It had been a week.
Seven days since the fire. Since his skin sizzled and screamed. Since memory became a liability.
The refugee camp was laid out like someone had tried to order misery alphabetically. Rows of tents stitched from tarps and torn rags, sagging at the corners and too thin for rain. Smoke from makeshift cooking pits clung low, stinging eyes and threading itself through clothes like punishment. People paced. Some prayed. Others just stared—mouths moving with no sound, like they'd forgotten what conversation was.
Adyanth's tent sat near the back edge, close to the metal fence that pretended to offer security. He didn't speak. Not a word since the day he'd arrived.
That had become a story of its own. A silent myth whispered in the pit lines and water queues.
"Have you seen him?"
"He doesn't talk. Hasn't said a word since he got here."
"They say he came in with burn powder still on his skin."
"He just stares at nothing."
"I think he thinks he's better than us."
Children turned myth into gossip.
"Ghost boy," some called him. "The one who acts mighty."
"He looks at us like we're beneath him."
"I saw him once—he didn't even blink when a dog bit his boot."
And perhaps he didn't. Because Adyanth wasn't looking at anyone.
He was trying to feel something.
Anything.
---
Each day passed in blurred sameness. He stayed inside the tent unless his stomach demanded otherwise—and even then, it wasn't hunger that pushed him out. It was calculation. Bare sustenance. Just enough to remain conscious.
He took his medication with the same mindset. Not for healing. Not to numb the pain.
He wanted to stay awake.
Alert.
Because he was waiting—for the grief to arrive.
And if it ever came, he didn't want to miss it.
---
He spent his days inside his head, rewinding memories like brittle film reels:
His mother singing while oil sizzled in the pan.
His father sitting in the late sun, fixing a broken hoe with one hand and cradling a cup of tea in the other.
The way their hands had moved.
The way their laughter had layered over silence like a quilt.
He begged the gods they believed in.
Whispered names he didn't even know. Repeated mantras under his breath just loud enough for hope to hear.
Let me cry.
Let me feel them gone.
But nothing came.
Their lives—everything they'd done, everyone they'd helped—had melted into ash. And what terrified him most wasn't the unfairness.
It was the silence.
Because not even he had wept for them.
---
That guilt pulsed louder than pain.
What kind of son doesn't grieve?
What kind of boy remembers warmth and feels nothing but cold?
His parents had given without hesitation. Shared rice in lean seasons. Stood between neighbors and starvation.
And now? They had vanished.
And so had he.
He was the boy who remained. The son who remembered—but never felt.
Selfish. Unworthy. Hollow.
A betrayal in skin.
---
That evening, like the last few, he left his tent for dinner. The food line was slow—thick with smoke and bodies. He kept his head low as a woman behind the ladle scooped half-cooked millet onto battered tin plates.
Voices rose just behind him.
"Why does he always look like that?"
"Like what?"
"Like he's better than us."
Someone snorted. "Maybe he thinks he's a prince. Living in that torn-up tent palace."
"I heard he hasn't cried once."
"Yeah. Must be cursed. Everyone talks about it."
A child pointed. "Mama, isn't that him?"
The mother didn't lower her voice. "Don't go near that one. He doesn't speak for a reason."
---
Each word landed like soot on his lungs.
His ribs still ached. Stitches tugged every time he bent to accept the metal plate. But that wasn't what burned.
Why did no one ask about the wounds?
Not even a passing kindness. Not even a glance of concern.
Why did they whisper instead of speak?
Why did they see him—and not what had been torn away from him?
For a moment, sadness rose.
But he crushed it.
How dare you think about yourself?
His own thoughts turned against him.
You think this pain matters? You lost your parents. You saw them burn. They screamed, and you're thinking about being ignored?
Did they think about themselves? No. They were kind. You're not.
---
His spiraling stopped when a voice called out.
"Hey."
Adyanth turned.
A boy—not much older, maybe fourteen—stood facing him. Scrawny, sun-dried, the kind of kid who'd fought too long to survive and now mistook scorn for strength.
"You're creeping people out," the boy said. "Stop with the silent act. You think you're the only one who lost something?"
Adyanth didn't reply.
He just… nodded.
Slow. Detached.
And turned to walk away, his food plate shaking in one hand.
The older boy's lip curled. He saw it not as humility, but insult.
"Hey—!"
A foot slammed into Adyanth's back.
He stumbled forward, the plate flying. Half-cooked millet scattered across the dirt.
The air went quiet.
Adyanth lay there for a breath, palms bruised, pain spidering from his ribs.
And then, for the first time in days—
Something stirred.
Heat.
Not warmth. Not sorrow.
Rage.
---
He rose slowly.
And without thought—
Punched.
The boy hadn't expected it. His nose cracked, blood bright and instant.
The world blurred.
Pain seared through Adyanth's chest—the punch tearing at the stitching around his ribs. He gasped, stumbling back, one hand at his side.
He'd never thrown a punch like that before. Never let it go that far. Not even when they mocked him back home. He always held back.
Because his parents were still alive then. Because their goodness had to be protected.
But now?
Now they were ash.
And rage was all he had left to offer.
---
The punch didn't end it.
The boy screamed, lunging back with both hands. Two others followed—lackeys or brothers, it didn't matter. They grabbed Adyanth by the collar, dragged him down, kicked his side.
One kick landed where the stitches tugged deepest.
Another sent him to the ground, curled in on himself.
He didn't fight back.
Not because he was noble.
But because he couldn't breathe.
He sobbed. In pain. Raw, breathless sobs that shook his entire body.
And the boys laughed.
They pointed. Shoved him once more. Then walked off, muttering about crazy ghost kids and bad luck.
---
He lay in the dirt. Curled like something dying.
And then—it came.
The crying.
But not for his parents.
Not for their kindness. Not for their loss.
He cried because he had been beaten. Because it hurt. Because the world had laughed. Because he was mocked.
It was ugly.
It was loud.
It was selfish.
And he hated it.
---
Why now?
Why do you cry now, when your mother burned holding a ladle in her hand?
Why does the pain of a kick make you weep, when the pain of losing everything didn't even flinch you?
He sobbed louder, ashamed of every single sound.
No one came to help him.
No one whispered his name in sympathy.
---
He hated it.
He hated himself.
For surviving. For failing to grieve. For crying now—when it was least deserved.
The last dignity he could've offered his parents—silence—was gone.
What remained was this… whimpering shell. Filthy. Bruised. Crying for himself.
And in that moment, a fracture deepened.
Whatever was left of the boy who had once stirred porridge with his mother and avoided chores by joking with his father...
It cracked.
Not from grief.
From guilt.
And shame.
And self-loathing so deep it could split bone.