Written in the Dust

It was the summer of 1987 when Sadaf returned to her grandmother’s old house in the dusty town of dir. lower, Pakistan. The town hadn’t changed much since she last visited as a kid. The narrow lanes still twisted like lazy snakes between house walls, cows grazing freely, and the air smelled of incense, dust, and distant laughter.

Her grandmother had passed away in January, quietly in her sleep. The house had remained locked since then, and it was Sadaf job to return, clear it out, and decide what to do with it. Sell it, probably, though the thought felt like a betrayal.

The key turned with strength, and the heavy wooden door open as she stepped inside. Dust motes swirled in the late afternoon light. The house smelled like time — old wood, faded spices, and something softer she couldn't name. Maybe memory.

Meera moved room to room, running her fingers over familiar surfaces: the carved teak dining table, the low charpai on the veranda, the faded photograph of her grandfather above the puja shelf. Her footsteps echoed, lonely.

She found herself in her grandmother’s room, the one where she used to sit cross-legged on the floor while Nani told her stories — real ones, about Partition, about walking across Punjab with only a brass pot and a sleeping baby. Those stories used to terrify her as a child. Now, they grounded her.

The closet was full of neatly folded saris, each one holding a story Meera would never fully know. But it was the old trunk under the bed that caught her attention.

Dust caked its metal edges. She opened it slowly.

Inside were things Meera hadn’t expected — handwritten letters tied in red thread, a diary, and at the very bottom, a small tin box. She opened it.

Inside were yellowing photographs: her mother as a teenager, her grandparents in black and white, standing awkwardly in front of a wheat field. And one photo that made Meera freeze.

It was her — no older than ten — standing in front of the house’s front gate, writing something with her finger on the dusty wall.

She remembered that day. It was just before they had to leave for Mumbai after the summer holidays. Her parents were arguing in the background, as always. She had wanted to leave a message behind for Nani, something silly, something only they shared.

She turned the photo over. In faint pencil, someone had written:

"She writes what she cannot say."

Sadaf blinked hard.

That evening, she went outside to the gate. The wall was still there — more cracked than she remembered, the whitewash long gone. She reached out and brushed her hand across the spot where she had written. Her finger caught on something. Letters?

She stepped back. In the fading light, she could just make out the outline of a word, long faded but still etched into the dust-stained plaster.

"Love."

A lump rose in her throat.

She had written it for Nani — not knowing how to say it out loud back then. And somehow, the wall had remembered. Long after she forgot. Long after the fights and the distances and the years apart.

Tears welled up, sudden and sharp. She stood there for a long while, until the muezzin’s call to prayer echoed across the rooftops and the sky turned a deep saffron. The town around her moved on — scooters buzzing, chai being poured, old men laughing on plastic chairs.

Sadaf wiped her face and walked back inside. She didn’t pack anything that night.

Instead, she opened Nani’s diary and began to read.

Epilogue

A few months later, Sadaf decided not to sell the house. Instead, she restored it, bit by bit, and turned it into a reading room and community space for local girls — a quiet place full of books, cushions, and cups of sweet tea.