Au Revoir

1
Present Day
It was the first Monday in weeks when I was not in office before ten. As I saw the frosted sundial of my old citizen ticking eleven thirty, I cursed myself for the umpteenth time for choosing that insurance company. I found out that the other companies did not require so many tests after signing up for that policy.
I scanned the lobby where I was made to wait before I could collect the reports of the tests. The hospital was one of those recently built ones that looked too cheerful and lacked the sobriety one expected of hospitals. I switched on the walkman in my Sony Ericsson and tried to listen to some music to stifle the urge to slap the hospital staff who were making me wait for hours for the report. But soon I realized I had never loaded any music into the phone. I smiled to myself thinking of how much I had changed for there was a time when I would listen to music all the time. Things had been hectic at the office with the project dead line just a couple of months away.

I turned the FM radio on and a peppy A R Rahman number greeted me. I closed my eyes and eased a little in the chair. I was woken up by a pleasant looking nurse a few minutes later.

“Dr. Sridar wants to talk to you. ”

“Can I just have my reports please? I will meet the doctor later if he wants me to. I am already too late. I have to rush to my office.”

“No, Sir. He wants to speak to regarding the reports only.”

I followed her dutifully to the doctor’s cabin. There was this geeky looking young man who was looking at the computer screen in front of him with utmost interest sitting behind a fancy looking table. He looked up at me as I entered and beckoned me to the chair opposite him with a pleasant smile.

“Good Morning Mr. Arun.”

“Good Morning, doctor. You wanted to see me?”

“Where are you employed Mr. Arun?”

‘That’s none of your bloody business. Just give me the damn report.’ My heart screamed.

“I work at Riversoft.” I said bluntly.

“OK. Let me come to the point. We had run all the basic tests. A few of the tests showed abnormalities. There seems to be malignant cell growth in blood. I am afraid you have blood cancer.” He blurted the whole thing in one breath. I wished it was some other doctor I was talking to. I wished I was somewhere else. I wished I was still sleeping in the lobby irritated by the delay. I did not know how to react. Somewhere in me there was this faint craving to hit the doctor across his face for all the blasphemous truths he dared to reveal to me. All of a sudden the hospital looked more sober than any place I had known. It seemed as if all the cheeriness had been sucked out of the place by this revelation.
The moment felt surreal. I kept looking at him, my new god who was dictating to me my new future. Sensing my thoughts, he proceeded to the next well-rehearsed line.

“We cannot afford to delay, Arun. We should run a few other tests to see how advanced it is, whether there has been metastasis and so on. You should start taking the treatment very soon. Cancer is curable.” My thoughts had left the place temporarily. The gravity and the seriousness of the situation were too strong to bear. I irrelevantly realized that the doctor was too short, that with his pointed nose he looked like a character out of some comic book. But comic characters did not break such tragic news about cancer and death. Next few thoughts were about Pramila, Sheela’s colleague. She had been diagnosed with lung cancer. I tried hard to think of what happened to her after that. I had not bothered to ask about her to Sheela- the same way as I had never bothered to ask Sheela about the million things in her world.

The young, short, evil doctor Sridar was telling something in his lecture like voice. I did not bother to follow any of it.
“Don’t worry, Arun. We will start the treatment this week. Take these tests now. We will get the results in a couple of days.”
I left his cabin without thanking him. All the tests I gave that day were a blur. They took a lot of my blood out of the veins off my left hand. I did not mind. I wryly thought that after all it was cancerous blood. After an hour, I was driving home. It was the first Monday in years when I did not attend office.

2
I parked the car and walked towards the lift. It was one of those rare times when my mind was completely blank. Maybe it was the million different things that tried to capture my mind’s attention that made it fully dormant or maybe the first and eternal confrontation with death silenced my mind in humble reverence. I went to my apartment without bothering to wish back Mrs. Manju, the one who lived in the opposite flat. I slept off with my shoes on, in the sofa and slowly the thoughts started unfolding, in sleep where I couldn’t suppress or direct them and slowly like the onset of the evening dew, layers of thoughts settled on my mind. Even in half sleep I realized my mind was undergoing some transformation. And then I had the strangest of dreams, I don’t know if it was a dream or just a fragment of memory playing in the vivid screen of my mind. It was a scene from my college days. It was one of those past-midnight chats that were usually about nothing in particular but everything in general. Most of them were laced with booze, but this one chat was when I was sober.
“What will you do if you find out you are going to die in ten days?”
Ananth was posting the question to everyone and scanned the room for any responses. All of us ignored his question as usual. He repeated the question, more loudly now in his ever so irritating voice.
“I will bang a hundred gals in those ten days!” I announced more to shut him up. But the idea seemed exciting.
“Did you realize that means you got to bang one every two hours twenty four minutes assuming you are at it for twenty four hours?” Ram asked within a second.
“That’s not a big challenge. I can do better than that.”
“No. You will actually be spending every moment of those ten days fearing and trying to accept death.” The eternally drunk Vikram declared from the other room. None of us knew he was even awake.

“You will spend those days regretting every mistake you did, wishing life had been different and you had done things differently.”
“But that’s boring. I would rather stick to the hundred girls thing.”
And then Vikram had smiled a strange smile at me. And now sleeping on the sofa in my house on my first day of the rest of life with cancer or rather the first day when I would start counting my days, his smile seemed to travel through ages and reach out to my present and then I got this creepy thought that Dr.Sridar looked like Vikram, the same height, the same pointed nose. And then he was bending down over me and shaking me violently. I knew he had come for my blood. To make me ‘pay’ for my sins or whatever he had said all those years back. Vikram had died the year after passing out of college. None of us had been surprised.
I woke up, drenched in sweat and Sheela was bending down placing her palm over my forehead to see if I was running temperature.

“What happened? How did you come home so early?”

“I had a little head ache. So I came home.”

“You are having headaches so often nowadays. Fevers too. May be we should see some doctor.”
And then I remembered that I had had fevers quite often in the recent past. Everything started to fall in place.

“What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing.”
I was thinking of how to start telling her. I watched her face. I tried to remember the last time I had said something that had brought about a smile on her face. I couldn’t think of one instance in the recent past when I had made her happy. Only a barrage of hundreds of fights was playing in my mind. And then without notice the thought came and brought with it a lot of peace.
I was not going to tell her. The idea bowled me over with its simplicity. I failed to think of the bigger picture and chuckled to myself in some insane pleasure for having averted the need to frame the right sentences to tell her the truth. I remembered moments in my schooldays when I got the same satisfaction when I would hide my Math papers from mom. It was as if I could always change reality by rejecting to speak about it, by preventing people from knowing. I soothed my mind saying I’ll tell her after it gets confirmed, after the other test results came. I wanted to think the doctor had said there was some chance that the previous tests had gone wrong. But the evil Sridar gave no such hopes. He had almost promised on his profession that I had cancer. A part of my mind rejoiced nonetheless when I decided not to tell. I kept looking at her and realized after many months that she was really beautiful.
I thought of how everything would change the moment I spill the truth. The knowledge about my condition was like a bomb, which would explode any moment killing all happiness and more importantly the ‘normal’ feeling around me. And I thought nonchalantly that my life would end the moment the truth came out – my life as Arun Kumar, my life as an average husband, my life as a successful Project manager, my life as a normal human being full of all the small mistakes. In that small bundle of truth was wrapped my entire life for once it was opened, I would be just another dying man and all my mistakes would have been instantly forgiven. I did not want that. Thinking of the past few years was making me sick. I had lived the life of an average man. Not the dream life I had wanted to live years back when I was still forming what would become my self-image, when I was dreaming of a good future and was not too busy to live life by the second. And so that day, watching Sheela make tea for me, I decided not to tell anyone the truth for as long as possible.

3

I tried to sleep that night hoping I would wake up from this nightmare to a world where I did not have cancer, where my biggest worry was to meet a one month project deadline. Office and work seemed distant then and so did my home, for locked inside myself I had traveled far, into unknown lands where the dying men belonged. I seemed to have aged a few decades in the few hours after I knew of my deadline. The mechanical part of my brain noted idly that I would in fact not be eligible for the insurance. So I would not be able to save a few thousands in taxes. I almost chuckled thinking of how intensely calculative I had become to be bothering about taxes and insurance right then. And the thought flows always lead to the topic of my near date with death.

And then I thought about all the recent illnesses, the frequent headaches and began relating everything to cancer. Before long my mind concluded that even the bike accident four years back had been because of my cancer. I felt as though the cancer had been there right inside me, waiting to come out, watching me every minute. And right when my mind was attributing childhood typhoid to cancer as well, I woke up from the semi sleep. Sheela was fast asleep, wrapped in the light blue sheets. I walked over to the balcony. It had a view of the beach. On nights when I did not get sleep, I would keep staring at the sea, bathing myself in the salty night breeze. And such sleepless nights had been more frequent than the past in the last few months.

I sank down in the chair in the balcony, letting the vastness of the dark night engulf me. I could feel a tiredness of the mind, a weariness born of months of hectic schedules, meetings, sleepless nights. I threw the bed sheet I had wrapped around me as I felt it looked like the typical cancer patient costume.

From where I was sitting, I could see the tarnished face of the moon. It suddenly seemed too dull and dark. I kept staring at it as the dim circle seemed to transform into a well, too deep and too hollow. At the bottom of the deep well, I could see my own reflection on the shallow sheet of water. I could hear a voice tell me that it was my well of happiness and it had dried up almost to its floor. And yet, on the water, I could see myself, I was
not my present self though. I was a much younger, much happier person, untouched by the weariness of work, just ready to face the world, just ready to make a life. And slowly, the well seemed to engulf me, to take me on a rendezvous with heaven which I realized was moments from my own past. I closed my eyes, thankful to accept that gift, to relive those moments in silence, sipping from my past which was soothing like a glass of old wine.
4
I was checking the mirror for the hundredth time that day. I was still not convinced if I had shaved properly. My face looked fresh and much younger without the bushy, uneven hair growth that had been sprouting all over my neck. My first shave gave me immense confidence and my skin tone seemed to have ‘improved’ from dark black to brown all of a sudden. The smell of cologne aftershave was strong and intoxicating.
“They are Punjabi people. They moved in only yesterday.”
I was idly over hearing the conversation between my parents about our new neighbors.
“He has just now retired from some bank. She is a house wife. They have two daughters.”
I was beginning to get interested.
I was fully alert waiting to know more about the mystery girls. I could already visualize the sizzling Punjabi sisters. I could almost see their round, shiny faces. I was hoping at least one of them was in my age group. Or they could be twins, even identical twins. I rejected the wish thinking it will be too boring to see two similar looking girls; I could us a little variety. Right when I was deciding on the exact facial features for the two girls, my mother’s next statement woke me up to reality.

“Both of them are studying in Stella Marris.”
Now I was both disappointed and excited. I had certainly heard about the reputation of Stella Marris. Many of my friends had even enlightened me on the theory that attractive physical appearance was a qualifying criterion to get into the college. I spent another fifteen minutes in front of the mirror to ensure I looked fit enough for the unknown angels’ eyes.
I alternated between the TV video games and checking the flat B8 from the balcony. We lived in A8 and the balconies of the two houses faced each other. A few men were moving the furniture to the house but there was no sight of the mysterious girls. After noon I got tired of the waiting and my interest began to fade at least momentarily though I did not go for the usual Sunday cricket match at my school ground. I was crossing newer levels in the latest super Mario game that never seemed to have a last stage when the lightning started. There was an immediate power failure as it started thundering hard.
“Arun, bring in the clothes I have wrung in the balcony. It looks like it’s going to rain hard.”
I reluctantly walked to the balcony, feeling too bad that I had to again start at the beginning of the stage in the game. The wind was strong and all the windows were drumming against their frames. The thick smell of wet mud filled the air, announcing the onset of a downpour. I hurriedly pulled off the clothes without even bothering to remove the clips. If I had not paused to enjoy the wet breeze, I would’ve missed the most beautiful picture I had ever seen. In the balcony in B8, two testimonials of God’s aesthetic touch walked over, oblivious to the presence of their devotee who was right then writing off his soul to their divinely appearance. It was then that I had the greatest dilemma I ever had to face in my life. It was about whom to direct my attention at that very moment. One of them was tall, fair and chubby, with a mature face which showed she was the older one. Her face seemed to emanate a warm feeling of genuine affection and love to the world around, pleasantness mixed with mild pride at being a source of beauty to the place surrounding her like a cheerful butterfly – my mind was at complete loss in trying to describe and classify how she looked as I noted the way her upper eye lashes kissed the lower ones as she closed her eyes, feeling the light drizzle on her soft face. She was wearing a baby pink churidar and matching ear rings. For the first time, I noted that their balcony was jus ten feet away from mine.
As I was getting engrossed in her, her sister came forward offering a better view. And THAT was more than my weak heart could bear. Those days I would classify beauty into two categories:
First, the ones you would want to own and keep close to you.
Second, the rare ones that leave you in total awe, making you feel happy about that you are alive, re assuring that there is a god and a tasteful one at that, the kind you read of in stories, and never hope to meet in person, the out of earth angels. This girl belonged to the second type. She was excessively fair, the color of jasmine and moon. She had neatly carved sharp eyebrows over the shiniest pair of eyes I had seen, her wavy her was overflowing over her shoulders, shining like black silk. She was wearing a sky blue salwar with a matching blue hair clip of an unusual shape. Her lips were the shape of heart, like two slices of the freshest strawberries. Her smile was unearthly and wise like the ones you saw in the images of goddesses. Her face seemed to echo the delicate transition from a cute child to an attractive adult. She also had a pink glow and a shine which made me wonder if she was on incubator from the day she was born. . Even the couple of marks from past pimples seemed to add to the heavenly face rather than mar its beauty. They seemed to reassure she was human too, as if she was an angel who was cursed to live among humans, to fill the deprived earth with beauty and goodness. She was extending her hand to let the lucky drain drops touch her fingers and the grace with which she moved again filled me with intense awe. Before I could remotely recover from the spell they had cast on me, the inevitable happened. They noticed me staring at them as I tried desperately to look disinterested as I removed the last of the clothes that been hung for drying. But instead of getting irritated or angry as I feared, they simply smiled at me mouthing a silent ‘hi’.
I gave an almost toothy grin. But I felt a little bitterness when I realized they would’ve probably have classified me just as a neighbor ‘kid’. I wished I was older than them. I wished they would see me as handsome young man. I came back into the room and went straight to the mirror to check my face. I was too disappointed to see my hair in total disorder. I hoped my angels hadn’t noticed it. But they had hardly seen me. I did not have any complains. It was pure luck that of all the apartment complexes in town, they chose this one. I could hardly breathe when I fantasized about the different possibilities about how I could get close to them. At that age I hardly knew of what was causing all this unrest and upheaval in my mind whenever I saw pretty women. My knowledge about hormones and other biochemistry that caused these changes was hardly existent and I took it as just another passing phase of life except that it never really passed.
But that Sunday when the angels came into my life I would’ve hardly imagined what was to come, and I feel in such surprises lies the beauty of life…

5
I used to cycle back home from school. It took me around twenty minutes. I would have to rush to the math tuitions after reaching home. I usually spent the cycle rides planning what I would do that evening. But in the past few days, the cycle rides like all other time were spent contemplating the beauty of my neighbor angel. I had found out from mother that her name was Soniya. Her elder sister was Neelam. But my meditations were always centered on Soniya. She was in her first year of college. That meant she was about four years older than me while Neelam was seven years older. As I took a turn to the beach road trying to recollect how her voice had sounded when she said that musical ‘hi’, I failed to see an approaching bike and he hit my bicycle hard from the front pushing me to the road. I had been coming too fast and so skidded for a distance bruising my elbows badly. There were cuts in my face too. Grains of sand stuck to the wounds. The biker was yelling at me. A few people had rushed to help me get up. And then was the moment of shame. There among those who had rushed to the spot was my dream angel, walking towards me hastening her graceful stride with anxiety and recognition. I got up on my own and was pretending to check the bicycle. A couple of spokes had come off from the rear wheel.

“Are you OK?”

I kept wondering why she was singing a song right then. She touched my forehead and was examining the wounds. It slowly dawned on me she was asking me something. I kept standing there, like some war hero, exhibiting the souvenirs from the latest battle.

“Are you OK, Arun?” Now I was shocked. I had not even considered the remote possibility that she would know my name.

“I am OK. It was nothing.” I hoped she hadn’t seen me falling off from the bicycle. I wished she would think I got hurt while racing with a friend or while overtaking a car.

“Shall we go to a doctor?”

“No. I am really ok.”

We walked towards our compound, pushing my bicycle which was making strange metallic noises as the spokes of the rear wheel rubbed against the road.

I tried hard not to keep staring at my angel. Now that she was walking so close by it was a really difficult task. It felt really unfair that she too had to walk like me. I was angry with her father, the retired bank manager for not buying her a car. It was unfair that the angel had to walk through the same shit filled road like just another ordinary mortal.

“Which school?” she casually asked. Her heart shaped lips seemed to join at an angle that made it look extra cute.

“DAV” I disliked the very name of the school.

She walked silently, immersed in thoughts. I continued watching her face, the way the two drops of sweat from her forehead left a wet trail as they flowed down to the rich valleys of her cheeks. I had an urge to wipe off the sweat and blow air into her face.

“How do you go to college?” I would’ve gotten heart attack if my angel took a city bus to commute to her college. I could already visualize a hundred men ogling at her in the bus. Somehow it felt like a gross imperfection to even imagine her going in a city bus.

“I have a scooty.” She said with yet another new variety of smile. She seemed to have endless varieties of smiles. Like a magician pulling off an unexpected trick, she was throwing the different types when I least expected them. The present smile seemed welcoming signaling that she did not find it an intrusion of her privacy that I was asking her questions about her life, even if they were about the most trivial things.

We had reached our apartment building. I looked at her hoping she would ask me to go to her house and put medicines for my war wounds.

“Hey wash the wounds with dettol and apply some anti septic.”

“Yeah, ok. ”
I guessed my voice revealed my disappointment.

“Ok then. Take care. See you, bye.” She flashed a smile of yet another variety whose meaning I couldn’t decipher.
I walked home, wishing I drove a bike instead of a bicycle and could drop her every day to college – at least on days when her scooty had some problem and though it was just another fantasy, I was already wishing her scooty would break down often. But there was also the frightening possibility that some other classmate would drop her. I almost chuckled in relief when I remembered that Stella Marris was a women’s college. But she would definitely have boyfriends, or rather friends who were guys. I was beginning to hate those hypothetical ‘friends who were guys’. And by the time I finished wishing that those friends’ bikes meet with horrible accidents, I reached my house.

6
Me and Soniya were going out. But by no means was it just the two of us and included Me, Soniya and thirty more people who lived in Akshaya Apartments. The residents had been planning a picnic for quite a long time. After a long debate, they decided on Mahabalipuram. It was a place that almost everyone had seen, but to go as a group there weren’t many good places. And when I heard that Soniya and Neelam had never visited Mahabalipuram, I got excited. I decided I will be their guide, conjuring up stories about each place. I bought a travel book on Mahabalipuram a week before we left. It cost me a month’s saved pocket money. I did not want to take any chances. On the day of the tour, I knew more about mahabalipuram than most people in Mahabalipuram. I was worried I shouldn’t sound too geeky.

This was about two months from the day the angels walked into Akshaya. In these two months I had spoken to Soniya only thrice other than the accident day. Somehow I was content on watching her from a distance. The three times when we talked were only brief ‘hi’, ‘byes’ while I was playing cricket in our compound garden or when she was putting rangoli. Yes, she was really good at rangoli and it was heavenly to watch her slender fingers so carefully deposit the coloured powders that seemed to transform magically into a beautiful picture.
I had not even noticed that we could actually overhear everything happening in B8 before Soniya came over. Then it had been one of the million irrelevant things. With each passing day, I was more convinced she came down from heaven. She became my sweet obsession. I would come home every day, guessing what colored dress she would be wearing, what song she would hum as she relaxed in the balcony for those precious fifteen minutes each evening. On a few prosperous days, she had even slept off in the balcony, clutching some dull novel. Those were days I heartily thanked my parents for buying that house. I was overcautious and never let her even get any hint of being watched. It never occurred to me as a wrong act. To me her mere presence in this locality was a gift from god, a prasad I dutifully accepted. I would admire the way she bit the golden chain around her neck, I admired the way she stretched out and relaxed after a long stint with a book, I admired the way she unconsciously kept adjusting her dupatta, I admired her sweet voice that soothed my soul even when she was fighting with her sister, I admired the sweet little Hindi songs she sang along with the TV. Now I come to think of it, there were so many things I admired about her that my full capacity to admire seems to have got exhausted in those few months I spent admiring her.

But when it came to talking to her, I got too self conscious. I could never bring myself to stop looking at her face and this made conversation really difficult. But Soniya was friendly to everyone. She would talk for hours to Mani uncle’s daughters, her immediate neighbours. From what I had overheard, her favourite food was chinese, her favourite actor was SRK , her favourite author was sidney sheldon, her favourite outing place was besant nagar beach and her favourite person was her sister, Neelam. I had stopped looking at Neelam right after the first day. Though I classified what I had for Soniya as ‘admiration’, for me even seeing some other girl then was nothing short of adultery.

Those two months of meditating about her eventually made me want to talk to her more and when I came to know about the trip, I started planning.
On the morning when we were getting ready to leave in the mini bus, there was the shocking news that Neelam was sick and so Neelam and Soniya weren’t coming with us. But the shock was short lived as Mani’s daughters pleaded with Soniya and convinced her to come. It also turned out that Neelam had only ordinary fever. I thanked god for the wonderful opportunity. Soniya would definitely have stuck close to Neelam had she come.

The travel time was fully spent on talks and boring Tamil songs kept blaring from the speakers. Anything other than the Hindi tunes Soniya hummed or sung were cacophony to my ears. Other than an idle two line chat about the weather I did get to speak to her throughout the journey. But the accidental brush of her hand against mine, as we were distributing the plates when we stopped for breakfast, did leave me dazed. I noted with extreme anger that Rajesh uncle was talking to her all the time, enquiring about all irrelevant details about her course. I secretly cursed him in my mind using all the ‘bad-words’ I could remember. I pitied my angel. This was a price she had to pay for being beautiful. The moment we set foot in Mahabalipuram, Soniya mouthed the one question I had been waiting for.

“Do any of you know about the history of this place?”

I bounced in with a triumphant expression, and started my well rehearsed
lecture.

“The actual name of the place is Mamallapuram. King Narasimhavarman who ruled it was called ‘Mamala’, meaning great wrestler…” And so I continued to a dumbfounded audience. I cautiously cut out the statistics and dates though I remembered them to sound casual. Soniya was thoroughly impressed, especially with my narrative of Arjuna’s penance. By the time I finished, she was putting her arm around my shoulder, batting her eyelashes in wonderment. My heart was leaping with joy. My mother was thoroughly confused, as the previous time we had been to mahabalipuram was when I was five.

From that time onwards till the evening we were together- me and my angel. But there were those annoying girls as well. And when the sun set and the full moon rose over the sea, we sat down in one of the rocks near the five rathas.

We had spent more than two hours at the beach, wetting our feet in the waves. A couple of large waves even made my angel hold my hand for support even if it was for just a few seconds.
“It will be so nice to have hot tea in this weather.” She suddenly said while another one of the waves broke.
In the next five minutes, I had run to the shop about half a mile away, collected tea in a plastic cup and rushed back with it, taking care not to spill it anywhere.

“Hey… You went all the way just to get this? I was just wishing!”
I handed her the cup with a small smile. I was happy. I did not do that to impress her. I wanted to have the satisfaction of fulfilling at least one of her wishes, even If it was a trivial one. She was my angel.

The sand from the beach was sticking to her legs. Her wavy hair was flowing with the heavy wind, as she narrowed her eyes to avoid the sand from getting into it. And to my surprise, the nonsense sisters ran away to their mom to annoy her into buying them a shell with their name inscribed on it. Soniya did not go. She kept looking at the broad sea, the skies, and the moon which seemed very ugly in her presence. She sipped silently from the tea cup.

“This place is beautiful… Everything about it. From the statues, beaches, rocks! Everything is so beautiful.”

“You are more beautiful!” I couldn’t believe my ears as I mouthed those words. I expected her to slap me hard or just walk away. But I did not feel any remorse. I felt it my duty as an ‘admirer’ to let the art work know it is priceless. She was looking down at the tea cup, unsure, maybe of how to react.

“You are the most beautiful girl I have seen. The most!”

She was still silent. For few moments the whole beach ahead of us felt empty. There were just the sky, sea, me, her and the moon. The waves provided the suitable music by splashing hard over the rocks to second my words. I looked into the sea and then to her. She was looking at me. She was no longer confused. She smiled at me another of her mysterious variety of smile and breathed the word in her usual honey coated tone.

“Thank you!” There seemed to be an emphasis on ‘you’. The whole return journey was a blur. I remember feeling that I had started smelling of the perfume Soniya used, the name of which I never found out. Years later, Sheila would bring the same perfume sample in a clothes store and ask for my opinion and I would reply “It is not good. Don’t buy it.”
7
“Hey thanks a lot..!” She was flashing the ugliest smile that ever left her lips.
Soniya was waving at the bastard. He was the ugliest person I ever saw. He refused to leave, making his bike roar as he kept showing his disgusting teeth. His hair was parted in the middle; he was wearing a ring in one of his ears. After full five minutes, he left with Soniya waving him off with many byes.
This was one month after the Mahabalipuram trip. I had started talking to her more often. But it never got personal. But I had seen or imagined I had seen shyness in her eyes when she spoke to me. I had heard music in my head in those precious moments of silence while we were talking. And now I had seen her coming in bike with that creature.
I decided to take a walk to cool my boiling blood. But as fate would have it, I met her near the gate. She was discussing something with Mrs. Pramila, the apartment secretary.

“Hi!” Her face bloomed on seeing me, but I realized her face always looked that way and had nothing to do with seeing me.
I muttered the dullest ‘hi’ possible and kept walking towards the gate.
“You are sounding too dull. What happened?”
“It’s nothing.”
She looked anxious. I kept walking towards the gate trying not to look at her excessively pleasing face.
“Wait. What happened, Arun? You seem to be angry with me.”

We were walking on the street. I was disappointed to know that my face so clearly revealed my anger.
“Wait! I can’t walk as fast as you do.”
“Who is that guy?”
Now I had crossed my limits. She could have just said ‘that is none of your business’ or at least ‘what has that got to do with you?’

I had stopped walking. I was staring at the line of houses of on the other side of the road to avoid having to see her face. I had never seen her getting angry. Despite all the anger, I knew I would break down if I saw anger in her divine eyes, and definitely not forgive myself for being the reason for it. Angels did not need to explain to mortals why they do what they do. Thus, I was standing there, torn between two alter egos, one worshiping her the way I always did, the other feeling too possessive though nothing ever warranted me to be possessive about her. I had pushed my luck just too far. But I was satisfied at being honest.
“He is just a friend.”
We kept walking in silence.
“He looks so gay!” I muttered.
She started laughing. She pinched my cheeks and withdrew her hand immediately.
“I won’t talk to him if that is bothering you so much. He isn’t a close friend.”
There were a million thoughts flooding my mind.
‘Implies I am a close friend.’
‘Angel considers me an important person.’
‘Angel considers me THE MOST important person.’
I did not know where that thought sprang from. We did not talk for the rest of the walk. WE reached the apartments in about five minutes. I had not once looked at her face- the longest span of time I had been without looking at her while I was with her.
“You will come tonight, right?” She asked casually.
“Where?”
“To the new year celebration tonight.”

I had completely forgotten that it was December 31st. We usually had dance, song and other programs that would go on till midnight. They usually gave me complex that I had no such talent. I would soothe that feeling making fun of everyone performing on stage. I usually had my own group of losers to give me company.
“I may not come. I am not really interested.”

“Hey… Neelam is dancing. Do come. It will be fun.”
“You are not dancing?”
“I don’t know how to dance.”
‘Your every movement is a dance. You just be yourself on stage. With every single graceful stride you cannot but paint the best dance strokes.’

“Moreover I am planning a mega rangoli. I will need some help.”
“Then I will surely come.”
She left without flashing any mysterious smiles at me.
I slept off that after reaching home. And predictably enough I dreamed about her. She was wearing cow boy hats and taking me on a horse ride. When the galloping of the horse became too fast, I frantically groped for something to hold onto.
“Hold on to me.” She whispered into my ears as the hat flew off and her wavy hair spread all over my face. “I will never let you fall.”
The celebrations had started already when I went down at 9 PM. All the latest songs were blaring from the loud speakers. I scanned the crowd for Soniya but she was nowhere in sight. I sat down and endured nearly an hour of dances and songs. I was beginning to get restless when I couldn’t spot Soniya till eleven thirty. I took a third round of the compound searching for her and found her in the front portion of the apartment buildings. A beautiful girl was extending a bouquet of flowers.
“How is it?” She anxiously asked. Here she was, my angel, looking for my appreciation like a kid. Her eyes were glowing like two balls of fire. She was wearing a jet black top and a faded blue jean. The moon was shining down on her face. The satin skin of her face had patches of the rangoli powders all over it.
“How is it?” She asked again. But I was too dazed to talk. Everybody in the apartment complex was at the other side of the compound where the music had grown louder as the clock ticked closer to midnight.
“Beautiful…” I whispered without taking my eyes off her face.
“The colors…” I said pointing to her face.
“Oh. Must’ve rubbed face with powder in hand.” My hand was still raised, pointing to her face.
“You are beautiful…” I told her the third time. A cold breeze swept past us and I sensed her coming closer to me.
“I look like charcoal next to you… ” I continued, intoxicated.
“No. You are really cute…” She was whispering too. The huskiness of the whisper felt like whiskey over her honey coated voice
“The way you keep looking at me, the longing and admiration, the jealousy and possessiveness…”
She had taken yet another step in my direction. I could smell her perfume and even her shampoo.
“The way you can never really have enough of being with me….”
My fingers had touched her face now. I felt something close to what Armstrong must’ve felt on touching the moon. I moved my fingers slowly over her face. Her face felt like warm silk. I could see the pink rushing into her fair face as she started blushing. My fingers reached her heart shaped lips and I could feel them trembling.
I took my hand off her face. And it was then that she planted her strawberry lips right over mine. The clock had stuck midnight. Crackers were being burst and the loud speakers were blaring a happy New Year song. Her lips tasted mildly of strawberry or so I imagined. In my mind, I was in one of the heavens, maybe the one she descended from. I could feel the angels of heaven showering flowers around us. The crackers lasted for about five minutes. It was a stroke of luck or destiny that nobody bothered to come to the entrance of the apartment complex for those precious five minutes. She broke the kiss and took a step back.
“Love you…” She was breathing into my ears. I saw a glint of madness in her eyes that looked very familiar. I realized it was the same madness that had been gripping me ever since she walked into my life. She planted a soft kiss on my cheeks and walked away, turning to flash the most mysterious smiles of all.

8

“When you reach the heights of happiness, Beware! From there you can only fall downward”
“Pardon, I don’t understand what you are saying…” I tried to walk away from beggar regretting I had even bothered to talk to him.
“No one does… And that is why all of you are suffering… You should know…” He smiled at me with a glint that looked out of place in the eyes of a fully starved beggar. I dug out one rupee from my pocket and put it in his hand, wishing he would leave me with that. But he did not even seem to notice the coin as it fell down and rolled into the drainage nearby. I cursed under my breath.
“What do you want?” I asked in a voice that did not hide the fact that I was thoroughly annoyed.
I had been walking home after playing cricket with few friends in the neighbourhood ground. This man had come to me on his own and started talking.
“I don’t need anything from you, son. You only do. Don’t get carried away. For every smile we will pay with tears. For every moment of happiness there will be hours of weeping!”
I couldn’t take the depressing words anymore. The stench that seemed to emanate from him gave me an instant head ache. I started walking away, towards home, towards some place where I would not have to endure such depressing thoughts, towards sanity. I shot a glance at the beggar to see if he was trying to follow me. But he was not. Instead he was smiling at me. The smile seemed pervasive, as if he could see through me, read my mind and could see my past, present and future right in my face. I quickly turned away as a man in a nearby shop in the platform muttered “Don’t mind him. He is a mad man. Keeps saying so much of shit all the time”

I walked towards home, wondering why Soniya did not come out of her house the whole day.
But I had spent the day engrossed in imaginations about her. I had vividly imagined living with her every day. I had felt mildly guilty that I had not said I love you after she did. But it had been too sudden and I knew that my mind had completely frozen due to the shock and excitement. I decided I would tell that today and was thinking of whether to buy her a rose or a chocolate to give her when we met. I shyly touched my lips to feel the kiss again, to relive the moment for the hundredth time that day.
As I neared the apartment building I spotted her coming out towards the front lawn. The first thing I noticed was that her eyes were fully red. I could see that she had been crying for hours. I stifled the urge to put arms around her, to comfort her, to blow air into her weary eyes. But there were people around and I simply gave her a questioning look.
“I want to talk to you…” She muttered and walked towards the gate.
She was silent till we reached the end of the street.
“What happened, Soniya?”

“I am so sorry for what happened yesterday.”

My heart started racing. I did not want to listen to this anymore.
“I should have been mature. This is madness. I don’t know. Somehow my heart was weak. I can’t believe I did what I did.”

I was speechless. Suddenly she was just another girl talking to me; the angel in her seemed to
have vanished.

“I am terribly sorry. Don’t spoil your mind with ideas. We are too immature. Let’s not talk again. Ever again. I am terribly sorry.” She was sobbing in between the sentences. A part of me wanted to hug her and tell her that she was wrong, that we were destined to be together, that I loved her and would take good care of her, that she was an angel from heaven. And another part was cursing her in my mind using all the bad words I had learnt from friends.

“Do you not love me?” I breathed out the words using the ‘love’ word for the first time in life with a girl.

“I don’t. Neither do you. All this is infatuation…. ”
I died inside and tried hard not to break down. I could see that her heart shaped lips were trembling as her tears flooded her cheeks. Seeing her crying pained me deep inside. I did not want my angel crying because of me. So I watched her silently, forgetting to let those thousand drops of tears that were stagnating my eyelids to flow.
“I will always love you, Soniya…” I said madly, matching her crying with my soulful voice.
“I think of you all the time. I love you with all my heart and soul.”
She was crying hard and simply walked away, drying her face in her dupatta with an ever so graceful stride.

I waited right there, hoping she would come back to me flashing one of her smiles, to tell me that she was only playing around with me, to hold me close and re assure that she loved me too. I even had a silly doubt that she was doing this to trust my love, whether I would leave her if she talked like this. But then she never came back and this was the last time I ever spoke to her.

9

Present Day

I walked towards the sylvan lodge that looked at least a hundred years old. As I reached the humble reception that had nothing more than a table and a chair I was surprised to see that it was in fact not empty and the chair was occupied by a puny person. I was unsure of whether it was the person in charge or some neighbourhood boy.
“I need a room for three days.”
As he looked up from the book he was reading, I could see that he was at least forty years old. He quickly hid the book he was reading.
“Five hundred per day. Two thousand deposit…” I paid the amount and slowly followed him to the room. I noted that it was smaller than the bathroom in my apartment.
“There is a balcony there with a nice view.” He said pointing to the corner of the room. I walked over to find that the ‘balcony’ was protruding only three feet from the room. But the view was splendid. I could see the hills all around, with the clouds engulfing the green patches. Surely this was not one of the famous lodges in Ooty, but it definitely suited the purpose for which I had gone there. I did not prefer the star hotels I usually stayed at. I had lied to Sheela that I was going to Bangalore for a conference.
I had spent the previous day getting a list of medicines that the doctor had prescribed; giving few more tests for god knew what. I needed some solitude, some time alone to think about what I was going to do, to let go of all the dreams of future I had nurtured all along.

“If there is anything you want, you can tell me. I can arrange for it.” The puny manager said with a toothy grin.
“No. I won’t need anything. Thank you.”
I did not know if he was asking about booze or something else. It made no difference.
The lake was vast. In every direction I could see the water reflecting the mountains all around. The place was less crowded than I remembered from my previous trips. I sat down in a stone bench, absorbing the enormity of the place. One of the branches from a tree in the bank of the lake was bending down and wetting the flower buds that had grown at the tip of the branches with the sheets of water that the ripples in the water were pushing to shore. Evening mist had started settling down slowly over the water, the air carried with it a scent of wetness and mud. From where I was sitting, I could see a school of thousand fishes in the shallow water, forming a dark sheet just below the water. A bushy brown dog was walking nearby, searching for a warm place to spend the evening. A couple of small kids were playing in the distance. One of them was a cute girl who was holding a balloon close to her as she clung to her mother. She saw me and tightened the hold on the balloon.
I realized that I too was like her in many ways, clinging to things that I held precious. I just wished those things were as simple as a balloon.
With so much life around me, my heart forgot all its woes. Instead of doing all the analyzing that I had planned to do, I simply sat there, lost in the beauty of nature all around, finding the world a celebration of life, a place too sacred to be polluted with worries. There I sat like a cheating husband, plotting my rendezvous with my new mistress. A mistress I felt no longing for – the mistress of death.
“Do you want a cotton candy, Sir?”
A small boy was standing near me, with many small packets if cotton candy tied to a stick he carried over his shoulders. I did not know what made him think I would be interested in cotton candy. But looking at him then, at his sleep lost eyes, I decided I wanted to eat cotton candy. I bought four cotton candies and as he left pocketing the money I had given, I saw with intense satisfaction that he was smiling. Somehow that smile seemed important then, as if it was a remainder for me about how I had forgotten to smile off late, of how I had forgotten to make people smile, of how I had traded the best things of life for dreams that had no purpose, of how empty my life had become chasing things that did not have life. Darkness had dawned down very fast before I realized it and a thousand stars were shining down over the lake, seemingly checking their twinkle on the reflection. A radio was playing in a teashop nearby. I could not hear what the song was, but the music seemed soothing. There I was sitting on the bench – a dying man. A man who had had it all – a loving wife, a great job, a good bunch of friends and yet I had chosen to be unhappy and discontented. And now when I knew my end was near I wanted to make amends, to restore the beautiful picture that I had been scribbling over, to live life all over again, the way I should have. And somehow instead of feeling angry or sad for my current state, I felt mildly peaceful for at last I had woken up to reality, to see life for what it was and I felt a deep sense of gratitude.

10
I could never really forgive Soniya for what she had done. For few years after that I could never again trust a girl. Though with passing time I could understand the tide of confusions that must’ve hit her, deep inside I could not accept what she did to me. And to this date I have never once classified what I had for her as ‘infatuation’ for the word itself creates images of lust, craving and guilt. What I had felt for her seemed too pure to qualify as that. But after all these years I can understand that it was not love either. But in the deep repositories of heart, those feelings got buried as unclassified, raw emotions that did not carry tags of right or wrong, good or bad. I guess such emotions are only meant to be experienced and never analyzed. But the event left me insecure about people, about relationships. And in those few years of adolescence, I was more than careful not to hurt myself again. I never again looked at Soniya or any other girl for a long time. All girls seemed to be the same and deep inside I feared them. I kept away from most of them. Whenever I saw any girl smile, I would be reminded of those infinite varieties that Soniya had flashed and then the day will be spent in re living the whole episode. I did not have much hope of forgetting her, but somehow all my emotions seemed to be bundled with imaginations and memory and did not reflect in real life, for I could walk past her without feeling any remorse or even looking at her. But the ‘image’ of her I had in my mind was haunting me, the word ‘infatuation’ would play a million times as if it was some verdict from hell to seal off my happiness.

Then I did not have any idea that this was just a passing phase like every other phase that had passed. And then it was life’s turn to throw some more surprises at me, but they were pleasant ones. The first time I saw Sheela I did not hear music in my head, instead I heard the sound of cars honking continuously. It was the first day of my work life. I was waiting at the bus stop at eight thirty to catch the bus. And suddenly there was lots of confusion and shouting. I heard the screeching sound of a car racing on the road. I too rushed into the crowd to see what was happening. A school boy had been run over by a speeding car. One girl from the crowd rushed to the boy and lifted him off the ground. She looked around and saw me and beckoned me to help. I too rushed in and carried him to an auto that had stopped nearby and as I deposited him on the auto seat, she quickly said.
“Hey… You get in too. I don’t have any cash.”
Even before I could protest I had gotten in and the auto was on the way to the nearby hospital. I kept checking my watch as we admitted the boy into the emergency ward, as I filled up the hospital admission form, as I rushed to the wash basin to wash the blood stain off my shirt, as I gave her all the cash I carried.
“Hey… Have this cash in case they ask you to buy some medicine or something urgently. I have to go now. I would really like to help here. But today is my first day at work. I am already late.”

I had gotten the boy’s home number from his ID card and had informed his mother. So I did not feel any guilt.
She started to say something and then changed her mind.

“Ok. Not a problem. I will be here till his parents are here. Give me your number.”
As she entered the number into her phone address book she looked up.
“Hey… What’s your name?”
“Arun.” I mumbled and left without bothering to ask her name.
I reached office at one that day. I was little agitated that she had asked me to come along. As I was getting used to the new place and the new people around, I slowly forgot the incident. I got a call at around six in the evening.
“Hey… This is Sheela.”
I identified the voice.
“Yeah tell me. How is he now?”
“He is OK now. His mom came a little while after you left. And I did not need the cash.
Where can I give it to you?”
“Hmmm… I will come to the same bus stop in about half hour. Can you come there? I can come anywhere else if you want.”
“No. I will be there.”

As the company bus dropped me near the bus stop I saw that she was standing there, looking tired.
“Hi… How was your first day at work?”
“It was good. Didn’t do much today. You stayed at the hospital?”

“Yeah…The boy’s mother was alone. She did not have anyone for help.”

“Oh … I would’ve surely stayed if it was any other day. You know, getting a job is so tough these days and I did not want to leave a bad impression the very first day.”
“Yeah I know. Getting a job is a tough thing. There was this interview I was going to attend today. One of the dream places I wanted to work at. I guess now I’ve to wait.”
She turned and left with a smile.

11
I checked the traffic ahead through the portion of the windshield of the auto which was not covered with Rajni stickers. I was precariously holding on to the dozen plastic bags full of cheap clothing accessories I had bought from Ranganathan Street.
“Shit! The traffic is too heavy. I hate Chennai for this.”
As I completed the statement a truck moved close to the auto releasing sooty smoke into the cramped interior of the auto. I strained hard to close my nose with my palm without losing hold on any of the bags.
“Shall I hold some of them?” Sheela offered. I handed over a couple of bags, and checked her face in the rear view mirror of the auto. Beads of perspiration were flowing down her forehead, wetting the sandal in the center. But unlike my weary face, her countenance showed no signs of impatience or irritation.
“Do you need to go home urgently?”
“Not really. But this traffic and pollution is too much to bear.”
She kept looking out of the window at the passing vehicles like a foreign tourist admiring the ethnic beauty of the place.
I looked at the auto driver’s face on the rear view mirror and noted that he too was thoroughly irritated with the traffic and felt some solace for having someone equally irritated with the circumstances.
I turned to see if Sheela was done with admiring the traffic and realized she would never stop. I had met her in the T Nagar bus stop, waiting for a Besant Nagar bus just like me. After seeing the buses overly crowded, she asked if we could share an auto ride.
“How is your new job?”
“Well, it is no longer new, but it is good. What about you? Did you … er…”
“Yeah… I got a job. I am a junior accountant at a financing firm.”
“Oh cool… I felt guilty the other day when you said you missed your interview.”
“Hey you don’t have to feel guilty. I might not have gotten selected after all. I don’t regret anything at all.”
“It is rare to see someone who doesn’t regret anything.”
“No. I mean it. If we keep analyzing what if things were different, we can never really understand what life is teaching us. In every twist of fate is a lesson, a message to us, to understand what the inner meaning is, to find the solution to this puzzle called life.” She paused.
“Sorry, I talk a lot at times! It is one of my most annoying characteristic.”
“What are the others?”
“Well, you will have to be a very close friend to find out.” She said with a smile. We reached Besant Nagar and it seemed like the ride ended too soon.
“I am looking forward to it.” I said as she got down of the auto.
She looked at me with raised eyebrows.
“To become a close friend, to know the other annoying things.”
“Sure. Goodnight.”
12
I woke up with a start as my mobile started singing in the dark and with eyes closed, trying to remember back the dream, I picked up the call.
“Lazy bones, why did you pick up?! That was supposed to be a missed call.”
“I am sorry.”
“Ok. Come soon. I will be waiting near the park in fifteen minutes.”
I sat up on my bed realizing just how intertwined our lives had become. It had been three months since the auto ride. And as if by the ‘twist of fate’ that she had talked about, we kept meeting often and had become close friends before we knew it. She would call up my mobile and wake me up in the morning, I would rush to join her for the morning walk, and we would call each other at least once during the day and usually talk well into the night. There always seemed to be something to talk about. We would both say ‘bye’ only to continue the call after a minute finding some other topic to talk about.
We seemed to have so many things in common. We were similar in so many ways and it was fun to talk to someone who shared your views. Again we were so dissimilar in so many other ways and it seemed fun to endlessly argue trying to justify each others’ stand. Before I realized it, she had become an indispensible part of me, a part I loved to go back to, the part that seemed to fill me with so much of life, the part that taught me to look for the brighter side, the part that opened up my mind and heart to absorb the world for what it is.
Right from the beginning I knew she was a better person compared to me. There had been innumerous incidents when she had reacted in ways that amused me, for I knew how my own reaction would have been under the very same circumstances. I seemed to live life inside a bottle while she seemed to be sailing happily in the wide ocean. Thus she became my window to a new life, a happy one.
She took me as one of her best friends. And I was amazed that I could be so genuinely friendly to a girl and at last the wounds from the Soniya episode started healing slowly. Unlike me, Sheela would never fully open up to me. But I did not expect her to. But I was an open book to her. I would tell her about my latest crush in office or my latest triumph in career or my latest problem with parents. There wasn’t anything I could not tell her. It made me wonder how someone could start caring for another so soon. At times when she was out of town, I would feel empty inside and keep looking at my mobile longingly as if it had the key to my life and my happiness within its plastic casing. I would divert myself by going out with other friends. I had had so many close friends in life, but somehow she seemed to be so ideal a friend that at times I felt sad thinking of what life will be like if this part too ended like the most good parts always seemed to. And for a really long time, I was too careful not to grow any other expectations of this relationship, for I knew it would definitely spoil it. She was my best friend and that was what I wanted of her.
Months passed by and my work got more hectic. I had to put in long hours every day and would end up working on Saturdays and Sundays at times. Unlike in school and college, I did want to rise up in my profession and the job I had gotten into was taxing. I would tell her loads about my work, about my goals, my future plans. She would hear me out patiently, track my progress and keep reminding me of them whenever I lose focus. I knew I could never be that way to her even if I tried. I too would try to ask her about her work, about what she wanted to become. But unlike her I could never be so selfless. I understood that there would never be any symmetry in our relationship.
She would sometimes ask me to join her in her innumerable service work she involved in, like weekend tuitions in an orphanage, or teaching art work to mentally challenged kids, or the hygiene awareness programs in slums. I would always have some excuse or the other to not attend such things. She would never force or complain. When I asked her why she did these things, she would simply smile. It was a simple smile of humility unlike the ones Soniya flashed. At times when I did join her in these ventures, I would watch her so enthusiastically teaching a mentally retarded kid to hold a brush or cut paper in shapes, or talk to the slum people about their day to day problems, I realized that she did that to feel normal, it was in her very nature. I was proud of the way she was and accepted that I could never be like her, but it did not matter, for she always liked others for what they were and never expected them to be like her. Naturally she had a large group of friends, but somehow I knew she was closer to me for some unknown reason which remained a puzzle to me just like the million other things about life.

13
And thus passed two years of my life, as she continued painting so many pages of my life with her presence.
“It is such a lovely morning!”
“You say that every morning.”
“That is what amuses me! How is it that every morning is so lovely?”
I rolled my eyes and kept walking, rubbing my eyes to ward off the sleep.
“Why are you so sleepy all the time?”
“We kept talking till three last night! It spoilt my sleep.”
“How more rude can someone be.” She said with a smile.
“My mom told me something today.”
I kept silent which meant I was listening.
“It’s a silly thing actually. But I wanted to tell you.”
“Cut the crap. Just tell the thing.”
“Wait! You are one impatient idiot. There is this alliance that has come up, someone one of our relatives has suggested.”
I stopped walking. I kept looking at her face. My heart beat had risen and I hardly knew why or what I was praying right then for I was supposedly an atheist.
“The horoscopes have matched. So mom is asking me to talk to him. Hey. Are you ok?”
I realized I had closed my eyes though I wanted to close my ears or rather her mouth.
“I am OK. What did you decide?”
“I have been putting it off for two years now. They aren’t ready to give me more time. My mom is bent on getting me married off within this year. I am thinking I’ll talk to him- maybe email him or something.”
I kept remaining silent. I had never fully realized she would one day get married and leave the place, somehow that seemed to mar the picture, the picture my life had been transforming to. I was feeling this hatred towards NRIs. I had never felt possessive about her before and it felt really strange.
“So in a couple of months, you will be free of my torture.”
“Yes. I am looking forward to it very much.” I said wryly.
“You are the rudest. You know what; I don’t like this idea of marrying someone in the US. It sounds so stereotypical. I’d rather wait for the prince charming who’d sweep me off my feet.”
“You would live happily wherever you go.”
I couldn’t believe I said that.
“Hey, why are you turning sentimental now?”
“I am not. I just said you’ll be happy, it’s the guy who is going to suffer forever.”
“That’s more like you. I will tell you later about the guy after I talk to him.”
She did not call me that day. She did not answer my calls.
I kept calling her mobile about twenty times. I could picture her talking to the unknown NRI guy, getting to know him, getting to like him, exchanging pictures. I felt nauseated and kept calling her number till I heard the announcement that the phone switched off. It was then I knew it, that I needed her in life, that I couldn’t do without her.
When she called me early the next morning, I yelled badly into the phone.
“Are you done romancing with the US guy? You couldn’t even bother to pick up your phone?”
“What?!”
“I kept calling a hundred times. You did not even bother to respond!”
“I am sorry! Listen… My father got a heart attack! I was at the hospital whole day.”
I felt shame run through me as she continued speaking.
“I forgot to take my phone. I was not romancing with anyone! ”
“I am sorry, Sheela. I really am. I got mad. How is your dad now?”
I reached the hospital in half hour.
“How is he now?”
“They say it’s just a mild attack. But I am freaked.”
Her mother was sitting nearby, sobbing silently. Her father was lying in the bed and looked motionless. I had been to her house only a couple of times, though her parents knew we were close friends.
It was during those hours in the hospital when I kept assuring her that everything was going to be alright, that I decided I will tell her how I felt about her. Despite the years that had passed by, I suddenly remembered the day when Soniya left me and how it had left me lonely. I did not know if I would be able to move on in life if Sheela too left me when I told her. So I mulled over whether or not to tell her and the mulling stretched for the length of a whole month, thinking and re thinking of whether a day would come when I would muster the courage to tell her and imagining how it would feel if she ever said yes.
She looked up in surprise to find me near the park before her, that too on a Sunday.
“It’s such a lovely morning!” I said with a smile.
“Day of surprises I guess. What are you going to do next?”
“What happened to that US groom you told me about?”
“Oh. Forgot to tell you. We chatted for about one hour that day. He rejected me saying I am too impractical! I really loved the word ‘impractical’. Anyways one US guy escaped the torture.”
I found myself smiling.
“You seem to be really amused. You knew he’d reject me, didn’t you?”
“No. I only know that I love you, Sheela. You are the liveliest person I know. I want to be with you all my life.”
I couldn’t believe my ears voicing aloud my deepest feelings. I was astonished to find myself so much at peace that I was smiling wide, like a man without a worry.
“Is this another joke?” Her eyes were wide open, looking straight into mine. I noted with amusement that I wasn’t tensed. I felt a peace with the world around. The park was empty except for a few sleepy dogs.
“No, Sheela. I never realized this before.”
“This is shocking, really. I thought our thing will never come to this.”
I wasn’t listening to her; a voice in my heart told me she was mine. I was looking at her that day, as if I had never seen her before in my life. Beads of perspiration coursed down her cheeks and coalesced under her chin, wetting her neck. I noted that her hair looked cute tied back in a rough knot.
“I don’t know how to react to this.”
“You need my help with that?”
“No. I need some time. Let’s not talk about this till then.”
Both of us kept standing there, looking into each other’s eyes. After a long silence when I kept admiring the way her face hid the fact that she was scared, she mumbled a ‘bye’ and walked away slowly, turning back thrice to look at me. I started dreaming of my future with her, of getting up each day to see her face, to hear her say ‘What a lovely morning!’, of talking to her for hours in person late through the night, of watching the stars shine down and count them together, of joining her in all the mad things she did, of being her most intimate pal.
14
For three weeks we did not talk to each other. Each day of those three weeks was a painful vacuum, when all the hope I had in me kept vaporizing with each passing day. I was so vividly reminded of the tearful eyes of Soniya the day she left me. All the images of being with Sheela seemed to carry with it a heavy load of agony like that of a dream I never should have dreamt. I resisted the urge to call her up or to stroll down in the morning to join her for her morning walk. I believed she would turn around on her own and say ‘yes’, but with each passing day, that belief was put to test and the days seemed to stretch pointlessly long with a huge hollow where there would be moments of talking, arguing and watching just how mad she was. I relived every moment we had shared in my mind, replaying every word spoken. It amused me just how well I remembered each word uttered, each moment that we spent- they were etched in my memory forever, and when I started considering the possibility that she would never return, the images in mind got more vivid, a sad tune seemingly blending into the scenes in mind, the tune of agony of never being lovable, the tune Soniya had composed and planted in my heart, the tune that had been subtly playing all along while I fooled myself to believe I was being happy, and that sad tune played louder with the passing of each day, until I could bear it no longer. The nights would extend right into the dawn as I would keep watching the ceiling of my room, trying to figure out what was happening in my mind. And so on that Sunday, when I had slept off at around 6 am, my phone started chiming loud waking me up from another fuzzy dream.
“Hello” I did not bother to look at who the call was from. The phone had lost its relevance in my life for three weeks then. There was a long silence and in that silence, I heard her. I woke up with a start and started listening to the silence, wishing I could hear the heart of the person speaking at the other end. I heard her voice after the longest minute of my life and my heart leapt with joy at as the sounds of her voice flowed through the phone.
“How are you?”
“I am doing great.” I lied.
There was a long pause again and I thought I heard the sound her soft sob and that hurt me. The sad tune started playing wildly in my mind, the tune of agony I was getting so used to, but now it was way too loud and way too cacophonic like the crying of a starved child. The sobs continued unabated, gradually growing into a loud cry.
“Why are you crying?”
“I… don’t… know.”
“Please don’t cry. It hurts.”
I wanted to cup her face in my hands and tell her not to cry, to kiss her tears away.
“Whatever it is, please don’t cry. It seriously hurts!” I could hear my voice break down. I regretted giving her so much pain.
“Don’t… avoid… me… please! Don’t ever ignore me like this… again… I feel so lonely without you…”
It was the first time I heard her crying. I had always thought of her as a very strong woman.
“I won’t. I promise I won’t.” Her crying continued for sometime as I continued to reassure her.
“I’ll always be with you, forever! Trust me!”
The sad tune had stopped; it had been turned off by her words, replaced by a soft silence, a silence that re fed my heart with all the sweetest dreams, of being with her for a seamlessly infinite future. The journey from that day through to the day of our wedding was the part of life I would most cherish. The moments when we walked together hand in hand for the first time in the same road we had walked in for so many times , the moments when she held my hand for the first time in her strong hold, her fingers had curled up over mine, in an effort to bond me to her for eternity. I would always remember the blushful smile on her face on the day of the wedding, when she wore the bright red sari.
“I love you, princess.” I whispered into Sheela’s ears as I hugged her from behind, watching our reflection in the mirror. She looked every bit a princess with the crimson mehndi lining her hands and palm, her hair covered with flowers of every possible colour.
“Darling, you are looking too good, not at all like you.” I said pulling her close.
“Hubby, you are looking every bit a beast, as usual.” Her eyes glinted in the yellow light of the candles.
“I will show you what a beast can do.” I pounced on her, pushing her to the bed.
That night was special in so many ways as we wrote tales of intense passion and love. It was the acme of our story. Had I known it would soon spiral down, I might’ve expended more effort to preserve the moments, to record them better in my mind. But the happiest moments are mostly lost forever when we get too intoxicated with the happiness of the present to bother about the melancholy that future holds in the dirty darkness of the unknown tomorrow.

15
I vomited blood all over the wash basin. I was coughing badly and this was the first instance when I felt the illness. So far the cancer had only been on the papers and reports and had not made its presence felt. But now the time had come for it to reveal its persona with a grand entry like that of a drama artiste in some heroic play. I washed up the mess slowly as the cough continued and I frantically searched for the pill the doctor had prescribed to take if I vomit blood. The coughing sound and my screams of pain were loud enough to prompt the ‘reception’ clerk to come rushing to the room, using his key to enter. Darkness seemed to pervade the room, dimming the lights in the room, even the full moon shining down from the cloudy sky, hovering above the line of mountains, through the narrow window. The maroon fluid gushing out of my throat felt warm, making the insides of my throat feel like sandpaper.
“What happened, sir? Shall I call the doctor?”
I tried to open my mouth to answer him, when another pout of blood splashed out from my mouth, wetting the brown carpet on the floor. I fumbled through the medicine packet to dig out the pills and swallowed a couple without drinking water.
“Shall I call a doctor?”
“No. I am alright.”
I sat down on the bed, trying hard to ignore the burning sensation in the throat.
“I have blood cancer.” I told more to myself than to the short clerk whose eyes widened on hearing the word.
He immediately went a whole meter away from me.
“You don’t have to do that. Cancer doesn’t spread like that.”
“I know, sir. Don’t mistake me. I just get little freaked about hospital and illnesses.”
“It’s OK. Even I used to be freaked about things. Just now I have started getting used to this illness.”
“You look too healthy to have cancer, sir.”
I did not know if it was a compliment. I did not thank him. He left the room assuring me that I could call him anytime in case I needed help. I smiled thinking the poor man must’ve been imagining that I might die any moment. But then the realization struck me like a lightning that maybe it wasn’t entirely impossible. Only when I took the glass for some water I noticed how much my hands were trembling. I took my phone and called Sheela.
“Hello”
Her voice seemed to soothe my nerves. I pressed the receiver close to my ears.
“Hi. Was free. Wanted to talk to you.”
“Ok. I just now came back from office.”
I talked to her for five more minutes about nothing in particular. Talking to her made me feel at home. I tried to ignore the metallic stench of blood emanating from my throat. I left Ooty that night, convinced that home was a much better place to be at that moment. I thought of telling her the truth as soon as I reached home, but changed my mind when Sheela opened the door in the early hours the next day and welcomed me home with the usual warm hug. I needed the hug more than ever. I did not want to see her cry that day. I did not want to see her cry ever. She was too precious for that.
16
Present Day
When I opened the door and saw my mother and father, I wanted to cry badly. I wanted to hug them and tell them I was hurt and that the world had been rude to me. Images of my childhood ran through my mind, when I would return home after getting hurt while playing. As I would graphically explain how I had got hurt, they would keep re assuring me that everything would be alright and it wasn’t a bad wound. My father would pat my back and say in a soft voice.
“You are a grown up boy. You shouldn’t cry for this.”
Even if the wound was small I would rush to them and report to them, for I used to believe that telling them would surely heal the wound. After all these years, that kid in me woke up again and wished fervently that my father would say it’s not a major illness and I shouldn’t cry for this.
“You have become so weak! Haven’t you been eating properly?”
She told this every time she visited me. I was their only child and would remain just a child to them forever. It felt good to have people with whom I could be just a child, even if it hurt them at times. Once I had proceeded to tell in graphic detail what exactly I thought about my father’s wisdom and decisions. That was when they left the house and started living in a two room apartment in the suburbs of the city. And now I had even more sorrow in store for them. All these years, they had nurtured this dream of seeing me well settled in every walk of life, just when they would have breathed a sigh of relief; they were going to face things they’d have never imagined.
“How is your health? Have you been taking the pressure pills properly?”
“Yes, but it has been shooting up now.”
I repeated my ever-neglected plea for taking up a complete health check up. They always seemed to have some reason for not doing it.
“We are happy now. With all these pills and stuff we are able to manage. Old age is an ailment no one can escape.” He said with his usual loud laugh.
‘No, father. Actually, I have escaped old age. I will be gone in a few days now! Just that I have to rot with cancer till then.’ The thought felt humorous for some reason.

I waited for the first opportunity to talk to my father alone. When he got settled in the balcony sofa holding a coffee cup, I took the opportunity to do something I had never done in my life.
“Father, I want to tell you something…”
He looked up arching his thick eyebrows and looking into the eyes that so blatantly resembled mine, I started talking.
“I have said things to you which I should not have said. You know, after getting a job, getting married, I was beginning to think I understood life just too well, to the extent that I found your guidance irritating.”
There was a long silence. I kept staring out towards the sea from the balcony, unsure of whether he would talk or start crying. But he was my father, he would never cry when someone was around, definitely not when that someone was me.
“I know you were so hurt though you hid it well. I am really sorry.”
“I never thought you would…” He paused, unsure of how to complete the statement. I had reduced the man to this: someone who chose the right words to speak to me, for I had punished him badly for being thoroughly outspoken to me about what he had felt. I realized he would never again take that right with me.
“With age, life teaches you lessons, especially through people you least expect it from. Yes, I was hurt, son. But it has been healing. And I cannot hold a grudge against you, for in you I see so much of myself.”
It was difficult to keep talking when so much of tears were thronging the eyelids; I fled the place with some excuse. As I left I caught a glimpse of his eyelids getting wet, I guess with age tear glands cannot hold it back for long.
They stayed till the evening and I sat down and heard all the stories my mother had to tell about every relative and neighbor. And by the time they left in the evening I knew I had given my mother one of the happiest days in recent times, for her needs from me were simple, the needs I had long forgotten to attend to: to spend some time with her and talk to her. It sometimes amazes me how easy it is for her to forgive me for everything I had done.
17
The Past that Passed away
Marriage gave me more reasons to love Sheela. But I chose to love her without reason as always. In those initial days of matrimony, she would wake me up with hot coffee, wrapping a towel over her hair. I would pull her to bed and sniff at the aroma of sheeka in her hair. We would sometimes go for a morning walk, but only if it was a holiday. I would start thinking of her even when in office, of moments from the previous day and, more often than not, of the previous night. I would call her up many times during the day just to hear her voice. We would together learn cooking, burning most of the dishes. She would fervently ask me stories from my office. She continued working in the accounting firm. We would spend the weekends going to movies, eating out in restaurants and end the day with a long walk in the beach talking about a thousand different things and that day we had chosen music.
“There was this song I used to listen to when I was thirteen. I am trying to find what song that was. They played it so many times on TV.”
“What about that?”
“No. I so badly want to listen to it once more. But I simply can’t recollect what song it was. I felt so happy then.”
“Hmm… let us try to recollect. How did it start?”
“Stupid question, hubby. That is what I don’t remember.”
“I meant what instrument? Do you remember any line from it?”
“No. But there is a long guitar piece. It is night time. A guy plays the guitar and a girl listens to his song. The tune is awesome.”
“I know hundred songs that satisfy these criteria.”
“I know. I used to wish then that my prince charming will come to me one night playing the guitar. You know at thirteen you tend to believe in such things.”
“What a pity I never played guitar.”
She laughed the short laugh she kept for times when she was playful.
“What?”
“That song- I want to listen to it again. I want to listen to it for hours.”
“Why suddenly?”
I turned to see her cheeks getting red, she had stopped walking. Her fingers curled mine like tender climbers. She came closer to me and whispered into my ears.
“Because they say listening to nice songs makes the baby beautiful and healthy.”
“Hey! Really?”
I took her in my arms.
“So, tell me. How does the name ‘Winnie’ sound?”
“You are going to name the baby ‘Winnie’?!”
“No! It’ll be the teddy’s name. Everything about the baby will be special.”
And thus the dream started – the dream of having a new purpose in life, of assuming new roles, of having one more person to live for, another person worth dying for. I would realize later that dreaming was an addiction. It was highly contagious and soon we were charting out every detail of our future with our son or daughter. We wanted to give the best of everything to him or her. She often claimed that she could hear the baby talk. I would then pretend to hear it too by keeping my ears pressed against her ever growing belly. She would push me away with a smile saying the baby would speak only to her. And I would keep looking at the smile emanating from her face, shining with each passing day. And in the early hours of the morning, she would wake me up from sleep and start crying without a reason. She would sometimes mumble that she had become ugly. And I would keep assuring her that she looked splendid. I would keep patting her back till she dozed off holding my hand close to her face. I knew she was scared of the process and so was I. She would throw tantrums at trivial things like me watching TV with a high volume or forgetting to turn off the hall light. I began reading up stuff on the net about pregnancy blues and how to handle it.
That day we had returned home after a routine monthly check up. The doctor had warned us that she was getting weak. That she should avoid straining herself physically. And so I started talking to her about the topic I had been putting off for long. She was checking the pills she had been prescribed.
“Darling… you heard what the doctor said.”
“I know what you are getting at.”
“Listen. I know you feel it’s too early. But I feel office is straining you out. I am worried, honey.”
“I can’t sit at home all the time right from now. I really can’t. The walls of the house seem so depressing during the afternoons when you aren’t home, when I am alone. And I asked our baby. It said it is ok if I go to office.”
It had been getting difficult arguing with her over things. She saw my face looking worried and planted a brief kiss and left the room.
One afternoon two weeks after the day of the checkup, I got a call from one of Sheila’s colleagues. It was one of those rare moments when I knew it was bad news before I picked the phone. I arrived at the hospital in fifteen minutes. My heart was racing hard. I could see the tears rolling down my cheeks in the reflection in the rear view mirror. When I reached her room and saw her curled up over the green sheets, I breathed a sigh of relief that at least she was safe. She did not open her eyes as I went and took her hand. The doctor who was a fat lady of about fifty forgot to verify if Sheela was awake and spoke loud enough for the people in the adjacent room to hear.
“I warned you last time, Arum. She was weak. I asked her not to strain. You guys obviously ignored my advice.”
I hushed her in vain as I noticed few careless tears rolling down Sheela’s cheeks. Through the narrow slit between her eyelids, I could see her emptiness and it made my stomach churn.
That night after reaching home, when I was about to switch the lights off, she muttered something incoherent between her incessant sobs.
“What is it?” I asked her, holding her close.
“The baby… It kept asking me. ‘Mom, why weren’t you careful? Didn’t you love me enough?’ I still keep hearing… its voice…its cry.”
“Baby… It’s not your fault. Trust me.”
In the days that followed I learnt a lot of lessons about loss and the pain it caused. I was myself hurt badly by it, but what pained me more was to see Sheela worsen with each day. Tears are not a terrible thing. Only when all the tears have dried up, the most terrible things come out. They are resignation, despair and more emptiness. The days became longer as she kept sitting in a corner in complete silence. Nothing I could say would even make her react. I was scared to see her like that. I was scared of what she was doing to herself. But beyond everything, I was scared that she would lock herself into that depression forever. She would wake up in the middle of the night and start crying or worse still keep talking to the baby just like when it was still there, safe in her womb. The depth of her sorrow made me helpless. I realized nothing I could say would help her move on. Every little thing around us seemed to remind us of the baby, like the weekly reminder she had set in her mobile to go to the nearby Amman temple, she had heard people say that it was auspicious temple for pregnant women and the goddess would protect the baby and child, or the ‘Winnie’ teddy bear, the first gift we had got for our unborn child, that was wrapped in gift paper, she had insisted that the baby should tear it open when it could, moreover she had read up that the fur could prove harmful to new born babies, or the music therapy cads she had collected to listen to, that were supposed to keep the baby in the belly tranquil and happy.
And so for months to come, even after she resumed going to office, she did not revert back to being her usual self. Her cheeriness and smiles seemed to have died in her womb with the baby. I would return home after a tired day’s work only to see her gloomy face, our conversations would be short and empty. I would convince myself that it was my hectic work that kept me in office till late night than the urge to not return to the new loneliness and distance that seemed to have crept between us at home. There were a few days when the thickness of the atmosphere seemed to choke me, when I would try to reason out with her.
“Honey, Even I am affected. You have stopped talking to me nowadays. This is not getting us anywhere. I don’t expect you to get back to normal soon. But at least let us be together at these times.”
“I know what I am doing is unfair. But I can’t help it. Nobody will ever understand what I am going through. I am sorry. But I can’t seem to come out of it.”
It was the intensity of such statements and the lack of emotion in her voice that made me feel even more isolated. I could’ve hugged her had she been crying, but she seemed to have been deprived of all emotions.
Things between us might’ve become normal; the wounds might’ve healed with the magical touch of time. Devil, they say, inhabits the tongue at times. And he certainly did on that day of gloom when, in the middle of a fight, that was becoming too common between us, I passed that imprudent remark.
“You never listen to me. We have paid enough for your stubbornness.”
The moment the words came out of my mouth, I wanted to take them back. But there is no way to ever do that in life and so the damage was done, the wounds that had been slowly healing were dug open.
“I am sorry. I really did not mean that.”
Her lips were trembling as she turned away from me to hide her face. She whisked off my hand as I tried to touch her shoulder.
“It hurts. More so because I know what you said is true.”
18
Present Day
Two months had passed since the unholy day when the evil, young doctor Sridhar passed a death sentence on me. I had started taking the medication ensuring care to not let Sheela find out about them. She did notice that I was taking days off very often. But she did not know how often I fainted or how cancer had successfully spread all over my body and was multiplying in millions every day. But all that did not matter that day. I was taking extra care to ensure that everything would go properly as planned. I noticed the thick beard as I passed the mirror and noted that it looked full of wisdom and experience though it was a result of negligence. Sheela was surprised to find me home before her. We ate a very ordinary meal watching a news channel cover yet another scandal involving a murder of an actress. She finished eating and walked to the bedroom, mumbling the usual reminder not to keep the volume too high.
Five minutes before midnight, I woke her up with a kiss.
“Happy Birthday, honey.”
I hoped she didn’t see the tears in my eyes. Something told me I wouldn’t live to see her next birthday. I took her hand and led her to the other bedroom that I had decorated myself with heart shaped balloons, wreaths of foliage and flowers, banners and loads of candles. The heart shaped cake had a thick strawberry icing. I had planted and lit twenty nine candles that formed a smaller blazing heart. But its heat was nothing compared to the warmth we shared. Her eyes were shining in the candle light as she saw deep into my eyes.
“Thank you, Sweet!”
No one is cuter than her in the whole wide world, especially when her eyes shine like that, when she calls me ‘sweet’, when she smiles that warm, cozy smile. She is the cutest.
The cake tasted very sweet, more so cause she bit the piece before feeding it to me. I held her hand and switched on the music system. An old romantic number started playing as I held her hand and started the Waltz. I had learnt the box step from YouTube and practiced it whole day. As we kept bumping into each other in the attempt, she started laughing loud. I had forgotten her last birthday when I was on an official trip. The sound of our feet gently thumping against the floor sounded musical. The midnight breeze lifted the curtain of the room as the moon tried to peek into the party. It was three days to the full moon, but it looked full enough for me. We kept talking about a million things that night, like the first time we met on the bus stop, how I proposed to her that day in the middle of the road, those three weeks of silence and how our love bloomed to matrimony. I held her hand tight that night before sleeping and forgot all my worries. She kept talking, punctuating each sentence with those soft kisses. I had been fantasizing of late about the heaven those believers claimed existed. But right then I was convinced there could be no place happier than her arms, no time more peaceful than right then. And in that peace, I fully forgot that I had kept the prescription sheet over the fridge. I had planned a full day’s outing for her birthday. But she woke up on her twenty ninth birthday to the news of her husband’s near date with death. That was when I decided if there was a God, he was cruel.

19
The moment I entered the dimly lit room, I regretted it. A group of people seated in the middle of the room turned towards us and smiled. I sat down at the end of the group, on a wooden chair that looked as wasted and dull as the people in the room. Sheela sat down next to me and locked my fingers with hers. This hold, I knew, meant I had to be strong. It sometimes annoyed me to accept that she could so easily see through my feigned layers of courage. I cursed Dr. Sridhar for suggesting that I should attend this meeting and myself for agreeing to it. It was a cancer patients association meeting where they ‘exchanged faith and courage and prayed for each other’ to quote his words. I had resisted the urge to explain to him that I was an atheist. In the four months since the diagnosis, I had heard enough about cancer from people and the Internet.
“Mr.Pandurangan will now share a few words with us.”
A man of about fifty stood up and smiled at us cheerily, as if he was about to deliver a pep talk to a football team.
“I was diagnosed with colon cancer two years back. I underwent surgery and have been taking chemotherapy sessions. I am getting weaker by the day the cancer is getting stronger.” He paused while I prayed that he would not talk further. “I am too weak and am no longer able to work. Now the doctors are saying I need to undergo another operation. I am not sure if my body will be able to withstand another one.” He paused, deciding whether or not to continue. A much younger looking woman, who must’ve been his wife, patted his hands and helped him to his chair. But before the chair person of the meeting could start talking, another bald-headed woman had stood up.
“My name is Raadhika. I was diagnosed with brain cancer three months back. The head-aches are becoming unbearable.” She was sobbing in between each word. “I am not able to smell things.” There was one more fit of sobbing. “I used to look beautiful six months back.” Her sobbing became too loud and she couldn’t continue speaking. Her mother escorted her to her seat.
“Let us all now pray for Mr.Pandurangan and Ms.Raadhika for a speedy recovery and for strength to withstand the treatments.”
The chair person went around the group talking slowly to every person as most of the group started praying for the two people.
As I saw those people closing their eyes in a terrified reverence, I was reminded of lines from a William Blake poem I had read when I was in school.
‘Did he who made the lamb make thee?’
It was the poet’s rhetoric at the fierceness and destructiveness of the tiger. I kept thinking of the God I did not believe in, wondering why these people were so immersed in pointless faith when their god had cursed them with so much of misery and pain. But the realization that I too was one among them, destined to rot with the same evil growth hit hard, as the chair person came near us.
“Hello sir, are you not praying?”
“Why should I even pray, sir? Did your god save you all? Did he free you of your misery? Did he not push you from pain to more pain all the time? Do you still want to fool yourself into believing there is a god and he would pull off miracles to save your precious life? Well, Sir, I am sorry I even came here.”
I was almost yelling at top of my voice. The people in the room were looking at me, horrified, as if I was the representative of the devil who so blasphemously dared to comment on the follies of their foolish god.
I got up and rushed to the door before anyone could speak and I could hear Sheela apologize to them, that I was getting depressed often nowadays. I sulked into an empty chair just outside the room. Sheela rushed out of the room to me.
“I am sorry about what I did there.”
I was digging my face into her shoulders- the only place where I could dare to lose my defenses and cry.
“I am really sorry.”
“You don’t have to be, baby. It’s ok. We won’t go to such places from now. It’s ok.”
And slowly, as she kept patting me and reassuring me that it was ok and that things are going to be alright, the pain seemed to fade away- the physical pain I had never bothered to tell anyone about and the agony of being sick, the fear of how it would worsen, the fear of rotting, the fallen dream of a happy future that would never materialize. She was my medicine for all my illnesses and that day, in the dim lit corridors of the hospital, I knew she was my angel from the God I did not believe in.

20
In the past few months I have seen it all: fear, pain, frustration, helplessness, more pain and more love. Sheela tried her best to look strong, as she saw my condition go down day by day. I sometimes wish it was a road accident that would take my life. The slow, methodical breaking down towards death was too painful, physically and emotionally. Some of the treatments seemed to work, but their effects didn’t last for long. People I knew, friends and relatives, suggested a million alternative medicines, like ayurveda, yoga, homeopathy, Reikei and so on. Sheela would wistfully look at me, but I did not go near any of them. I was scared of getting hopes high, of mine and more importantly of hers. I refrained from taking the pain killers Sridar had prescribed unless I could no longer bear it. Even if it was painful, I did not want to lose the last few days in unconscious slumber. There would be loads of sleep afterwards, when sleep would be the only thing I was capable of.
These were also days when I realized just how deep the bonds of love were. I had asked my parents not to visit too often. But I knew that my mother could not stop herself from crying all the time if she saw me. I could not stomach her perpetual crying. Sheela feigned as much strength as she could. On many days, when we would visit one doctor after another, when each of them would expend maximum efforts in explaining to us just how magnificently the cancer had spread across each of the organs like a emperor bent on conquering the world.
Sheela would listen to it almost nonchalantly. She would go to the Amman temple that she had stopped going to since the miscarriage. She would pray for hours and then return home with loads of vibhuthi . She would smear it across my forehead with her eyes closed in a silent prayer. I hope earnestly that she is not praying for me to live long. She takes care of me like a baby, like the baby she could not have. I am sure that she would have made a very caring mother. During the day when she would leave the house to buy stuff, mostly my medicines, I keep staring at the ceiling in the bedroom or keep staring at the pictures from our wedding album. In those pictures, I see a life that was and could have been- a happy life, without worries, without cancer, without miscarriages. I sometimes wish I could go back to those days of happiness. When I was a kid I used to believe we could traverse back to any point in life if we wish for it with our eyes closed tight, like in the movies. Nowadays I try that a lot of times. There are a million points in my life where I would like to go, in fact any other point than the present. But that trick, I have found, is false. We are stuck with the present whether we like it or not. I sometimes cry when she is not around, to let out the pain and the memories. It seems to heal the agony, if only for a short time. But when she is there with me, I assume the role of a wise husband who has to be mature and strong. In such roles we play for our loved ones lies the beauty of life as far as I have lived it, like those times at night when she would wake up from sleep on hearing my groans, when she would ask me if it was paining.
“Not at all, honey.” I would lie or would feign to be sleeping if talking itself was incredibly painful. At times when the pain was tolerable, I would smile at her, and she might go back to sleep, holding me close to her.
Maybe she thought holding me tight would ward off death if he came knocking. Maybe she was right or maybe she wasn’t. I will soon find out. At times when she was too weak to appear strong, she would break down and cry and ask the one question I didn’t know the answer for.
“Why us? Why is this happening to us? What wrong did we ever do?”
On another day in another life, I might’ve explained to her that there was no such order that only the bad would suffer and the good people would always live happily ever after, that life was a matter of probability, a matter of chance like the rolling of a dice. But now I was not the same man. I would simply respond with a hug or a kiss. If I have enough energy, I would mumble a promise I know I cannot keep.
“Listen. Whatever happens I won’t leave you. OK? Trust me. I will be with you until death do us apart and even beyond that. I will be your shadow protecting you, looking after you.”
It must’ve been the intoxication of the medicines or the gloominess and pain that evoked such irrational statements from an atheist like me. Or maybe I too just want to believe in a few things if it will comfort my disturbed self. And with that same borrowed belief, I want to pray for her peace, she has seen too much sorrow in too short a time. I want to go off before it gets too painful for both of us. But I try to keep wide awake when she is not around for I do not want to leave in her absence. Maybe in the warmth of her embrace death will not be that painful.
21
His wish was fulfilled soon. He died in his sleep, wrapped in her arms. She woke up and put him in her lap when she realized the moment had passed. She patted him and rocked him in her arms. After nearly an hour, she called up his parents and then hers. She knew there would be loads of people rushing in; people who thought he had passed away, for only she knew that he had not gone anywhere. It was a secret between her and her man. No one would understand it and nobody needed to. She knew he would keep his promise and she knew he was just with her. She could feel him right there, comforting her with a warm hug.
She did not want to cry for crying would mean she accepted that he was leaving her. She would never accept that. He would forever be with her, and look after her the way he did while he was alive and that hope was the only reason, only strength that held her fragile soul then. She already dreamed longingly of the day when she would join him and they could spend eternity together, for their souls were bonded with infinite love.
Au Revoir!
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