By The River - Part 3

So the next day, he forced himself to stay back at work. He stayed back and sorted different kinds of cinnamon sticks into neat stacks. The shopkeeper was happy that his helper was finally taking his job seriously and asked no questions, hoping this new change stayed for a while.


He went back home from a different longer route that day, avoiding the banks of his river. He heard her gushing currents rage and flow, fertilising her banks but still crushing weeds and pebbles with her force. He wondered if he was the reason for the rage or if he was imagining things. He liked how he affected her, that proud river who said what if she disappeared. He would show her. He would make her wait.


He kept away the next day too. It was tougher though and he found it difficult, the fantasy had worn and he had to tear himself away from his usual route again, his feet protesting with pain, his head buzzing. The river raged, egged on by the unseasonal rains. He swore he would go back the next day. He swore he would pretend that nothing abnormal had happened.


But he did not go. He awoke the next day to find his father's body lying limp and lifeless on the bed. Torn with grief, he spent the day arranging his father's funeral and last rites. His father was cremated in the temple compound, and a day later, finally, he found himself making his way to her banks again. This time, to release his father's ashes into her waters. It felt like an intrusion but he walked and he reached her banks. But no Sindhu came strolling out. He waited, half scared, half eager, but an hour passed and finally, he tossed in the ashes and made his way back home, his head shaved, his house lonely.


Ten days later, he went back to work. While coming home, he took the route that passed the river bank, like he did. He did not look up this time, he did not expect her this time. He knew he would go home, he knew he would never see her again. He had kept away too long.


He was wrong.


She was perched on a rock, looking at him, dressed in white. The white of mourning? The white of peace? The white of renunciation? He did not know. He walked, a little taken aback at her appearance. He stopped in front of her. The minutes passed, slow, stretched out, until the sun sank in the horizon and Sindhu embraced him.


Her hands were icy like they always were, her breath came short, her lips were at his ears and her hands were on his shoulders. He automatically lifted her off the rock and threw her down on the ground, tearing off her white, her white of peace, of renunciation, of mourning, grinding into her flesh, violent, painful and wild. he left the marks of his nails on her back and hips, he left bites on her neck and navel, he left her womanhood pounding and throbbing. Those luscious and ample breasts were finally his, and he claimed them like he would claim his woman, his mother, his goddess.


She held on, letting his violence course through her veins, gasping, moaning, weeping, begging, laughing, sobbing and screaming.


He was sure the whole village must have heard them, the next day, when we woke up, sore and scratched. But evidently, they did not. And they would not, for the next few days as he ravaged his Sindhu, and she filled him up with her currents and waves. He knew every contour and mood now, he knew every pleasure and pain, he knew every need and desire that coursed through her.

But there was still something he did not know. There were shadows in her eyes he did not see.