untying the knot, she threw her snood over Amir’s face. Mohsin put the plastic bag down and held her by her arm. He looked down the road in the direction of the market. There he saw Force 10, the policeman whose car he had washed once. Force 10 wore a green helmet and held a stun gun in his hand.
‘Mohsin, bring water, bring water,’ his mother cried. ‘Let us wash this boy’s face.’
Mohsin ran across the bridge and grabbed the fallen bucket by its handle. He jumped over the green strip on to the bank. As he dipped the bucket into the brook, bright bubbles emerged noisily out of the water and burst on the surface.
His mother was kneeling by Amir’s head. Beneath the scarf, she glimpsed the blood trickling down Amir’s jaw, gathering in the hollow of his throat between the collarbones. Unable to bear the sight of it, she wept hysterically.
Neighbours gathered around. Mohiddin held Mohsin’s mother, turning her head away from the boy felled on the road. ‘Ya Rasullallah, Ya Rasullallah,’ he recited. Najib fidgeted and muttered under his breath. He stepped back, rushed forward and kicked the shell with his shoe like a football player. It rolled over the edge of the bridge and fell into the stream.
As it hit the water, it exploded. The entire stream frothed violently, splashing Mohsin’s face. Najib gritted his teeth and let loose a stream of profanity.
Mohsin returned with the bucket of water and asked Mohiddin to take his mother away. Then he picked up the snood from Amir’s face and threw it on to the tarmac.
Amir’s face was splotched with blood, his eyes clogged. Red flesh hung loosely from his forehead.
Mohsin lifted the boy’s head into his lap and sprinkled a palmful of water from the bucket on his face. He rinsed his fingers in the bucket, dissolving the blood, and the white and grey matter clinging to his fingertips. He dribbled some water on to Amir’s temples, washing them. ‘Give me the scarf,’ he said to Najib, who was standing by Amir’s feet. But Najib stood motionless, gaping at the gash the shell had made in Amir’s head.
‘Give me the scarf, you idiot,’ Mohsin snapped. Najib looked startled, as though he had been woken from a nightmare. He picked up the strip of cloth from the road and raised it like a flag. The dirt from the street clung to the wet patches of blood and brain on the snood. Najib whipped the fabric to shake off the muck before handing it to Mohsin.
The wound continued to bleed and ooze. Mohsin’s mother was wailing at the bridge. Mohiddin, still holding her arm, was loudly reciting: ‘Ya Rasullallah, Ya Rasullallah.’ Najib paced restlessly. He lit up a cigarette suddenly, not caring that Mohiddin, a venerable elder, whom the young men respected enough to not smoke in his presence, was in their midst.
Mohsin wound the fabric around the wound and fished out Amir’s ID card and mobile phone from his trouser pocket. The cell phone’s screen was broken with multiple cracks radiating across the tiny glass pane, however it lit up obligingly when Mohsin pressed the button to activate it. He scrolled to the contacts and dialled the first number on the list, Abba.
‘Where are you, Amir?’ Abba asked. Mohsin was silent. He had no words to say to the father of the boy whom he had not seen before toda
y; a man whose son’s name, age and the school he attended he had learnt after he was dead.
‘Are you still at the tuition centre? Your mother was asking what was taking you so long, Amir.’
‘I’m calling from—’ Mohsin began.
‘Who are you?’ Abba interrupted. ‘And why are you using Amir’s phone?’
‘Amir has had an accident,’ Mohsin replied, not knowing what else to say.
‘Is he okay? Where is he now?’ Abba asked.
Across the lake, Amir’s village was at the foot of a hill. As news of Amir’s death spread, the people of the neighbourhood thronged to the house. Within minutes, a casket had been organized, sheets of tarp spread over the courtyard and a tent erected at the far end beside a dense walnut coppice.
On this day, Mohsin’s clothes had different stains and smears. Not the usual black smears of grease but the pale grey smears of brains. Not the yellow stains of oil, but the red stains of blood. He stood with the school satchel, holding it close to his chest. He had gathered and put Amir’s pencils, notebooks, mobile phone and wallet inside it. He pressed his back to the metal grill of the veranda, fixing his eyes on the tent. Through a little gap, over the heads of wailing women with headscarves of bright, flaming colours, he watched Mohiddin raise Amir’s small, pale arm and wash it.
Mohsin’s hunger had vanished. A languor came over him and he felt morose and dazed. He listened listlessly to the uneven shuffle of footsteps around him. Young boys and girls shepherding in the old and weak, bringing them tumblers of cold water from inside the house, whispering consolation and condolences into their ears. Mohsin stood there looking towards the sky the sun had fogged up. The air was oppressive and still. He closed his eyes and overheard two boys.