It was Mira’s job to polish the marbles, and she had always been bothered by it. She and her father would wait until it was almost dusk and the visitors had left, after which she would polish the tombstones, and her father would pick up flowers from the tombstone.
She had made her father known that she hated polishing the tombstones, and he would just chuckle and say that she was too sensitive. But little would he ever understand that it made her angry to indulge the pearly white marble in its unceasing demands.
Nevertheless, she would pretend to concentrate on the slab of marble in front of her, like it was the only thing in the world, just so that she wouldn’t have to look at him sneaking flowers inside his bag.
Mira had accompanied her father to the graveyard since she was a little girl. She had never quite liked stepping out of the house after dark. There were stray dogs in the neighbourhood that barked very threateningly and she often caught men sitting on sidewalks, clutching dirty glasses filled with liquor, the sounds of their revelry issuing into the night.
But most importantly, something told her that if her mother were alive today, she would never have allowed her to leave after the sun had set.
Her father would carefully pick up the flowers as if his hands were made just to hold soft stems, and then they would sneak away towards their home, disappearing into the night. She would spend her time currying vegetables and chopping the onions; He would spend his time bunching the flowers together, putting them in water, making them look as if they had never even known the sight of death. And then in the morning when she would be sleeping, he would set out into the city to sell those flowers to mourners, lovers, and the ones that needed flowers to brighten up the sordid corners of their houses.
Some mornings she would wake up to find a single stem of rose neatly tucked beside her pillow. She would pick it up from her quilt and place it in water, and then she would never look at it again.
Its fragrance would disappear in a day and the petals would turn dark and papery and wither off right in front of her eyes. The only time she would even pay attention to it was when she had to throw it in the garbage bin. Roses might have been pretty to lovers and mourners, but to her, the only thing she ever understood about it was the fact that the flower picked from the graveyard was never actually meant for her.
But she would soon jump out of her reverie, not wanting to question her father’s conviction (and the source of their livelihood) that unlike the dead, flowers could get another chance.
She would start another day by cleaning the house. There was not much to clean, it was a small house. But it was her duty to make sure that the Lilly-white walls were never covered in dust. She would make herself a simple breakfast, and then she would pretty much while away her time.
Sometimes she would think of wandering away from the house as far she could, even if it was just for a little while. She would look out the window and wonder what was beyond the streets that were visible from her bedroom. But she knew that her father would never approve of her leaving the house without him.
Once she had tried to leave the house. A known film star was supposed to stop by their village to shoot a film. She excitedly latched the front door of their house behind her and ran towards the filming area. The pitter-patter of her chappals were sounds that she had long missed. She was home long before dusk had set in, but when she returned, the latch was unlocked. Her father was back home early, and the worst part about his red face was that there was no anger in it whatsoever.
Come evening, her father would be back home from the city and she would offer him something to eat, which he would deny and ask for just a glass of water. She would then ready her things for the evening, and they would set out to the graveyard.
On the way, Mira would often encounter those loafers on the sidewalk, idling about in their evening revelry. She often found herself wondering if sitting on the sidewalk, they had indeed found happiness, or if they were merely engaged for life in a cat-and-mouse game with that elusive dream.
The thought would last only for a second or two, and then they would near the rusting gates of the Graveyard.
Almost every day, she would ask herself-
‘Do I really have to?’
Then she would just proceed inside, cautious, in case a griever was lingering about.
Some evenings she would hear the sounds of violin floating towards them from afar. She would hum along with the melody, and her father would smile without looking at her. The thing about that sound of music was that she was definite that she had never heard that melody before, and yet she found herself humming along. It was amazing how much faster she could polish the marble if it was along with the music.
A few times while going back home, she had mustered the courage to tell her father that she really did not want to accompany him in the evenings. Until a few years back, he would say, ‘Do what I tell you to, Mira’. She would nod and tag along next evening as well.
But lately, a sound of helplessness had replaced the tone of authority in his voice that she had grown up hearing. He was weak and growing old very fast. There was very little he said to her and she couldn’t find it in herself to leave him all alone.
When she was younger, her father would often take her to the gardens where flowers blossomed all year round. He would carry her on his shoulder and spend several hours with her in the gardens. She had always thought that he took her because she had loved flowers.
But now, the flower sitting in front of her right by her windowsill did not even get so much of a cursory glance.
Then, she had even been scolded many a time for touching the ones on exhibition. Her father would apologise for her, but she didn’t remember him ever warning her not to touch them again, even though she knew that those flowers must cost even more than their lives.
With time, she understood that the blossom of a flower had meant more to her father than it ever did to her. It was more than the beauty of pink, round petals. He collected and sold them, and it should not have meant more than that. Yet it must’ve, for she did not seem to recollect any flowers being there on her mother’s grave.
***
A lone porcelain vase sat beneath the windowsill in Mira’s room. The last flower that had ever been there had blackened, turned papery, and withered away in front of her eyes; much like her own father.
Nothing was binding her to the walls painted in Lilly-white. There hadn’t been any roses beside her in the morning for a long time. She didn’t have to polish marble on old tombstones anymore, although, she often found herself worrying that they would start growing ugly. So, once in a month, she would tiptoe out of the house at the break of dawn and check upon them, but now she left the flowers so.
She remembered asking her father once why he bothered to make her polish the tombstones when they could just have collected the flowers and dashed.
‘But we must give the dead a clean home to live in, Mira’, he had said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, ‘even if it is one not adorned with flowers.’
It was then that she had understood that the lone stem of the flower, sitting beneath her windowsill was probably differentiating her from the dead all these years.
She had saved the urn filled with her father’s ashes, which they told her to set adrift in the holy river.
Her father never got a grave like her mother had one. She was told that this difference, which was now ultimately the difference between their souls trapped in marble, versus brass, was the reason they spent their lives in solitude, for society never appreciates differences.
She planted some seeds of rose in the nearby garden in his ash, which she watered every day the first thing in the morning. In time, white-coloured roses would start blossoming on the shrub and the dark, sordid patch of the earth would look pretty.
She would cook a simple breakfast for herself and then set out to work in the gardens where flowers blossomed all year round. She would return in the evening and sit on the sidewalk, clutching a glass full of liquor, revelling in the sounds of the evening. Some evenings, she would hear the sounds of violin floating towards her from afar, and she found herself humming along with it. And just for a moment sometimes, she wondered if she indeed had found happiness. But then she would take a sip from her glass and continue humming.
Photo by Sandy Millar on Unsplash
