Prologue #2
Abhinav watched his father’s profile, still sharp despite the illness, still recognisable as the man who used to fill every room he entered.
“Papa,” he asked quietly. “Do you really believe Kul Devi is watching over us?”
Rajendra didn’t answer immediately.
“I believe,” he took a deep breath before continuing, “that faith gives you something to hold onto when everything else is falling apart. The question is whether you face it alone or whether you face it with something larger than yourself to lean on.”
“Even if that something doesn’t actually help?”
His father smiled faintly. “Who says it doesn’t help? Your mother has the strength to sit with me all day. Naina lights incense and then she can smile through her tears. Maybe that’s what gods are for. Not to fix what’s broken, but to help us survive it while it stays broken.”
Abhinav remained silent.
His father reached out and patted his hand once. “You don’t have to believe what I believe. You just have to respect that some people need their faith to get through the unbearable.”
“Even when the unbearable happens anyway?”
“Especially then.”
The sun touched the horizon. Gold bled into orange, into red.
“Ready to head back?” Abhinav’s voice was soft.
“One more minute.”
So, they stayed. Watching the light change. His father’s breathing was now audible over the sound of the waves.
Abhinav thought about the diya. About his mother’s daily prayers. About a goddess thousands of miles away who was supposed to be watching over them. He thought about what watching over someone was even supposed to mean when it looked like this.
He didn’t say any of it.
Two Weeks Later
The end came on a Thursday afternoon when the nurse checked his vitals. Her face changed, and she stepped out to make a phone call.
Abhinav was in the study reviewing contracts when his mother appeared in the doorway. She didn’t say anything. Didn’t need to.
He closed his laptop and followed her.
The three of them gathered around the hospital bed.
Sarita on the right, Rajendra’s hand pressed between both of hers against her cheek.
Naina on the left, fingers laced through his, tears already falling silently onto her father’s hand.
Abhinav at the foot of the bed, watching his father’s chest rise and fall, slowly, each breath shallow.
The doctor had explained this part. The final stage. How the body would begin shutting down. How the breathing would change. How at some point it would simply stop.
Rajendra’s eyes opened one more time. They moved across the room. Sarita. Naina. Then found Abhinav at the foot of the bed.
Something in them sharpened. Focused. His lips moved.
Abhinav came closer and leaned down.
“I...” Just a breath. Barely there. “...believe in you...”
“I will.” His voice came out rougher than intended. “Make you proud.”
His father’s eyes held his for another moment. Then closed.
His chest rose.
Fell.
Rose again, shallowly.
Fell.
And didn’t rise again.
The monitor’s steady beep went flat. One long tone that filled the room.
The nurse stepped forward, checked for a pulse, and looked at the doctor who’d appeared in the doorway. The doctor checked his watch and noted the time.
“Time of death: 4:47 PM.”
Sarita collapsed forward, forehead on her husband’s shoulder, body shaking with silent grief. Naina was still holding his hand, gripping it as if she just held on tight enough, he might come back.
Abhinav stood very straight. Then walked to the terrace and slid the door shut behind him.
Dubai spread out below in all its afternoon brilliance. The skyline he’d looked at a thousand times. The Burj Al Arab in the distance.
Abhinav stood with his hands on the railing.
And let himself break.
He just stood there while grief moved through him. Hot and sharp and complete. He let himself be, for these few minutes, simply a son who had lost his father.
The tears came. He didn’t wipe them. Didn’t move. Just let them fall while his chest ached and his throat closed and every breath felt like work.
He’d learned so much from this man. How to negotiate. How to read a room. How to walk into any city and make it work for you. How to build something from nothing.
What had simply never occurred to him until now, was how to be in the same home, the same life, without him.
Abhinav stayed on the terrace until the tears stopped on their own. Then straightened. Used his handkerchief. Controlled his breathing until it was even.
When he slid the door open, he was someone who had things to do.
“I need to make calls.” He told his mother.
She looked up, understood and nodded.
He stepped into the hallway.
Called Kishore first.
“It’s done,” he informed when his assistant answered. “Clear my calendar for two weeks. The funeral is tomorrow. Draft a statement for the partners and press. Nothing excessive.”
“Boss…”
“That’s all for now.”
He ended the call. Scrolled to the next number.
Mahesh Kumar Anand, his father’s younger brother, answered on the fourth ring, groggy with sleep. The news was followed by a sharp inhale, then his aunt’s voice in the background asking what happened.
He made six more calls. Each one with the same careful words. Each one met with the same sounds of grief breaking open on the other end of the line.
When it was done, he went back inside.
The nurse was already preparing the body. His mother sat in the chair, staring at nothing. Naina had finally let go of their father’s hand and was curled against Sarita’s side, face buried in her mother’s shoulder.
Abhinav looked at the small shrine in the corner.
The diya had burned out sometime in the last hour. The idols stood in the dark the way they always had. Patient, unchanging, unbothered.
He turned away.
There was paperwork to be handled. Arrangements to make. A funeral to plan.
That’s what he knew. That’s all he had left.