In my first month in the city, I learned that longing had many voices.
It sounded like footsteps in the hallway outside my rented room. Like a door opening and then closing when no one was there. Like a spoon slipping from my own hand when the night grew too quiet.
But the voice I missed most was still Grandma’s.
Every Sunday, I waited for her to call from the little shop at the end of the alley. We didn’t have a telephone in our room. To reach me, Grandma had to walk nearly twenty minutes, carrying the coins she kept in the pocket of her cloth skirt.
The calls usually lasted only a few minutes.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Kiddo. Have you eaten?”
Grandma’s first question was always the same. And I always gave the same answer.
“Yes.”
Sometimes it was true. More often, it wasn’t.
I was afraid that if I said I hadn’t eaten, she would go home without buying anything for herself. I knew her habits. Grandma could endure hunger, but she couldn’t bear hearing that I was hungry.
“How’s school?”
“Good.”
“Made lots of friends?”
“Some.”
“If anyone gives you trouble, tell me.”
I smiled every time I heard that sentence. Grandma had never gone far in school, but she knew that trouble didn’t always come in the form of homework problems. Sometimes it came as someone else’s stare, as a fear that couldn’t be explained, or as a night that felt too long.
One Sunday, the phone never rang.
I sat on the edge of my bed from late afternoon onward. My textbook lay open, but not a single sentence made it into my head. The clock hands moved slowly. The sun sank. The sky changed from yellow to gray.
I told myself that maybe Grandma had too many customers. Maybe her cooking oil had spilled. Maybe it was raining in our village.
I came up with all sorts of reasons because I still wasn’t brave enough to think of the worst one.
It was nearly nightfall when the landlord knocked on my door.
“There’s a call from your village,” he said. “At the shop near the main road.”
I stood up at once.
My heart pounded so hard I was afraid the people outside could hear it.
At the shop, the public telephone sat on a wooden table covered in rings from drinking glasses. The shopkeeper held out the receiver to me.
“Talk. Don’t take too long.”
“Hello?”
The voice on the other end wasn’t Grandma’s.
“It’s me, Mr. Jaya.”
Mr. Jaya was our neighbor. I knew his voice from the afternoons when he bought fried bananas for his child.
“Where’s Grandma?” I asked.
He was silent for a moment.
“At the community clinic.”
It felt as if the world had lost its floor.
“What happened?”
“Just dizziness. Don’t be afraid.”
Adults often said don’t be afraid when they themselves were hiding something frightening.
I gripped the phone tighter. “I want to talk to Grandma.”
“She’s being examined.”
“I want to talk to her.”
This time, my voice sounded like the voice of the little boy who used to sleep on a thin mat and clutch the edge of Grandma’s clothes so she wouldn’t leave him behind.
At last, Mr. Jaya called for someone. I heard footsteps, a door, and then a small cough I knew all too well.
“Kiddo?”
I covered my mouth with my hand.
“It’s me, Grandma.”
“Why aren’t you asleep?”
The question was so ordinary that tears fell before I could stop them.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing. Just a chill.”
“That’s a lie.”
Grandma gave a small laugh, but it quickly turned into a cough.
I stared at the dirty floor of the shop. There was a splotch of oil near my feet. Suddenly, I was back in our small house. Seeing Grandma standing behind the old door-table. Seeing her hands lift fried snacks from the hot oil. Seeing her set aside the larger portion of rice for me.
“I’ll just come home,” I said.
“Don’t.”
“I can come home tonight.”
“You have school tomorrow.”
“I don’t care.”
“Don’t say that.”
For the first time, Grandma’s voice sounded firm from far away.
“Your schooling isn’t something you’re allowed to abandon just because Grandma felt dizzy for one day.”
“But I’m scared.”
On the other end, Grandma didn’t answer right away.
Then she said, very softly, “If you’re afraid, say you’re afraid. Don’t throw away everything we’ve worked for.”
I cried in that shop. I didn’t care that the shopkeeper was watching, or that the people on the road could hear me.
“You have to promise you’ll be all right, Grandma.”
“If I promise, will you eat dinner?”
I laughed through my tears. “That’s not an answer.”
“It is. And you still have to eat.”
After the call ended, I bought a packet of rice with the money I had left. I ate half that night. I saved the other half for breakfast.
The next day, the letter I wrote to Grandma didn’t contain any good news.
Grandma, I’m so scared.
I wrote that sentence at the very top, then left it standing there on its own. For the first time, I didn’t try to make my fear look small.
I wrote about the night in my rented room, about wanting to go home, and about feeling guilty for not being beside her when she fell ill.
Before folding the letter, I added:
If you need me, call me. I’ll come.
Grandma’s reply arrived five days later.
Kiddo,
Grandma calls you every day, but not so you’ll come home and quit school.
Grandma calls you so you’ll keep moving forward.
I read the letter over and over. At the very bottom was a small stain that had made the ink run. Maybe it was water. Maybe it was oil. I didn’t know.
I pinned the letter to the wall of my room, beside the one before it.
That night, I studied until the lamp was nearly out. I was still afraid. But the fear no longer felt like a hole I had to jump over alone.
There was Grandma’s voice on the other side of the distance.
Not loud. Not long.
But enough to make me understand that home wasn’t only the place where someone waited for you to come back. Home could also be the voice telling you to keep moving forward, even while the person saying it lay alone in a room at the community clinic.
And for the first time, I promised Grandma not that I would become rich right away.
I promised I would eat properly, study hard, and not let her sacrifices be wasted just because I was afraid.
Outside my room, the city kept moving.
Inside my chest, our small house continued to glow.