He tried to shout. He tried to scream. But the water was too strong, too suffocating...too scary. With its humongous never ending depth, reminding him of the nightmare he so often had, reminding him he was nothing but a mortal speck in this infinite labyrinth. His frail arms thrashed about wildly, trying somehow to beat the water's grasping binds away.

Azaad wait! He could hear his mother's voice behind him even as he ignored it and ran ahead laughing in the rain

People began to notice what was going on. he could hear their fearful screams. They scared him even more. He tried to swim out. Away to the other end. But the water had risen too high and was rising by the minute. The sky wouldn't stop crying and the water would keep opening its gigantic mouth fraction by fraction until it swallowed him whole. He knew it.

 He had seen the swimming pools in those distant tall buildings. And the kids who swam in the crystal water. What would it feel like, he had wondered, to lose oneself  in such a sea. He had been standing at the fencing of the pool. That scrap of painted wood was all that separated him and them. His torn ragged clothes from their expensive swimsuits. His pointless dreams from their exhilarated laughs. The poor...from the rich. The swimming instructor had looked at his dark face and bony frame like he was no human in flesh and blood but akin to dirty vermin scuttling around the drains. Though nothing would have given him more pleasure than to glare right back...he had to go and check on his own pool. It had been days. Long long rainy days. and at each one Azaad had seen water filling up in the underpass near the spot he begged at. Gaushala was too small a place for anyone to pay attention to engineering flaws in the drainage system of the underpass. It may be grumbled upon and complained about endlessly by the people zooming about in their cars but for him...it was nothing but pure delight. His pool would not be bigger or better than theirs. It couldn't. It would be muddy too perhaps, dirtier than theirs...but at least it would be his. And he would laze around for as long as he liked. As Azaad watched the rain fall more heavily his feet ached to jump in and for the first time taste the luxury his mother had once said only the rich could have. But no. It had to be deeper. He would let the rains make it deeper.

He didn't think he could hold on much longer. His tiny lungs gasped for air. But every time his mouth opened to oblige, it would be greeted with a fresh cascade of stale water. Azaad's legs had been kicking furiously all this time. But they had started to ache now. Wouldn't it be much easier to just give up? It would hurt. Yes. But at least it would hurt less than this.

Friday afternoon. Finally. It was deep enough. The sun had come out in days and its gentle rays were playing with the muddy water's surface. Standing above it, Azaad gazed down at this brown pool with pride. The sun felt warm on his skin. He had made enough for a usual morning. His mother was out begging on the other side of the street today. He would have wanted her to be here and marvel at what he had once wished upon. The wish on which she looked at with pity in her eyes and shame in her heart. But the child was tired of waiting for her to show up. He couldn't stand still any longer. Not with the flooded underpass beneath calling out to him. 'Your name means freedom after all', he thought with an innocent smile as he peeled off his little dirty vest and jumped into the sun kissed water, 'live by it'.

They were shouting out instructions in disturbingly loud voices. Some trying to find a rope. Some screaming at others to find help. Some shamelessly standing with their phones out and cameras on. While some were frozen still and simply gaping at the horror unfolding beneath them. All this was nothing but a crazed frantic buzz for the drowning boy. Is Amma up there? The water was in his eyes and hands were giving up their effort to find something to hold on to. Is she up there? Seeing me die? The crowd's gasps and mingled shouts suddenly increased in volume as the child heard a heavy splash near him. Someone had jumped in.

Perfect. The water was just the right depth for Azaad to swim freely. The other side of the underpass was shallow. He would step out from there when he was done. He had tired himself out swimming back and forth so he decided to lay on his back and try to look at the glaring sun above. The water felt like the soft cushion he had never had under his back, softly cradling him from side to side. Azaad closed his eyes. He had never known comfort such as this in the short number of years he had lived and breathed. Suddenly something shifted. As if somebody had blew out the only candle in mid winter. He opened his eyes to see the clouds had taken over the sky just as a drop of water  landed on his heaven turned face. He sighed in disappointment...he wasn't done swimming yet. It'll stop soon...Azaad gave himself hope even as the rain picked pace. He didn't realise the water level was beginning to increase dangerously. He could still float with his neck above the surface but maybe was time to get out after all...Amma must be waiting. Worried. She must be worried. The shallow end was on the far side before he was mid way there, a strong wind began to toss around. Trees bent and swayed. Suddenly this was more than just plain old rain. It seemed the skies had started attacking the earth. Azaad had to tilt his face upwards as far as it would go to keep out of water...the waves were swaying back and forth, doing their best to swallow him whole. 

He felt strong arms wrap around him. And for the first time in what had felt like hours Azaad stopped struggling and held on as tight as he could. Had it been hours? Or only a few seconds? He didn't realise his mouth was open in a terrible scream all along...as if the storm was sweeping it away before it could reach even his own ears. However he soon realised the tall gangly person was struggling to move forward even though the winds were on their side. It seemed he didn't know how to swim. Why had he jumped in? But the person held Azaad up anyway. Still alarmingly close but farther away from the water's hungry jaws. With a jolt Azaad discovered that with the man supporting his weight he could swim forward. A new energy took hold of him as he kicked his legs with all the might his tiny weak body could muster and the man pushed him forward, aiding his return through the deep maze towards the shallow end.

Azaad felt a distant ray of hope in his fatigued mind as he could see that he was nearing the edge. The crowd was holding out strong broken tree branches for them to hold on too. He reached out for the sharp bark and was pulled back to safety. Almost about to faint when his feet touched the ground, all he could remember was his mother's warmth next to him. She had engulfed him in a  rough desperate hug shaking with hysterical sobs, kissing his head. But wait. What about the other person? Azaad would have bolted upright if every inch of his body wasn't screaming in pain right then. Cruel as fate is, the favour of the winds had changed as soon as Azaad had been lifted out of the abyss. The storm started to flow the wrong way and had pushed the already struggling rescuer farther away into the deep end. Azaad had known how to swim. This person did not. Trapped between the swelling waves and the sharp needle like gusts of winds he had no way out. Azaad's last memory before everything went dark was the blurry sight of those struggling arms flailing helplessly in that dreaded end of the underpass. It didn't take long. Soon the limbs stopped resisting. stopped opposing. stopped fighting. They succumbed to the mighty will of the rising water. It wanted a victim that afternoon... and had finally claimed one.

The rain still fell in sheets over the smooth surface of Azaad's pool. But if anyone were to look now they would never be able to decipher what horrors had occurred there a few moments ago. Or what was now at the bottom of the underpass, lying helpless, lifeless, waiting to be fished out by the divers who arrived at the scene only to discover that they were 10 seconds too late.

*

It had been a year since that day. The day Azaad had seen the person whom he owed his life to drown in the underpass. It had been in the papers the next day. Atleast that's what he gathered when he saw the flooded underpass's pictures in the newspaper. He didn't know how to read. After countless objections from the people, the town municipality had finally fixed the drainage system. The underpass didn't flood in the rains anymore. Azaad may be still a boy of 6 but he had grown taller in the last one year. His gaze had almost lost it's child like softness in the aftermath of what he had witnessed that horrid day. He hadn't visited the tall building's pool again. It seemed he wasn't welcome there anyway. 

Evening was falling quick. The sky had turned the soft flower like colour Azaad didn't know the name of but still loved with all his heart. Gazing up at the calming sky he found his thoughts wondering again to his unknown rescuer. He had never even seen his face. His mother had covered his eyes and told him to turn away when the divers finally drew his body out of the water. All he could remember about him was his tall frame pushing him back to safety and his wildly thrashing arms as he ....

*

" A rag picker, yes. Just 19 years old. He had no family you know. He was walking by and he heard the..." Mira was yet again telling in hushed tones to her younger sister on the phone, the very story which touched her heart when she had heard the news about a year ago. She was walking towards the place it had happened, to light a diya in memory of the brave soul she hoped she would someday have courage enough to become. He hadn't even known how to swim... why then did he still jump in to save the drowning boy, knowing he wouldn't be able to get out? Or had there simply been no time to think when he heard an unanswered plea for help? Mira sighed, perhaps she would never know. As she bent over to light the diya, she happened to see a kid sitting nearby, looking at her. His deep brown eyes were clearly wondering what she was up to. She approached him with a small smile. "What's your name?" she asked him kindly, sitting down on one knee to reach his level. "Azaad" he answered quietly gazing up at her, as if surprised at her softness. "Azaad" Mira repeated gently,"Do you know what happened here?", she asked him nodding towards the underpass below. She saw his expression change from perplexity to horror at this question. But yet, he nodded silently. "Come on", Mira held out a diya to him. No words were needed. He was indeed a wise little guy. He took the diya in his slightly trembling hands and bend over to place it on the pavement next to Mira's. She struck a match to light up the pair and the sound cracked like a whip through the night.

 Both of them, stood side by side in the silence of the night, watching the flickering golden light dance around in the shadows. Mira held back a shuddering tearful breath and took Azaad's little hand in her own as finally, after all this time, he found the strength to break down, and cry.