It's around 12pm by the time we are almost ready to head back to Dhaka.
The central ground of the cul-de-sac is a hive of activity with butlers and maids rushing around loading bags into all the vehicles making up our return convoy.
As mum is not travelling with us, I note with great sadness that the rickety ambulance we journeyed in together is missing.
I know why - we don't need one now - but it still hurts like a fucker!
Before I get too depressed though a huge slap hits my back, "SO! You can finally travel in style like the rest of us!"
I turn to look at Goldie and his shiny tooth peering out of his Cheshire cat grin and try my best not to say something inappropriate. My mind is repeatedly telling me to tell him what a fucking loser he is, how much he has...no, sorry, that should be is...hurting Princess' father and the family and on top of that, the potential devastation he has caused for the future of his nieces from whom he stole thousands of taka!
Instead I smile and speak up sarcastically, "Yep. Too bad I can't also look stylish like you with your gold tooth eh?"
"Haha...someday baba...someday!" he says slapping me on the back again, this time harder than the first jolting me forward.
I suddenly get the distinct impression that he's not just being a cocky twat but using this as an opportunity to get his own back on me having probably got fed up with me being so obviously hateful of everything he stood for since my arrival.
Before I say anything I regret my sister arrives as if out of the blue, having seen me from across the yard and the fowl expression I must be wearing on my face, "Yo bro, dad needs us!" and with that she tugs me away.
"Thanks. I was about to punch the twat!" I say as my sister says nothing but looks at me with one eyebrow raised and a smirk on her face.
"So, does dad actually need us or what?"
As I say that my sister leads me around a corner into a room on the ground floor of the three storied building and Tanny is laughing away with Sajid and my other lanky cousin who's name had still managed to elude my attention as cousin Neema is sitting in another corner with little Princess on her lap looking at her jewellery and occasionally both the girls looking over at the boys and sighing at their silliness.
"Oh, hey guys! Wondered where all of you were!" I say.
"So, seeing as all the gang here are coming back to Dhaka I figured we should all travel together so we can have more of a laugh than having some old grump sitting with us...not that dad or Auntie Poppy fall in that category...often!" my sister says with a chuckle.
"Fine by me assuming the other billion cousins we've met since we've been here aren't coming!" I pipe up but my sister just laughs as Neema replies, "No brother, the rest - most of whom I don't even know by the way - live here!!! It'll just be us!"
I turn to look at Neema with Princess with her and with a little confusion in my voice ask why she is going to be coming with us then, bearing in mind the little lady was only 5 years old and as far as I knew both her parents - the legitimate ones that is, were not coming back with us.
"Because I'll be looking after her...she hardly gets to see her famous British cousins so I decided she should not miss out and neither should I" says Goldie as he walks in like John Wayne in one of those old Westerns.
And for a minute, the feeling I have continues that theme.
I get tense as I look him right in the eyes. Both of us moving our mouths as if we're chewing tobacco, fingers twitching and eyes narrowing as we're poised to go for our revolvers...the cousins scarpering off to hide but not too far so that they can see who wins and tumble weed rolling through the room with a bell ringing in the distance.
Total silence ensues and no one says anything.
"Right. And how do her parents feel about that Goldie?" I finally say with a slight sneer.
"She is practically my little girl so they let me do whatever I wish. Don't you worry about that."
I imagine pulling my gun out of holster and shooting the guy's gold tooth out of his mouth with the kind of skill Robin Hood had by firing an arrow to split another just to prove a point - that would be proof that I did not like him and encourage others not to pretend to, but before I say anything too venomous my sister steps into the void between us and snaps me back into reality.
"Yeah, Goldie told us that was the case and well, you know what uncle and auntie are like, as long as Princess is happy they are."
"Humph...fine by me then. I'm only a visitor anyway!" I say as I walk up to Princess and stroke her gorgeous thick black hair and then kiss her on the head.
Don't get me wrong in case it's coming across this way, I have absolutely no problem with Princess. In fact, she was one of mum's favorite nieces so how could I not love her...besides, in herself she was adorable. It was the fucking adults messing the world up for her.
Before anyone else manages to utter anything else though, one of the butlers rush round the corner, "Brother and sisters, the vehicles are ready for your departure but before setting off, everyone is gathering at Auntie's grave for one last prayer so if you could make your way over please."
"Stroke of luck to be honest as I was pretty close to blowing so the interruption was well timed to say the least" I think to myself as we all follow my sister out and head over to mum's resting place.
The entire family is gathered there including the plethora of cousins we had met and I would hazard a guess, most of the village are there too.
I also spy a lone camera man looming near the corner of the mosque with a reporter standing by with a not very subtle microphone in his hand ready to film us all and do his news reporter thing really. However, after the chaos of the day before during Bang-lastonbury, one stray reporter was a welcome sight indeed.
People make way for my sister, Tanny - who some still think is actually the British born son of Mrs Khan! - and I to make our way to the front to stand next to dad, Dada, Dadi and Auntie Neema.
I look around constantly for the mum’s messenger from the morning but the old man is nowhere to be seen and a part of me starts thinking maybe he was some spooky spirit guide but before I get too carried away with that crazy imagination of mine, I shake my head to get that ridiculous thought out of my mind.
“Coincidence my boy. Pure coincidence!” I mutter under my breath.
By the time we are at the front, to my surprise the ever reliable fly in every fucking ointment, Goldie has appeared at the front too. I resist making any snide comments like “mum would not want you here Goldie!” out of respect for mum and the rest of the family gathered as Dada asks Uncle Hasab to commence his prayer.
At first I am relieved that we did not have the rock and roll Molabhi from yesterday but that is until we start reaching 15 minutes of standing in the excruciating heat and having prayed for mum, us and the entirety of the world, Uncle Hasab starts praying for more ludicrous stuff as he sobs uncontrollably.
"...and lest I forget Allah, please let the roof of the community centre be completed. We are almost there but probably won't make the deadline of getting it finished before the end of summer. Oh, also, please allow the presents I sent to my brother's family over in Jamalpur day before yesterday reach them...Oh Allah..."
"Errr...is he for real?" Tanny whispers as I start snickering like mad as he does too.
I'm meant to be praying for mum and this is our way of saying goodbye once and for all and he's throwing in added extras like delivery of presents??! Unbelievable but in a way, so random it is hilarious.
Luckily our inappropriately timed behaviour in brought to a halt by my sister jabbing me in the ribs with her elbow a moment or two before the camera man has swung his lens in our direction.
Tanny and I bow our heads as quickly as we can as our shoulders continue shaking with hysterics but we hide this by both making sounds as though we are crying.
Shortly after, Uncle Hasab finishes his prayer and Dada and dad turn to address everyone - thanking them for their love, support and prayers during such a harrowing time for the family as a whole, let alone for the Khans - before asking the crowd to disperse and make way for the Dhaka contingent to get into their vehicles in readiness for the trek home.
Having regained some self-control again, I stop to glance at mum one last time as Tanny continues his migration with the crowd towards the parked vehicles.
My sister and dad join me.
"I think we should take a moment to say goodbye to your mummy without the rest of the show!" and with that dad walks up to mum with my sister and I in tow.
All three of us crouch down and putting our hands on mum's resting place we say nothing but close our eyes and cry.
Despite the heat, the earth is still soft and tender. I imagine the earth being replaced by mum lying there and my hand resting on her stomach as she sleeps, which is moving up and down as she breathes lightly.
My sister rests her head on my shoulder and dad says a quick prayer from us three to mum bringing his prayer to an end with "I will always love you shona" which means gold in English and it breaks my heart.
The Bangladeshi culture is so reserved that using nicknames for one another is usually a secret thing. Doesn't matter how sweet it is, you just don't call each other dear, darling, love so on and so on! Just "O-Go" is the most common especially for the generation mum and dad were from which means "hey-you"...not very romantic at all. And to reveal any public display of affection such as saying I love you or kissing or holding hands is a big no-no. So for dad to say that in front of us really sealed the deal.
This was it.
End of an era of my life...our lives together as a unit. We were going to be leaving mum behind and moving on with our lives without her in it.
And I knew, the world was a poorer place for it.
Not just our little three person world or even that of the extended family but every single person's life whom mum touched in one way or another - through her writings, her lectures and presentations, her charity work. And the lives of those she would never meet like my children.
I think about how lucky my nephews have been to have had some of the love and affection that mine shall never know and my crying builds into a crescendo of sobbing.
My sister and dad are surprised initially at how emotional I have gotten having kept myself in check as much as possible throughout the whole trip so far; both put their arms around me to hold me still as I practically start keeling over - my hands tightening into a fist, digging into the cool clay.
"We should go baba. We should go now." my dad says gently and I look up at him, eyes full of water but know he is right.
Nothing we did now would change what had happened. It was time to move on.
My dad and sister help me up as my knees wobble; I am a little perturbed myself at how bad I suddenly became in mere moments and look at dad and my sister grateful that I have them in my life to hold me up whenever I fall albeit mum was not there now.
As we slowly walk towards the vehicles I dry my eyes as we occasionally shake hands with extended family gathered to wave us off and promising us that mum was in safe hands and that they would look after her.
My sister spies the mound of clay I had gathered in my fist still there.
"Are you going to chuck that or what little bro?" she asks inquisitively.
I look at her confused at first and then in the direction of her eyes and without even knowing, have created a round ball in my palm from the earth I had clawed away.
With all the wrinkles, nooks and crannies, it almost looks like a miniature clay version of Earth itself.
"Ironic then that I was contemplating had much worse the world had become with mum gone yet here I was, holding the world in the palm of my hand." I think to myself.
"The world gifted to me by mum without me even noticing."
Out of nowhere I feel an enormous sensation of warmth and love overwhelm me as I have a flashback to times when mum used to stroke my head when things got bad and always told me the world had a way of falling into place even when things did not feel that way and I smile.
"I would sis and probably should, but this'll remind me that just cos the world is a poorer place without mum in it, being my mother's son, I'll find a way so that it doesn't have to remain like that."
My sister smiles back and putting her arm around my shoulder gives me a gentle hug and we look at each other once more before entering our vehicle.
As the engine revs into action and starts to drive away, we all cheer and wave out of the open windows of the vehicle to the folk surrounding us and as we do, I spot the old man standing over mum’s grave as we drive passed as we exit the cul-de-sac.
There is a part of me that wants to ask the driver to stop so I can speak to the guy but as if he has read my mind, the old man waves me on with that huge toothless smile of his and a knowing glint in his eyes: every story doesn't have a happy ending but this one still may, even if not today.
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