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Rahad Abir
On Death

Parineeta

My best friend’s sister. She was a sweet little girl. The same age as my son is now—a sixth grader. We were five years ahead of her. Parineeta died of cancer. That was the first time I knew that cancer could be deadly. That cancer could kill you not from the inside, but from the outside too. First, Parineeta fell ill. Then months after she made the PG Hospital her permanent home. We friends went to visit her a couple of times. The last time I saw her she was no longer the pretty little Parineeta. Just a human scrap. Rotting every hour. Her hair was gone. Her upper lip loose, about to come off. After that, I only met her at the burning ghat. Her little body covered in a white sheet. I watched her for hours. Watched how the fire slowly melted her into nothing. I don’t think I’ve ever watched anything in my life with so much care.

Three days after there came the sraddha. A feast in her honor. We had fun. We ate a lot. Laughed a lot. Even entered into an eating competition. Gobbling up sweet rosogollas one after another. I can’t remember who among our friends won. But I can distinctly remember that the air in the house was light. Celebratory, even. As if every gathered soul was so burdened by the memory of little Parineeta and her cancer that it was necessary to share a laugh. Loud and out. Only Parineeta’s mother never laughed. She wept. She wailed. And in the days to come she would lament in the dark kitchen for hours. In the late mornings, after the men were out for work. In the late afternoons, when others were lost in their siestas. In the early evenings, when birds were busy and noisy and on their way homes. I could hear her lamenting from my room. Droning, monotonic. And the neighbors who passed by the kitchen. We got used to it—her prolonged talking and crying. After a time, her unhurried, unloud, unending bemoaning sounded like sad, steady, mournful singing. She sang religiously, ritually. For years, I think. I’d never heard such mundane, melodic, lovely crying in my life.

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