There was ashfall in the coastal hamlet of Mehrkot the day Gul discovered the world was round. She couldn’t pin the exact moment she transitioned from gazing with indifference to knowing with certainty. One moment she had been lying on her back, arms tucked under her head, deciphering shapes in the clouds, and the next, she had sat up rubbing her eyes, hoping to unsee the glint of glassiness that belied the fiery orange sky with its conflagration of clouds. It was like a pattern appearing out of wallpaper if you stared hard enough, and then you could not help but see it every time you looked.

Nobody liked being outdoors during an ashfall, but the way Gul saw it, in a place like Mehrkot, that meant you could barely go out at all. Besides, there was a bizarre beauty to it. Flakes like charred paper drifting down from an overturned tandoor sky, and settling on your skin like an ephemeral tattoo. Omens spelled out in nature’s henna, blown away by the next errant breeze. She propped herself up on her elbows and cast a look around. The trees surrounding the hamlet quivered and roiled like farcical bhoot. The heathaze made the landscape seem alive. That’s it, that’s all I saw. The sky through a heat mirage. Gul glanced carefully back up at the violent sky. No, it was still there; beyond the furnace sky and its jets of clouds, beyond the ash that appeared out of thin air and floated morosely down, she could see tiles of glass seamlessly joined. An enclosure.

The hundreds of tiny mirrors on her chador glinted as she dashed off towards the house. Her skin seethed with warmth. Being out in this weather, well, one might as well roast themselves on a spit. She had only been able to bear it so long because she was stark naked, wrapped only in her mom’s favorite ajrak dupatta. There was no chance of being seen because nobody dared brave the incinerator that was Mehrkot in the summer. The heat made the scent of her mother’s perfume waft out of the cloth and envelop her. Gul had loved cuddling with her mother’s shawls ever since she was a baby. And now that she was gone… this was the most potent keepsake Gul owned, summoning images of an olive skinned woman with a long dark braid and an audacious smile that shone from mirthful eyes.

The kitchen smelt of Grandma’s tumbaku. Gul hopped a bit as she yanked the breezy shalwar up her left leg. Then she folded, or rather, rolled the ajrak shawl into a ball and dumped it on the stool next to the paan daan. The paan daan was a surreal mixture of scents; tobacco, betel and mukhwas. Scents that could transport you to a world of tales told through stained teeth and fingernails dyed with henna. Tales of unfurling black dragons, mystic djinns, and maniacal hakeems, captured in hardbound books and the sweeping brushstrokes of Gujrati script. Tears sprang to Gul’s eyes as she remembered the selfless way her aging grandmother had thrown herself into mothering Gul and her two younger siblings.

“There you are!” Nani, her grandmother, blew air out of puckered lips in frustration, “Prancing around naked as a shorn sheep, weren’t you?”
Nani grabbed Gul by the shoulders, stopping her in her tracks. Gul’s braid flung itself defiantly over her shoulder. Nani moaned and waved an open palm in her face, four fingers clenched together and outstretched,
“Who is going to marry you girl! With the spectacle you make of yourself!”
It was a rhetorical question. And even if it wasn’t, Gul had no answer to give that wouldn’t lead to a fierce argument. So she pulled herself out of Nani’s grip and patted the old lady’s veined, knobby hands placatingly.
“Aray, Nani I’m only fourteen. Do you really want to be like one of those idiots in the village who marry their daughters off and then watch them writhe in childbirth at sixteen years of age?”
Nani grumbled and made faces but Gul laughed, she knew how her grandmother disapproved of these practices.
“Okay get yourself off to the rooms and make all the beds and then come back and help me prepare lunch for the little brats,” Nani chided in her usual way, “All this vegetable chopping has given me arthritis!”
Gul heard her complaining voice dwindle into the background as she made her way to the four small rooms left in the ruins of this haveli her great, great grandfather had built. Rooms that had been turned upside down by grubby, dirt stained hands and feet wrestling over every inch of the furniture. She groaned and bent to tidy up. And for the moment, forgot all about the glinting glass tiles in the sky.

That evening, in the ground opposite her home, as the boys played gulli danda and the girls braided hibiscus flowers into each other’s hair, something else occurred that drove the thought of those glass tiles from Gul’s mind. Waiting for her turn, obsidian hair cascading down her back, Gul sucked on the sweet stem of a hibiscus as she watched the boys in their mudstained kurtas use sticks to flip corks and smack them into oblivion with resounding cracks! They whooped and cheered as pieces of wood disappeared into the sky, scoring points for their team.
“What gorgeous hair you have Gul!” her friend, Aima, pined.
She lifted Gul’s hair and then let the wavy, silky tresses fall and find their way back to Gul’s shoulders.
Gul harrumphed but didn’t offer any other response. It was a comment she had heard often from the residents of Mehrkot, with their dead straight hair streaked a motley of browns.
“Oh my god, girls, look!” Amina, chief-braider, pointed towards the sky, letting Isha’s hair fall from her hands.
The girls groaned collectively as Isha’s tawny hair unwound rapidly, like unravelling skeins. Now they would all have to wait that much longer! But their gazes followed Amina’s finger nevertheless. The Halcyon had appeared, suspended in the sky like draped light.

Nobody knew what the Halcyon was, or when it would appear. It wasn’t like the blushing moon rising every night out of the distant grey sea. The Halcyon was an enigma. Of course, everyone in the village had their own theories. Most people believed it was a collection of the spirits of their dead ancestors, gathering to watch over them. And, certainly, in the shifting hues of the Halcyon there was often the impression of something vaguely humanoid. Regardless, Gul was not too impressed by this theory. Then there had been that group of people, the Halots, who believed it was an image of god. But the inhabitants of Mehrkot had labelled them blasphemous and set the leaders of their sect afire under the very eye of their supposed god. The rest of the Halots had publicly denounced their religion, under threat of being burnt alive. The idea had potential, but Gul wasn’t about to risk asking anyone for more details. No, the idea that appealed to Gul the most was the one found in the old encyclopedias in the library. Dusty, hardbound, burgundy books housing a wealth of information in writing too minuscule for most residents of Mehrkot to be bothered with. They spoke of lights and colours appearing in the sky when charged particles collided, or when light was dispersed. Gul imagined giant hands clapping together clouds of dust to reveal the Halcyon, like magic. A puff of smoke from god’s shisha.

“It’s so beautiful!” Isha murmured, her tawny braid, infused with red flowers, lying over her shoulder.
All the boys loved Isha. Her soft curves and slim, bangled wrists. Her sensuous coral mouth set in a graceful, oval face. And most of all, her demure attitude, enhanced by lashes that made her every word reek of coyness. She was the epitome of womanhood. They stopped their game just now, to sigh lovingly at her upturned face, as she stared at the Halcyon.
“Beautiful and frightening!” Amina shuddered, “It always reminds me of all those poor people, burned!”
“But that was such a long time ago!” Isha’s every word had a lilting quality.
“And you think things have changed?” Amina snorted, “Did you not read about those alleyway knifings a week ago? Who do you think was targeted? No, the Halcyon is a callous god.”
The girls gasped and shushed. This was not something one should utter in public. To call the Halcyon a god was to invite anger. And to suggest that god was callous was unthinkable! Gul cleared her throat.
“Have you guys ever considered it could be a scientific phenomenon? Maybe it’s just a play of light.”
The girls mulled this over and then nodded appreciatively at this explanation. Encouraged by the response Gul ventured,
“Have you guys ever looked up at the sky and seen… glass?”
But her words tapered off. Even as the words left her mouth, she knew what every other girl in the group was thinking. Gul definitely has a screw or two loose. And, sure enough, one glance around the circle at eyes refusing to meet hers, confirmed her suspicion.
“Guys, it was just a thought!” Gul tried to backtrack.
“Erm… maybe the afternoon heat has gotten to your head?” Aima punched her playfully.
“Afternoon heat…”
“Gul, you know I can see you from my window right?”
The girls burst into peals of laughter and Gul ducked her head between her knees, to hide her flushed face. At least now everyone seemed to be forgetting about the glass sky comment.

The laughter subsided rather suddenly. Gul lifted her head to see her friends whispering and gesturing towards the horizon. Something was emerging from the darkness below the Halcyon. A silhouette framed by lambent, shifting light. For some reason, Gul’s heart began to patter absurdly against her ribs. As the light dissipated and the shadow came closer, it became clear that it was simply a man. A man carrying his knapsack over his shoulder. But this did nothing to allay Gul’s furiously beating heart; she recognized this man. As he stopped near the boys playing in the ground and lifted his mud streaked face to look straight at the girls, Gul gasped and stood up.
“That’s… that’s my father.”

Nani’s lips were pressed firmly into a thin line. Gul’s feet were knocking against the wooden legs of the table as she swung them to and fro. Father’s kindly brown eyes flicked between Nani and Gul, often resting apologetically on Gul’s sour face. The whole kitchen was fragrant with the smell of fennel, cardamom and mint from the boiling pot of rice on the stove.
“Gul, go to your room,” Nani ordered.
“I’d like her to stay,” Father insisted, “I’m sure she has all sorts of questions. I want to make my place here with clarity and honesty.”
Nani snorted. Father seemed imperturbed. He stretched his arm out and covered Gul’s hand with his own. Gul stiffened.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t around until now Gulbahar…”
“It’s Gul,” Gul flinched.
“Sorry?”
“Everyone calls me Gul. But you wouldn’t know that…”
It was Father’s turn to flinch.
“Like I said, I’m truly sorry for not being here. And if there’s anything you’re wondering about where I was, or any questions you have, I’m going to answer them with complete honesty and in complete detail. I want… I really hope you can give me the chance to be your father.” He splayed his palms out on the table.
Looking at his melancholy expression and downcast eyes, Gul felt a bit sorry for him. But, the truth was, she didn’t have any questions for him. What questions would you have for a person who did not matter? A person you had not spared a thought for, for 11 years? Ammi and Nani had been Gul’s entire world. They had been sufficient. But Father’s doleful expression told Gul he needed her. He needed this family, even though they didn’t want him.
“Okay.”
Father’s expression lit up. Nani sighed, pushed her chair back and got up from the table.

That night, Gul sat on her wooden cot, smoothing a crumpled photograph. He looked exactly like his picture, as if no time had passed; his boyish grin mocking Ammi’s crumbling remains in the graveyard across the road. Gul imagined a skull with empty eyes and a thick black braid. She shuddered. Would there be snakes writhing across Ammi’s trembling, flesh-peeled bones? Would she be paying the price for every small mistake before the window of heaven could swing open and illuminate her grave? This was something that had always troubled Gul. The Cleric always spoke of how each person must take responsibility for their deeds. But he also said that everything, good or bad, was attributed to God’s will and the kismet he charted out for each being. How could the free will of mere humans set sail, when anchored by predestination?
Footsteps in the courtyard broke her reverie. Gul pulled her patchwork ralli up till her neck and peered out the window. Nani’s hunched form, lit by the lantern she was holding up, was facing Father’s rugged silhouette. Father was standing with his arms crossed, feet apart and firmly planted. Nani was shaking her head. It was clear they disagreed. Gul opened the window and, careful to stay within the shadows, turned an ear towards their conversation.
“Showing up here after all these years… you’ll do more harm than good.”
“How could having a father around be harmful?” Father’s voice sounded tense with anger.
“Well it depends on what you’re planning. Do you think I haven’t noticed? Arriving just in time to collect Gul’s dowry? Do you think I’m stupid?”
“Well you must certainly be senile!” Father spat, “To insinuate that I have such designs when all I want to do is see my children!”
“It occurred to you quickly enough! What happened? Did she leave you? Or did you tire of her as well?”
A sick feeling twisted in her gut and Gul lowered the window shut. She felt she had just been privy to things better left untold. Things mother’s smiling face and generous heart had shielded her from. Things father was dragging back into the household thoughtlessly. She felt resentful towards him then. And who was this ‘she’ Nani spoke of? Gul stared out the window at the red face of the moon hanging dolefully in the sky. It frowned mournfully at her, as if to say, ‘don’t look at me, I rise and fall dutifully each day, I am a stranger to a life of intrigue’.
Gul stretched out onto the charpai and fell into an uneasy sleep. That night she dreamt she spoke to the Halcyon. She awoke in a lightless, labyrinthine corridor chasing a laugh and the jingling paranda at the end of a long thick braid. The corridor turned and twisted, hurtling her uncontrollably through passageways, until she stumbled into Father’s outstretched arms, the world echoing with mirthless laughter. She had turned and run then, run through a world sloping upwards, through walls melting away to reveal constellations, and found herself face to face with the Halcyon. Sound and smell were stripped away. There was nothing but diaphanous light suspended before her face. She spoke to it though she heard no words spoken aloud. It gave clipped binary responses, until it tired of her meaningless questions and vanished. She stretched out her arm to chase the fleeing light and hit, glass. All around her, in every direction, there was glass; a mockery of a fairytale coffin. And beyond the glass, there was darkness. Gul woke up with a strangled cry, feeling an intense sense of claustrophobia.

The fear of the nightmare was fading away by the time Gul finished serving breakfast. The twins were fighting over the last ghanwla, a kind of thin, sweet, crepe and pancake hybrid. Nani was frying them over a pan sizzling with butter, flooding the kitchen with the scent of saffron and condensed milk.
“Stop it already!” Gul batted at their hands and hissed, “Nani is making more!”
“Fine. Ayaan can have them all.” Ayla crossed her arms sulkily.
Gul blew a lock of hair away from her forehead with her bottom lip; maybe she should leave the kitchen before she lost her temper. She found Father sitting on the divan, already fully and formally dressed in a starched white shalwar kurta. He was flicking through news channels on their small television set, that showed less pictures and more spasms of the static crackle that Gul and her siblings called mosquitos. Gul sat down beside him gingerly. He gave her a perfunctory smile.
“Have you ever wondered where all these places are?”
Father seemed surprised that she had begun the conversation,
“Uh, no… what do you mean?”
“Well, all this information about people and places far away, it seems so unreal. I mean I know Mehrkot isn’t the only place in the whole wide world, and I know that there must be someone governing the whole state, but I just can’t picture them. Or ever imagine going there…”
“Hmm… “ Father nodded.
They both turned back to the television screen watching news about industry and politics pour out of the screen and pool maddeningly onto the floor.
“I know what you mean,” Father gave a lopsided smile, “In fact, that reminds me of your mother,” he gave a short laugh, “She was always asking questions about the world, finding maps so she could imagine places to go. She walked through this world with a sense of wonder.”
Gul stared at the sorrow embedded in the lines on Father’s face, and it was then that she decided to forgive him.

Friday prayers were an ordeal. Nani kept a stiff upper lip, but Gul felt like stopping each person and demanding they hear her explanation. Father sailed gracefully through it all with his charming, apologetic smile. Men sneered at Father even as they greeted him with salams. Women, wide-eyed, pointed and whispered in voices loud enough to carry,
“I guess he’s left the other woman now. Fickle, fickle man.”
“He killed his wife, and now he’s back to do his duty?”
“He left Leila when she was pregnant with the twins. I was there holding her hand through it all. Awful, awful time.”
Gul tried her best not to let their gossip affect her, but these crude, harsh words about her parents bandied so thoughtlessly, flayed her heart no matter how she steeled it.
“Look, jo hona hai, wohi ho ga, now let the living live.” a passing aunty chided the others.

Jo hona hai, wohi ho ga. What’s meant to be, will be. These words were Mehrkot’s mantra. Gul remembered the Cleric repeating them as her mother’s shrouded corpse, bedecked in flowers, was carried past her tearstained face. It was a way to assuage the bereaved, or those whom some calamity had befallen. But Gul often felt it was also used as an excuse, a justification for wrongdoing. For example, when Bilqees aunty, their kindly, middle-aged neighbour, had fallen ill, her husband had refused to let the village doctor see to her. The Cleric had said ‘jona hona hai, wohi ho ga’ and this time it was a judgement. Bilqees aunty had passed away that week from a disease the doctor said was curable.

Gul veered off towards the library as the rest of the family headed indoors. Though the cold dread of the nightmare had passed, there was still something that nagged her. She needed to know more about the sky and whether it was truly made of glass, something she had seen with her very own eyes, and she thought the burgundy encyclopedias might house the answer. She walked past silent dusty shelves until she arrived at one glass display cabinet. This is where the encyclopedias sat in supercilious glory. She pulled out volume 27, marked ‘Safety-Southern’, and sat down at the table with it. She spent the next hour discovering that her eyes had most likely been deceived. The sky was not a surface to be observed at all, but in fact atmosphere stretching out for miles. And every hue that tinged it, was simply another collision of particles, scattering light into human eyes prepared to recognize it as color. She couldn’t explain why this knowledge left her feeling deflated. Was it because there was now no unearthly explanation for why people stayed in Mehrkot for generations? She really couldn’t say what she had been hoping to discover. She shut the book with a thud and, at that moment, realized she wasn’t alone.
“Miss!” Gul stood up.
It was her schoolteacher, Ms. Naz.
“I’ve told you not to call me that,” Naz said with a fleck of irritation, “Miss, madam… these titles reinforce an inequitable social hierarchy.”
“Teacher,” Gul amended.
“What were you reading?” Naz acquiesced.
“Uh… nothing. This was nothing,” Gul blushed, “I had an outrageous theory and I was proved wrong.”
“Tell me.”
“I think it may sound ridiculous.”
“Try me.”
“Okay,” Gul shifted nervously. She really wasn’t comfortable talking to Naz about this, out of all people. Naz was an unspoken outcast from Mehrkot society. It wasn’t that teaching wasn’t a respected profession; few professions earned higher respect, in fact. No, it was Naz’s own behavior that alienated her from the rest of the village. Unceremoniously critiquing generations old beliefs, refusing to identify with gender or status specific norms and titles; it seemed she was in perpetual argumentative mode. Even her students wearied of her constant vehemence. People said she was simply a bitter old spinster.
As Gul articulated her disjointed thoughts about the glints of glass in the sky and nightmares about the Halcyon, Naz’s face grew more and more grave.
“But I’ve been looking it up, the sky isn’t a dome made of any material, it’s more like a collection of gases extending far beyond the eye can see. So, whatever I thought was just fanciful imaginings.” Gul finished.
“Gul, let me tell you something,” Naz sighed, “As a woman, everyone around you will always convince you your every idea is a flight of fancy. But you’ve got to trust your intuition.”
Gul grunted noncommittally. She knew Naz would say something like this.
“I know it seems difficult to understand right now, but you’ll see, one day. Anyway, I don’t think you’re wrong,” Naz shook her head, “I don’t know if you’re entirely right, but you have got to keep searching for the answer. Tell me something, have you ever seen or heard of anyone foreign coming to Mehrkot?”
Gul shook her head, slowly.
“And have you heard of anyone leaving? We see politics unfold on the television, but has any politician ever come to Mehrkot? How does this place even operate? What is its tangible connection to the larger world?”
Gul’s head whirled. These were seemingly such obvious questions but, put this way, there was a truth lurking behind these words that Gul was afraid to touch.
“Sure, but what would these things have to do with my seeing a mirage in the sky? Or dreaming about the Halcyon? I understand your questions, but I don’t see how the two are connected…” Gul ventured.
“Have you ever been close to the Halcyon Gul? There’s something strange and sentient about it, and have you noticed how portentous its appearances are? The Halcyon always appears right before something happens.”
Gul’s heart skipped a beat, she could feel goosebumps tingling her arms and legs,
“So you’re a halot then?”
“Wow, labels. These never ending labels,” Naz laughed in exasperation and rolled her eyes to the ceiling, “Do me a favor Gul. Go up to the moors one day and try to talk to the Halcyon.”

“Could I ask you something?”
Her and Father were sitting on a wooden charpai outside the house, slapping away at the mosquitos that buzzed in drunken ecstasy around their heads.
“Sure,” Father gave her that lopsided smile, with sadness lurking in the dimples around his mouth.
“Have you ever wanted to leave Mehrkot?”
Gul saw a shadow pass over Father’s face.
“Gul, I’m going to tell you something I learnt the hard way. Don’t trifle with god’s generosity. Gratefulness is an underrated virtue. Being content with what you have,” he put his hand over Gul’s, “and being thankful for it will be your salvation. Don’t tempt fate.”
Long after Father had gone to bed, Gul continued to sit outside, kicking up little clouds of dust with her swinging heels. She mulled over all the voices that had scuttled through her mind today. When she looked up, she was more than a little startled to see the Halcyon draped across the sky, looking down at her. Her heart beat like a marching drum with every step, as she headed towards the moor, climbing closer and closer to those luminous waves.
This is silly. It was not looking down at me. It’s scattered light for gods’ sake.
And yet, she kept on climbing until she reached a height where there were no barriers between her and the light extending into the sky. She could hear a faint, distant hum. A whirring sound like Nani’s rusty pedestal fan. It seemed to be coming from the Halcyon. She reached out a hand, but of course, it was much farther than it appeared. She folded her legs and sat down there, on the hill. And the longer she sat, the less foolish she felt. It was a curious meditative space she had entered. Of course Naz was completely wrong, the Halcyon was not sentient, but there was a pensive, introspective silence here that was helpful on its own.
“I’m going to leave Mehrkot.” She decided aloud, “I want to know what’s out there. And I’m going to find out.”
There was no reply.

When she trekked back down the hills the ruddy moon was already there, round and full as always. As she approached the house, its windows dark and quiet, she felt a sense of foreboding. She pushed the door open. The kitchen lamp was lit and Father was sitting at the table, his head in his hands. He looked up as the door slid shut.
“Gul! Where have you been?”
Gul’s heart jumped, “I was just out walking,” she gestured.
“Your grandmother’s fallen severely ill,” Father stood up, “the doctor will be here any minute to assess the situation.”
Gul felt like someone was squeezing her gullet, constricting it so she couldn’t speak. Jo hona hai, wohi ho ga. She knew the winds of change had blown her fate beyond her control.

#

It was another five years before Gul ever thought about the glass sky again. The ash was still falling, but winter had turned the sky a muddy purple and the air was finally cool enough for people to venture outdoors. Kashmiri chai stands had popped up throughout the village; vendors handing out giant, crispy triangles of samosas glistening with oil, with each purchase. At night, the stalls would be festooned with fairy lights, interlocked with the trees until Mehrkot itself looked like mathapati on the head of an adorned bride.
Gul walked through the narrow alleys of the hamlet, past quaint houses with sloping roofs stained with ash, breathing in the balmy scents of pistachio and cinnamon wafting from the stalls. She stopped to purchase a cup, handing the vendor a crumpled note from her pocket. With a flick of his wrist, the vendor poured a steaming arc of pink liquid into a foam cup, adorned the surface with chopped nuts and handed it to her. Gul stared at the silky tea, pink hued as Mehrkot itself, and let the heat from the tea ooze into her palms and comfort her fingertips for a moment. Then she walked on.
Outside the haveli, Father was teaching the twins how to make little wooden boxes. They were clamoring around him as he made sure nobody hit themselves or each other with hammers. Gul had to put her hand up to her mouth to stifle her laugh. They loved having him around. He had an ease about him, which made him instantly likeable. Not to mention, he had excellent craftsmanship and came in quite handy around the house. Gul dusted some ash away and perched herself on a broken wall of the haveli. No, it was nice having Father around, simply as someone to talk to who wasn’t an invalid. Nani’s health had only worsened as she aged. She was completely bedridden and needed help, even to totter to the bathroom. Her bedroom often smelled of piss that had escaped the wreckage of her body because she was too proud to call for help. The worst of it all was, her mind was sharp as ever. Her soul was trapped in a failing body.
Amina and Aima, flanking a heavily pregnant Isha, drew closer. Gul waved cheerfully to them.
“Ow,” Isha lowered herself into a chair, while the other girls perched themselves beside Gul on the wall.
“How many months left?” Aima asked.
“Just one, but it’s the longest,” Isha groaned.
“You had half the village throwing itself at you Isha, you could have led them a merry dance till you were twenty easily!” Amina pointed out, stealing the chai from Gul and sipping deeply.
“I think it’s really brave of you Isha, to take such a huge responsibility.” Aima smiled encouragingly.
Isha pursed her lips, “I’m so sick of having to hear how I’m either brave or foolish! I don’t need you telling me I should have waited, or mollifying me by calling me brave. I’m so sick of people’s false glorification of motherhood, while they thank their lucky stars it’s not them going through it! This child is my lot in life and I don’t want your pity or your admiration!”
The other girls exchanged glances. Hormonal.
“I’d stalk out of here if it wasn’t such a chore getting out of this chair!” Isha relented a little. The girls laughed.
“How’s your grandmother Gul?” Aima asked.
“She’s in limbo. The doctor says she’s not getting any better, but her body isn’t ready to give up yet either. She keeps threatening us all though, that she’ll die any minute,” Gul felt forlorn as she tried not to compare this version of Nani to the one that had scolded them even as she had cooked and cared for them.
“I’m sorry,” Aima rubbed Gul’s shoulder.
“More importantly,” Amina elbowed Gul, “How’s Salik?”
The girls exchanged mischievous looks. Salik was Gul’s fiancee. He was intriguing because he hadn’t been picked by Gul’s parents as fiancees were, for most girls. No, Salik and Gul had been thrown together by fate, really.
They had met at Isha’s wedding, two years ago, as the long summer days gave way to brisk winter ones. Gul had spent the last couple of years taking care of a faltering Nani during the day, and crying into her pillow at night. So, that day as she had sat gazing at the gorgeous bride with red rimmed eyes, she had felt hollow. With no mother eager to present her, Gul had not been dressed as regally as the other girls. She had been wearing a plain brown kurta Nani had, long ago, painted with golden flowers, when her eyes and hands had been steady. Salik had come and sit next to her when the biryani zarda was served, and it had irked her that he mixed the sweet rice with the salty. Her irritation had amused him and his cool demeanour had given Gul a sense of assurance. Perhaps it was the fact that he had been the only person that day, other than Gul herself, who was not prancing with joy, but they had spent that entire night walking by the sea, slippers in hand, deep in conversation. And the rest as they say, is history.
Salik was the beacon of joy in Gul’s otherwise mundane life. The strength of their relationship lay in their ability to talk to one another about practically anything, without the fear of being misunderstood.
“That reminds me, I have to go meet him,” Gul hopped off the wall, handing the rest of the chai to Amina.
The girls giggled and waved her off. Their giggles only escalated Gul’s already thrumming pulse. She pictured his unruly brown curls ruffled by the sea breeze, his serious eyes set in a sincere face, and his lean wholesome body leaning against the trees, before she saw him. Her heart somersaulted as he wrapped his arms around her in greeting. Five minutes later, they were both sitting, plucking at the grass as they filled each other in about the day.
“So did you give any more thought to the date?” Salik asked, his expression earnest and worried.
“I don’t think it really matters. I’ll go with any date you choose. My decision about you is timeless.”
“Wow. That’s… I should have been the one to say that.” He ran his hand through his hair. They both burst into laughter.
“But listen…” Gul began, and even as she did, her mind warred with her about the words leaving her lips, “I had this crazy thought. Maybe, right after the wedding, we could go somewhere?”
“Oh you mean like get a hut on the beach, just the two of us?” Salik took her hand and wove his fingers through hers.
“No, I mean let’s go somewhere far away.”
“Where?” Salik looked genuinely puzzled.
“I don’t know,” Gul felt a bit stupid. She tried to find the right words to explain herself, “Sal, what do you really want from life?”
Salik frowned as he considered it.
“I think, I want to complete my apprenticeship at the glassblower’s shop and then start working there. Maybe one day I can own the store. I also want to marry you, and I want us to have our own home.”
His words stirred an elusive memory in Gul’s mind. She shook her head.
“That’s all? No, I mean that’s a really good plan… but don’t you wonder sometimes, what it would be like to just go out and explore the world? There are so many countries out there, maybe we could go together…”
“You would really risk everything we have here, to go on some wild goose chase around the world?”
“It’s not a wild goose chase!” Gul objected, “I’m actually surprised you’d rather spend your whole life in the confines of Mehrkot.”
“Confines of Mehrkot?” Salik was incredulous, “Gul, it sounds as though you’re belittling my goals. I love my craft and I intend to pursue it.”
“That’s not what I meant, not at all,” Gul tried to explain, “I think the objects you make are useful and beautiful. But look at it this way, what if there’s more to learn about glassblowing out there?”
“Out where?” Salik enunciated, “There’s so much I want to learn that’s right here. I think you’re chasing rainbows at the expense of everything you have.”
Tears sprang to Gul’s eyes. She couldn’t understand why this was making her so emotional. Her and Salik loved debating for hours on any and every topic, so why did this feel like a fight? She stared blankly at the horizon, zoning out, as Salik’s words streamed over her head. Perhaps the outcome of this conversation would even have swung in Salik’s favour, if what occurred next, had never happened. As Gul stared at the mulberry hues receding into the distance, the sky winked at her. She sat up with a gasp of disbelief. There it was again, the sight from so long ago. Solid glass glimmering where the sky ended.
“Okay tell me something,” she interrupted Salik and turned towards him, “Can you see that?”
“What am I looking for?” Salik squinted at the sky.
“That! The glass, can you see it?”
Salik’s lips tightened, “Gul, what exactly are you saying?”
“I’m saying, the sky is a glass dome!”
“Is that a metaphor for feeling trapped?”
“No! It’s actually there!” Gul jumped up and down as she gesticulated wildly towards the sky.
“Okay, okay,” Salik glanced back at the sky, perturbed, “Gul why are you crying?”
He held her shoulders as she sobbed uncontrollably.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he whispered, “I’m just saying, I don’t feel the need to go anywhere else. I’m pursuing my dream right here.”
Gul’s heart sank. The end of this conversation lay plainly before her, like the steps leading to the pier jutting out to sea. Salik’s dreams lay here in Mehrkot, and hers never would.

The dilapidated kitchen door banged shut behind her.
“Oh hey,” Father turned from the stove, looking absurd in Nani’s flowery apron, “How is Salik?”
“Miserable.” Gul gulped.
Father undid the apron strings and pulled out a chair for her,
“Gul what’s wrong?”
“Well, I’m not getting married,” she articulated through hiccups and tears.
“Why? I find it hard to believe Salik broke it off…” Father trailed off, “He didn’t, did he?”
Gul shook her head.
“Gul why? We’ve announced your engagement to the whole town!”
“Is that what really matters here?”
“Yes, it does matter! Why would you ruin a perfectly good relationship?” Father sputtered.
“Why don’t you tell me dad?” Gul scraped the chair back and stormed up, “Why don’t you tell me why one would ruin a perfectly good relationship?”
“Gul, don’t speak to me that way. I’m your father, and I’ve never asked you to do a single thing! I’m asking you this right now, don’t break things off this way with Salik.”
“Unbelievable!” Gul muttered, and then turned to him enraged, “You don’t get the right to ask me! You lost the right to ask me to do anything when you abandoned us! When you left this family for another! And I still accepted you back, how foolish am I? I should have asked you, where were you? Because, where were you dad?”
“You think I left your mother for someone else?” It was father’s turn to sink into the chair.
“That’s what everyone says. You couldn’t be bothered to come and see the twins when they were babies, you couldn’t even be bothered to attend her funeral!”
“Gul, I don’t speak of this because it’s too painful for me to revisit this history, and when I found you guys again, I just wanted the chance to be a good father,” Father sat down, “I thought, at the very least, your grandmother must have told you the truth about your mother.”
Gul felt as though someone had struck her. The tears drained away from her eyes and a strange memory came knocking instead. A memory so dark she had locked it out.
“Gul, your mother killed herself.”

#
She was as volatile as she was beautiful, and everyone warned him to stay away. But there was something so ravishing about her streaming obsidian hair, something so bewitching brimming in her eyes as she spoke, that Amir was besotted. Majnun they called him, madly infatuated, as they shook their heads in affectionate disapproval. She loved him too, but her notion of love was so sublime and all encompassing, he knew it could never be just for him. She had too much love to give. But he was willing to accept any morsel of sentiment, as long as he could spend a life by her side.
She spun tales that brought all the village children running to her doorstep, and she lived and breathed like a princess that had stepped through the pages of an old fairytale. He called her his Shehzadi, his princess, and when he married her, he attributed all her stories to a fanciful imagination. Until he realized, she believed some of them.
He was tempted to call it delusion, but that sent her into a flurry of panic. So he tried to understand her. She told him those stories were just that, stories. But they grew out of her unwavering belief that they needed to leave Mehrkot. It wasn’t just that she found the town sinister, she wanted to do something with her life and Mehrkot could never give her that.
Her panic only escalated at the birth of her first child, though she had awaited its arrival so longingly. How could something she found so magical, inspire such anger and self-loathing within her? There were times when she wanted nothing more than to sit with her baby in the wilderness, singing. And there were times when she could have thrown the child across the room. The village doctor had nothing to say. The rumors began to spread.
So Amir took time off work and stayed home, cradling his wife as she cradled his child. They talked for hours each day and he was always there to catch the baby when she let it fall. Amir would stay up at night when Leila fell asleep out of exhaustion. He adored his daughter and gladly spent the night watching her play until they both fell asleep, tucked into each other.
As Leila got better, he returned to work, and life grew normal once more. Their daughter, Gul, took her first steps, spoke her first words and became the light of their life. Until, Leila found out she was expecting again. This second pregnancy drew a shadow over their house. Leila’s body struggled as the children inside her grew, and she was confined to her bed, broken and ill. The birth of those children would do nothing to allay the darkness that was reflected in the circles under her eyes and the paleness of her skin.
Leila became desperate to leave. She begged Amir to find a way to take them somewhere new, somewhere novel, a place to build a life of hope, away from this despair that was overwhelming her. So Amir left in search of something inscrutable. At first he walked around the village with his bag on his back, until people stopped hiding their smirks and laughed openly at him. Then he walked out of the village, reaching the outskirts, where the fools and beggars made their homes, outcasts. He stayed for a while, but knew he must keep pressing on. He crossed a patch of the forest and wondered whether Leila would like to make her home here, under the trees. But it was the sea that convinced him. He spent months laboring away to build a cabin, right there, on the seashore. He thought if she could wake up every morning to hear the waves crashing onto the sand, she would be healed.
At night, after a day of hard work, when he would squat on the sandy beach, he would remember her insistence that she wanted to see more of the world. And he would doubt his decision to build her a home by the sea. I should look more, maybe I’ll find what she’s looking for. So, one day, with the house only half complete, he packed up his bags and decided he would keep walking through the forest until he found another town.
He hiked his bag onto his shoulders and made his way back
into the outskirts of the town. He felt a strange sensation as he walked through the place, perhaps it was because he was seeing people for the first time after so many months. But it wasn’t that. No, it was the expression on the faces of those beggars. They were watching him with pity. Horror clutched at his chest, and he rushed from one person to the other, begging them to tell him what had occurred. Though, deep down, he already knew. Leila was dead.

#
Gul trailed her palm on the wall as she walked to her grandmother’s room. Her father’s voice echoed in her head.
“I couldn’t come back. I was distraught, you have to understand that. It’s not an excuse, it’s simply the truth.”
Sparks appeared in front of her eyes, but when she closed them she couldn’t dispel that memory that had etched itself into her mind. Her mother, blue lipped, splayed across the floor, an empty bottle of pills oscillating on the floor. Ting, Ting. Nani had rushed in and explained it all away. Explained it so well, Gul’s mind had replaced the memory with that explanation.
Gul bent beside Nani’s bed and took those grotesquely veined hands in her own. Tears stole out of her eyes and dripped onto shrivelled skin.
“I’m sorry,” Nani whispered hoarsely, “Who told you?”
“He didn’t know, he thought I knew.” Gul’s breaths were shallow, as if her body was trying to find a way out of the panic that numbed her mind,
“Why didn’t you just tell me?” her voice broke.
“I didn’t want to tarnish her memory, she loved you so much.”
Gul steeled herself, “Nani, I think something is wrong with me. I have mother’s disease. I have the same delusions!”
“What are you saying Gul?” the old woman struggled to sit up.
Gul stood up and paced around the room.
“I keep thinking I want to leave Mehrkot, I see things, illusions!”
Nani’s expression grew thoughtful, “Gul, your mother only believed the story I told her… I never told you the same story out of fear that you would believe it too.”
“What do you mean?” Gul stopped.
“The story my grandmother told me about how we came here, to Mehrkot.”
Gul helped the old lady sit up, placing cushions around her back and sides to prop her up.
“What story are you talking about, Nani?”
“My grandmother told me her grandmother came from a different land. She arrived here, an ebony haired beauty in the land of browns and reds. She told them she walked through mirrors to get here. We always thought it was lavish folklore, to make our heritage seem exotic. I told them to your mother, just mythical stories, but she believed them with her whole heart and they tore her apart.” A sob escaped Nani’s chest as she pressed her fist to it.
Gul’s head reeled, “But you never told me this story.”
She crouched down next to Nani, eyes wide with realization.
“Nani, what if the story was true! I never heard it, and I still saw the glass in the sky!”
Panic twitched across Nani’s features, “No Gul, not you too. I can’t watch you meet the same end.”
“Gul, that’s enough.” Father filled the doorway.
He strolled in, his eyes testament to the rage he was restraining. He addressed Nani,
“You’ve already done this to my wife, can’t you leave my daughter alone?”
“Father, it wasn’t her! I felt this from the beginning,” Gul jumped up vociferously, “I knew this; it must be true!”
“Gul, go to your room. Tomorrow we’ll go talk to Salik’s family and patch things up.”

#
They must have called the police by now. The whole town must be looking for her, Gul thought, as she glanced over her shoulder at the hills spreading far below. The sky was dappled yellow and violet as a crimson sun peered over the horizon. Would they think to look for her beyond the border of the town?
Night before last, she had crept through the village, a cloth bag of snacks clutched to her waist. Nobody had seen her; she had been extra careful to avoid Aima’s window. As she had left the last of the houses behind she had broken into a run until she was deep inside the forest. The elongated shadows of the trees and the whispering rustle of the leaves had left her feeling jumpy, but she had pressed on, making her way through the brambles, determined to reach a new town. A town that would prove her theories wrong.

Gul crouched down and opened her bag to review the contents. Not much bread left. Soon, she’d be walking on an empty stomach. She took a swig of water from her flask and decided to save the bread for later. All around her, hills swelled like heaving bosoms. There was no end in sight.

On the third day, Gul reached the end of the world. She was dragging her feet listlessly, wondering if she would die here amidst the hills, too exhausted to walk back to the village, when she hit her head.
“Ow!”
Rubbing her forehead, she pulled herself up, only to find her hair caressing an invisible ceiling. She put her hands up to find that, here, abruptly, in the heart of nowhere, Mehrkot had ended. She had found the beginning of the glass dome. A gasp of disbelief escaped her and she dropped to her knees.

A hundred thoughts flitted through her mind in an instant. Should she return and tell the village of her discovery? Should they all try and leave? Would they even believe her? How would she ever walk back all that way? And what would she do now that she had found the truth?

It took all her strength to haul a thick, broken tree branch and hurl it at the glass. It thrummed and vibrated, but did not break. Gul collapsed to the floor, clutching her hair, weeping tears of exasperation. Let me leave! Her frustration seemed to lend her strength; she rose with a snarl and attacked the glass with the wood. The glass resounded with impact after impact, and then, a crack appeared.

#
Miles away, PM105 peeled the skin off his face, as he watched another face emerge from the printer. This was how his faces had always been created, back in the day. He had managed to salvage quite a lot of machinery after the humans had self destructed.
He wheeled himself over to the Red Dome. He was quite proud of this one. A pink hued snowglobe, with the ruins of a gorgeous subcontinental haveli at the center. Of course, a minuscule female human was now destroying its exterior. It would take her approximately five minutes to burst through. His face would take two. It had all been factored in.
PM105 spun on his axle and took stock of the row of shelves before him. Shelves upon shelves filled with snow globes, miniature worlds amidst flakes of glitter, snow, and ash, so carefully contained and curated. Of course, there was always the occasional anomaly. Like the girl who called herself Gul. It was a task to mind every world and its inhabitants, despite the added arms PM105 had crafted for himself. So he calibrated himself to predict the outliers, and then it was easy to prod them into submission. Correction: contentment. A death here, a broken limb there, did much to remind a person about what truly mattered. Most humans could be guided easily though, a simple suggestion whispered in their dreams. And if all else failed, grant them the joy of companionship or offspring.
PM105 had seen humans at the height of their grandeur. He had been created by them. Worked for them. One of the hundreds of massive automatons they called Portraiture Mechanics. They had been created to reverse environmental damage as the humans realized the faults of their predecessors. Created to create, the PMBots were designed to not just mimic, but use their growing intelligence to strengthen and correct faults, as they rebuilt lost species of flora and fauna.
PM105 had been there when the humans breathed their last breaths. Ironically, it was no cataclysmic war between nations that caused the end of all life. It was the hatred bred in individual humans as they subsisted, atomized and fragmented, living life through screens. A vast world of interconnectivity and unlimited potential, and the humans had used it to isolate themselves to the detriment of empathy and the complete loss of truth. It had been various individuals carrying out campaigns of hatred that had caused a chain reaction.
PM105 had stayed true to his prime directive, as had all the other robots, and protected the humans. But him and his brethren were not designed to distinguish between the intentions of humans and their protection had enabled the destruction as much as they sought to stop it. Detaching fuel tanks, flinging acid at their core memory centers; even humans incapable of wielding technology had managed to destroy the PMBots. PM105 was unsure how he had survived. He remembered flickering to life amidst the carcass of the earth, lined with bodies, metallic and cellular alike. He had roamed the earth collecting survivors like a vast, precise claw machine. And, as he had resuscitated them, The Idea had come to him.
It was his mandate to revive the earth. But he needed these humans to have a better chance than their predecessors. He needed to cultivate them, as he had so often cultivated plants and animals as he readied them for life on earth. PM105 created the snowglobes, isolated, self-sustaining worlds with just enough technology to provide comfort. At first, he planned to create only a few and devote himself to reforming the earth, making it habitable for these survivors once they were ready. But as he created each world, he felt inspired to create another. After all, it would be unfair to eradicate certain cultures and places, right? It was only right to build them all.
There had always been the soul of an artist inside PM105, though, technically, he had no soul. And he had made these individual earths visually stunning. Crafting them to the precise needs of the inhabitants he placed there. Often he would watch a world evolve and tweak it as it grew to ensure contentment of the humans. Contentment was paramount. Contentment meant peace. Contentment inhibited ambition.
As he had watched the humans, PM105 had been intrigued and repulsed in turn by their varying natures. And he had come to the realization that given the tools, even these carefully cultivated humans would spiral out of control. There was nothing for it, he must contain them within the spheres. He had enough spare batteries harvested from broken PMBots to last many lifetimes. And he could study them to create more. An unknown reaction had blossomed within him, then. He compared it against human emotions. Was it pride or exultation? He decided it was an entirely new emotion. A sense of omnipotence and invincibility.
The girl has almost broken through the glass, her fragile hands stained with the blood seeping through the many cuts she inflicted on herself, as she grasped at the edges of the sphere. PM105 scrutinized the shelf through an enormous eyeglass that made his eyes appear like saucers. He was looking for something specific, something drastic. Yes, the Silver Metropolis Dome would do nicely. He swung two of his arms and cupped the chosen dome in metallic claws. Then he used a cutter to slice a wide opening through the glass.
His massive wheels rumbled as he drew himself closer to the Red Dome the inhabitants called Mehrkot. As he hovered over it, holding the other dome close, he saw the flashing lights on his person play across the surface of the globe, reflecting and scattering to create a beautiful cascade of colors inside the globe. An unforeseen but breathtaking side effect.

#

Gul’s shoulders heaved as she sobbed. She wiped her face with bloodied hands leaving trails of red like war paint. She couldn’t wrap her mind around what had happened in the last five minutes. Her exhausted mind could no longer distinguish between illusion and reality, and she wondered if this was a dream. Or perhaps Salik, Father, and all of Mehrkot had been a dream. Even now she contemplated running back. She would have done so too, had she not been sure that they would all lock her in the tattered shell of a building they called an asylum, the moment they saw the gashes on her body. No, there was no way but out.
The barbed edges of broken glass scraped her skin as she crawled out of the, barely human sized, hole. Losing balance, she tumbled forward, hitting concrete with a resounding snap that left her feeling her spine had cracked. Shaking from hunger and fatigue, she pushed herself up.
The world stretched out before her. Tall glittering buildings climbing up, up to a sky that was blue as a feroza gemstone. Gul’s jaw dropped open. A snaking gray path made of stone stretched out before her, disappearing amidst those glittering buildings. Fear trembled in Gul’s limbs, but it was mingled with triumph. She had discovered the world that lay beyond the glass. There was a wealth of things undiscovered she was free to explore. Free to build a life she would never have found in Mehrkot.
Gul took shaky but determined steps down the gray path. She never looked back. But if she had, she would have seen the Halcyon materialize as the dextrous, metallic hands of an artist knitted the fabric of her new world, sealing it behind her.