“Papa, just two more hours… My train is about to reach the station. You and Maa be ready.” Aditya’s voice, brimming with excitement on the phone, had almost made Keshav Babu drop the teacup from his hands. The cup was saved, but Keshav Babu’s entire being trembled. The ticking of the clock on the wall in front of him sounded like a time bomb.

Aditya was coming. After two years. His son, Major Aditya, who was guarding the nation on the icy peaks of Siachen, was coming home.

Happiness? No, there wasn’t a single trace of happiness on Keshav Babu’s face. There was only anxiety there. An anxiety like that of a criminal at the time of his punishment. For the past hour, he had been pacing around the drawing room like a madman. Sometimes straightening the sofa cushions, sometimes wiping the dust off the table with his kurta.

The house was completely deserted. The same house, which once resonated with ‘Sudha’s’ laughter and the tinkling of her bangles, now felt like a silent tomb. Keshav Babu sprayed room freshener in the room with trembling hands—Sudha’s favorite, jasmine-scented. He was trying to hide that musty, stale smell that had settled into the walls over the past six months.

But can scent hide the truth?

Keshav Babu went to the bedroom and opened the wardrobe. Sudha’s sarees were neatly kept there. He took out a blue saree—the one Sudha often wore—and placed it on the drawing room couch as if someone had just folded and kept it there. Then he picked up Sudha’s spectacles and placed them on the center table, on top of the newspaper.

Tears were continuously flowing from his eyes as he did all this.

It had been six months since Sudha passed away. Cardiac arrest. Everything had happened so suddenly that Keshav Babu hadn’t gotten a chance to recover. At that time, Aditya was on a very delicate and dangerous mission in Siachen. The commanding officer had advised Keshav Babu—”Sir, if we give Major this news right now, his mental balance could be disturbed. A mistake there means death. Please wait until the mission is over.”

And Keshav Babu had waited. To save his son’s life, he had swallowed the biggest sorrow of his life alone.

For the past six months, Keshav Babu couldn’t speak to Aditya on the phone as Sudha, because a voice could not be deceived. He would make excuses—”Mom has gone to the temple,” “Mom is sleeping,” “Mom has a throat infection.” But he kept writing letters. In Sudha’s name. Giving small, careful instructions just like Sudha would—”Sleep wearing socks,” “Eat food on time.”

He would cry while writing those letters, the ink would smudge, and he would write again. For six months, he had kept a dead wife alive on paper for his son.

But today? Today Aditya would be standing right in front of him. How would this wall of lies hold up today? Keshav Babu’s heart was sinking. He felt, how would he face his son? How would he tell him that the mother whose carrot halwa he was craving to eat, had long turned to ashes?

The doorbell rang.

A shiver ran through Keshav Babu’s body. He wiped his tears, plastered a fake smile on his face, and went to open the door.

Aditya stood in front of him. In uniform. His face showed fatigue, his beard was a bit grown, but his eyes had the gleam of coming home.

“Papa!” Aditya dropped his bag and hugged his father.

Keshav Babu hugged him back, but his body was stiff.

“My lion has come,” Keshav Babu’s voice was choked.

Aditya came inside. His eyes wandered all around. “Where is Maa? Is she in the kitchen? I’ve told her so many times not to be stuck in the kitchen when I come home.”

Aditya headed straight towards the kitchen.

“Stop, son!” Keshav Babu shouted loudly. Aditya stopped. “She… Sudha is not home.”

“Not home?” Aditya’s brows furrowed. “You just said to be ready. Where has she gone?”

“She… your Mausi (aunt) is very unwell. Kanpur. She had to leave last night itself. I insisted she stay, saying Adi is coming, but Mausi’s condition was serious,” Keshav Babu blurted out a rehearsed lie in one breath. “She said she’ll be back in two days.”

Aditya stared at his father. There was silence for a few moments.

“Alright,” Aditya said in a low voice. “No problem.”

He sat down on the sofa. His gaze fell on the spectacles on the table and the blue saree on the couch. Keshav Babu felt relieved. Good, setting the stage had helped.

“You freshen up, I’ll make tea,” Keshav Babu wanted to quickly escape to the kitchen.

“Leave it, Papa,” Aditya said. “Sit for a while. Let’s talk.”

Aditya’s behavior was a bit odd. He was neither angry about his mother’s absence, nor did he insist on calling her. He was just observing everything in the house very intently. The dust settled on the walls, the dried-up money plant, and the silence that had spread in every corner of the house.

“The house has changed a lot, Papa,” Aditya said, looking at the ceiling. “There are cobwebs in the corners. Maa couldn’t stand a single cobweb.”

Keshav Babu began to sweat. “Yes, well… she had back pain for the last few days, so the cleaning couldn’t be done properly. The maid is also on leave.”

“And these plants?” Aditya touched the soil in the dry pot. “They’re dead, Papa. Maa used to talk to them like children. Did she forget her children in Mausi’s illness?”

Keshav Babu felt he was about to be caught. Aditya’s questions were becoming sharper, like a military interrogation.

“Son, you’re tired. Take some rest,” Keshav Babu tried to change the topic.

“Papa, I’m hungry,” Aditya said suddenly. “Maa must have made carrot halwa, right? She must have made it before leaving? She knows I like it.”

Keshav Babu’s breath caught. He had tried to make halwa, but it had burned and he had hidden it.

“Well… son… she couldn’t make it in a hurry,” Keshav Babu lowered his gaze.

Aditya stood up from his place. His face had become very stern. He walked slowly to the showcase where the landline phone was kept.

“Papa, do you know what’s the most difficult thing in Siachen?” Aditya picked up the phone receiver and wiped the layer of dust on it with his finger. “Not the cold… not the enemy’s bullet… The most difficult thing is the ‘silence’.”

Keshav Babu was staring at him, speechless.

“Silence doesn’t lie, Papa,” Aditya turned and looked straight into his father’s eyes. “And this house… this house is screaming that no homemaker lives here. At least not for the past many months.”

“What are you saying, Adi?” Keshav Babu’s throat went dry.

Aditya took out a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket. It was a letter.

“This last letter you sent… in ‘Sudha’s’ name,” Aditya’s voice was trembling now. “Papa, do you remember how Maa wrote ‘ह’ (ha)? She used to draw the tail of ‘ह’ a little longer. And you… you make the ‘ह’ a little round.”

The ground seemed to slip from under Keshav Babu’s feet.

“And the biggest thing,” Aditya slammed that letter on the table. “In this letter, you wrote that ‘the neighbor Mrs. Verma’s daughter got married’. Papa, Mrs. Verma left that house three years ago. Maa knew that. She would never make this mistake. But you had forgotten.”

Keshav Babu fell onto the sofa. His game was over.

“You… you knew?” Keshav Babu whispered.

Aditya knelt down in front of his father. The stern soldier’s eyes now streamed with a flood of tears.

“Four months ago… I got the news, Papa,” Aditya said, sobbing. “A friend of mine posted at headquarters told me that a condolence message had come from my home.”

“Then you… why didn’t you tell?” Keshav Babu held his son’s face.

“Because I knew what you were doing,” Aditya kissed his father’s hands. “I was at the border, Papa. If I had broken down on the phone, or if I had insisted on coming home, you would have shattered here alone. You were pretending to be Maa to save me, and I… I was pretending to believe that act to save you.”

The room was filled only with the sound of two men crying. Father and son. Both had placed a heavy stone of lies on their chests to save each other.

“I thought I could handle it,” Keshav Babu said, crying. “But I lost, son. I couldn’t give you a mother’s love. See, I even burned the halwa. The house is dirty too. I am incomplete without your mother, Adi… completely incomplete.”

Aditya embraced his father. The son who had just returned as a Major was now playing the role of a father.

“You haven’t lost, Papa. You did what no father in the world could do,” Aditya said. “You lost your life partner, yet you got up every morning and dredged up her memories for me, so that I wouldn’t feel the pain. This is not defeat, this is the greatest victory in the world.”

Aditya picked up that blue saree which Keshav Babu had arranged on the couch. He pressed it to his chest and took a deep breath.

“It still has Maa’s fragrance, Papa,” Aditya smiled, amidst tears. “She isn’t gone. She is alive in the love of both of us. She is alive in your attempt at that burnt halwa.”

Keshav Babu looked at his son. He felt as if his son had truly grown up today. The ice of Siachen hadn’t made him hard, but even more sensitive.

Night had fallen. The house lights were off, only a small lamp was lit in the drawing room.

A pot was on the gas stove in the kitchen. Aditya and Keshav Babu were making khichdi together. The same khichdi that Sudha would often make when someone had an upset stomach or a heavy heart.

“Add less salt, Maa used to say one should eat less salt at night,” Aditya said softly.

“Yes,” Keshav Babu nodded in agreement.

Both sat at the dining table. Two plates were laid. One chair was empty—Sudha’s chair. Aditya took the first bite of khichdi. It was tasteless, maybe a little soggy too. But he ate it.

Keshav Babu was watching him.

“How is it?”

“Exactly the way home food should be,” Aditya said.

After that, no one spoke. Words had run out in that room. There was no place for lies anymore. There was only a sacred silence—the silence that is necessary to join two broken hearts. In that silence, Keshav Babu felt that his house was no longer deserted. His son had returned, and with him had returned an understanding that had turned that building back into a ‘home’.

Outside, in the darkness of the night, a cricket chirped, and inside, two people ate khichdi in silence, sharing their respective sorrows.