The day finally arrived when Pun Dai felt that his hair had grown enough to trim it short. It could be that he was seized by the irresistible desire to visit the barber, and he didn’t care if the hair was still short. At around 7 in the morning, his mother called him to their small dining room, and they drank their tea silently. Afterwards, he emerged from the house and soaked in the warm sunshine. “I’m going for a haircut,” he said in a voice so small that he didn’t know whether it reached his mother, whose hearing had subsided with age.

But this time, fortunately, she had heard it, and she couldn’t help but laugh, displaying her hideous teeth. “Look! This stupid boy! There are hardly a hundred strands of hair on his scalp. Oe! Are you trying to impress young girls with your smart haircut?” The old mother laughed some more, but Pun Dai had already crossed the neighbourhood.

She had noticed that when she teased him like this, he would blush but never make any remarks. “Oe! Tell me, do you like any girls?” She would ask this question during dinner, and Pun Dai would tactically ask his mother to add some daal and rice to his plate. That question wouldn’t be asked again that day.

It was routine for many in the neighbourhood to see Pun Dai pass by their houses. For one household, Pun Dai even served as a reminder to prepare the morning meal. “Pun is already heading somewhere. Go and fry some cauliflower, or the children will be late for school.” The children who had seen him playing cricket at the park would be awed when he passed by their houses. “Dai, going to play cricket?” the elated kids would ask, withdrawing from their conversations to look at him admiringly. He was a role model for the children who loved cricket.

Although Pun Dai had not achieved anything in cricket, he was quite popular among certain groups, especially those who played at Basundhara Park. Cricket was just a part of his routine—a soothing escape from his banal lifestyle at home. It wasn’t as if he played cricket to become a national player. It was a habit that drew him to the bustling park, where something was always happening. But this morning, he wasn’t heading there. Instead of taking a right turn at the chowk, he walked straight ahead, making his way to his favourite barber at Ratna Chowk.

Pun Dai took in the burnt buildings on either side of the road, their walls blackened and windows shattered. The area, a hub of government offices, was fiercely targeted by the protesters on September 9. Pun Dai could sense that now there was a semblance of normalcy. The wild roars of those two fateful days were even heard at the residence of Pun Dai. That day, Pun Dai had thought the world was coming to an end, and it was a matter of time before everything was reduced to ashes. As if some miracle had happened, peace settled in after a couple of days, much faster than anyone had expected.

Regarding the Gen Z revolt, Pun Dai was confused about what to feel; he was itching to go to the park, but he couldn’t dare step out of the house amid that chaos. The worst consequence Pun Dai faced was that he couldn’t go for his routine walk to the park.

To make sure Pun Dai didn’t involve himself in the aggressive protest, his old mother had checked on him frequently and had even locked the main door. Why would Pun Dai join the crowd anyway? Why would Pun Dai complain about anything? For him, everything was fair. In his eyes, everyone was fair. While the reason for the protest might have resonated even with Pun Dai’s life, he was not aware of it, or he might even be suppressing it.

The whole neighbourhood, and even his mother—when she was at her worst—labelled Pun Dai as a failure, a loafer with no ambitions. At 33, especially in Nepal, one is supposed to settle into a stable job, get married to a nice lady, and have a kid or two who would grow up to be the grandparents’ friends.

Pun Dai was distant from this ideal stance. He was what society looked at with contempt: jobless and unmarried. If Pun Dai were to be honest, would he admit that his current status in life was subtly and indirectly shaped by the failure of political actors? No. That’s not how Pun Dai functioned. There might be a psychological defect present within him, for he would never place the blame on anyone or any conditions.

He was harmless to the world. His mother didn’t see him as a burden but as a friend who filled the gap left by his father. It would be a different case altogether had there not been any source of income, but the deceased husband’s pension was keeping them going. The duo of son and mother were both frugal, which meant they had some extra money saved for the future. If Pun Dai ever got married, the mother would perhaps spend the money on it.

She often wondered what her son would have done if there had been no monthly pension. At times, she felt overwhelmed with the realisation that when she died, her son wouldn’t be eligible to collect the pension of his father. This fact worried her, and she secretly wished that Pun Dai would start making money. This boy is too innocent for this cruel world, she often thought.

The students carrying backpacks, the vehicles urgently manoeuvring through the roads, and the desperate shopkeepers waiting for customers—this was a typical Ratna Chowk. Pun Dai noticed the same urgency upon his arrival at the chowk. If he had gone straight from the chowk, he would have reached JMC College, where he had once studied. But the barber’s shop was some 50 metres forward, so he ambled ahead.

As he walked towards the barber shop, he replayed his past visits to the shop, the pleasing massage done on his head and neck. It had been half a year or so since he had decided that he would trim his hair every time with this barber.

The first visit, he remembered, was during the monsoon season. He had come early in the morning, and when the barber was meticulously combing through the scarce hair of Pun Dai, a massive rainfall had occurred. There were just the two of them, and because it was raining, no other customers arrived at the shop. The barber went inside the shop and came back with two cups of tea. The rain subsided only hours later, and over tea, the barber shared that it had been over 10 years since he had opened the shop. Then he went on to talk about a wide range of topics, from his wife to Bollywood films.

Originally from Bihar, the barber was a huge fan of Sanjay Dutt, and it resonated with Pun Dai when the barber praised the hero for his role as Munna Bhai in one of his movies.

The barber shop looked humble, nothing flashy. A small board sat on the porch, helping people recognise it as a barber shop. Pun Dai shyly entered the shop and noticed the barber was giving a haircut to a small kid, whose mother was strictly monitoring the barber’s moves. Focused on his work, the barber, at first, didn’t look at the new customer and asked him to wait outside on the bench. “Sure,” said Pun Dai, and as soon as the barber heard it, he looked back and smiled. “Ohoo Pun Dai, you have come. Wait a bit, okay?” The barber sounded pleased. “Come, you can sit on one of these chairs. No need to wait outside,” he gestured towards the vacant chair inside the shop.

In a few minutes, more customers streamed in, some asking if the barber was by himself, others complaining that he was never free. “Why doesn’t this barber add another barber to this shop?” someone complained. Showing urgency, the raging customers left, leaving just the barber and Pun Dai.

As the barber wrapped a cloth around Pun Dai’s body, he asked, “How’s life going? What’s keeping you occupied these days?” “Oh, nothing much. The usual,” Pun Dai said in an easy manner, as if he was accustomed to this question. “Come, work with me then. See, people are demanding another barber,” the barber joked and laughed loudly, even triggering Pun Dai’s laughter. “But I don’t know how to cut hair,” Pun Dai joked back. “Oh, I’m here to teach you, my friend.” Could it be possible? Pun Dai closed his eyes as the barber carefully started working through his hair. This man from another country felt much closer to Pun Dai than any of his cricketing friends.

Pun Dai knew that his cricketing friends at the park saw him a bit differently, like he was different from all of them. This man, who trimmed hair, was very easy to talk to. And his touch, Pun Dai realised, was soothing and sensual. No one had touched his body for a long time. Eyes closed, Pun Dai found himself imagining coming to the barber shop daily and learning the tricks from him.

Eventually, he would learn the art of hair trimming and become a great barber. Perhaps they would work late into the evening, and he would stop going to his mother’s house, opting to sleep in the barber’s small, dingy room.