Sunday, 22 October 1995
There was a cold moon overnight. Satya may as well have been ill, for she refused to leave the room that her grandfather had set aside for her and instead curled up further beneath her warm duvet. Wrapping it around her body, she hooded it over her head as well, fearful of the approach of the daddy-longlegs with its spindling limbs that had been tormenting her since she had laid down. No, it was unfair to blame a rogue crane fly, she told herself, for it was her inner contemplations that unsettled her; the strange random poetry of her own that had suddenly descended, echoing over and over within.
She lay awake for hours, chewing over words and what they meant, reflecting on the horrible pain within. Her pounding heart bore witness to a terrible inner fear, which no amount of silent meditation could dull. Rolling over, she found a spare pillow and hugged it close to her chest. At last she edged herself back against the wall, as if it was her best protection, and returned to her recurring dreams.
When her grandfather had tried to rouse her this morning it was almost in vain, for she had refused to be moved from her bed. She had no idea how long he had been calling her before she finally responded with a grunt, muttering that her plan had changed; today was no day for walking in the hills. She wanted to grieve and mourn and wallow in self-pity, to sink into another depression, another fit of melancholy; she wanted to head back, to project her anger onto another, to disappear once more into her underground hiding place amongst the books and journals, to take in that smell and those dull echoes.
Standing before the magnificent view now, Satya was glad that she had been too weak to obey the inner callings; she was glad that he had insisted, pulling her from her slumber. Here the sun cloaked the open fields with warmth, bathing them in its golden silver light. They had fought their way past wild parsnips and through the rough grass to get there, drinking up the delicious scent of the tall yellow and white flowers around them, the last before winter perhaps. They had ascended and descended the round hills and bulbous undulations, and now they stood before that view: the dark green of a conifer plantation, the yellowish patchwork of fields beyond and, up on the furthest plateau, dry brown enclosures bordered by walls of stone.
Beside her, her grandfather wheezed, panting as if their ascent had stolen the last of his breath. ‘We can rest here if you like,’ she tried, hoping for one for herself, ‘the grass is dry.’
‘If I sit down I’ll never be able to get up again,’ he replied, dismissing her concern, ‘Let’s press on. Two more miles and we’re there, and then we can rest all day if you want to.’
Wandering on, they traversed more fields edged with ancient hedges and nearly leafless trees, trampling over the light green and yellow dry grass for miles on end. Ultimately, they would end up back where they had started, following this great loop around the hill of hills, through the deep and wide valley, over the top of countless hills, down quiet forgotten lanes and through a shaded strip of woodland; ultimately, they would end up back where they had started from, but their destination was long out of sight. On the hills her companion was silent, except for his gasping breath, but as they meandered along gentler inclines he was filled with those old tales that she had so missed.
At once they happened upon a river bed, the pitiful brook amongst the boulders telling a tale of its own, recalling the warmth they had been blessed with all summer long. She worried for his ankles, but he only insisted on journeying along its course, jumping from rock to rock, crunching stones beneath his boots. He was unimpressed by her concern for him and left her behind, eager to catch sight of the real river he said he could hear beyond the bend. Theirs was only a tributary, he told her, hurrying on like a young adventurer in search of treasure.
When she caught up with him, he pointed left and right at the convergence of two channels and attempted to explain why the water there moved quickly while the water behind them stood in idle puddles. At the junction, they turned right to ramble on against the flow. By the left-hand bank, the water flowed past them unimpeded by the rocks a quarter of a metre beneath the surface, but beside their path the water dodged rounded stones and swirled around them, bubbling white froth where it spilt over little dams, stagnant in the isolated pools. On and on they walked against the current, upstream, negotiating the path as it grew narrower and narrower. Overhanging trees and the insecure rocks made their journey difficult and uncomfortable, but still they pressed on. Their backs bent, they walked erratically, stumbling several times on loose debris; even her grandfather had to concede now that there was no joy in this. The time had come to clamber up the bank through a gap in the trees and return to the meadow beside their diminishing tributary. The journey would be easier now and, at last, they could concentrate on each other in place of the rocks.
‘You’ve changed, Satya,’ came his words all of a sudden, ‘You’re not as lively as you used to be, you don’t seem to express your feelings anymore.’ He glanced at her momentarily. ‘What’s happened to you?’
There was so much she could say, so much she could tell him, but she could not articulate her contemplations yet. It would all be a rambling splurge, soon forgotten. He had heard about the riot the previous afternoon, about the maddening racists who had stood in the way of a peaceful protest, of the culpability and complacency of the police who had protected them. He was sorry he had forced her to go along, but glad that she had not been caught up in it; he had thought times had changed, that the tide had turned. He had thought that the decent folk of the town would outnumber the band of hate-mongers in their midst set on causing strife.
What should she tell him, she wondered? That one of those racists was once her friend? That for a year and a half she had dreamed of him and their reunion? What was she to tell him? That it was their side that had kicked off the riot, enraged by provocation? That the racists numbered a mere handful; that they had suffered for their stand? That they bore the brunt of the violence, that it was her side that had flown into a frenzied rage, that the bloodied were the racists, the victorious the decent folk of the town? What was she to tell him, she asked herself? That the one she fell in love with now lay in a hospital bed ready to give up his soul, his body broken, his life shattered, while the one who really loved him could only look on in despair, afraid that he would die before they were ever reconciled? Could she tell her grandfather any of this, she wondered?
As she pondered how she might begin, they came upon a road. It took them a while to find the stile through the hedge, but they were soon clambering over it, guessing the direction for home. He seemed to think he knew the way, although they were lost an hour ago. At his side, she strolled on, her feet aching on the old grey tarmac. It carried them down a hill and around a bend until it met the river again, where a ford dipped down just beneath its shimmering surface. Here the rocks were settled, the water like a sheet of glass, unmoving and beautifully clear. An old white road sign seemed to point them in the right direction, but they would have to cross the ankle-deep river first. With great balance and wide strides, they could perhaps have crossed on the few stones that remained proud of the surface, but she and her companion had neither. They would cool their blisters instead, they decided, paddling across the ford with their shoes and socks in hand, watching their every step to guard their skin from cuts and scratches. They had entered another world, so unlike the one they had left early that morning.
‘Have you given up on your journey, Satya?’ the old man asked her as they bent down to dry their feet on the other side. ‘Are you no longer searching?’
She did not feel like replying to him and wished that she could redirect their conversation onto a happier topic. The sky above them was wonderful and blue, and the air so clean that she thought she would inhale all of it at once. His feet back in his boots, her grandfather made a seat for them on top of a compacted bank of earth and declared it lunchtime. He had brought sandwiches, samosas, fruit and a steaming flask of milky PG Tips.
‘Tuck in my dear,’ he said to her, pushing a plastic container in her direction.
Momentarily she took a bite from a cumin scented samosa, but her gaze soon returned to him. ‘Have I given up on my journey?’ she murmured, ‘I think I’m on a different journey now. You once told me I might find faith on the potter’s wheel. Maybe I have. Maybe that’s what I’ve done. Who was it who said that faith is just three things? You told me this once.’
‘To be truthful in speech,’ he replied, ‘to give back all that you are given in trust and to leave alone anything that does not concern you. My father-in-law used to say that.’
‘Well it’s true,’ sighed Satya, ‘but it’s hard to practice. I think I know where truth stands, if such a thing can be said to exist, but it’s bitter. Yes, the truth is bitter. And so I’m torn. A part of me wants to pursue that faith, but I don’t know that I will, because action is harder than words. So, so much harder. To be truthful in speech? It’s taken me an age to tell a friend the truth. To return a trust? I have something that doesn’t belong to me right now. To leave alone what doesn’t concern you? Impossible, almost impossible. The what ifs, the if onlys, the I wonders; they eat you up, burn you, they eat away at you. A part of me wants that faith to reform me, but mostly I just want an easy life; I just want the world, to get a good job, a nice house, a BMW if possible. The truth is bitter; it isn’t sweet.’
‘You’ve grown too serious, Satya,’ her grandfather said with a smile.
‘If you knew what I hold inside, Dadaji, you’d probably shun me; disown me.’
‘Never,’ he countered firmly.
‘I remember the day dad came to collect me from my uncle’s house. I should’ve run to him when I saw him parking outside, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. He wanted to hug me, but I pushed him away. I wasn’t angry with him for sending me to my uncle’s house; no, I treasure those months like I couldn’t say. Andeep has such a beautiful faith, such a beautiful character. Their company is like gold to me. In their company, I want what they’ve got too; I want to live like that. But in truth, it’s all unreality. When my dad came to collect me, it reminded me of this. The way we are, the way we’ve always been: this is our reality.’
Satya drew her tongue to a halt; it was just as she had said it would be: a rambling splurge. If only she could convey her feelings, if only she could articulate those feelings inside; if only she could let it out.
‘I wish I hadn’t left the same day as my last exam. It was too soon. I wrote my answers for three hours solid, scribbling until the very last minute. And then it was all over: my exam, my studies and that whole era of unreality. I went back to Andeep’s house, had lunch with them for the final time, packed my things and that was it. I thanked them for their company, hospitality, goodness, and care, but I don’t think they knew how much it really meant to me. As we pulled away, I realised it wasn’t the goodbye I wanted. I wanted to hold on, to stay with them forever. I wanted to be a part of their world. But instead I returned to ours.
‘You all threw a party for me when I came home. Mum hugged me like she never used to, kissed me, sobbed and cried. Even Jaspreet and Meeta embraced me, welcoming me home. They were just home from school and I hated seeing their uniform because it brought back all the wrong memories. Sukhbir grunted at me and did a high five as if he was saluting some strange victory. They told me you were coming to dinner at six o’clock, thinking I’d be pleased, but I wasn’t. I wasn’t pleased to be home at all. It was like waking from the sweetest of dreams only to discover it was all imaginary, unreal.
‘When you arrived, we all sat down at the table for our first full family meal in two years. There was enough food to span the passing evening, but I hardly ate any of it. Mum cooked meat, forgetting I’d been vegetarian for a year. Everyone was ecstatic, except me. Jas kept on telling me that she wasn’t angry with me anymore. Sukhbir sat opposite me and kept on looking at me, observing me, as if he wanted me to say something to him. And you saw it, and you questioned me. “Why are you so quiet?” you asked me. “Am I quiet?” I replied, shrugging my shoulders, apologising. “Quiet as a mouse,” you said. That’s when I asked you my question: is silence golden or yellow? You peered at me with a smile, but you didn’t reply. Was it the wrong question?’
Her grandfather looked back at her in exactly the same manner as he had then, but seemed to be contemplating a response this time. ‘I’m a great believer in silence, Satya, as you know,’ he began at last, ‘but too often it’s the tool of the coward. Of the one who won’t stand up for what he knows is right.’
‘It may be that I’m a coward then, Dadaji, because this is the case for me. I can’t tell you what I hold inside, because the truth is too uncomfortable.’
‘Truth alone triumphs, Satya,’ he replied a moment later. ‘And falsehood never succeeds,’ he added.
‘Truth?’ she muttered. ‘Dare I tell you the truth?’
‘Perhaps the truth will liberate you.’
‘A truth like this?’ Perhaps she had got there at last. Perhaps this was all she wanted to say. ‘Did I have to come back?’ she asked, their eyes meeting finally. ‘Did I have to come back here to find my faith? Perhaps I found it in the midst of a mad rampage. No, not on the potter’s wheel, but amidst airborne bricks and flying fists.’
Her grandfather looked concerned suddenly and almost spilt his tea. ‘Did you witness yesterday’s riot, Satya?’ he asked anxiously, ‘I thought you’d escaped it.’
‘I have a confession to make, Dadaji,’ she murmured urgently, oblivious to his alarm, ‘I got sent away because of a boy.’
‘Oh, my dear Satya,’ he replied, nearly laughing, ‘I know everything already.’
‘No. No you don’t,’ she moaned, ‘not everything, Dadaji.’ Her gaze sought something to settle on: a cloud, a tree, a field, that fast-flowing water, anything. ‘So the truth?’ she sighed aloud, overwhelmed. ‘So I fell in love, but he didn’t love me back. He was my hero, because he came to my rescue. I thought he rescued me because he liked me, but he just did it because it was the right thing to do. I wasn’t dating him, but I wanted to. I thought he was the answer to my prayers. Turns out I forgot what I prayed for.’ Glancing above her, she exhaled loudly. ‘Yeah, and the answer wasn’t what I was expecting either. Yes, an old friend made me see that.’
Beside her, the old man nodded his head as if he knew exactly what she meant. ‘You mean going away, living with Andeep, getting such excellent exam results?’ he asked, studying her face, ‘None of this could’ve happened if you’d never met that boy?’
‘No, Dadaji,’ she replied, ‘I had to encounter him again.’ She let out a heavy lament. ‘The truth is, that’s why I came back: I wanted to find him again, to convince him to love me, to make everything right. I thought he’d be the answer to my prayers again. But I didn’t find him, not as I was expecting to anyway. Not until you insisted I join the demonstration.’
‘Was he a face in the crowd?’
‘Something like that. But now he’s in hospital, fighting for his life, because a mob almost kicked him to death.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they could, I suppose. It’s funny, but in this tragedy I think I found my faith. Everything that happened yesterday was out of my control. Nothing panned out how I thought it would. Yeah, I thought I was being called back to that guy, but it turns out I was being called back to my creator. If I hadn’t come back yesterday, probably the one I thought I loved would already be dead. No one would’ve defended him, begged them to stop. They would’ve kicked and kicked until the end. They were going to. Instead, perhaps he’ll survive and perhaps my old friend will get her second chance. Perhaps only the truth could reunite them.’
They had walked far that morning, but all of the effort felt like nothing now beneath the weight of her words. To pull all of that out from the depths of her soul had been exhausting. ‘Yes, I think I’ve found my faith at last,’ she said, nodding ever so slightly. ‘It’s the faith of your beloved. A life of service. That’s my calling. To be in the right place at the right time, to help another in need. Yes, even if he’s my worst enemy. Hmm, perhaps that’s what I must do.’
As they set off for home, Satya resolved to tell her companion everything that had happened. She told him of Anjana’s relationship with Ben and the bond they had, even when they were enemies. She told him of all that she had seen and all that she had heard. And she told him what her brother had done, and for how long she had known, and when she had put two and two together, and how long it had taken her to finally tell her friend the truth. As they wandered along the base of the steeper hills, her grandfather listened to her intently, his own tongue unmoving, his lips silent.
On their way, they met another river bed, this time dry, running through a forest. Close to their destination, they happened upon a peculiar ancient tree standing on tiptoes on the edge of the wood, the soil eroded away from around its roots so that a remarkable tunnel sat beneath its green-stained trunk. They had seen immense beauty that day, walking in the open fields and beneath the barren trees. They had climbed the steepest hills, studying streams and their rocky waterfalls, scrutinising the view across a vast incomprehensible landscape. They had witnessed the meandering, snaking tributaries, joining others in the distance. They had taken in the sight of the late autumnal fields, bordered by hedges and walls, and the swathes of open grazing country. They could have stood in awe all afternoon, taking in the magnificent creation before them, but Satya’s words had supplanted their silent meditations.
They were nearly back at their starting place now, hurrying on as dark grey rain clouds started to loom close to them. They prayed for reprieve, seeking refuge from a deluge that promised to soak them through. Today there was no romance in a downpour. When they heard the dull roll of thunder in the distance, Satya wondered if there was any hope for them, but at its sound her companion brought them to a standstill. Clasping hold of her sleeve, he pulled her gaze towards him and stared into her soul.
‘You’ve finally earned the right to call yourself Satya,’ he told her sombrely, ‘You once asked me why you have a Sanskrit name; now we know why. Satyameva jayate, Satya: truth alone triumphs. What is it we say? How can those who’ve not been endowed with truth find peace? Yes, it’s truth that leads us home. May you find your way home, Satya. May God guide you now and always.’
