The Unsaid

Ekraz Singh
THE YOUNG BOY LEANS AGAINST THE DOORFRAME. His nails pick at a crack in the cement near the small of his back as he stares down the street, far past the sabzi mandi where a bald, mustached, shopkeeper quickly bellows out his prices for eggplant, bitter melon, lychee an mangoes.
Arun, his mother calls from within, her dark eyes peering over the kettle in which she ladles lentils before pressing them against the side to see if they’ve been thoroughly cooked. The boy chews on his lower lip and glances inside the house, holding his mother’s gaze for a few seconds. Years from now, as he challenges himself to eat ramen from a pot with a single chopstick in a cold basement nestled within a suburb of Toronto, he’ll remember her like this – seated by the chulha as she cooks, standing from her patra, and eyes swelling as she hurriedly tucks her black hair under her white dupatta and makes her way to the front door of their home. He’ll call her from across the Atlantic. He’ll ask her why she didn’t tell him. The phone will shake against her ear. Her black-rimmed bifocals will slide from her round cheeks to the tip of her nose. She’ll insist she did tell him, that he doesn’t remember because he was too young. He’ll tell her she didn’t, but he doesn’t hate her.
Arun! His mother yells, her voice tinged with a helplessness he cannot comprehend yet.
The boy looks down the street once more and sees the headlights of a rickety blue bus peek out from behind the corner. Before his mother can reach him he bolts. He runs past children playing inside tight inlets that lead to different streets, past the sabzi mandi where the shopkeeper continues to shout, past houses with doors closed securely to seal out dust and others left open to allow for any semblance of a fresh breeze on a scorching summer day, and past pairs of legs he is unable to count. His small bare feet thud against the ground beneath him, creating sparse, low-lying clouds of sand. He stops once he reaches the bus at the end of the street.
The driver sees the young boy and quickly looks away. He shouts at his passengers to hurry up and get off the bus. Those who stay on ignore the boy or stare at him.
The boy doesn’t notice. He waits patiently, focusing on the blue exterior of the bus. A smile spreads across his face once it begins to move. The bus disappears, revealing a crowd of men and women. Looking up, the boy scans their faces as they brush past him. His smile fades once he is left alone.
The mother leans against the doorframe. Her nails pick at a crack in the cement near the small of her back as she stares down the street, far past the sabzi mandi, at her son kicking dirt as he slowly walks home. When he’s within reach she pulls him close so he can silently drench the fabric of her kameez. Her fingers circle his scalp of dark hair before she crouches to his height. She cups his cheeks and uses the pads of her thumbs to wipe the tears flowing from his brown eyes.
Like every other day this week, the boy stares at his mother as she parts her lips to say something that will be left unsaid.