Where the River Forgot My Name

There’s a river in the village where I grew up. It doesn’t show up on any map. It’s not wide or particularly deep, but to me, it holds the entire weight of my childhood.

It curves gently through the trees, its water clear and always cold, no matter the season. We called it Bulan Dara—Moon’s Daughter—though I never really knew why. Maybe because the water shimmered under moonlight, or maybe because someone long ago whispered a story that stuck.

When I was a child, the river was magic.

It was the place where we skipped school just to feel wild. Where we dared each other to jump from mossy rocks. Where we sat with legs in the water, sharing secrets we swore we’d carry to the grave.

But the river also had rules.

The elders said never go alone. Never stay after dark. And whatever you do, never say your full name out loud by the water. They said the river remembered things. That it kept stories. That sometimes, it kept people too.

We laughed at that, of course. We were young and invincible. And nothing scared you when your friends were beside you and the sun was warm on your back.

Then came the summer of 2009.

We were thirteen. Curious, restless, and full of strange thoughts about growing up and breaking rules. That was the year Aamir disappeared.

He was my closest friend. The kind of friend you share silence with. We would sit at the edge of the river, watching the light ripple across the surface, speaking in fragments.

“I think I want to leave this place one day,” he said once.

“Where would you go?”

“Anywhere the wind carries me.”

He was a dreamer. Quieter than the rest of us. Always staring too long at the sky like it was telling him things the rest of us couldn't hear.

Then one day, he didn’t come home.

His mother thought he’d gone to the market. But he never returned. A search party was formed. Days passed. They checked the fields, the woods, and finally, the river.

His sandals were found on the bank. No footprints. No sign of a struggle. Just the hush of the water and the air heavy with unspoken things.

The elders shook their heads.

“He must’ve said his name.”

After that, we weren’t allowed near the river.

But I returned—once.

It was a year later, the night before I was to leave for boarding school. I needed to say goodbye. Not just to the place, but to him. I followed the narrow path I still remembered by heart. The trees whispered like they always had. The air smelled of rain and old leaves.

The river looked the same. Calm. Innocent. Like it hadn’t stolen anything at all.

I sat at the same rock we always shared. The sky was pale with starlight.

I whispered, “Aamir, are you still here?”

The river didn't answer. But I thought I saw a ripple. A movement just beneath the surface.

I stood and took a step closer. Then another. My voice trembled.

“I don’t know if you can hear me... but I remember you. I always will.”

I almost said my full name, just to test it. Just to see.

But something inside me stopped. Some instinct older than logic. So I stayed silent. Just stood there, breathing.

The wind picked up.

And then, for the briefest second, I heard laughter—faint, familiar, and gone just as quickly.

I never went back.

Years passed. I moved to the city. Made a life full of buildings and deadlines. But the river never left me. It lived in dreams. In quiet moments. In the space between memory and longing.

Last week, I went home for the first time in over a decade.

The village had changed. Fewer children played outside. The forest had crept closer. My childhood house had a new roof.

But the river was still there.

Older. Wilder. The path overgrown but not forgotten.

I walked to it, alone. For the first time since that night.

It welcomed me like it always had—gentle breeze, rippling light, the scent of damp earth.

I sat. I didn’t speak.

Just listened.

And in that stillness, I understood something.

The river hadn’t taken Aamir.

It had remembered him.

It had held his spirit in its quiet, sacred way. Not out of malice, but out of love.

Some things don’t want to be understood. They want to be respected.

I dipped my hand in the water, feeling the years melt away.

Then I stood and whispered, “Thank you.”

And I left.

I still don’t say my full name near water.

But every time it rains, every time I hear a stream or a fountain, I think of Bulan Dara, and the boy who became part of it.

Some places forget us the moment we leave.

But others—especially the ones tied to our souls—never do.