Chapter 8: Crossing the Bridge

After leaving, I bought a lot of those brown envelopes—the kind burned as offerings at the ghat, to provide for the dead in the afterlife.

The shopkeeper at the corner looked at me strangely as I asked for so many. I felt oddly comforted by the familiar scent of agarbatti and sandalwood in the shop.

I burned them all at my parents’ samadhi, enough for them to spend for a hundred years.

The flames danced in the dusk, orange and fierce. I closed my eyes, whispering a prayer, imagining Ma and Papa finally at peace, somewhere far away from all this suffering.

Afterwards, I went home to have a look.

The house greeted me with silence. Spider webs hung in the corners, the walls streaked with dust and time. The air was thick with memories—Ma’s laughter, Papa’s cough, the clatter of pots in the kitchen.

I didn’t clean or touch anything.

I stood in the middle of the living room, suitcase in hand, letting the past wash over me. Each faded photograph, each broken cup, seemed to tell a story of a life that was once mine.

I stood at the doorway for a long time, until the sky was completely dark.

Mosquitoes buzzed around my ankles. The village dogs howled at the moon. Still, I didn’t move, as if leaving would be a final goodbye.

There are no streetlights in the village. I turned on my phone and saw it was nearly eleven.

The screen glowed in the darkness, the only light for miles around. My battery was almost dead, but I didn’t care.

I took an auto to Rajpur. The city was quiet at night.

The driver yawned, glancing at me in the rearview mirror. We passed shuttered shops, stray dogs prowling the gutters, the distant thud of a late-night dhol somewhere in the slums.

Occasionally, a few motorcycles whizzed by—delivery boys on their late shifts.

Their headlights sliced through the darkness, vanishing as quickly as they came. I clutched my bag tighter, the city lights blurring past.

Dragging my suitcase, I stopped by the bridge.

My arms ached, but I barely noticed. The bridge loomed ahead, silent and watchful. Below, the river glimmered, reflecting the city’s lights like scattered jewels.

No one paid me any attention, probably thinking I was just tired and resting with my suitcase.

I stood by the railing, staring into the water, lost in thought. The world around me faded, as if time had paused just for me.

I waited until midnight. No one passed by anymore.

The night grew colder. The last rickshaw rattled past. My phone beeped—battery low, almost gone.

I wrote a note and left it on my suitcase, then climbed over the railing and jumped.

I traced the rusted railing, hearing the distant temple bells from across the river. For a moment, I thought of Ma’s voice, telling me to be strong. The wind roared in my ears. For a split second, everything was silent, peaceful. No pain, no longing, just the cool embrace of the air.

The moment I jumped, I don’t know if I was imagining it, but I heard Arjun’s voice—

"Arre, don’t jump, Neha!"

The shout echoed through the darkness, urgent and terrified, cutting through the night like a bolt of lightning. I closed my eyes, surrendering to the unknown below. Somewhere above the roar of the river, a single WhatsApp message pinged on my dying phone—Arjun’s name flashing on the screen.