Translated from Bangla by Ashraf ul Alam Shikder. Cover art: Detail of rickshaw art from Bangladesh.
The Krishnachura trees on both sides of the Gulshan main road seem to be greener this season, and the flowers seem to be dazzling with their red color growing more intense. The matchless beauty of the Japanese cherry blossoms has created a brilliant landscape of such redness that the views of this area are now considered modest as the bride with nothing less than her nobility.
Such a unique sight in the afternoon, and this road beckons me in a way that I cannot ignore. Walking on this path, I drown in a sense of emptiness. People would do anything to lose themselves in such void! It could turn some people into Baul-monks, others into mystics, poets or saints. Some become immersed in the melody of a song. Very few are born with a god-given keen sensitivity allowing them to drown in those magical qualities. Those who don’t have it, must resort to the aid of marijuana, alcohol or drugs to get lost in it.
But that is no longer possible for me. As an ordinary person, I have my own way to make my time more meaningful while still busy with work, which includes reading books, watching movies as well as trying to absorb nature in all its attraction. Still, books, nature, or films all seem companions to dreamy imagination of perfection rather than vehicles for drowning in the feeling of emptiness. They create an imaginary landscape in the mind that spurs us to laugh or cry rather than emptying us from within; they urge us to care while alone with ourselves. For some, watching a rainbow in a rain-soaked soggy afternoon, makes them wish to capture its colorfulness in their heart rather than remember its disappearance into an infinite void. This path of being filled in the name of emptiness is the path taken by many young people like me.
But why don’t those sensitive people blessed by the Creator change their path to fullness like us? How, and for what purpose, do they perceive death before they die? Do they choose such a path to harmonize their senses with the Creator and to match their nervous system with the Creator’s magic? Is that emptiness necessary for true creation too? Is this consciousness of replacing man and the human nervous system with the nerves of the great creation so overpowering that a great artist-devotee is so enriched by it that all earthly attainments are trampled underfoot and lost in indestructible songs like the Creator’s! The same is true of air as well. In spite of its invisibility, how proudly it splits into oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and other gases. It is like the invisible wings of the flying airplane, like the seven colors of a rainbow on the horizon. The smile of dreams spanning over the horizon. Then comes the magic-reality of immersing oneself into an infinite emptiness. As I walk alone along the road, nature, the trees, and the flowers all drag me down to an abyss of abstract thought. That is why I feel so connected to this road. But since I have just joined a foreign embassy, I have to forgo a few plans, as it is already evening by the time I finish all my pending work.
That evening I was returning home from work. My home, a spacious rented room, including a kitchen, a drawing room, and a bathroom. I had no idea that such an arrangement was possible in this elite neighborhood here. Tidying up my single room home is a favorite pastime of mine. Dear to my heart are my sofa bed and my reading table too.
This is the time of one month-long fasting rituals and it feels so good to walk the empty streets after `Iftar`. Today, after last night’s north westerly storm, a sweet and gentle breeze blows around instead of the heat. The dangling hair on either side of my ears is being blown by gusts of wind. I can fathom a storm making its way again. Clouds of ill tidings. After an obstreperous churning on the sea, a devastating hurricane named `Foni` is racing towards the land. So, there will be much rain tonight too.
I can’t help but think of the emotions stirred by a rainy night. Now the wind is playing with my hair, a hint that joyful night is approaching. The random liberty of the breeze on my hair tells me that, like a shadow, I am followed by someone. That shadow behind me is definitely a little taller than me. I thwart the temptation to look back. But the shadow at my heels comes closer and a woman says in an Orphean voice, “One-night costs only eight thousand bucks, Sir. But I assure you that you will enjoy it more than your money.”
The girl wearing a thin black jacket moves up next to me. I wonder why in this Bangladeshi summer both of us are wearing the same winter clothes. So, this girl too is bothered by the chilly jets of air coming from the air-conditioner, in an expensive office like mine. Why does she make such an offer despite being employed at a good job? I feel better looking at her feet before I look at her face. She is wearing a pair of black shoes with at least a two-inch heel. The white glittering buttons on the lovely design of her shoes look like diamonds. So, she may look a little taller than me. However, I am sure that her height is no less than five feet seven inches. It looks like the lady wished to be a star, maybe still wants to. But does she think that the darker the night around the star, the brighter it becomes?
Her body is straight and tall, and bears the wafting scent of wet leaves from the mountain forest. That scent is turning into a mixture combining camellia, Chinese hibiscus and apple. The aroma runs deep in the cells of my memory, my subconscious, spurs me to focus my attention on her and turn inquisitive. Though her hair remains loose and unbraided, it does not reach down to her waist. Her hairstyle enhances the brightness of her pink face against her black jacket.
I can’t resist the temptation to see her face. Several pimples grant her that wild look of burning youth, which sets my heart racing. I become at a loss for words as soon as I look into her charming, deep dark eyes, but she smiles sweetly and says in Bengali, “I think you are not a coward after all and won’t hold back. You see, the sweet queen’s crape-myrtle flowers are soft but look hard on the outside; I am as soft as those flowers.”
Then she grabs my hand, walks on as though she is directed towards her own home. Now her bodily fragrance clearly is driving me crazy. I cannot help myself, my left hand is already stuck inside her arm, and I wrap my fingers around her long fingers. The more I become absorbed in her and lose my focus on the road, the more the destination appears to be clear to her, the more she is focused on the path. The fact that she is oblivious to my total immersion in her increases the irrational hold the mysterious lady has on me.
I am astonished to see her recognize my humble flat. She stops in front of the door and casts a hesitant glance towards me. I assure her, “Yeah, this is my apartment.”
I unlock the door and she takes off her shoes, carefully takes them inside the flat and places them by the door rather than outside. It seems that she doesn’t want others to be curious in what is going on inside this flat.
She is a lean and slim lady wearing a red T-shirt with a V-cut collar, she looks as pleasant as a cherry and flourishing like a crape-myrtle flower. She sits on the sofa to relax and says, “Tonight is just like the night we spent in the beautiful hotel beside the blue lake in Switzerland … isn’t it?”
Surprisingly, despite many attempts, I can’t recall any session with her there in Zurich. I was there only four days, and the truth is – I’ve never stayed at a hotel on or beside the lake due to their high price.
This girl is lying through her teeth but I don’t want to catch her lying. Has she mistaken me for some other young man? I guess if now I point out her lies or mistake, she will leave this place saying, “Oh, sorry, you’re not the man I thought of.” My heart bleeds at the very thought.
Then this lonely and friendless life of mine will go astray running after a friend. My salary arouses jealousy in anyone my age so it is also quite attractive. So how could I find a friend here in this capital of non-readers and people with little inclination for intellectual thought?
It’s rather safer for me to be immersed in my kingdom of fantasy, among the books I have collected.
2
Did the bee smell the money and arrive today? Eight thousand bucks is not a big deal. I am driven by few other thoughts, reminiscing about those Swiss nights I spent attending a seminar in Switzerland. Even in the dreamy, generous openness of the land and aroma of cocoa-rich chocolate, I was immersed in my own wild thoughts! And frequently I would rush to the balcony of the hotel and look at the wide blue waters of the lake joining with the Alps, hiding its beauty behind a veil like a newlywed bride.
I was absorbed in observing the sight, again and again – hundreds of times, enslaved in my childhood dreams. I was searching for a pair of eyes hidden behind the veil of … regardless. The pair of eyes I have been searching for in that magical light and darkness of nature wrapped in clouds, ever since adolescence, whether under the drizzling rain or on days when the rain drops torrential.
Still today I look at the girl in search of those eyes. I overcome my hesitation – should I look into her hypnotic eyes or not – as the blood floods the middle of my chest. On those nights in Zurich, as soon as I tried to find similarities between those imaginary eyes and hers, my blood would start pulsing in my veins leaving the main atrium of the heart. From the green Alps they dodged the blue waters of Lake Zurich to the top of the sky.
I wanted to ask the girl, “Are you Emma?” But I didn’t because I feared losing her. Laying her right foot on her left to relax, she says, “I think, you have forgotten my name, right? But, so soon! Yes, I am Emma.”
“O, yes, I remember, Emma.” And I also want to tell her that there is a touch of redness under her left arm, near her chest, like a mark left by a bloody tongue instead of a never-ending kiss! But I cannot say that out of shame. Emma smiles. Deception and mystery are playing in her eyes. She says, Are you still confused about me? So, you are thinking why did I ask you for eight thousand bucks instead of introducing myself, right?”
Surprisingly, that’s exactly what I had been thinking. But Emma goes on to say, “It’s just a reminder of how much you get paid for thirty days of work. One night with me means a month of your salary. What else, just calculating how many nights a month I can spend with you as your lover, without incurring in a big financial loss! Life is too short; you know?”
Then she stands up. The scattered light of the lamp on the left creates the reflection of Emma’s shadow on the right wall, which surprises me. Oh shit, I have known this young woman for a long time. Emma’s shadow is more acquainted with me than with her. Yes, I spent a considerable amount of time with her. But I have just forgotten where, when, and how? Those moments are sinking much deeper in my memory – it seems very hard for me to recall. That problem is also solved by her shadow, showing the outline of her body sharper and more upright.
Yes, she starts undressing, with that customary gesture used when you take off shoes upon entering a house. I cannot look at Emma directly and look at her shadow instead. I am so scared thinking of what evil would befall me if I look ed straight at her. Am I so addicted to the dream-imagined version of this woman; I have suffered such extreme mental anguish ‘waiting’ for this moment all my life that my heart becomes reckless at the thought of getting her!
As she takes off her belt and jeans, Emma says with regret, ”I can’t believe that you haven’t slept with anyone since you returned from Zurich!”
How can I convince her of this? Doesn’t she realize that my imagination doesn’t equate with the mental standard of the girls who live in this city? Whether she believes it or not, I don’t like to get involved with anybody here fearing what trouble I might get into. Who knows how, and when someone will spy on me, and even on my personal life, and put an end to it – after returning to Dhaka? Why can’t she understand?
Why doesn’t she understand, here the seasons and the flowers are unique, but there is a huge void when it comes to trust and dependence. Where can one find a woman to love where people are more interested in one’s social position rather than in the soul? But, in exchange for spending a night, Emma is also looking for money … yet why am I so anxious about her?
Emma throws her jeans to the other side of the sofa and sits on it. She crosses her legs and says, “Uhm, of course, yes, that should also be considered. The wind that blows here in this city contains sulfide. The atmosphere is overwhelmed with carbon and too much noise from overcrowded people. The feeling of love is lost.”
After her words, I turn my focus from her shadow to her and look at Emma in her wholeness, the flesh and blood. I am in awe of her physical beauty and breathless instead of my breathing speeding it up. Inside I am sweating like a pig. Seeing me sitting still, she says, “Are you hesitant? Ah, if you only knew what the human race is capable of doing then you would understand that people get busy only in the midst of destruction, except for the time of love. If you could be in God’s shoes and saw what humankind will do in the next twenty-four hours in this world, like an open book …”
I am really surprised by Emma’s wise words and can’t refrain from asking her, “Then what would I see?”
“Over the next twenty-four hours, the people of the world will build two million cars that require sixty million barrels of oil. In the meantime, they will fell more than ten million trees while each of the 350,000 newborns including those those of us already in existence will need to breathe an average of 23000 times. 150 to 200 species of creatures will become extinct. Jeff Bezos alone earns 275 million dollars, but an average resident of my city, Dhaka, may have a hard time earning just 275 bucks. Unlimited weapons will be produced; the American people will buy more than 56,000 firearms. In Brazil alone, 168 people will be killed. 29,000 people will be arrested over 24 hours for various crimes. Some positive things will happen too. One hundred and eighty million people will celebrate their birthdays, six thousand five hundred marriages will take place in America (although there will be more break ups in Asia and the Middle East). But if you look at the statistics of rape, violence against women, war, religious extremism, kidnappings and murders, human trafficking, occupations, and other evils of human culture – you will certainly think that human beings are in fact destined for doom. So, let us enjoy loving each other and enjoy at least one more night of endless happiness in life.”
“I see you are also wise.”
“And you! Don’t underestimate yourself. Graffiti are prohibited in Switzerland, and yet written on the walls of several buildings, on the hills, on the glass of your hotel window, were the words ‘I need you.’”
“That’s why you came?”
“See, I have a reputation for beauty in Zurich. But, no one has ever wanted me the way you do. No one else but you has seen my reflection in the blue waters of the lake flowing from the Alps. The word ‘Emma’, which you wrote again and again in the midst of the tens of thousands watery wakes left behind by the boat you were standing on, are now melting into wax and hardening in the air of Europe.”
“But …”
“You may have marriage in mind. I don’t want to be hired for free or easy labor, and don’t want to be just the happiest memory. Obviously, the amount of money is nothing compared to being alone with me, which you wrote with the blood of your wounded heart.”
Emma’s last words seemed to linger on the entire glass wall like raindrops or the icy cold night mist. Those words melted down and morphed into the body of the alphabets and finally resonated in my ears. After a span of time, I remembered that Emma had nurtured my dream more than I had done myself. And yes, I had found Emma in the first emotions of my childhood, in the middle of a heavy rain. So, I told her that story.
There was a vast pond in the middle of a solitary field. On its banks, the dense shadow of mango trees and blackberry trees embraced the darkness of a special grove where rain dropped from the clouds in the fairy tale. Either it was the middle of day or dawn or dusk -I had no idea about the specific time.
There the mesmerizing shadow of trees erased all the differences between morning, afternoon, and even the evening light; I was frightened by a laughing fairy with pink skin who suddenly emerged from there. I became very scared.
It was freezing cold, I can hear the sound of my chattering teeth. That fairy came down next to me with her physical warmth and light as if I were looking at a Greek rain goddess. Not even a drop of rain, nor any particle of darkness could ever touch her. And surprisingly I noticed that beneath her left shoulder was a mole like the one on my mom’s shoulder, I had lost my mother early on, when I was a child.
Amazed I looked at her, calling out in a muffled voice, ‘Emma’. She smelled like a wet night mixed with camellia, hibiscus, rose and apples. There was heavenly softness in her big eyes outlined with Kazal. She was addictive, settling her eyes on my eyes. Her deep breath rose and fell creating what seemed like a shelter for life.
The rain had stopped. I realized that the afternoon sun was setting; It was clear to me as I watched its last and haunting light laughing through the dark blackish clouds. Though it was evening, I did not want to leave her and return home.
“The evening was getting darker and the people of my village had come out searching for me in the woods with their hurricane-lanterns. Their presence annoyed me. I was really feeling forlorn at the thought of having to go away and leave behind the fairy named ‘Emma’”.
“Yeah, you told this story to my reflection in the waters of Lake Zurich that day.”
“Did I really?”
“Yeah, certainly, I told you that I had been searching for a way to come to you since that day.”
“And you took such a long time? I was there all alone, why didn’t you come for me?”
“What do you mean I took so long? You would have lost me if you had met me there. How can I explain to you what a pain it is to be a famous woman? But don’t be afraid. The more the carbide and carbon pile up, the more rainy nights will increase – the easier it will be for me to come to you.
3
I got closer and sat next to her half-naked body. I saw her so closely on that day of heavy rain. having attained a closer look at her gleaming body, and even after melting down like wax in its heat, the following question peeked deeply into my heart, “There was a reddish mole under your left shoulder …”
“Oh, so you remember it?”, as she said this she kept exposing her body to show it.
It is as though, for eternity, her sky-like body has been revealing itself by raining down cloud after cloud. Looking at her paragon of beauty, I begged her to not ever leave me.
She told me, “I had hidden the mole off my body into the wardrobe of your hotel in Zurich, in a fold of my red bra. I think you have to go back there. Shouldn’t you? You are now a happy young man. It’s not right for you to be impatient for that small a mole or sesame. At least not in a city like this one with polluted air filled with carbide.”
Forgetting all about the moles, drowning in the gulf of Emma’s love, I can hear, in the light of the hurricane lantern, some villagers whisper somewhere far away. I wanted to hide myself in the million clouds in every fold of Emma’s skin so that they wouldn’t find me this time. And Emma said lovingly, “Thinking about how you wrote my name on a piece of white cloud in Zurich, I fell in love with you over and over again.”
“Okay, fine, stay with me then. Hold me tight, in this dark rainy forest.”
With a sweet smile, Emma says, “I have an important appointment tomorrow in Paris. But definitely, I will come one evening.”
“Will you really come back to me? Before winter?” I asked. “I love snow and winter as much as I am afraid. In my early childhood I learned to feel the joy of being with someone like you in the midst of fear. If you come back to me, as I touch your long fingers, I will try to understand the relation between your comings and goings, from feeling chills or feeling the heavy rains coming”.
It’s raining heavily, and the hurricane lantern is gradually approaching. The whispered letters became the body of the word. They said, “What a bad habit this boy has cultivated since his childhood! Whenever it rains, he forgets all his regular routines. He even forgets to eat and drink.”
But I could not pay attention to those words. I could only hear an amatory sweet voice:
“One Night Costs Eight Thousand only, Sir. But I assure you you’ll enjoy it more than your money.”
Kazi Rafi a post graduate in English literature is a prominent fiction and dexterous short story writer in Bangladesh (B-1975). He has eleven novels and six volumes of stories to his credit.
His first novel Blurred Dream of Sassandra was awarded with HSBC-Kali O Kolom Award-2010 which is one of the most prestigious awards in Bangladesh and Bangla literature. He received three more awards including ‘Nirnay Gold Medal-2013’ for the outstanding performance in the era of Novel and Short Stories.
Ashraf-ul Alam Shikder (born February 28, 1964 died February 12, 2024) worked full-time as a translator and writer and also created designs for the web, print, and television commercials. The Dhaka Company Herbs & Health employed him in his home office.
