Table Of ContentFINDING ARUN
Marisha Pink
ISBN 978 0 9926283 2 1
SMASHWORDS EDITION
Published by Not By The Book 2013
Copyright Marisha Pink 2013
marishapink.com
notbythebook.co.uk
Marisha Pink asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work in
accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This publication is a work of fiction. All names and characters are a product of
the author’s imagination and any resemblance to any real persons, living or dead,
is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, now known or
hereafter invented, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not
be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book
with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If
you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for
your use only, please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy.
Thank you for respecting this author's work.
CONTENTS
Dedication
Part One: Aaron
Part Two: Arun
Join the conversation
About the author
Acknowledgements
For Mum and Dad, who always help me find my way.
For Aji, who can always be found in my heart.
‘Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.
Live the life you’ve imagined.’
Henry David Thoreau
PART ONE
AARON
ONE
THE warmth of the sun’s rays gently caressed Aaron’s eyelids through the
window and even with his eyes closed he could see the hazy yellow and orange
hue of the morning. For a split second the new day glowed with promise, but as
he lay in his bed and blinked his eyes open, the now familiar stinging sensation
brought with it the pain of realisation: she was gone.
He closed his eyes once more while a sinking feeling swept over him and the
crushing heaviness in his chest became almost unbearable. He swallowed hard,
willing himself not to cry, but silent tears pooled in the corners of his eyes and
began to roll stealthily down his cheeks. He breathed a deep sigh, desperate to
steel himself against the oppressive pain. It hurt like nothing had ever hurt before
and no matter how many times he replayed the events in his mind nothing would
change. She was gone and he hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye.
Brushing the tears from his face Aaron propped himself up on his elbows to
survey the room. He hadn’t been there for months, yet in the short time since
he’d returned home it had become difficult to coax him from the only room in
which he felt truly at ease. The bedroom provided his only escape from the
scores of visitors who had descended upon the house to pay their respects to his
late mother. Unable to recall ever meeting most of them before, he neither
wanted nor welcomed their intrusion, and with his mother gone even the faces
that he did recognise seemed alien to him now.
Aaron had always felt uncomfortable in social situations and those involving
his mother’s affluent and ever-expanding circle of friends were amongst the
worst. He was well-mannered, impeccably groomed and boasted an intellect far
beyond his nineteen years, yet these things were never enough to disguise one
simple truth: he would always be the brown kid in the white room. Over the
years her various acquaintances had each been careful to feign indifference to,
and even unawareness of, the discord between the colour of his skin and that of
his adoptive mother’s. For her part, she had loved and raised him as her own,
fiercely challenging anyone who so much as threatened to look at him the wrong
way, but inside he knew the truth. He would always be different and nothing he
could say, or do, would ever gain him genuine acceptance into her world.
With his only ally gone Aaron felt awkward and alone, and despite his best
efforts he found the conversations with mourners an increasingly tedious
inconvenience. It wasn’t that their condolences were insincere, but without his
mother’s mediating presence the exchanges quickly turned to idle chatter,
uncomfortable silence, or a curious mixture of both. There was no longer a need
for either of them to tolerate one another, yet each visitor persisted in their half-
hearted attempts at conversation, trying and failing to forge a meaningful
connection with him. Eventually he would tire of the charade and, finding any
excuse to extract himself from the strained interactions, swiftly retreat to the
safety of his room, certain that nobody was actually missing him.
In the confines of his room it was almost possible to pretend that nothing had
happened. To pretend that his mother hadn’t fallen sick and that he hadn’t really
left London to volunteer in Namibia all those months ago. He hadn’t wanted to
leave her, but she had been insistent that he continue with his plans, assuring him
that she would make a full recovery. As a doctor herself he’d had no reason to
doubt her, but the other doctors had reassured him too; expensive doctors who
were adamant that they had ‘caught it early’ and that it was ‘amenable to
surgery’. Except that they hadn’t, and it wasn’t, and seemingly overnight her
condition had transformed from fixable to fatal. Everything had happened so fast
that it was almost a blur in his mind. For days he had tried desperately to get
home, hitching rides with strangers and sleeping on airport floors, all the while
praying that a flight would become available. But by the time he had arrived
home it was already too late.
He sat up fully in bed pulling the duvet towards his chin to keep in the
warmth. Over a week had passed since his mother’s burial and with visitor
numbers showing a steady decline in recent days, he was hopeful that today he
would finally be able to move about the house without being accosted. Aunt
Ruby, his father’s sister, was the only one who remained, having flown in from
Australia to assist when his mother’s condition had initially deteriorated, but she
could hardly be described as a guest. She had made herself at home, instantly
taking charge of running their large Georgian house, and without her
intervention Aaron was certain that his father would have fallen apart
completely.
Of the little extended family that they had, Aunt Ruby was the only relative
that Aaron both liked and trusted. As a child, each time his mother had been
called overseas to present her research at a conference, Aaron had been packed
off to Australia to stay with Aunt Ruby for a few weeks. Over the years they had
grown very close and though Aaron’s visits had become less frequent with age,
their relationship was still much stronger than the one that he shared with her
brother.
Aaron couldn’t recall ever being close to his adoptive father and it had
quickly dawned on him that the expensive trips to Aunt Ruby were simply a way
to relieve his father from having to engage with him whilst his mother was away.
His father’s role had always seemed perfunctory; there was minimal interaction,
none of the love or warmth that one might expect to receive from a parent, and
in a telling act of detachment the old man insisted that Aaron call him by his first
name. It baffled Aaron how his father and Aunt Ruby could have developed such
contrasting characters, but never more than in the last week had he been grateful
for their differences, and for the buffer that Aunt Ruby provided between them.
He swung his long limbs out of the bed and rose unsteadily to his feet, carefully
stooping to avoid knocking his head on the exposed wooden beams that
zigzagged across the ceiling. At nearly six feet tall he would have made an
impressive figure, if it weren’t for his lanky, boyish physique, which often
fooled people into thinking that he was much younger than he was. He picked
his way cautiously across the room avoiding the piles of clothes, plates and
luggage strewn haphazardly across the floor, and on safely reaching the other
side, rounded the corner into the en-suite bathroom.
Catching sight of himself in the small vanity mirror he was somewhat
startled by his appearance. His once neatly groomed, coffee-coloured hair was
now an unkempt, overgrown mess that stretched in every direction imaginable
about his tanned face. Two dark halos encircled his warm hazel eyes, a testament
to the grief and suffering he had experienced in the past week, and an army of
protruding hairs threatening to turn themselves into a full beard had laid claim to
his jaw. He turned on the tap and splashed cold water rhythmically over his
cheeks, the coolness at once inviting against the stinging heat of his bronzed,
tear-stained face, and immediately he felt his mood begin to lift. He patted his
face dry and, returning to the bedroom, scoured the rubble until he found a
crumpled white T-shirt and a faded pair of grey tracksuit bottoms, which he
deftly slipped into as he made his way towards the door.
Padding barefoot down the two flights of stairs to the kitchen, Aaron was
conscious of the silence that echoed throughout the house. After the hustle and
bustle of the past week the silence suddenly seemed eerie and unsettling, yet he
wondered hopefully whether he might be alone. At the foot of the stairs he
turned the corner towards the large open kitchen and much to his dismay found
his father seated at the heavy oak dining table with the daily newspaper spread
before him. Arthur Rutherford was a simple and pragmatic man, who liked the
status quo and didn’t believe in unnecessary fuss. An antique dealer by trade, he
preferred to work with things rather than people, and had shied away from most
displays of human emotion until a chance meeting with Catherine, Aaron’s
adoptive mother, had turned his world upside down.
Catherine had got under his skin, the way that she did with nearly everyone
she encountered, and even stern and serious Arthur had been powerless to resist
her charms. On the surface they had seemed an unlikely match, but as a young
doctor Catherine’s obvious passion and drive to help others had touched
something within him, and he had opened up to her, sharing a softer side that
few others ever saw. His life had been devoted to making her happy and though
the casual observer might have thought him bland and uninspiring compared to
his outspoken and charismatic other half, she had always made sure that he knew
just how important his love and support were to her successes.
Aaron paused uncertainly on the threshold of the kitchen, shifting
uncomfortably from foot to foot until at last Arthur glanced up and
acknowledged his presence. It was the first time that they had been completely
alone together since his return and now the awful truth of their loss seemed to
stretch between them like some unfillable chasm. They stared at each other for
what felt like an eternity to Aaron, Arthur’s steely grey eyes like bottomless pits
of sorrow steadily pouring their sadness into his soul. They may not have been
close, but they shared a mutual respect for one another and the places that they
had each held in Catherine’s heart, and there in the silence of the kitchen no
words were necessary for each to know and empathise with the other’s pain.
Unable to stand the tension any longer, Aaron was first to break the silence.
‘Good morning, Arthur.’
‘Good morning, Aaron. Are you hungry?’
‘Not really, no.’
‘You must eat; you need to keep your strength up. I think Aunt Ruby has left
you a plate in the fridge. Take a seat and I’ll warm it up for you.’
Aaron did as instructed and slipped into Arthur’s vacant seat while the old
man stood to rummage around the fridge. He flicked lazily through the pages of
the open newspaper until a closer inspection of one article caused him to flip
quickly back to the front page in confusion. The newspaper was dated 8th April
2012; the day of his mother’s death.
‘Arthur, you do realise that newspaper is over two weeks old?’
Arthur sighed.
‘I know. I just thought that I would catch up on what’s happened since …
since …’
His voice trailed off, leaving the unfinished sentence hanging in mid-air.
Aaron didn’t know what to say, but a few moments later Arthur regained his
composure.
‘We need to make a start on sorting through your mother’s things. Most of it
can go to charity; it’s what she would have wanted. Are you able to help me out
today?’
‘Of course,’ Aaron answered, swallowing hard in an attempt to suppress the
