Bhabra

dead weight (bonus #2)

A/N warning about topics of grief and assault.

October 1986

The tube light made his eyes burn. It was too bright. Brighter than any light he had seen in his life, including the sun. The sun didn't concentrate His light on one particular object, even during midday. It was this focus of the tube light that overwhelmed his other senses, leaving room only for vision.

That explained why the man who had rented the tube light for the night snapped his fingers in front his eyes to end his trance. "Bacche did you hear what I just said?"

"Huh?"

Impatient, Mahesh Lal Thakur sighed in a way that made his black moustache wobble. Ideally, it should've been shaved when his head was. But the younger Thakur saab skipped that part of the ritual. Being bald was, apparently, bad enough. "I guess you're too tired to decide. Sleep, we'll talk tomorrow."

That confused Nakul even more. "Where?"

Thakur saab frowned, gesturing to the sparsely furnished guest house room he'd brought Nakul to. In a car. Ambassador. That had been fun, he had never been in a car before. The ride managed to take his mind off Raghu Kaka, at least for a while. "Where do you think?"

Nakul still wasn't sure. But he also didn't want to annoy the man further. He watched Thakur saab grab a cotton sheet from the metal closet, place it on the bed Nakul was sitting on. Well, sitting was an overstatement, he was perched on its edge, afraid to get comfortable lest the older man be offended. "Sleep," he repeated, this time a bit kinder than before. "Here," he added, just to confirm to Nakul that he was, in fact, allowed to use the bed. One of the two single beds in the room, separated by a brown table over which hung the tube light.

The twelve-­year-old nodded. Testing the truth in Thakur saab's invitation, he shifted back a little, sitting a bit more comfortably, but not daring to bring his feet up on the bed and continuing to dangle them. His eyes went back to the tube light.

"Do you want me to switch it off?"

Nakul nodded again. Flipping the switch over the table, Mahesh Lal plunged the room into familiar darkness. Invisible, Nakul pulled his feet up and lied on his side, back towards Thakur saab and facing the open window. Now that his eyes weren't burning, he could feel the cool October breeze on his skin. His other senses also working overdrive.

He heard Thakur saab shuffling around behind him, opening the drawer and shutting it again. He heard the creak of his bed, the newly bald man settling to sleep. He heard the click of a lighter. He smelled the smoke of cigarette going over the table and reaching his own bed. He then heard faint snores.

One wasn't supposed to smoke during the thirteen-day period of mourning. Wasn't supposed to do anything but mourn and eat sattvic food and mourn some more. But just like with his moustache, Mahesh Lal Thakur chose to ignore this rule too. Nakul didn't think his wife would approve. Then again, she wasn't here. Neither was Madhu. He thought they would come down to Bhabra to participate in the last rites of the old Thakur saab and Raghu Kaka but it was only Mahesh Lal Thakur, a man Nakul had heard of a lot but met only half a dozen times including today. Before, when Mahima Tai and Madhulika used to live in Bhabra, he would come by every year for a week or two. Time when Nakul would avoid getting in his way. And time when Madhu won't pester him to play, too busy getting pampered by her father.