Stephen Kelman - Man on Fire

I asked him if he was sure. Had he heard God’s voice clearly on this matter. He replied that he had. It had felt warm in his ear like a wind. This is how I knew he was telling the truth.

I went away to my bedroom to meditate on this momentous event. Some tears were shed of surprise only. It had not been the news I was expecting. I watched the future I had been planning for fall away and saw another one rise to take its place. This took several minutes and I waited patiently for the new world to build itself as the almighty commanded it. Then I went back into the room where my son was and held him in my arms for a precious stint. I told him I was very proud of him. He had listened to his heart and followed its advice like a man, with no fear or hesitation. His heart was like a lion’s.

My wife was very happy to know the outcome and we celebrated with rare trip to the dosa kiosk across the road from our apartment for muttai dosa.

You may be wondering how I could handle the disappointing news in such a positive spirit. The answer is simple. My son is his own person. He is as different from me as two oranges from the same tree. The tree may be common to both in the nourishment it provides but each fruit is separate and must occupy its own space accordingly. Also Shubham is my best friend and I love him. This means that I must allow him to follow his own path. He does not have to be like me. I will bear the differences between us as well as enjoying the binding qualities. God has a different plan for each of us. When you love someone you should not stand above them as the leaves to shade them from the burning sun. You should stand back and give them a clear sighting of the sky. This way they will grow to their full height. You can watch the journey in comfort and take great pleasure in the shapes they make.

Thank you.

The rain fell. It roared and kicked and pulled the breath out of me. Already I couldn’t see ahead to a time when it would stop. The world cooled and filled itself in, everything that was once empty became swollen and precarious. Shoes and silences drowned. The sunglasses sellers left their intersections for higher ground and second jobs weaving placemats out of the hair their wives had harvested from unsuspecting sightseers in the high season.

The birds and the butterflies all went away. The street danced and life moved inside.

Bibhuti plastered his leg. It was a clean break and he was skilled in repairs. It would heal in two weeks, he said. I needn’t be worried. He’d broken every part of himself in pursuit of his sport and he’d always healed himself to full satisfaction. The break was a good thing, it meant I’d overcome any fear I’d had of hurting him.

‘You are ready now,’ he said.

‘I don’t feel ready.’

‘You will. I am very proud of you in this moment. I knew you were the right man for the job.’

His wife made draughts of turmeric and milk for the pain. Jolly Boy brought a sack of rice for him to rest his foot on. The TV consoled him in his time of inactivity. He played the tapes of his record-breaking history, and mesmerised himself into a rapture from which all future spells would rise. Visual proof of his superpowers gave him nourishment and he hit the phone, calling in favours and spreading word of the record attempt like a boastful smog through the city. He set a date, four weeks away to allow for his recovery. There’d be advance notices in the city and sports sections and Bibhuti was promised an interview in his own paper.

After tense negotiations the venue was confirmed, the temple where his wife worshipped. She’d pushed for it as the only way of guaranteeing his safety. At the closing of the deal she dashed out in the rain to give her thanks to the priests in person. She came back spattered in caramel-coloured mud, bags of food swinging from the handlebars of her scooter. She cooked a celebration thali of dhal and gobi and something with cashew nuts.

The new school term started but Jolly Boy stayed at home. He confessed between our courtyard shuffles that he’d been expelled for fighting. Another boy had questioned his father’s sanity. The privilege of being Bibhuti’s son needed constant defending from the book-shy dullards of his class. Until a new school could be found he was mine to lean on. His laughter was my medicine whenever my belly ached or my legs started to shake under the stress of his father’s expectations.

Bibhuti still hobbled down to the courtyard to put me through my daily paces, sitting on the bonnet of his car spitting motivational slogans at me while I brutalised a man made of rice sacks, perfecting my swing and sharpening my taste for his blood. The rain pinned us to the walls and sprayed the face of Jolly Boy’s stopwatch whenever he tried to get a reading. It kept putting out the flames at Gopal Dutta’s funeral. The smell of him roasting made me hungry. It stuck to me for days.

His death came as a shock. I’d supposed it was the return of the cancer Bibhuti had banished all those years ago. I expected to be revisited as he’d been. Bibhuti claimed natural causes, just his age catching up with him. His reaction to the inevitable was to pine for a day behind the locked bedroom door. When he came out he was himself again.

He took a practice bat to the cremation to use as a prop. It held him upright when he stood at the pyre to mumble a farewell to his eldest student. He hoped also that it would remind the mourners that Gopal Dutta had been an ally to our grand plan. In his absence life would go on and greatness would follow.

He’d wanted to be a woman next, his daughter told me. He liked the idea of carrying children who could eat his sins while he slept.

Every day a suspension of disbelief. A brave front against the constant chatter of gods and reincarnations. Everyone was wired in to your presence but I hadn’t seen you yet and I couldn’t feel you coming. I looked in the rain and I looked in the dead face of Gopal Dutta. I looked in the scars on Bibhuti’s back from a decade of self-flagellation. I saw nothing there that inclined me towards you. Darkness still awaited me sooner or later and my occupation became sandbagging myself against the fear of it.

The air con flitted like a restless bird from off to on to off, and I was a bird to be fussed over between the customs of the house. Every so often Bibhuti would look up from his laptop, the secret write-up he wouldn’t show me, to ask if I was comfortable and had everything I needed. He’d consult with his wife who’d retreat to the kitchen and return with another plate of mango slices or another glass of water.

Bibhuti brought a bat inside and took to bunting it absently against his shoulder or his unplastered leg as he sat thinking between stints at the keyboard and in the quiet times after meals. Every impact set the teeth of the room on edge, all but his. He was blissful in these moments, fantasising about the places I might hit him and the pleasure it would bring. He beat out a guillotine rhythm that had his wife fleeing to the kitchen to scrub the pots with audible force.

Then silence would wash in again and all would seem as it should be. I decided that his faith was just a wilful act of forgetting. He needed to forget that should he fail his death would stain other lives. That was how he bartered his own fear down to a whisper in the dark that nobody else could hear.

Vijay Five came to interview Bibhuti for the newspaper. He didn’t ask Bibhuti any direct questions beyond the date and location of our attempt. He already knew Bibhuti’s story and had made his peace with it.

Bibhuti asked for the front page. This would be his crowning achievement and he wanted everybody to see it and know what could be done with the right attitude.