Mother. Father. And my country. These are the words I wanted to scribble ever since I arrived here in heaven, or hell, or wherever it is. Here, we are given raw meat to eat (I don’t know from which animal), so I assume I’m living in hell. At times, the river of milk flows, and that is when I convince myself that it’s heaven. Afterwards, I feel grateful for all the good deeds I had done in my past life. Pens are really scarce here, and I don’t know where they come from. Every object, every event, every scene makes me feel like I’m caught inside one of those ludicrous dreams.

In my past life, I took the pen and its mechanism for granted. Only when you die and arrive in hell or heaven, does the pen become so precious. So while it’s still in my hold, I should be doing some thoughtless writing. Oh, life! Or should I be saying, “Oh, death!”? After hearing all this, you must be wondering where I got this pen. Well, I stole it because if you were in my place, you wouldn’t have cared about stealing or committing a minor crime either.

The last thing I remember from my past life is my own voice that never belonged to me. Agony. That’s what I felt as I was collapsing on the street. The pain was real, but the realisation that I was dying hurt way more than the bullets. That was the cry of death, and it was meant to be loud. All eyes were on me, unblinking and sympathetic. When you’re about to die, you don’t feel ashamed that people are watching you cry. If you ask me who exactly killed me, I can’t tell you that. I’m sure not even the investigation reports caught the culprit, if killing me was even considered a crime at all.

The day was September 8. I was one of those pleading protesters, wanting to be heard, and as far as I remember, my concerns were valid. If you’re sane enough, you hate the idea of being governed by sin-ridden leaders. Someone who is right in the head doesn’t like the corrupt. There’s a long story behind my appearance on the streets on that fateful day. Like every citizen from the hinterlands, I, too, felt that the state had always sidelined the poor and powerless, only nourishing the elites flanking it. The collective frustration led to a grand protest, and people of my ilk gathered from across the country. I wasn’t the only brave person protesting the wrongdoings. It’s just that I was unlucky enough to be killed. I am sure that some brave but equally fortunate guys are now positioned at the helm, relishing power and luxury. And what have I become? Mr Ghost. But being a ghost, I should stop the blame games—something that humans are really good at.

As I’m writing this, the sky, or whatever it is, turns yellowish, painting everything I see in yellow. Here, the colour patterns change swiftly, the ghosts disappear amid their walks, and almost everything is illogical. Some days, the voice comes, and you can talk to other ghosts. If you are lucky, you’ll bump into a ghost from your country. Other times, you only communicate through gestures. Once, I came across my grandfather, and sadly, we were both in muted mode. Initially, he was surprised, but in no time, he was weeping, perhaps sensing that I had died so early. That was when I discovered that tears come in red gel. I don’t remember parting ways with my grandfather because one of us might have melted. That’s how it works here. You never know when you’ll melt, only to exist later.

It will be a miracle if I don’t melt while writing this. In a way, I enjoy this afterlife because no responsibility binds me, and I feel at peace most of the time. When I don’t exist here, I don’t know where I go. Maybe people invite me into their dreams, and I exist there. In that case, I’m with my mother most of the time. What I find hilarious in hell or heaven is that those who were mute in their past lives are the only ones whose voices are always audible. They are the ones who instruct and guide us, but they are scarce. Since I arrived here, I have come across only a few people from my past life. There are foreigners too, but it’s amazing how often I bump into my countrymen.

As I sit and continue to write under the tree, the green fields before my eyes turn into small stones. Some figures vanish; some appear out of the blue. I’m still here, like a real human. And it might be so because it’s still daytime in my country, and my mother is not dreaming. It hurts me to think about my family, how they managed to raise me through poverty, how they sent me to Kathmandu for my studies as they continued to work in the fields. I imagine my mother hugging my dead body, shaking it vigorously, and even slapping me for pretending to be dead. It hurts every time my thoughts swirl toward my family.

What I wish for is to be in their dreams, since I’m unconscious during that time. While I’m in their dreams, I cease to exist here and don’t feel a thing. Initially, I was always looking forward to encountering the people I knew from my past life, but as time has passed, I realise that their absence here leaves a void in their families. I wonder what happens when all the people who love me eventually die. I’ll stop travelling to their dreams, meaning that I will keep roaming around hell or heaven. When that happens, I might encounter my people more frequently. But the problem is that you can’t reunite and become a family again. Here, you never know where and when you will reappear after vanishing. There’s a fat chance that you might never even encounter your people again. See how many people die every day.

Some days, you wake up next to angry Indians. Other days, blonde English-speaking women beckon you and say something incoherent. If you are lucky, you are clad in white cotton-like fabrics. And the worst is when you look down to find the red blanket suffocating your dead body. There’s nothing under your control. You just continue to die, with all the burdens from your past life refusing to go away. The clouds taste different each day. Some days, the stones are edible and kind of tasty. When we aren’t given meat, we eat whatever appears before our eyes. Once, when I was surrounded by a mountain of mud, I grabbed a handful and chewed it. Surprisingly, it tasted like roasted yams.

It’s as if we are characters from video games where players can choose to play in different modes. Sometimes, we’re just floating in the sky. I had never boarded a plane in my past life, so I enjoy this mode more than any other. The other week—or perhaps the other month—I collided with a Swedish ghost while I was swimming in the white river. The young ghost simply apologised. There happened to be a lush bank beside the river, and as I sat there vacantly, the young ghost walked up to me. His steps were measured and slow, his eyes swollen for some reason.

“How long have you been dead?” I asked him, although that’s not how I usually start conversations here.

“Oh, I died in 2020,” the young ghost announced, slouching on the wet mud.

I didn’t ask the reason behind his death, but he was interested in mine.

“I died in a revolt against the state. And I heard from the freshly dead that I had been declared a martyr in my country.”

The red gel dampened my lids, but he found my death fascinating.

“Oh, my! You’re something else. But how come the state kills its own citizens?”

I remember him asking this question, but I don’t remember answering it. I must have melted before I could answer that. It was in my favour that I melted because I would not have loved explaining everything to him. Of all the events from my past life, I don’t particularly want to recall what transpired on September 8. But as I said, memories linger against my wishes, and if it were in my hands, I would love to die here too.

Perhaps I would be liberated that way. From how the freshly dead described the aftermath of the September 8 revolt, I’m even more heartbroken, if the heart still beats here in hell or heaven. I was told about September 9, about the dead bodies extracted from the debris, and about the new faces that replaced the old ones. It’s heartbreaking to learn that we martyrs are trivialised and glamorised as the leaders see fit.

No matter what, the quest for power among the parties will never deplete. Protests. Elections. Politicians. Positions. These entities will function as they always have, and I doubt that my country will leap toward “real reforms” at turbo speed.

Being a ghost, I don’t want to sound preachy. My only wish is that the fresher ones here won’t have to hesitate when they’re confronted with the question, “How did you die?” Because then you become an anti-national ghost if you say a bad thing about your country.