Daily Times

Balochi short story by A R Dad

I would wake up as soon as my mother; sometimes it even seemed as if we were the same person. My father wrote in his diary that my mother and I were the same person.

Whether she was cooking food or brewing tea, I would always sit next to her. It was I who would always open the kitchen door, though my hand didn’t reach the doorknob -the door would open because my mother was with me.

She would light the fire and I would play with it shuffling burning coals with the stick of the broom. A few times mother hadtried to stop me but as I paid no heed, she never asked again.

In the evening as the sun went down, we would stroll to the kitchen where mother would prepare dinner and I would play with the coals. The fire in our kitchen never died because I always guarded it. Mother had nothing to do with it.

One day, the windows of the kitchen were closed and I was waiting for the burning woods to crackle into glowing coals when my eyes welled up and rubbing them I rushed out. At that moment I forgot both about my mother and the fire. A moment later, mother called out, “come back, the fire is about to die.”

As I entered, flames leapt forth from the smouldering fire again. My father mentions in his diary that the moment I would step into the kitchen, the fire would burn instantly. Matches and fuels were mere pretexts.

One morning, while we were in the kitchen, mother said, “Now that you have grown older; I think you should start your education”. I rolled a glowing ember close to her bare foot. Feeling the heat, she pulled her foot back instantly. She gazed at me as though she had grown sick of my play, but she couldn’t tell me because she never wanted to see the fire go out.

“Where should I go to study”? I said, putting the smouldering ember back. “To the cleric’s house,” she replied.

I assumed that now she wanted to distance herself from me but knowing about my obsession, before I could ask, she added, “There is a greater fire there. The moment you see it you will forget ours”. But she didn’t know that I loved the fire burning in our kitchen more than anything else in the world.

My father records in his diary that for three consecutive days I refused to go to the cleric’s house. I would express my displeasure by crying incessantly at times and, at others by maintaining a long silence. When I was asked the reason for my refusal to go the cleric’s house, I said I would only go if I could take the kitchen fire with me. Hearing this, father writes, he broke out laughing.

On the fourth day, father forced me to go to the cleric’s house. The cleric was busy teaching lessons to his pupils. As I stepped in, my eyes wandered in search of the fire my mother had told me about. My father patted my shoulder and said, “Look there to the left of the cleric, it is calling you”. I ran eagerly to the spot he had indicated, but the fire was too big to handle. A voice within me said, “You can’t play with it. It would burn you. You don’t know each other well.” Crying, I walked over to my father who was looking at me while standing by the door. I told him that I couldn’t handle this fire and we should hurry back, otherwise mother would put off the fire in the kitchen before we reached home.

When we arrived back at my house, the fire was still burning. I went right to it and started to play with it. I told my mother, “Neither will I allow anyone to sit before this fire nor do I exchange it with anyone.”

My father wrote in his diary that when I was fifteen or sixteen there was heavy rain in the town; a thousand homes collapsed and many people died. There was heavy flooding and we couldn’t get the fire going in ourkitchen, without it I grew restless and desperate. I cried and beat my head. The news about my madness spread in the entire neighbourhood.

One night I dreamt that our kitchen fire was burning in an unknown house. I wondered whether someone had stolen it. The next morning I silently left home in search of our lost fire. My mother searched everywhere for me.

Now all the jungle has grown dry and the fire is alit in our kitchen but my mother’s eyes are welled up and she cannot breathe properly.Now I am an old man. I have searched everywhere for our fire but it was nowhere to be found.At last I managed to get a fire from somewhere. From dawn to dusk I play with it but my mother is not with me anymore.

Sometimes I hear a voice addressing me:”Now that you have grown older; I think you should start your education.” I looked around but couldn’t see anyone. Sometimes I roll a glowing coal near my bare feet but I can’t feel its heat.

Yesterday I heard somebody talking about a fire, a son and his mother. When someone draws close to pick it up, it releases clouds of smokes and blinds the eyes. When alone, it narrates the story over and over again. Everyone in the neighbourhood hears the story it narrates.

I am desperate to see that fire but my heart is weak and I can’t walk far. Nor can I ask my sons to fetch the very fire because I don’t want them to know about my relationship with it. The first page of my dairy reads: “My son steps in and holds my hand and says: ‘Dad! Let’s go to the kitchen. I will show you something.’ Upon hearing the word ‘kitchen’ I collapse and he leaves my hand saying: “Now you are afraid of fire. Don’t you want to see the fire that tells the story of rain, a woman and her son?”

Published in Daily Times, November 30^th 2018.