She died. My cousin. Just like that. A phone call; my dad crying on the phone: she is dead, hira, don't tell anyone yet, okay, we'll let them know when the dead body arrives.

Four months gone and I still can't comprehend the meaning of it. It feels strange to write about it. Like I am making use of her death somehow. For writing.

But writing is all I have, to relive, the pain, the grief; to understand the meaninglessnes of it.

What are these hollow words going to do anyway? She is dead. Nothing is going to change that. The finality of it. Her eyes. Her voice. Her laugh. The images of all these pass by like an unending stream. All gone. Where? And then the words: she is dead. The same words, ringing always. Dead, Dead, Dead. And yet they do not register. How can she be gone. She was just 22. God? A live person, their heart beating, their lungs breathing. Gone, in an instant.

Maybe its because I had always thought of death as something in the abstract, that I do not get its meaning when its here. Why do we think that we are going to continue forever as we are, things are always going to be the same, never change?


I can't stop wondering where she would be. Where is she in Death's other Kingdom. Is she happy? Then I think of her body, buried; probably decaying slowly; I try to imagine her hands, her face, in that soil. And I close my eyes, with a strange terror. God let her be okay, wherever she is.

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Is she alive in some other world? I have so many dreams where she comes back and somehow everything is back to normal again. Had one today once again. She was coming from somewhere, I was waiting for her. Thinking I would beat her into a pulp orchestrating this drama. Or perhaps just hug her tight. But it can't be real. One cannot create a fake body of their own. Why is it that I cannot accept her nonexistence? She was alive, I can hear her voice as clear as anything. If a phone were to ring just now, and there would be her voice at the other end, no shock would jolt me. Death is strange. One feels. Sees. Smells. And its gone. Just like that. How? Why do we feel so much if it goes away like this. Why can't we know whats on the other side. Its cruel.

My memory isn't good. But there are still things that I remember. I remember, as kids, setting up that makeshift tent in our backyard lawn. Or going up to the roof early in the morning and eating chips and coke. Or watching Cinderella, or Beauty and the Beast or any of those Disney movies. Or fighting, there was one so bad we ended up with scars. Or looking up for the crescent, one night before Eid every year. Or filling up those transcription pages we were given as summer homework in grade 3. Or flying those kites on Basant. Or when there were power failures, making those shadow bunnies and fish with our hands, in the candlelight. Or eating oranges on the roof, in the winter sunlight. Or playing hide and seek. Or hopscotch on the roof. Or 'kho kho' or 'barf pani' or 'pithoo gol garm' or hopscotch or any of those games they used to play in those days. Or taking swings in our neighbour's lawn.

Think I should probably stop. I know perhaps there's no one that visits this blog now. But if you are reading this and you believe in prayers, please pray for her soul.