The Ghost of The Bo Tree

THE BO TREE

But there was one thing she liked more than all the other things that she hated about coming back to Uncle Somi's farm. It was not a feeling nor an experience or any such strange abstract sensation.

It was the Bo tree right in the center of the orange tree field. It had always been there, ever since she could remember. It was impossible to imagine the orange fields without that one big Bo tree right in the center, standing like an oddity and not giving a care to the rest of the world.

It was large, thick and awfully wrinkled, with strange branches crawling all over the place which should have been its trunk. It was not pleasing in any manner. If anything, it was ugly, scary and the last thing that should have held a child's fancy- but she was in love with it.

The villagers never let anyone go near that tree, and even Uncle Somi would never let any of his children go anywhere close to the atrocious thing that stood in the center of the field. And there, right there was the reason she was always hiding around it. Uncle Somi couldn't care less what happened to her- so he never cared where she was anyway, but the Bo tree protected her from all the vile tricks that Cousin Aniket and Cousin Nidhi had in store for her when she returned from the hostel.

And because nobody went near it, it was left for Lei alone to enjoy all the oranges that grew in the trees around the Bo tree; which were much better than the oranges that grew elsewhere in the farm. Lei liked the Bo tree also because it took care of her when she needed it most.

Like that time when the winter rains hit and she spent one whole afternoon under it (avoiding Uncle Somi's new bride) while its branches seemed to close in protectively around her so that in the end she was still dry and warm. Or that time when Cousin Nidhi cut her hair for the fifth time and Lei wept silently under the Bo tree to discover the next morning that her hair had grown back. Nidhi never cut her hair again. Or the first night that Lei had spent under the Bo tree, when she was nine and trying to avoid dinner, when she dreamt of a feast and the next morning her tongue still had the faint taste of sweetmeats.

But what she would never forget was the night after Herri the farmer assaulted her. She simply couldn't bring herself to go back to the farmhouse again and so she spent the night under the Bo tree, talking and dozing off, only to wake up with a strange fear and dozing off again. Then, in the middle of the night she felt warm arms caressing her, and she finally let herself fall asleep. Next morning all of Herri's crops had withered away- people blamed the rains for it, but Lei knew better.