The silence in the dimly lit foyer was interrupted by her footsteps as she entered the living room. The clock on the living room wall was about to strike 11 PM. As quietly as she could, she hung her key ring on the key holder behind the entrance door and tiptoed into the living room.
“Welcome home sweetheart. So, was it Chinese or Mughlai tonight? “, he said without turning the wheelchair around to face her.
“Oh. I thought you had fallen asleep”, she said as she turned on the light switch.
“In case you forgot, invalids like me usually prefer to be helped into their beds“.
The wheelchair swirled around to reveal a handsome square face.
She was exhausted after a long day especially when she had spent a major chunk of the evening on the road jostling her way through the city traffic. She wondered if she could put up with another shot of sarcasm.
“You look like you are in a bad mood today... angry with me?” she smiled in a feeble effort to dispel the gloom in the air. “I was just about to leave when they set up a conference call with the clients in Maryland and asked me to join. And then by the time it got over I...”
“Forget it. I don’t want to know... you must be tired. I had dinner. There’s some iced tea in the fridge in case you feel like having one.”
“Did Bimla Tai make koftas in the afternoon today? I asked her to before I left this morning.”
“I’ll keep the television volume down so you can sleep. Just keep the bedroom door closed.” He reached out for the television remote.
“Why are you doing this? Can we sit and talk for a while? I mean, without the television on?” she walked over to the couch adjacent to the wheelchair.
He did not answer.
“I brought some almond and fig ice-cream, your favourite, right? Lets...”
“There is Hitler’s Biography at eleven on the History channel that I do not want to miss. Besides, you seem to have caught a bad cold already. Icecream is a bad idea under the circumstances.”
“What is it with you! This was never your idea of spending time together.” She got up feeling exasperated. She was a little bit of everything – hurt, angry, disappointed, and guilty.
“You don’t want to know my idea of spending time together.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ll never understand it.” He turned his wheelchair around and started adjusting some books lying around in a pile on the table on the side.
She stood there a while, waiting for him to turn back and look into her eyes that were brimming with tears. But his hands continued to linger around on the items on the table trying to quench some kind of wanderlust long after the books were standing at the edge of the table in a neat pile.
If there is one thing that I have come to believe about men I have known in my life, it is that they are baffled, dumbfounded little travelers on the vast emotional plane of life – completely ill-equipped with the right travelling kits. I have to admit that there have been aplenty estrogen-laden moments when I have taken the unfair liberty to generalize and declare all men to be completely devoid of sensitivity and emotion. But after the rise and fall of many strong emotions when I have succumbed to my only friend and only enemy whose name is Reality, I have observed that men act the way they do because they are afraid of catching themselves under the grip of any emotion whatsoever. If they cannot become invisible, they start treating others as invisible – thus ironically making fear the most predominant emotion in their lives.
On the other hand, women who take a self-proclaimed and in my opinion somewhat foolish, pride in their capacity to withstand a lot of pain admit that the hardest to bear is the pain of indifference. It can make the strongest of women crumble under its sting. It leaves them angry, exposed and vulnerable to more hurt. I believe the reason for this is that the only armour needed for indifference is indifference itself and I am yet to meet a woman who has been able to equip herself with it.
“Yes. You are right. I won’t understand. I spend the entire day doing things I had never planned in my life. I no longer understand what anyone wants... or for that matter what I want.”
The tender thread of patience that held a rein on her temper had snapped. Her frustrations and the ache in her body flowed out in a rapid stream of angry words.
“I am sorry you have to work so hard and I am sorry you have to look at a husband who is half paralyzed from waist to toe every single day. I wish I could help you by vanishing into thin air but unfortunately I am helplessly incapacitated to do that.”
“You can help me by being a little less rude.”
“Try saying this to someone who has been staring at the freaking door for four hours, waiting to hear it creak open. It’s not every day I look forward to...”
“I told you I was...”
“Can you please not tell me anymore about how indispensible you are at work, especially because I haven’t exactly felt that way in a long time?”
“So this is what it is all about? Let me tell you something here, I didn’t exactly choose to be where I am today. I am doing this because one of us has to... and that one is me at the moment.”
Realizing that she had been too sarcastic, she mellowed down and gently placed her hand on his shoulder.
”C’mon... it’s been more than a year... don’t be so harsh on yourself and on me.”
“Yeah... I’m sorry about ending a perfectly wonderful evening of yours on this note. Hope you have a pleasant sleep. Good night.” The wheelchair moved on leaving a cold, bitter cloud of air around her.
“What is it with you? I’m sorry you had to wait...” she said in a flustered tone.
“I don’t want to talk about anything”
“Why don’t you let all this bitterness out once and for all?”
“There is no bitterness. I’m just fed up. And I said I don’t want to talk.”
“Why? Why don’t you ever want to talk about it?”
“Talk about, what? Losing one half of my body in a freaking car accident, losing a lucrative job, a promising career? Losing my four year old son and watching my beautiful wife turn into a workaholic machine? Watching everything I loved about my life being torn apart in a matter of minutes... “, emotions that simmered in his heart like white fire, flared up again.
“You lost this, you lost that... it’s always about you, right? I was happy too... with the home loan finally paid off; I was ready to settle into full time motherhood... live the life I always wanted to... finish my paintings... enjoy life with Akash and you... and a baby on her way...“ she gasped for breath and her voice softened as she continued.
“...we decided we’d name her Avani… you were so sure it was a daughter... and I remember you said how they would both form the two ends of the spectrum of our lives... the earth and the sky...” She stared at the ceiling as tears outlined her face.
“Can you please go to bed? I said good night.”
“Sure...”
She was so angry; she shook as she fumbled for words.
“And yes, you should definitely be sorry. It may have been a perfectly wonderful evening that you just ruined. Good night. I have a long day tomorrow.”
She threw her handbag on the sofa and stormed into the bedroom closing the door behind her with a loud bang.
Just then a small brown packet slipped out of the handbag and fell at his feet.
*
She caught sight of it when she lifted her head from the pillow. She had been crying only a few minutes but it seemed like an eternity had passed. She wiped her tears and picked herself up. On her side of the bed lay a pink rose and a packet wrapped in a pale blue gift paper. She untied the pearl white ribbon and tore open the gift wrapper. It was a book titled “Wildflowers under the willows” by Sushant Mehta. On the first page it read, “Dedicated to my beautiful wife”.
*
The remote control lay still and the television never got switched on. The clock on the living room wall broke the dead stillness of the room as it struck half past eleven. The tall frame that sat huddled in a wheelchair looked like it had been frozen in time except for the occasional tear that left a trail on the back of his hand. Clasped in his hands lay a book titled, “Wildflowers under the willows” which he held close to his heart.
A note from the book had fallen on the floor. It read:
“For my dearest husband.
The light in your eyes as you hold the first print of your book in your hands is the greatest gift I could give myself.”
The prints had come out only that afternoon. While he had telephoned the publisher to send him the first print of the book as a surprise for her, it was a two hour drive from her office to the publishers’ and a three hour drive back home.
Just then the bedroom door opened and she rushed out into the living room. She walked up to the wheelchair, sat down on the floor besides it and placed her head in his lap. He gently caressed her hair as he whispered, “Happy anniversary”. She looked up at the face of the man she loved more than anyone else in the world and said in a voice muffled with tears, “Happy anniversary, darling”.
The darkest hour of the night came alive as a stream of moonlight fell through the living room window on two souls who had lost themselves and found each other again.
“I’m starving.”
“So am I. Now that you reminded me, mughlai not such a bad idea...”
“It’s midnight madam. All restaurants are closed. May I have the pleasure of serving Maggi noodles to the young lady?”
“Sounds yum....with nimbupaani on the rocks?”
“It’s a deal.”
The willows had come alive with wildflowers.
