Whispers of Hate

by Sanchit Garg

  But now I was at someone else's house, and I knew it was a bad thing if I didn’t compliment it like a normal person. So, I had to make an effort with a stone on my heart.

  I smiled, “The food is delicious.”

  “Better than your wife’s! Say it?”

  I paused, “Well…”

  “Just say it. I know it is?”

  I blushed, “You have never eaten hers. Okay, a little bit better...”

  After dinner, the kids and his wife went inside, and we talked till 11:30 in the night. Every event of our life from the past five years, we just discussed it and laughed. I tried not to bring up any topic that was sad or hurtful. I tried my best not to, and I didn’t, because I knew one thing would lead to another and that to something else. I would then have to tell him everything, and that would have been too much for him to endure. He would have shattered, and I didn’t want that to happen to him. If it were something minor hurtful, I would have told him, but not this. I just couldn’t kill my best friend from within.

  And so, we went to slumber, with me being put up in the guest room, which was adjacent to the drawing-room. I went to the room, changed my clothes to the one he provided me and then, I just laid down on the bed and went to sleep.

  In my dream, I was back in the corridor, but this time the light sporadically fractured throughout, and the path tapered off at unusual angles for no apparent purpose. It felt as if someone was playing a game with me. I kept on running towards the taper, the light continued getting dimmer as I moved closer to the light source. This time, I never reached the source, there was nothing in the surrounding view, just me, the light source and a pain closing in on me.

  I woke up at 5 in the morning, stood up and walked out of the room. It looked like they were still asleep, so I came back to the bed and laid down. I just couldn’t go to sleep again. The dream… I remembered it again… and then I just kept on lying down with my eyes staring at the ceiling. There was this feeling within me that something terrible was going to happen again. Time passed, and around 6 am, I heard a sound from outside the room. Someone must have roused up.

  I stood up and walked out of the room again, and it was just his wife.

  “Bhaiya! You are awake already.”

  “Yes, Bhabhi! I woke up at 5, but then I kept lying down on the bed.”

  With a sad face, she replied, “You should have woken us up then. And see your friend? He’s still sleeping. Can you make him learn to wake up early too? He wakes up at 7 and then just hurries for office, making me stressed."

  I grinned, “Okay! I will.”

  I went to the washroom to freshen up and at 7:30 am, we sat for breakfast. We were about to start eating when we heard a “ting-tong” ringing sound.

  His wife remarked, “Who is calling this early in the morning? Let me check.”

  She stood up, walked to the phone and picked it up, "Hello!"

  “Bhaiya! Someone is asking for you.”

  I was startled, “For me! How is this possible?”

  I walked up to the phone and picked up the receiver, “Hello!”

  Someone said hello from the other side, and I knew it was Mohan. Then I remembered that I gave Mother, Vinod’s number before coming here. How forgetful can I be?

  He said in a sad voice, “Bhaiya!”

  “Why did you call here? Is everything okay?”

  “Bhaiya! Father is not okay! We brought him to the city, too. Please come to Yashoda hospital as soon as possible.”

  “Please tell me everything's OK. That’s he’s totally fine.”

  “I don’t know. He’s in the ICU. Please hurry. I can’t handle everything on my own.”

  “Okay! Don’t worry. I will get there as fast as I can.”

  I put back the receiver, and my expressions turned severe.

  Vinod inquired, “What happened? Is everything good?”

  I lied, “Yes, it is. Mohan is at the Yashoda hospital with Father. Nothing too serious. I will go ahead and get everything sorted out.”

  “Hey, wait! I would like to come too.”

  “No! Don’t worry. If it gets severe, which I believe it wouldn't, I would ask for you straight away. For now, just go to your work. Mohan is just a cry-baby. He doesn’t know how to handle work and life, so he's always looking out for me. I believe before the end of the day; I would happily reach back home with both of them.”

  “But still… let me come with you.”

  “Don’t you believe me? You are my best friend. So, if I need any help, I will come to you.”

  “Okay! If you say so. But if you don’t, you know I get angry very soon.”

  I laughed, “Yes, I do. For now, just help me out with the route to the hospital.”

  I didn’t eat anything else after that. I just bid them goodbye, walked out of his home and speed-walked towards my car.

  In route to the hospital, no thoughts came to my mind, nothing. All I felt was the need to reach there as swiftly as possible. I didn’t even know what happened to my father or who else was there at the hospital or how did Mohan bring father to the city, nothing. I never showed it, but I loved my father and never hated him. He was a much better man than me at everything, and I was just a child in a man’s body.

  The hospital was 17 kilometres away from his house, and I had a vague idea of the location from Vinod. I stopped twice or thrice in between the route to ask for directions and finally reached it in under 20 minutes. I didn’t even look at the speed of the car, but I drove as fast as I could. I quickly parked my car and rushed inside the hospital. It was a massive building. Once inside, I was greeted with a hall big enough to accommodate at least 300 people. I looked around for someone familiar or from the staff. There was a reception at the other end of the gate through which I entered, with a man in his mid-40’s working out on some forms.

  I walked up to him.

  “Excuse me, Sir! Do you know where my father is being operated on.”

  “I would. Can you please tell me his name?”

  “Yes! It’s Shri. Madan Kumar”

  “Okay! Please wait while I check where he is from my register.”

  After around 2 minutes of suspense and turning of pages, he finally spoke.

  “Here it is. He’s being operated in the ICU on the 1st Floor.

  “Thank You. Can you also help me with the directions?”

  “Yes! Just turn to the left from here, then take the first right and onto the stairs. Once you reach the 1st floor, ask anyone for the room.

  I did as he told me and reached the 1st floor. The gallery was much narrower here, and there were rooms on both sides of it. I kept on walking straight, checking out the room’s names and looking for someone who could help me.

  As I was walking, I saw a little boy sitting on a bench alone. He was probably some five-six years old. What caught my eye was that this boy was filthy, as if he came here after playing out in the mud and it looked as if he was concentrating on something. But it was a hospital, so how did they allow the boy to get here?

  I stopped midway through. I couldn’t get a better look at his face, but yes it felt serious and as if he was speaking to someone, something, out of nowhere, as in whispering. Now, it looked as if he had started to yell at someone and with his right hand, he began scratching his left hand. First, it turned red and then I could see blue-red blood coming faintly out of his hands. Without thinking much, I quickly grabbed his hands and damn they were cold. The moment I was about to touch his head, he looked up at me by turning his head up and damn god, it was not a sight to be happy about. His face was unrecognisable as if it was dirty, but there was something wrong with his eyes. In a split second, he shook his hand and ran towards the stairs. I ran after him, and by the time I reached the ground floor, he was gone, as if disappeared.

  I walked to the receptionist and asked, “Did you see a boy just now running through here?”

  “I didn’t see any boy and only you, who is running in the hall, shouting at someone.�
�

  “Sorry.”

  Maybe, he was busy with his work, and he didn’t look at the kid at all. Okay. I would leave him be. I didn’t get a better look at him. Maybe, like his clothes, his face was dirty too from playing.

  I looked around but didn’t find anyone who resembled him. So I proceeded back to the first floor to reach my father’s room.

  As I walked, I saw Mohan in the gallery. He seemed fine.

  I shouted, “Mohan! Where is Father?”

  “Thank God! Brother, you came soon. The doctors just told me that he would be okay. He just needs to be in the hospital for the night just as an extra precaution and we can take him back home in the morning. Bhabhi and Mother are here too.”

  I just couldn’t understand how this happened. He was the most fit person that I knew of. He went on morning and evening walks, always ate healthy, and I had hardly seen him change a bit in the past 20 years. He even looked at least 10 years younger than his age, and people would get jealous of him all the time. But luckily, everything is okay, or I would have had to blame myself for not being there when it happened.

  I went into the ICU room and turned my focus towards Father, who was on the hospital bed, asleep in all those medical equipment, getting oxygen by the machine and breathing somehow. Tears dropped down my eyes as I looked at him. I wanted to touch him, but I didn’t want to destroy any chances of him getting well. I was a bad person, and strange things happened when I did that. So, I just came out and walked to Mohan.

  I probed, “So, what exactly happened?”

  “Father woke up at around 4 in the morning. He went to the bathroom and came out to wash his hands. While washing his hands, he just fainted.”

  “Really? How do you know that?”

  “I woke up at around the same time, and that’s when I found him lying near the washbasin. After repeated attempts to call out to him and wake him up didn’t work, I rushed to wake up Mother. Seeing this, she ran out to our neighbour’s house and luckily they helped us to bring him to the town’s doctor. But the doctor there told us that they didn’t have any specialists, and to take father to the city hospital. So, we asked our neighbour for one more favour, and he helped us without any second thought.”

  I couldn’t thank our neighbour enough for helping us out so much in time of our need. I was forever indebted to him. Now, my father would be alright, and we could go home cheerfully. All we needed to do was to be here till the morning, and he would be back home again with us.

  “So, where are Mother and Nandana?”

  “I told them to wait in the restroom, near the reception.”

  “Okay.”

  Leaving Mohan behind, I walked to the restroom where my mother and Nandana were putting up.

  nce there, I walked inside and saw them sitting from a distance. My mother’s eyes looked sad and hurtful like her tears had already dried. Nandana was heartfelt too, but she was keeping up somehow. Everyone knew that my father loved her more than he loved Purnima. For him, she was superior to his own daughter, and this was a thinking which everyone needed, but only a select few precious people had. They would have jokes among themselves, always making the other happy. But things changed after the incident in the village and my father just kept to himself. So, even if something was genuinely wrong with him, that led us to this point, he would not have told us about it. That’s how he was. I think I learned this quality from him. Which may feel good if we consider our loved ones, but in the end, it hurts more, it hurts you more, and it hurts them more. It’s so hard to express your problems to the other person. It’s like you don’t want to involve them in your mess and turn their life into a mess.

  After some 15 minutes of just watching them, I saw Nandana making my mother to go to sleep. She cried a lot, and it was better if she had a peaceful time. Nandana looked sad too. It was like she was more depressed than me. Don’t know why, but men do cry, they feel sad, but they have these inherent strata set by the society that you should not cry, being a man you just shouldn’t. I am fed up with the masculinity that society keeps on portraying. You need to show yourself, as masculine, as the leader of the house. But honestly speaking, it doesn’t help at all, I cry all the time internally. Well, some other men do this too, and it hurts so much. Everyone deserves to be human, luckily for me, it was not easy to hold my emotions in. Maybe I had a certain feminine side too. Most of the time, I tried not to, but it just happened, and no matter how much I thought of blaming someone else, I could only indict myself.

  I finally walked up to Nandana and just a meter distance from her, I stopped and looked at her. My mother rested her head on Nandana’s shoulder, and we both just looked at each other with teary eyes. Seeing her, I knew I would cry at any moment, and if I disturbed her, Mother would wake up too. So, I just walked out of the restroom and walked back to the outside of my father’s room where Mohan was before. But, he wasn’t there now.

  Where the hell does he go in these precise moments? Maybe he went to sleep somewhere knowing that now I would take care of everything. At times like these, he makes me ponder his love for Father. He should be here with us, but who am I to say, I was not even present there when it happened. It was him who found out what happened to Father and brought him to the city. So, I was the wicked one and no one else.

  I sat on a bench facing the opposite of my father’s room. I was still happy that my father would be totally fine tomorrow and to change everyone’s mood, I thought to make some plans for tomorrow morning. He hardly goes out of home, so I would take him out to visit the city, the museum and other places of interest. But I fell asleep in between.

  Sometime later, Mohan roused me up.

  “Bhaiya! Something is wrong with Father. I reacted back in shock, “What are you saying? He is totally fine. Are you mad?”

  “No! I’m not mad. His pulse started to decrease after 4 in the evening.”

  That’s around the same time he fainted yesterday.

  “The doctors told me, they are trying to find the cause, but they haven’t found one till now.”

  “Please don’t scare me. Tell me that he is okay. The doctors just want to make some money. Give it to them and tell them nothing is to happen to him.”

  “It didn’t look about the money, they were seriously troubled as if they were helpless and had already tried a lot many things.”

  “Where is mother and Nandana?”

  “They came to check on Father, but I sent them to wait in the hospital's waiting room.”

  “At least, there’s one thing that you did right. Where did the doctors go?”

  “They are with Father, but they told me not to come inside till they come out.”

  “Okay! We will wait here while they do their job.”

  I know doctors are not inherently good or bad. They are just doing their job, and this is an excellent hospital, but you need to be extra careful. It’s human life we are talking about, and even though they are trying to give their best, mistakes can happen anytime and with anyone. It’s human nature to make errors, but I didn’t want any of it to occur in our case. I just didn’t have the privilege to create one. There was a lot at stake. He was part of our support system.

  After around an hour or so, two doctors came out. I ran up to them and inquired, “Doctor! When can we take our father back home.”

  “Any time after tomorrow morning.”

  I suspired, “Thank You. So, how is he doing?”

  “Sorry to say, but there was nothing we could do to save him. It was out of our hands.”

  I was shocked. Just now, he told me that I could take Father back tomorrow and now he was saying he’s no more. Is the doctor mad? No, it can't be. Was he speaking about his body before? It was as if my whole world went under and out of my feet. It was not that I was thinking about my father being dead, it was about what would happen to my mother, what would she do now. She had lost her support system, her life force; even though they didn’t show it, they loved each other too much. They n
ever fought at all, though I believe a little fighting is always good.

  Then a thought came into my mind. It was the ghost, both the events happened around 4, at the same time. Maybe the filthy boy had something to do with this?

  No matter how frantically I tried to attach an otherworldly meaning to it, it was entirely for nothing. The simple truth was that he was no more. He was dead. I didn’t even get the chance to make him happy, to see a smile on his face, everything just ended in a split second. I understood right away that my life, mother’s life to be more precise, as we knew it, was over, but the real defeat took a little longer to set in. Despite all our despair, thoughts and prayers, it eventually was the end of our happy days. They were not happy per se, but now they had transformed into nothingness.

  Inside, my heart was bleeding, but outside I just wanted to laugh hysterically, on myself, on my life, on my family, and on, everyone else. How easy it was to lose people, so easy and how difficult it was to bring people back into your life, you just couldn’t no matter how hard you tried. But, the main quandary now was to tell about it to my mother. I was the eldest, and I had to be the one to explain it to her. No one else was to bear the pain of it. I had to be the devil incarnate and kill her from the inside out.

  I went inside my father’s room to take a look at him, at his lifeless body, his pale face, his un-dreamy eyes, his smile-less and sealed lips, his frozen hands, his deaf ears, his move-less limbs…I just couldn’t see him like this, and in less than a minute, I just walked out of it.

  I asked Mohan to accompany me.