Denjil’s Carpet, for a Home Yet to Be
Denjil’s Carpet, for a Home Yet to Be
A poignant tale of longing and hope centred around a young lad’s dream of building a home. The story unfolds as he discovers an intricately designed carpet in a bustling market, which becomes a symbol of the future.
Hewalked quickly, almost eagerly, through the lanes of old Deira — narrow streets where sunlight filtered down in dusty shafts, catching the windscreens of tired Datsuns and faded Peugeots. The afternoon wore a golden hue, and the city moved around him in a chorus of sound and scent — horns blaring, hawkers calling, the rich aroma of cardamom tea dancing with the sharpness of petrol fumes.
But the lad — and he was little more than a boy—walked as if wrapped in a small secret. He carried a fake leather bag on his shoulder, the sort you found in Friday markets for ten dirhams if you bargained well enough. The corners were already peeling. But inside, tucked away in that modest bag, were thirty-five crisp, hundred-dirham notes. His hard-earned savings. They smelled of ink and a future yet to arrive.
It wasn’t much by Dubai standards — not the kind of money that turned heads or bought apartments. But it was his. And that made all the difference.
There was a spring in his step, barely visible but entirely there. Like something invisible had lifted him slightly off the ground, as though he were walking on his magic carpet. Aladdin came to mind. Not the one in the glossy comic books, but the old one, from storybooks in faraway Ceylon, who flew above palm trees and desert sands with only his courage and hope.
Now and then, he dipped a hand into the bag to touch the notes — not to count them, but just to feel them, to remind himself they were still real. Vincent, the cashier at the bank, had handed them over earlier that day with a grin usually reserved for men who wore gold chains and drove Toyota Crowns.
“So now I am one of them,” he had thought with a smile. “A big man.”
But what did it mean to be a big man? A job at the bank? A flat of one’s own? A wife, still waiting in Colombo for her visa to arrive? Perhaps it was all of those things. Perhaps none.
He crossed the road and stepped into the cool, shaded interior of Mostafawi Carpets. It felt like entering another world. The scent of wool and dye lingered like a memory. Rolls of rugs stood propped against the walls like giant slumbering animals. Aunty Rani had insisted — with the fierce loyalty only aunties can muster — that if he ever bought a carpet, it must be from Mostafawi.
“From Qom! From Isfahan!” she’d declared. “Beta, None of that tourist junk from Al Fahidi.”
At first, nobody noticed him. But that suited him fine. He wandered slowly, letting his fingers trail along the edges of rugs as one might pat a well-behaved dog. Reds and ochres, ocean blues and sandy beiges — all folded and waiting, like rolled-up stories.
A tired-eyed Iranian salesman, kind behind his moustache, eventually stepped forward.
“Naujawan…” he said in a language the boy didn’t follow.
“English, please,” the young man said gently, and with that, a quiet conversation began. Not so much in English or Urdu, but in the language of choosing, of measuring, of imagining a room that had not yet come into being.
The carpet he chose was red and blue, its pattern quiet and repetitive — not loud, not boastful. It cost 3,500 dirhams. He paid 3,000. The salesman, perhaps sensing the occasion, had lowered the price without asking.
A strong Pakistani, called from the storeroom, came to carry the roll. Together, they loaded it into a waiting Cressida — its vinyl seats brown, its engine humming like a distant memory. The young man handed him two dirhams.
The taxi driver looked over his shoulder. “Kahan se, bhai?”
“Falcon Roundabout,” he said softly. Not because he didn’t know where he lived, but because the word home was still shy on his tongue.
The drive across the Creek was slow — the kind of slow that lets the city breathe. He watched men in dusty pants wait for lorries. A rusted crane hovered above a half-finished tower like a bird that had forgotten how to fly. Two lads walked along the pavement holding hands, their bell-bottoms brushing in rhythm — not lovers, just friends, the kind of friends who don’t notice time slipping away.
At Falcon Roundabout, the sun had vanished behind rooftops, and the air smelled of warm concrete and lentils. He paid the driver and looked for Ramlal, the building’s watchman.
Ramlal soon appeared — barefoot, smiling, a faded towel thrown over one shoulder. He was from Gujarat and spoke with the cheerful affection of one who had lived long enough to make jokes without offence.
“Too thin, Denjil! Too thin to be married,” he laughed. “Let me cook for you — chapati with ghee. Then you’ll be fat like a nice husband!”
He could never pronounce Denzil. It became Denjil, softened somewhere in the vowels of his village tongue.
Ramlal slung the carpet onto his own back with ease and led the way up. At the sixth-floor landing, he waved a salaam and vanished back up the stairs before thanks could be offered.
The young man opened the door. It creaked slightly — the kind of creak that says a room has been waiting. Inside, it was quiet. A pedestal fan turned slowly. The walls were plain. A single folding table leaned against one corner.
He unfurled the carpet across the centre of the room. It whispered as it opened — a soft whoosh, a laying down of roots.
He sat cross-legged in the middle of it. Smoothed out a crease. Ran his hand over the threads.
He did not think of what he had paid, or whether she would like it. Only this: that the carpet was here now. That it belonged.
And that when she arrived, the room would no longer echo.
Outside, the city went on shouting. But inside, the flat waited, still and ready.
Comments
Post a Comment