It was somewhere between nine and ten in the morning. Even this late, Abantika had not been woken as usual by the bright golden sunlight slipping through the gaps in the window curtains from the corridor. She was woken instead by the clatter of a roommate's pots and pans and the strong smell of dried fish. Whether that smell could still reach her nose after she woke, she was not sure.

When she opened her eyes, she looked first at the window. No light was coming through the blue curtain. There was a strange darkness about it. The spot she was used to seeing flooded with light was dark, and Abantika could not accept it.

Just by the window, in the corridor, she kept a few small potted plants. Some pots were tied to the window grille with jute string. Why was it so dark today? And how were her plants? Curious, Abantika opened the main door and went out, and came face to face with something astonishing.

Who had put such big plants here? And where were Abantika's plants? There stood a large bucket with a frangipani, a white hibiscus, an orange ixora, an allamanda, periwinkles and many flowering and fruiting plants whose names she did not know. Even in such a bad moment, Abantika picked up a wounded yellow allamanda flower from the floor and pressed it between the pages of the diary she kept hidden in her table's locker. Many dried flowers had gathered in its pages. Who she kept them for, she did not know.

It was a shabby little garden, as if a small earthquake had just struck. The plants were barely alive. It could not even be called a rooftop garden, as there was no open sky above. Still, Abantika felt she had seen a jungle like this at the botanical garden in Mirpur. And the frangipani, too, she had seen somewhere. Oh yes, she remembered: it was the plant from Chand's balcony.

Chand was Abantika's student. On their balcony she had seen the frangipani in a white Berger bucket, with a small purple periwinkle at its base. That was here too. But how had it come from the ninth-floor balcony near Tipu Sultan Road, past Dholaikhal and along Lalmohan Saha Street? Had it flown? There was no way. Abantika decided that anyone might have a similar pot and a similar plant. But not a single plant here would survive unless it was put in the sun. That was the first thing to think about. The next was that whoever had put these big plants here was certainly no plant lover.

Her own small potted plants had been shoved against the wall in a heap. They were in a sorry state; some were badly hurt, their limbs broken. Seeing them, Abantika was close to tears. Her face gave nothing away, but looking at the plants she felt the emptiness of having lost something. Slowly the feeling showed on her face like a dark cloud, and she could not hold herself back and cried.

There was no one around to comfort her. It was not the first time she had cried over plants. Once she had set a sweet potato on sticks in water in a transparent glass jelly jar on the balcony, having first peeled off the label to make it clear, because she loved watching the white roots grow in a transparent pot. When she changed the water, she did not cut the roots but cleaned them so they stayed white.

Seeing the sweet potato hanging like that, her roommate Munira had asked, laughing: "Apu, why have you hung it like you're executing it? What's its crime?" Abantika had laughed out loud and replied: "It has committed no crime! Green leaves will come out of it. Wait and see."

Leaves did come out of that sweet potato, and roots too. Every day the sun dried the water to half the pot, and every morning Abantika filled it again. Then one morning she found the pot gone. She grabbed her black-framed glasses from the wardrobe and tried for a while to see if anything was visible below, but nothing could be seen. What could anyone make out clearly from the tenth floor? That day Abantika cried a lot.

It was Ramadan. Before iftar that afternoon she told her friend Malati, almost in tears. It was from Malati that she had learned that a sweet potato hung on sticks in water grows green leaves. Malati told her: "Yours only had leaves. Mine was about to climb the grille, it had grown so big. It fell down too because I hadn't tied it. Luckily it didn't fall on anyone's head. When I couldn't find it, I burst into tears."

Hearing Malati, Abantika's pain eased a little. She realised that hearing other people's sorrows lessens one's own. Today she remembered that, and much else, looking at the broken plants. She remembered the old one-storey building with the crumbling wall opposite the ISKCON temple on Lalmohan Saha Street, which had a frangipani on its roof. From below she could never tell what it was planted in, but its big green leaves held her eyes every time she walked past, until she crossed the corner. She wanted to know what colour its flowers were. One day she had seen white frangipani lying on the road.

She remembered the poinsettia too, whose new leaves came in pink and turned green as they matured. It had to be kept in the sun for the pink leaves to come; the mix of green and pink was its beauty. But that plant, too, had left her one day, and she never bought another.

She missed her Nitu Apu, with whom she had first started planting. From the corridor window you could see the whole post office beside Banglabazar Girls' School. When it was demolished for rebuilding, Abantika and Nitu went to fetch soil from there, and how Nitu had charmed the guard to get it. Looking at the earthquake-struck garden, those conversations came back to her.

Nitu used to live in the room directly opposite. About a year and a half ago she had gone home to her village. Two days before leaving, Abantika had seen her crying alone here and there, but no matter how many times she asked, Nitu never said why. It was still a mystery. One reason Abantika thought of Nitu as her own sister was that both loved plants. Another was that once, for three or four days, Abantika had not been able to laugh; she no longer remembered why. Some invisible cosmic current of sorrow had washed her laughter away, and she had not noticed it herself. After a few days Nitu said: "Abantika, I've seen you laugh today after four days, and I'm so glad! What happened? Will you tell me?" "I don't know myself what happened, Apu." "All right, you don't need to know. But please don't stay so glum! I don't like to see it." Abantika had laughed and answered: "Apu, that you noticed is a joy for me."

Abantika had been very hurt when Nitu left. About four months ago a new junior from her department, Nila, had taken Nitu's seat. Nila was quiet and had already won a place in Abantika's heart. Abantika did not usually like juniors, but Nila was different, perhaps because she had taken Nitu Apu's seat, Abantika thought. Now, bewildered by all the plants crammed together, she saw Nila coming out of her room and asked her in a calm voice: "Do you know who put these plants here?"

Abantika was not at all calm. She had learned that if she showed her restless irritation, people might think her aggressive, though she was not aggressive towards anyone. So she tried, even fighting herself, to speak so that no one could guess her state of mind. Nila replied: "Apu, I just woke up. I don't know who put the plants here. But a new girl came to our room early this morning. Maybe they're hers." "All right, go."

Abantika wondered what she would say to her. She had to ask her to arrange her plants to one side and make room for Abantika's. Otherwise these plants would die here. She had kept frangipani, lemon, hibiscus, poinsettia, periwinkle and even chilli plants there before, and after a while their life had vanished, leaving only dry stems. It had hurt her terribly. These plants would not survive either, because there was not enough sunlight here for them to grow, or even to live.

She wondered whether the girl would be senior or junior to her. A batchmate would be best. A junior would be a problem: she was frankly afraid to argue with juniors, in case one said something rude that she could not answer and she ended up hurt inside for nothing. From Nila she learned the girl was her senior. That was a relief. She could swallow it if a senior spoke harshly; she trusted herself to do that.

She could not tell whether it was before noon or afternoon. Nila pointed the girl out, but Abantika could not find the courage to ask her. A few days earlier something unpleasant had happened. She had been unable to attend the senior batch's farewell programme for personal reasons, and the departing students had begun to look at her askance. On the day of the programme, as she ate lunch in her room, a senior girl kept shouting "Abantika, Abantika!" and then said sharply: "Why don't you move these plants from here? They were fine in the corner in front of your room. After the programme, after dancing, everyone will come and rest here. Why have you put them in the middle? Move them!" Abantika wanted to scream with anger or stubbornness, but she held herself in, stayed silent a moment and calmly replied: "I didn't put these here." To provoke her further, the girl said: "What if I throw them away now?" Abantika, to show she did not care, answered: "Yes, throw them away."

Fearing trouble at the programme, Abantika had already moved her own plants, some into her room and some near other windows. She watched all that day and until one at night to see whether anyone threw the plants away or came to rest in that corner after the singing and dancing. No one did. Then she understood it had only been a way to scold her, using the plants as an excuse.

Afraid of being scolded again, she did not dare speak to the new girl. After much thought she asked: "Apu, are these plants yours?" The girl did not like the question. She stared with wide eyes and said: "Yes, mine! So what?" "Nothing, Apu. But before putting your plants here you could have placed mine properly. You've ruined my plants and now you ask what's wrong!" At this the girl became angry: "This space belongs to everyone on the floor. Anyone can put whatever they like here. If you care so much about your plants, keep them on your own balcony or in your room. If you keep plants here, anyone can break them or do what they like, and you can't say anything to anyone. I broke your plants, and if I want I'll break them again, and you can't say anything about it." Unable to control her anger, Abantika glared and answered furiously: "I'll complain to the house tutor. You can't do this. If you had told me, I would have made space for your plants."

It was ten to three in the afternoon. The bus was at half past three; Abantika was going home on the university bus and had asked Mita to wake her. Mita was now calling her: "Hey, what are you muttering in your sleep!"

Sprawled on the bed, Abantika opened her eyes with a start and saw Mita sitting in front of her. For a moment Mita seemed like the witch of a girl she had been arguing with. Wiping her eyes, she made sure it was Mita, then ignored her and ran out to the corridor, her heart pounding. The quarrel from her sleep had not yet faded. She had only one thought: were the plants all right?

In the corridor, everything was in order, just as she had left it before sleeping. Breathing a sigh of relief, she tried to remember everything. With the faint stale smell of the Buriganga drifting on the air and the flash of sunlight, she realised that none of it had been real. It had been a dream.

On her bed lay a green diary, open. At the top of the open page was written "Plantophile", then "Dear stranger," and Mita had read no further before Abantika came back. Standing there, she said to Mita, "Give me the diary." A black ballpoint pen was inside it. She turned the page of the letter and wrote on the next one: "Am I really a plantophile? Otherwise who dreams of a plant disaster!" Putting the diary on the bed, about to go and freshen up to shake off the daze, she explained to Mita the unreal events. "Don't ask, Mita. This happens whenever I sleep in the daytime. I slept one hour and it feels like I've slept three days straight, and in my dream I've seen the whole history of the last two years." Saying this, she went off to freshen up.

While she was gone, Mita read the letter. It said:

"Dear stranger, it is a moonlit midnight now, and everything is wrapped in a sheet of silence. I want to know whether you are asleep or awake, but there is no way to know, because I do not know who you are. Writing letters to a stranger has become an addiction lately. I imagine you are awake, holding some window grille and looking out at the moon. The full moon can be seen through the corridor window. In the moonlight the plants sway a little, shyly, at the hint of a gentle breeze. This weather has drawn me to my diary. If I don't sleep now I will be sleepy in class tomorrow, yet I want very much to write to you. I have not written for a while because I have been busy, but you are with me all the time. I quietly tell you everything that happens to me at every moment, sometimes by talking to the sky, sometimes to the river, or I send my words to your address on the gentle wind of the deep night. I am not sure they ever reach you. Still I send them, for my own satisfaction.

"For some days a new word has been going round in my head. I think people would laugh if they heard it, so I am writing it to you. If someone who loves songs or music is a melophile, someone who loves cinema a cinephile, and someone who loves the cosmos an astrophile, then why shouldn't someone who loves planting be a plantophile? Surely she is a plantophile, tell me! If you would just once agree with me, the word would seem entirely logical and right to me. If it rains hard next Friday, I will take it that you agree with me.

"I have more to tell you. You must never be annoyed by my plants, nor jealous of the time I spend with them. When I am ill, you will look after the plants. Our room will have two wide windows. Against one will be my study table with a bookshelf, and on that shelf there will certainly be Sarat Chandra's Parineeta. I love both its characters, Shekhar and Lalita. On the other side there will be a plant shelf, with a snake plant, money plant, caladium, zebrina, variegated lucky bamboo and many more indoor plants, and a spider plant in green and white too.

"When I lose focus on my studies, I will look at the plants for a while to refresh myself, then calm myself by caring for them a little. Sometimes I worry a lot, you know. When I have children, will I care for the child or the plants? After much thought I have decided: as I teach my child to speak, I will teach it to care for plants. It must know that human life exists because plants exist on earth. Allah created each as the complement of the other. If plants did not take in carbon dioxide, the earth would become poisonous, and without oxygen all living beings would gradually vanish. I won't write more today. Wherever you are, be well."

On the next page Abantika had written: "Am I really a plantophile?" Mita had barely finished reading when Abantika came back into the room. Seeing the diary in Mita's hand, she was furious. Glaring at Mita with eyes like sparks of fire, she shouted, "Mita!" The diary fell from Mita's hand to the floor. Abantika rushed in, picked it up and said to Mita in a very angry voice: "Why did you touch someone else's personal diary? You can't do this, Mita."

The writer is a student in the Department of Public Administration, Jagannath University, Dhaka.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.