The Mute Bird

She was standing along the porch and watching the sunset. The vermilion shades of sky were reflecting on her face and impression of bright yellow sun in her dark eyes. Her long hair was tied in a big bun, with a few strands falling on her face. Her knee-length dress had purple flowers on white base, adorned with the chicken laces on sleeves and bottom. Her left arm was resting on the railings, while fingers of right hand were writing something in the air. She was lip-syncing an old Bangla song.

The clock behind her was about to strike seven. And he is coming towards the main gate of their house. He is never late for a single second. His grey hair was shining with few white streaks. He was wearing a short half-sleeved brown checked shirt and loose black double pleat trouser with black leather sandals. His thick glasses were making a convex shape of his eyes gazing at her.

As soon as she saw him coming she opened the entrance gate for him, and headed towards the kitchen. She kept a pan on the stove for boiling two cups water. She just turned fifteen last October on the day of the first Durga Puja. And he was completing his fifty seven, but still she is a mentor to him. She does everything for him, from cooking to washing and ironing clothes, making his bed and cleaning of the house. Her soul was imprisoned in this house for years. She never went out for a long time. As the water started boiling, she poured two spoonfuls of Darjeeling tea leaves in it. She opened the sugar pot, but it was empty. She walked towards the Puja room, to fetch the sugar from the big can kept there.

He called her with a gruff voice, Pakhi.

She turned towards him. He asked her to oil his hair. She forgot about the sugar and rushed to take the coconut oil and started oiling his grey hair. He was sitting on an armchair, with his arms resting on it, and head resting on the back. She stood behind the chair, poured some oil on her palms and her thin fingers started dancing on his scalp.

He took a long breath, sighed, Pakhi you remember Dasgupta, she nodded her head as her father couldn’t see it. He continues he is no more, he left us today. A tear dropped on her cheek.

He didn’t come to the office today, then I called to his home, his son picked up the call.  He told me when Dasgupta was coming to office today morning; he measured about 10 meters of the distance from his house, a motorcycle with two people sitting on it came and parked nearby him, the guy sitting behind took a black revolver and shot him with two bullets. After hearing all of that, I hung up the call and went to the site, the police was still there, a white silhouette was created around Dasgupta’s body, he fell with his face up and one leg folded towards another, his one hand high from his head and one on his chest, holding a rolled newspaper. When I entered his house, his wife was sobbing heavily and sitting on the entrance gate. His body was still with the police and they were investigating. They were trying to find who those men were. His son Subroto introduced me to the Inspector handling the case. He started asking me about Dasgupta’s friends and enemies.

Pakhi has stopped oiling her father’s hair, her fingers were stiff but still on his scalp. Her eyes were getting darker as her tears mixed with the kajal of her eyes, and looking like the black tea she forgot on the stove. Her breath was choked; she could only hear, could not express, could not ask and could not even cry loud. She is mute since her mother had been killed similarly when she was five. Her father continued telling the details of Dasgupta’s murder as much as he knew. But Pakhi went in a vortex of memories.

It’s been ten years now, and she was too young, but she remembers everything of that day. Her mother was sitting on the floor of the porch, plucking spinach leaves and eggplants were there in a basket with a knife. She was going to prepare spinach with eggplant. The time was six in the evening, and Pakhi was playing around with a wooden house. Her mother always wore saree, that day she was wearing a turquoise tant saree with black borders. Pakhi remembers her mother was more beautiful than she is today. A small radio was kept besides the wall playing bangla songs her mother loved.

She was trying to copy her mother and singing the song with her. She didn’t know these would be her last vocals. Unexpectedly, a thin slender man came on a cycle, tying a red towel around his face. He threw his cycle in front of the entrance gate, and entered the porch. In a second before Pakhi or her mother could understand his motive of entering the house he took a knife from his pocket. This knife was bigger and sharper than the knife kept in the basket with eggplants. He inserted the knife in her mother’s stomach and blood was smeared on Pakhi’s face. She closed her eyes and screamed like anything, she didn’t remember what happened next.

When she opened her eyes, she was in her father’s lap. He was sitting along the scattered spinach leaves which were no more green, her mother’s dead body, lying beside. One leg folded towards another, one hand high from her hand and one hand on her stomach, stained with blood. Her gold ornaments were missing from her dead body. Policemen and neighbors gathered around the house. A white silhouette has been drawn around her mother’s body. And police were asking questions to Pakhi, who was the man, how he looked like, and more. But she was unable to reply as she gone mute forever after the breath-taking scream.