Tahmima Anam - The Bones of Grace

‘Plant a jackfruit tree,’ he said, just as I was ducking my head through the sad doorway. ‘They come up hardy.’

Chittagong. It made sense. Big city, she could disappear. But where would she go. And how would I find her? I use my mobile and call Shathi.

‘I’m not coming back right now,’ I say. She doesn’t ask me where I am, or why, and for a second this irritates me, but then I just tell myself to be relieved because here is one less person I have to lie to. But she says, ‘What do I tell your mother?’ And I feel a little bad, so I say, ‘Give her the phone.’ I can see my mother holding the phone with two hands. ‘Amma,’ I announce, ‘be nice to Shathi. I’ll be back when my business is finished.’

She grunts at me and I know it won’t make a difference, she’ll still torture my wife by making her pick the grit out of the rice, and she’ll make her walk three times a day to the well, and cook her dal fresh every morning even though I bought a fridge that keeps everything cold. Why am I feeling bad? She’s a woman, that’s what they do, eat shit from morning to night, they must not mind it, they must know it from the minute they’re born. When you know what to expect, things aren’t so bad. This is what I tell myself as I wait at the station.

III I Go to the City

My bus pulls up to the station and I think, it’s not such a big city. Compared to Dubai, compared to Dhaka, it’s a village. No way I could miss Megna in this town. Only so many streets. I could walk each one, go into each house. Not the first time I fancied myself a hero, nice song to accompany me, bursting through doors and raising my face to the sun, shoulders jiggling, singing, ‘I’m gonna find my girl, whole world be damned.’

First thing I do, I find myself a hotel, somewhere I can put my feet up. I want somewhere nice, so when I bring Megna in, and the kid, I can tell them: here I’ve come, look, a room to myself, a sink in the corner, electric fan, tube light, I’m your daddy come to rescue you, everything you ever wanted. I even think about a room with AC, but even in my Bollywood dream that’s too much. I find it near the station, Hotel Al-Noor. It’s clean, a place you can bring a woman and she’ll think, man has made something of himself, man is a man, not some kid who ran out of the country like a scared goat. There’s a bathroom at the end of the corridor so I wash. Then I go downstairs I eat something at the restaurant, where I share a table with a few other men, not unlike me, I think, until one of them calls me ‘uncle’, and I think shit, I look older than am, or at least, older than I feel.

‘Uncle’ he says, ‘what’s your business in Chittagong?’

I made up a story on the bus ride. ‘I’m looking for my sister,’ I say.

I have their attention. Five or six men — boys — with their fingers in rice and dal. ‘Something happened to her.’ It’s the same story, the real story, except I tell it like I’m not the villain. ‘Guy from my village, we all knew him, lived just on the other side of a few fields — said he was going to marry her. But kids these days, all scoundrels.’

‘So what happened, they went secret to the Kazi?’

‘No. Said he would. But then he ran off. Got a ticket to foreign and left her cold. I heard she came here, so I’m looking.’

‘Why’d she come here? You have people here?’

I finish eating. Lick my fingers and the dal is drying on my fingernails. There’s one guy at the table who’s a bit older than the others, reminds me of Hameed. Actually the whole thing, men at a meal after a day of work, and for the first time I am having a missing twinge for my boys, Dubai, the sandpit, Bride and Groom.

‘There was a child. So she came here.’

Now they know the whole story. I can see them thinking she was a slut because she opened her legs.

I don’t know why I give a damn what they think, but I do. ‘I think he forced himself,’ I say.

‘Son of a pig,’ one of them says.

‘You have a photo?’

‘No.’ I could hardly even remember her face. I saw it every day but I’m thinking now how much I wish I did have a picture, something I could show around the streets here.

The older guy points to one of his friends, a shiny little guy with a scar from his nose to his lip. ‘Shumon here fancies himself an artist. Why don’t you draw a picture of his sister.’

The others nodded. ‘He’ll do it. He’s good.’

They were all rickshaw boys. Lived in a row of shacks behind the hotel. Tonight they were celebrating because the ban on rickshaws had just been lifted on the main road and they had made a bit more. Shumon had a wife, three kids, his parents, two younger brothers living with him. The other guy, Salam, was getting married but he still had to send money to his people back in the village. And the older guy was Awal, arms like twists of rope, grey on his beard, five daughters and another kid on the way.

To make a little money on the side, Shumon painted the backs of rickshaws. Women melting in the arms of their lovers, pink faces and tits like mountains.

‘He’ll make your sister look like a film star.’

Not sure if I want a picture of Megna looking like that. Maybe, I say.

Next day I go to the train station. Girl comes into town, she’ll be at the bus station, the train station, or the ferry ghat.

All this time I haven’t tried to think about what Megna’s been doing for these ten years. In my dreamworld she was somewhere nice like in garments or a beauty salon. All the other things she could be doing, like begging on the street, I didn’t think about. Still I go to the train station because if she’s a beggar she would definitely be there. Before I go I call Shathi on the mobile. She answers on the first ring, like she’s been holding the phone in her hand. ‘I’m in Chittagong,’ I tell her.

I can hear her breathing on the other side of the phone. ‘Good,’ she says.

‘Are you crying?’

‘No.’

‘What happened, my mother did something?’

‘No. She hasn’t been well, she’s mostly been lying down.’

‘What is it?’

‘I had a dream you were never coming back.’

All day while I’m at the train station I think about what Shathi said. I tell my story to all the beggars at the station. People hold out their hands and beg to me, and I think it wasn’t long ago I was begging myself, to a foreman to lend me some money for my brother’s leg. Now brother is doing fine, he even had a son, boy walks around the village like a little white prince. No one knows Megna. An old woman says, yes, I saw her, give me a few paisa and I’ll tell you where. Her eyes are clouded, she’s got the cataracts and I know she’s lying. I throw her a few coins I don’t bother to hear what she’s telling me. I think Shathi’s right, if I find Megna I’ll never go back, I’ll just stay at the Al-Noor forever, looking up at the ceiling fan all day with my head in her lap.

I find Shumon’s place behind the hotel. There’s a whole world back there, tin and paper shacks all stuck together. ‘Come,’ I tell him, ‘get the others, we’ll have dinner. I’ll pay.’

We meet the hotel owner, friendly guy. He asks me how long I’m staying, I say a week, ten days, that’s it. He nods over at a table at the back, where a pair of cops are ordering tea. Word’s gotten out about my sister. Everyone knows the cops won’t help. They’ll put those RAB guys on you and next thing you know, you’re the one in jail. Guy owes me a favour, hotel owner says, pointing to the one on the left. Bald circle on the top of his head. ‘If you tell him I sent you, he’ll do what’s right, won’t jerk you around.’

I nod but I don’t believe it. But I tell Shumon to do his drawing. Just the face, I say. ‘I’ll pay you.’