In the morning, grimly got on the bus. We pass village after village: ponds, paddy fields, tired farmers stepping over muddy aisles. Wispy clouds in the sky. From time to time, without warning, it was as if my breathing would stop: I hadn't told you that I was coming. Who knows how you upset you'd get, what a scolding I'd receive! Though, on the other hand, it is entirely possible that you'd be overjoyed on seeing me, would clasp me tight to your bosom, and exclaim, 'I can't believe I'm seeing my little bird after such a long time!'

I have to see you. No matter what happens, I must see you. Right now. I must. This is how it goes for me. I couldn't stop myself today. Nothing, except death, could possibly stop me today. On the bus, on the way to meet you, I pray that I would die, that perhaps death would be preferable than what lay at the end of my trip. May be something uglier than getting raped. But come what may, today I have to see you.

It feels like I haven't seen you in a thousand years. I shut my eyes and try to dream you into being. As if in a mist I see your eyes, your lips, your teeth, the six feet of you. But all separately, I can't piece the parts together into a whole. And even if I do, it falls apart after a little while. For the last few days it was as if I would never again see you in this lifetime. I had felt worn out, carrying this cold feeling inside me. I had no choice but to reach for you, to go to you.

I look out the bus window. A woman washing clothes by the bank of a hyacinth-choked pond, just a sari wrapped around her body. No blouse, a breast exposed at the side. The thought of being like her stiffens me; hunger, poverty, the daily grind of life, all these can strip away shame, embarrassment, self-regard.

I feel very tense. I have no idea how you are going to feel about my dropping in on your doorstep without any advance notice. But what else could I do? I couldn't stand it after getting word that you were ill, couldn't bear being in this world. Now I prepare myself for any eventuality, for any kind of humiliation.

Finally I arrive at my destination. The noontime sun is hungrily swallowing up people around me. I unclip my hair and spread it on my neck. In the rickshaw I take out the small mirror and apply lipstick, blush-on, tidy myself up. I feel myself floating on air. Clouds have now massed in a winter sky, and I see you through a veil of winter mist. I close my eyes and see your white teeth, but am unable to touch you. The rickshaw flies, and I feel as if I am suffocating from time to time.

I have come very near to your house. In the distance, between the rows of trees I can glimpse your darwan. The world comes to a halt. Every tree, each leaf, the lake in front of your house--everything--is deathly still. In a few moments Adam and Eve will meet, and the whole earth will be swept away in a flood of light.

A couple of men are standing in front of your house. On spotting me, your servant boy steps forward. Urgently I ask him 'How is your master?' He informs me that you are now much better, that in fact you have gone to your office. He goes on to add that there is nobody in the house. I feel the inevitable magic pull of your bedroom. Breathlessly I run upstairs to the first floor, to your bedroom, whose very air is laden with your fragrant breath. Here you had descended from a hole in the ceiling…I enter timelessness. A dream-heavy night. Where Ravi Shankar had played, and I had danced amidst the stars holding your hand. I had swooned. And had asked, 'How am I going to live without seeing you? How will I live?' And you had then scrounged among the scattered stars, and had found the prettiest one, and brought it over and touched it to my lips and had said, 'See, this is the elixir of life.' That star had brushed my lips, glided down my mouth and past my heart, then settled in my stomach. You had said 'One day this elixir will be a heart. You'll put a hand over your bosom and hear it thumping. It shall become a part of your body. Each time you bear a child, it will come to your lap draped in a halo.'

Your room now is a swelling sea. I rise with every wave, take a deep breath, then go under. I am going to call your office right now. Maybe you'll exclaim 'My darling, my little bird! I haven't seen you for so many days. Just wait, I'll be right there. I am going to hug you so tightly you won't be able to breath.'

Your phone rings. My heart starts knocking. One second, two seconds, a million seconds pass. Then your voice, 'What's new? How are you?' I reply, 'I'm in your bedroom. Come home immediately.'

Then suddenly the world darkens, Gabriel sounds his end-of-the-world trumpet--'You shouldn't have come. There are lots of people staying in my house. You should leave right now and catch a bus to Dhaka.' One by one the lights go out in the world. The sky, stars, storms, mountains, the earth--all crash down on top of me. Shattering into tiny pieces I collapse on to your seawave-bed, my heaven of gold blown apart in a split second. I cry out loud, like a mother at her first childbirth.

But how do I break this vicious circle?

I rise from the rubble, and call you again. I say 'I have to see you once, even if for a second. Nothing can keep me away, not even death.'

'Come to my office.'

But cast-off being, the spurned lover, that I am now, how do I drag this lifeless, broken body all the way to your office?

I enter your room in the office building. A sparkling lake of a room in which you are working surrounded by a smoky fog. On seeing me you shout, 'Have you gone mad? Where's your self-respect?'

Head lowered, I think that when Eve's secrets have been bared, Adam begins to think highly of himself. The office is crowded with people, some with files to be signed, some to plead their case. I want to cry out aloud. One by one, the cells in my body start to wink out, I feel myself dying.

You dismiss the people around you. Then say, 'I've been very sick the last few days. came to the office today for the first time in four days. Why did you come down here without telling me?'

I look silently at your face. I feel very cold. Through an icy fog I see that your lips are flame-red. Your face keeps disappearing in the fog. Why is this room so cold? Why do you look so thin?

As if from the other side of death I hear you say, 'You are weeping in my office, in front of all these people. Where's your self-respect?' Then more softly, pityingly, 'Shall I send you by car?'

Gathering the shreds of my remaining strength I manage to reply, 'No.'

Again, a bolt of lightning strikes my head. I am reduced to ashes.

'Your behaviour is getting more and more outrageous with each passing day. You love me, yet you behave like this. Love me, but why to the point of distraction? My father, my uncle and brother, you know the whole house is humming with people. Thank God they have gone to visit the Meghna bridge today. How dare you enter my bedroom without my permission? You are going to be the death of me. Do you know to what extent you are demeaning yourself?'

I turn to stone. Somewhere far-off orchards wither and die. I think to myself: What can I do? On every full-moon night, every time I thrill with pleasure, during each rainfall, your eyes, your lips, your teeth, your breath, your bedroom, the mug from which you drink water, the bedside table lamp, the leaves of your money-plant, the orchids dancing in your verandah, the grass on your front lawn--all call out to me, irresistibly. Reason, dignity, intelligence, individuality--all vanish! Then it is as if nothing short of death can stop me from going to you.

I feel as if I have no strength left in me with which to get up and leave your room. Through the cloud of fog all I see are your fever-burnt lips.

Then silently, after some time, I do get up. Just before I open the door I turn my head to look at you. You raise your hand and wave good-bye.

Rashida Sultana is one of Bangladesh's younger writers.
Khademul Islam is literary editor, The Daily Star.