Kabir walked into the living room. The silence hit him not as absence, but as pressure—violent, ringing. He saw the side table. The steel plate was still there. Papaya cubes had turned translucent, slimy orange. The fork rested at the same angle his father had left. Twelve hours ago the plate was an annoyance—an interruption to an “important” meeting. Now it was a relic. He cut this for me. He picked the ripe one. He deseeded it. He walked in hoping I would look at him. And I waved him away like a fly. Death rewrote memory in real time. The “annoying old man” dissolved. In his place stood only the saint. Kabir remembered his father waiting up, folding laundry even though they had a maid. Why didn’t I see it then? Why does the lens become clear only when the subject is gone? Kabir walked to his father’s bedroom door. It was slightly ajar. He pushed it open.