Red Oxide Floors
By Vinayak Das Gupta
My father says he is doing better than ever. In late April, sunlight through green wooden window slats stripes the red oxide floor and falls across his face like a barcode reading him as he sits on the divan. His bare feet hover above the cool ground. He pinches his sagging skin; the folds settle slowly back into place near his temple. He presses his thumb into a takeaway container. It leaves an impression.
You need to let go, he tells me, smacking his lips, satisfied with the demonstration. Empty bottles, cereal boxes, and disposable cutlery lie scattered around him, and when I reach for a crumpled copy of Celan’s Threadsuns he says, don't touch that. More things appear, along with a smell I cannot name, and he turns away when I mention help. The chair disappears under postcards; then the table goes. He sleeps on the floor now; the windows no longer open. No light on his face. I can’t read him anymore.
I am so cold, he says, but the things are in the way and I cannot reach him. He spends minutes retrieving a slipper from beneath collapsed biscuit tins, and when it comes free he stares around as if he has lost something else. He writes on walls now. Words climb plaster, and trace cupboard outlines, sentences breaking where his hand can no longer stretch. On Christmas day he mentions a song from a passing car, a melody that reminds him of a bookshop long since replaced by a mall, but when I beg him to let me call a doctor he screams, no.
His face is contorted as he chooses his words. My son is dead. I don't know you. It’s been fourteen years since Cyril died. He pushes me toward the door; I could overpower him, but I do not have it in me. When I call, he does not know me. On a Wednesday in late January, I find him by the smell. I cannot tell where my father ends and the things begin.
THE END
Author Bio: Vinayak Das Gupta lives, writes, and teaches in Delhi NCR. His fiction has appeared in Bull Magazine.