Mountain and River

The Next Day

the year — unclear.. Udhampur.. the pool.. sun breaking on the water in long white strips.. chlorine in everything, in the air, in your skin after, in the towel that never quite dried between visits..

the 1m board.. jute wrapped over the wood.. rough under bare feet, that particular weave you could feel in the arches for hours after.. i'd walked its length a dozen times.. forward jumps, forward dives.. knew that motion in my sleep.. bored of it maybe.. wanted to go backward this time..

wanted the thing i hadn't done..

toes gripping the jute.. heels hanging just past the edge, over nothing, over water i couldn't see anymore.. arms up.. eyes on the sky, not behind me, not on the water waiting to catch me.. a breath held longer than it needed to be..

jumped..

didn't clear it..

edge caught my nose.. a scrape, then a sting sharper than the scrape should've caused.. then warmth spreading fast.. blood.. i remember tasting it before i understood where it was coming from.. metal and chlorine, an ugly mix.. the world went narrow for a second, just the sting and the wet and the sound of my own breathing gone ragged..

mom.. there almost at once.. i don't know how she got there so fast.. cloth pressed hard.. firm hands, quick, no hesitation in them.. her voice calm, low, the kind that's working to stay that way.. her eyes weren't calm.. i saw that even through the blur.. she cleaned the wound.. bandaged it.. checked it twice.. took me home with my head tilted back, her hand steady on my shoulder the whole way..

no lecture.. no this-is-why-we-don't-do-such-things..

no bargaining me out of the water for good.. just the quiet efficient work of fixing what needed fixing..

next day.. pool again.. same chlorine, same sun, same jute under my feet.. she walked me to the same board.. didn't say be careful.. didn't say try it forward instead, safer, easier.. didn't even mention yesterday.. just walked beside me, stood there.. wanted to see me jump backward again.. the exact same jump that had opened my nose the day before..

so I did..

exhilaration

Usne khud chalayi?

Did he ride it himself ? 1972 They arrived on a rickshaw — baba, dadi, bua — and I remember running out to meet them the way children run, which is to say without thinking about what running means. I don't remember saying namaste. I remember the rickshaw's rear,

The Blue Bicycle

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One Punch, No Bell.

January 1979. Dehra Dun winter: the kind of cold that makes your thoughts brittle and your lies freeze on the way out. We did PT in blazers and flannels because changing into whites felt like a luxury the mountains hadn’t approved. Boxing season. An annual plague in the name

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Usne khud chalayi?

The Blue Bicycle

When Eyes Adjust

One Punch, No Bell.