Woman: I think I was as small as her, once.

She takes care to appear only when I am alone. Her chubby little face with its cropped, tousled hair pops out from behind the door to ask- “Are they gone?”- in a soft, squeaky whisper.

“Of course.” I reassure her. “But you needn’t always wait till they leave.”

She scrunches up her nose and tilts her head to one side, as if to seriously consider my incredible proposition.

“No…” she says, quite decisively. “I like it better when it is just we two.” With that, she happily skips to my side. She has a faded red frock on. Despite the cold weather, it has no sleeves- but that is not by design. Her mother can afford only two dresses for her in a year. She had worn out the summer one in the hotter days’ past, so the winter one had to be altered. Perhaps this is why she seems fascinated with my sari, and runs her fingers through the pleats of my skirt over and over again.

“Could I….” she starts, softly. “Will you let me wear this?” She tugs at one of the pleats.

“What?” I ask, surprised. “You want to wear this?”

She nods ‘yes’, enthusiastically.

“Oh….” I try to stifle my chuckles. “Oh…chellam…. you cannot wear this!”

She looks crestfallen.

“No….I mean….you are too small! Besides, aren’t you happy in your little frock?”

I regret the words the moment they leave my mouth. How could anybody be happy in that old thing? To make amends, I rush to my room and search through the cupboard to find something small enough. I come up with a sample of purple silk just long enough to cover her.

When the draping is complete, she is as happy as can be. She walks slowly around the house so as not to let the makeshift tucks and pins come apart, waving gracefully to invisible admirers. It is quite a spectacle- with no spectators.

When tired of this activity, she decides to exercise her mouth, by regaling me with countless stories peppered with intimate details of her dolls’ personal lives. ‘It’s strange.’ I think to myself. Just yesterday, she wanted to cut her hair to be more like a boy. Today, she wants to be ‘a lady’. Tomorrow, they will tell her that she ‘wants to be a wife.’

* * *

Man: It is now dusk.

Work has gone on longer than usual, and I am thankful when the whistle blows. With every bone in my body aching, I inch my way home. Taking my time in this short interlude between chaos and chaos is the only luxury I can claim. I must go to work, and I must go home to her. But in this soft twilight, the world belongs to me.

I reach the front door sooner than I wanted to. I know what I will see on the other side. My wife, staring absently into thin air- the same way I left her in the morning. She would have not changed from her red sari- she has been wearing it for the past week. The only sign that she has moved lies in the torn strip of purple silk she clutches firmly. No matter where I hide it, she always seems to find it.

I do not know if I love her still. I do not know if she is mad. Perhaps she is as sane as me, or perhaps I am the mad one. But if she sees our little girl with tousled hair, wearing the faded old play dress she died in everyday, then I pray that someday I will be as mad as her. I swear to God, that is what I pray for…..

* * *

Woman: My thoughts aren’t thoughts anymore; my feelings aren’t feelings. They are just distractions from the only thing that now occupies my mind- her face. Her face. That is all that matters, all that ever was. Nothing existed before her, and everything that did during the course of that transient life seems to have died with it. For these reasons, that day remains burned into my memory forever.

Through the corner of my eye, I could still see her. There was just too much work in the house that day. ‘‘I must not let my thoughts wander. Focus!’’, I said to myself.

But I could still hear her laughing.

“Focus.” I said again.

I could still see her, out of the corner of my eye, playing among the trees…

“Focus. Keep your head down!”

The laughter stopped.

“Is that really her? Look up…. LOOK UP!”

Like waking from a nightmare … except you’re already awake. But the fog remains as you stumble through the forest; as you walk absentmindedly through oceans of faces and enquiring looks; as you answer questions in a voice not your own; as you collapse in a swirl of confusion; as you close your eyes for the last time on a world in which your child might just be alive….

They said that it must have been a wild animal that dragged her off. I don’t refute that- it was a wild animal who gagged her, attacked her, and killed her- no real human being could have done that. No living, breathing soul could have had the heart to choke the life out of that little angel, leaving me just a scrap of her purple play dress.

It’s strange, though. Sometimes I see that scrap of cloth soaking wet- as if drenched in tears. I wonder if they are hers, or mine.

I wonder if the laughter I hear every day is hers, or mine…

.    .    .