It was a Tuesday evening in Mumbai, and the office was its usual buzz of keyboards, murmurs, and fluorescent light. Rohan sat at his desk, sipping cold machine coffee, lost in the endless emails that never really seemed urgent, but always demanded urgency. He had grown used to the noise — the kind of noise that numbed the silence inside.

Just as he was about to log off, his phone buzzed.

“Maa Calling.”

He stared at it for a few seconds. Their calls were rare, and always short. “Have you eaten?” “How is work?” “Don’t forget to pay your LIC.” But something in his chest told him this wasn’t one of those calls.

He picked up. “Hello?”

There was a pause, and then his mother’s voice, low and trembling:

“Rohan… Nana passed away this morning.”

Silence.

It wasn't a surprise — Nana had been ill for months. Still, something inside him cracked. Rohan leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and breathed out. His mind didn’t immediately go to the funeral, or the property, or even his mother’s sorrow.

It went to that one summer — when he was eight — sitting on Nana’s lap under the mango tree in the courtyard, licking aamras off his fingers while listening to stories about gods who could lift mountains and birds who spoke in poems.

“I’m so sorry, Maa,” he finally said, his voice dry.

His mother sniffled on the other end. “Beta, I know it's been years. But… we need to go back. The house… it’s time. The lawyer said there’s paperwork, and the buyers are waiting.”

Rohan felt something tighten in his chest. That house had been his entire world once. Now it was a name on a property deed. He hadn’t been back in fifteen years. Not since college. Not since things changed.

“I’ll book my tickets,” he said quietly. “I’ll come with you.”

Three days later, Rohan found himself standing at Dadar station, a worn suitcase in one hand and a backpack slung over his shoulder. The train to his hometown — Sangave — was late as always. He looked around at the platform: chaiwalas shouting, families fussing over luggage, kids clinging to their mothers. It all felt familiar… and far away.

As he waited, a memory returned: Nana, holding his tiny hand, guiding him through the same station, buying him orange soda and samosas, telling him stories to keep him from crying in the crowd.

The train finally arrived with a screech, and Rohan boarded. He took a window seat, resting his forehead against the glass. The city slowly faded, replaced by green fields and dusty roads, and with it, the fog in his mind began to lift.

Somewhere in the back of his heart, the village was calling — not just with its dust and trees, but with everything he’d buried under years of emails, deadlines, and grown-up silence.

He didn’t know what to expect. But he knew this: it was time to go home.