"But we have to hide Baba, run and hide," Nani Ma says suddenly like she just remembered something and Qismat recognizes the tone of voice -- the same as when she ended her tales.

"Why? Why hide Nani Ma?" he says, feeling alarm and confusion at once and sitting up in the bed. "Everything is okay."

"Can you not hear them, Baba?" she says in a low voice just over the rains." The hanadar brigade are approaching, boy, they're waiting outside, they're hiding in the dark spaces and will catch you."

"Nani Ma, it is late at night, there is nobody outside, no hanadars, nobody anywhere...look!" And as if in response, a loud volley of hailstones rattled off someone's car in the street below. Taak-taak-thak. He watches Nani Ma with her arms extended through the grills, as she tries to catch a piece of ice. He looks out the window once more, and sees that the bird is gone. The hanadar bahini (Pakistani Death Squads of '71) has also vanished into the night.

"Hey look, look, there's the Buriganga River and there's the ghat." She shouts looking far past the twisted machinery that is Dhaka city. Perhaps she even looked into the past, for she suddenly smiles. Qismat wonders if the sparkle in her eyes is from tears.

Qismat has a photograph of his grandmother, a black and white image. They have arrived at the wharfs at Sadar Ghat on the river Buriganga. Panchi boats with billowing sails like houses landed their passengers there. Buriganga -- Bengali for the 'Old Maid Ganges'-- a tributary that brought the Ganges home to lay down and die. Qismat cannot avoid the brightness of the young woman's eyes, outshining the ribbons in her hair. Her family -- her husband the professor of rivers, roguish in that England-returned way, smiles next to her- various family members the men large and mustachioed, women in burkhas flapping in the river's breeze -- all looking expectantly at the new bride who has come to their family. Even in the photo, everyone looks incredibly still -- like the weight of heirlooms had slowed them down.

Qismat can't see the river, though he knows that she could see the shriveled rivulet because it had always been her compass. She was always pointing to it.

"So few boats now, look," she says to Qismat. A single disheveled braid of hair, fat and python-like, swings behind her like a hemp rope that has come undone. Standing by that window, lost in whatever she was looking at, Qismat sees, that in the gloom, all color is drained and she looks like the photograph in the album.

"Nani Ma I really feel like I am dying, ...there's this girl," Qismat says

But she says "Then to the market, me and you for paan and betel-nuts to bite and chew."

"Nani Ma, I want to tell you I am sick, I may be dying even", says Qismat his eyes are closed. "It always hurts here..."pointing vaguely somewhere at his chest. His heart is what he seeks.

"...A betel worm slips out of sight..."

"Nani Ma, one day you will come here and I will be gone, you know..."

"Mother and Daughter will have a fight..."

"...Saffron flowers bloom anew

"Fresh, sweet pumpkin stew ..."

"Nani Ma, I really feel like I am dying, ...there's this girl."

"My little one, up with you..."

"What, Nani Ma?! I am telling you my problems, you keep on with your nonsense... stop playing...please, I am serious." Qismat says with a smile he cannot help. Mad, crazy or out of control, Qismat always found it hard to remain serious with Nani Ma.

"A girl. I want to talk about a girl," said Qismat

"A girl," she said quietly, as though that was all there was to be said.

"Will you be angry with me now? You are the only one I can talk to, Nani Ma."

"Does she live in a house with many Krishnachura trees?" she asks.

"Tree? What tree? Nani Ma, I am trying to tell you there's this girl, and that I think I love her...!" and Qismat heard himself for the first time.

"You are asking about trees?" but Qismat's voice is losing its strength. "Dying," he said. "I'm dying. Truly."

"Tell your friend, she should never walk underneath that tree after dark. Especially with her hair undone. If you want to show her your true love, take her to the river," she said.

"Damn,." Qismat swears under his breath. This bloody madness of hers, allows him to talk to her, but also kills him sometimes. She talks when she wants to, sings when she doesn't.

But what about this new thing? Qismat holds this new discovery of love like a stamp collector holds a rare stamp, and looks at it from various angles. It hurts, but it hurts something else, like a green mango hurts the cheeks. Was it possible to be in love like this? Shit. It is easier to simply think about Shyama in the realms of fuzziness and abstraction; but somehow now she has become a constant utterance of his lips and his tongue -- she is a word.

"Here take these...quickly," she says suddenly.

"Hailstones?" says Qismat.

"Hailstones- they will help you," she says quietly, smiling and Qismat notices her hands extended out of the windows, held a few large pieces of ice in them and her eyes were at pointed at him -- large, like the moon. He knew what she meant -- in Qismat's family new-born babies were rubbed with water from a melted hailstone. He pushes off his sheets and gets out of bed.

"Come Nani Ma, lets go downstairs," Qismat says.

"I will escape," she said, "You will take me. There are people I must speak with -- people I must listen to, sing with...go to the Shrine. You will take me to Baulia, to Majarkot," she said.

Qismat wants to lie, but finds he has nothing to say.

"I will walk along the river, at the Shrine I will sing,"she says. "I will sing songs that will scare the hanadar away! You think they will just crawl away? We will fight!"

Qismat looks at her, the hair on his neck standing up like soldiers. He says, "Nani Ma, aren't you afraid of getting lost? Who will I talk to then? Who will sing for me then?"

She stops at the threshold of Qismat's room and turns slowly at Qismat and smiles.

"One day you will get up and find you are not so clever after all..." she says pointing at him with one finger. "I know my way about -- you don't know anything!" She says.

He smiles back at his grandmother's play-acting and gently grabs her by her arm.

"Nani Ma, come with me tonight to your room and I will sneak you out on another night. Agreed?" Qismat can't help feel a rush of delight to see the brightness in those eyes spark, even for a moment, as she looks at him. She can see what his grandfather saw in those eyes to fall so madly in love. His grandfather, someone nobody talks about, but who is always there hiding underneath all words.

As they gingerly walk down the dark steps, one at a time, she gently hums a tune that Qismat mistakes for breathing at first.

"O boat-man of miracles, take back the oar,
My rowing is done
All my life I have pulled the oar
The boat moves not and falls back with the tide and ebb
Matters not my heed of ropes and bars
The helm doesn't cut through water
The boat is free, and the stern will give
The boat is not secure anywhere."

Outside the hailstones continue with a rhythm all its own. Taak-taak-taak.

Bangladeshi-born Javed Jahangir lives in Massachusetts. His novel *Ghost Alley awaits a publisher.