Read Online Finding Arun by Marisha Pink - Free Book Online

time, inclination, nor patience
to try to comprehend the inner workings of Arthur’s mind.
    He shrugged the odd episode aside and realised to
his delight that he was alone once more. He picked up his backpack
and, slinging it over his shoulders, started confidently towards
the terminal building, a nostalgic smile plastered across his face.
Less than four months before he had stood in the very same spot,
full of enthusiasm for his African adventure and committed to
helping orphans find the loving families that many thought they
could never have. Now he was focused on only one thing; helping
himself to find the family that he’d never known he could have, and
that, he mused, was a very different kind of adventure indeed.
     

 
NINE
     
    SETTLING himself into his seat, Aaron couldn’t help
but to stare in awe at the other passengers boarding the early Jet
Airways flight to Mumbai. He had never been surrounded by so many
people of the same colour, his colour, and far from feeling out of
place, for once he felt that he could actually blend in. Oblivious
to his fascination, passengers were leisurely tucking their
belongings into the overhead compartments, strapping in excited
children and confused elderly family members, and requesting
everything from extra pillows to different seats.
    All about him loud conversations in tongue-twisting
dialects were taking place, while the cabin crew desperately tried
to usher the crowd into their seats so that the plane could depart.
Men on opposite sides of the aircraft shouted across to one
another, gesticulating wildly in what Aaron initially perceived to
be aggression, until both fell about laughing jovially and he
realised how crucial an understanding of the language and culture
was going to be. There was a palpable buzz on-board the flight and
the energy fed into Aaron’s own excitement, rendering him even more
impatient to arrive at his final destination.
    When the plane finally eased into the sky, Aaron
felt a wave of fatigue wash over him. The restless night, the early
start and the exchanges with Arthur and Aunt Ruby had exhausted him
and, though he tried to fight it, within minutes he had drifted off
into a deep sleep. He remained that way for the duration of the
flight, stirring only when the attendant shook him awake for
drinks, meals and snacks, his sleep consumed with vivid dreams of
Catherine that he struggled to recall on awakening. He was a young
boy and then a young man, but Catherine never seemed to age at all,
remaining just as she had looked before he had left for Africa. In
so many of the dreams she seemed close enough for him to touch her,
but whenever he reached out she was always just beyond his grasp.
The dreams left him feeling disorientated and physically pained on
awakening and by the time the pilot announced that they were coming
in to land at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Airport, Aaron was
grateful of the opportunity to escape the confines of the
aircraft.
    The plane descended rapidly and Aaron felt his ears
painfully begin to pop from the changing pressure. Wincing, he
covered them with his hands and wriggled his jaw in an attempt to
initiate a yawn.
    ‘ Apane kana ko ahata kara rahe
haim? ’ said the elderly
woman sitting across the aisle to his right, a genuine look of
concern on her face.
    ‘I’m sorry?’ replied Aaron, utterly confused.
    ‘ Maim pucha raha hum agara apane kana
ko ahata kara rahe haim? ’ she said again, this time nodding and smiling at
him.
    ‘She’s asking if your ears are hurting?’ intervened
the gentleman to his left.
    He was a middle-aged, dark-skinned Indian man with a
large belly that his shirt buttons were struggling to contain.
    ‘Oh, right,’ said Aaron, turning to nod in answer to
the elderly woman’s question.
    ‘I take it you don’t speak Hindi?’ the gentleman
chuckled good-naturedly.
    ‘No, not exactly.’
    ‘I’m Prakash,’ he said, extending his hand
courteously.
    ‘Aaron,’ he replied, accepting