Sushil wasted no time in gently scooping Rohan up into his strong arms and

swinging him over his head onto his broad back. He took Radhika’s small carrier

bag in one hand and gently clasped her fingers with his other.

Radhika, feeling too ill to do otherwise, followed the tall man. He led the way

to a parked jeep and carefully lifted Radhika and Rohan into the back seats of

the vehicle before he climbed into the driver’s seat. He took them on a bumpy

three-hour journey to the Sunauli border.

Radhika fell asleep, only waking when Sushil stopped the car at their

destination.

Sushil carefully lifted mother and son out of the car and led them to a waiting

bus. He shepherded Radhika onto the bus, still holding Rohan. He quickly found

her two seats to stretch out on, and somewhat to her surprise also sat down with

Rohan, the boy held protectively on his lap. He stayed with them, even when the

bus started up and drove off.

Radhika had no idea why he was doing this. She and Rohan were strangers

after all. It crossed her mind that he might be a trafficker, taking her back to the

old gang, but she was too sick to develop that thought much further.

Halfway through the final, gruelling, 10-hour stretch home to Kathmandu,

Radhika felt her strength returning and she began to feel more like her old self.

Sitting up, she began to talk to Sushil, sharing some of her more shocking

experiences with the man. She found him surprisingly easy to talk to and he also

encouraged her to speak, as if he were used to listening to other people’s misery.

She quickly found herself pouring her heart out to him. She told this stranger her

entire life story, off-loading all the misery, the danger and then the hope to him.

‘He seemed really saddened by what I was describing and kept on gravely

shaking his head.

‘In the beginning, it hadn’t really occurred to me to ask him why he was

helping us. I barely had the energy to speak. But now I could ask him the

question I had been dying to ask, “Why do so much for strangers?” He simply replied that he felt he had no choice.

“What kind of a man would leave a mother and her child on the roadside like

that? Not someone who could truly call himself a man,” was his reply.

‘He was very good with Rohan too. He played endless games of hide and seek

using an old newspaper and Rohan was beginning to engage with him and even

make some sounds. It was an amazing sight to see him smile again.’

This level of kindness was almost beyond belief to Radhika. This stranger was

more like the men she had grown up with, men like her father. The men who she

had almost forgotten existed, such had been her experiences in the last few

years.

She closed her eyes and thanked the gods for watching over her and Rohan.

They were almost home.

At around 11 a.m., Radhika, Rohan and Sushil finally reached Kathmandu’s

central bus station.

Radhika couldn’t believe the journey was almost over. Tears welled up in her

eyes as she slowly disembarked from the rickety bus and took in the familiar

smells and sounds of her homeland.

It was almost three years since she had last stood on Nepalese soil and she

doubted her son had any memories of their native country.

She found herself drinking in every smell, every colour, every sign of

humanity on the bustling, dusty streets – elated to feel a sense of belonging once

more.

Finally, when she had the strength to take Rohan from Sushil’s arms, Radhika

gathered her tiny son to her.

She looked gratefully at the man who had helped her complete this journey

before whispering in Rohan’s ear. ‘We’re home, darling. We’re finally HOME.’