I took the cab back home, picked up my bike, got a bouquet of white roses and a box of chocolates from a nearby florist, and reached her building at around 3 p.m. It was a dull, grey day. Monsoon clouds had covered the sky like a thick blanket, and the sun was unable to shine through. Now, when I recall the afternoon, I can even describe it as a rather gloomy and sad day. One could see birds returning to their nests in large batches, way before their usual time. The sound of dusty wind echoed everywhere, and an odd drop of rain fell on me time and again, reminding me of the uncertainty of the weather.
I had parked my bike at the designated visitor parking and was walking towards the entry gate when my phone rang. Shall I tell her that I am here? I contemplated as I fished my phone out of my pocket. Maybe not. Let it be a surprise. I had expected a call from Adira, but it was actually Piyush. I had not called him last night to inform him about my safe return to the house, which was customary after a party at his home. I skipped his call as I had a more important matter to attend to. I sent him a message instead: Busy, will call later.
Piyush is the type who always respects a person’s privacy, no matter who that person is. I cannot say that about any other relative of mine, but Piyush has been like that ever since I’ve known him. Surprisingly, I got another call from him despite my text message. I wondered if he had not yet seen my message and disconnected the call again, but then he called me a third time, within seconds of my disconnecting his call. Knowing what kind of person he is, I sensed that it must have been something critical. I was in the lift, and usually, the reception is pretty bad when the elevator goes up or down. Still, I answered his call.
‘Hello?’
‘Where are you?’ Piyush asked me, and from his tone I could imagine his face all flustered and drained.
‘At Adira’s house. Is everything all right?’ Tamanna was pregnant then, and my mind worked in different directions, throwing ill thoughts about her, at me. ‘Is Tamanna okay?’ I asked instantly without giving him any time to respond to my first question.
‘Why are you at her house?’ Piyush asked me, and then he said, ‘Tamanna is fine. Listen, Ronnie . . .’ his voice started breaking up.
‘I cannot hear you,’ I told him, wondering if he could hear me.
‘Listen . . . Ronnie . . . we . . . You must . . . mother . . . hospital . . . Gurgaon.’ This was all that I could hear before the call was disconnected.
I got out of the lift as soon as it opened without realizing that I was two floors away from Adira’s floor and someone had pressed the buttons to get into the elevator.
‘Oh my God!’ I exclaimed way too loudly, and embarrassed myself in front of an elderly couple who were just coming out of their house when I realized my mistake, but by then the lift doors had closed behind me.
I decided to deal with one thing at a time and dialled Piyush’s number to know what had happened and whose mother was in hospital. I feared that it was either Piyush’s or Tamanna’s mother. The call went on voicemail as he was trying to get connected to someone, most likely me because as soon as I disconnected the call, my phone had Piyush’s incoming call on it.
‘Sorry about that, I was in the lift. What happened?’ I asked him as calmly as I could.
‘Listen to me very carefully . . .’ he began, and the rest of his words made my world crumble into pieces.
ARTEMIS HOSPITAL, GURGAON
27 AUGUST 2017
Piyush did not give me any particulars. He just told me that Adira was hurt. How badly? He could not tell me. It was worrying to not know as hurt could be anything from a scratch to a fracture to a life-threatening injury. I was terrified and my heart was palpitating. Unfit to drive all the way from Noida to Gurgaon, I wanted someone to pick me up and take me to her. A cab would have taken forever to arrive, and as it was getting close to peak traffic hours, it would have been caught in traffic all evening. A bike ride was the quickest option for me, but in my present situation it was definitely not the safest.
Suddenly, it was as if I heard Adira, ‘Ronnie, come on! It is just a bike ride!’ She had a habit of saying this, mocking my fear for her safety when she asked me to take her out for a drive after 12 a.m. on Delhi roads. I did not find Delhi very safe to roam around with her after dark.
My mind was playing games with me, but this time I knew that it was in my own interest. I had to go to her. She needed me then more than she had ever needed me. Fifteen minutes later, I was on my way to be by her side. My mind was occupied with all sorts of thoughts and worries, yet my body was in control. The worst times tell you how strong you are, and that was the time which tested my strength.
I parked outside the hospital at 6.30 p.m. and called Piyush straight away. He had gone back home to check on Tamanna who could not come to the hospital despite wanting to see her best friend. ‘Her mother is there,’ Piyush informed me.
‘Oh, okay,’ I was not expecting her mother to come over for a minor injury and my fears worsened. ‘How badly is she hurt? Where is she?’ I inquired, walking down the corridor that leads to the outpatient department.
‘She is in the ICU,’ he finally told me, and that is when I realized that all my worst fears had come true. She was in the ICU, and her mother had come from Chandigarh to see her. She had met with an accident the night we went to the party at Tamanna and Piyush’s house and was severely injured. She was unconscious when I saw her through the glass window in the ICU. I could not see her face, for she was surrounded by machines that were blinking, I knew a blinking device was a good sign; it meant that she was there, resting, recovering, fighting and not losing the battle. As it was after 6 p.m., I was not allowed to go in and see her till the next day.
Piyush joined Adira’s mother and me in the hospital a few hours later. While I sat alone with her mother, I did not dare to ask her if she knew how it had happened and what her daughter’s condition was. I was not scared of what she would think or say about me, or if she would be rude to me or scold me for having dated her daughter without her approval. It was way beyond the petty fight of likes and dislikes—it was the look in her eyes. Every time a doctor spoke about her baby daughter who was lying unconscious on the bed inside a room where we could not even enter at that hour, her ghostly eyes hovered over to the door—expressionless. She had tears in them, but none trickled down, and this made my guilt deeper, deep enough to penetrate my soul.
Adira is a strong girl, and that day I found out where she got her strength from. Her mother loved Adira more than I could even imagine loving her. Adira was all that she had in the world. She was her only child. The human she had created and loved all those years—she made her the person I fell in love with. I was so selfish and cruel in saying that Adira would have to choose between her mother and me. I wondered if it was all too late now. I felt like a beast, sitting across from her; a monster who tried to take her beloved daughter away from her by emotionally blackmailing her.
I asked Piyush how and what had happened but not in front of her mother, as I did not want to increase her pain. She had so far borne my presence there, for the sake of her daughter—I knew that, and I tried to be kind to her, for Adira.
The vehicle in which Adira and Piyush’s friends had set off towards Noida after the party had met with an accident. No one knew how and with what the car had collided, but it was severely damaged. The couple, who were seated in the front, had lost their lives. Adira had been in a coma ever since she was brought to the hospital in the morning. I immediately knew that the car which we had seen, a Zen, was theirs. I was there, and I did not help her! The recollection of this fact still kills me. The accident was reported early in the morning by a passer-by who had managed to bring all three to the hospital in an auto. By then, Adira had lost a lot of blood and the other two travellers in the car had been declared—brought dead.
‘Could they have been saved? The couple?’ I asked Piyush.
He did not know. Maybe they could have been saved had I not listened to Taran. I felt so sm
all! We did not even go close to the car as we were worried about some hypothetical court cases. Probably, Adira would have also not gone into a coma had she received timely care and medical attention, had we not been the cowardly jerks that we had been.
Adira had a broken hand and two broken ribs as she was not wearing a seat belt. She had also suffered a brain injury, but as there was quite a lot of swelling around the brain, the doctors were not able to determine how long it would take to heal properly so they could tell us what had actually gone wrong or why she was unable to regain consciousness and was in a coma.
PRESENT TIME
CHANDIGARH, INDIA
Every weekend, I visit her at her mother’s home in Chandigarh. Adira, though, doesn’t remember me. She doesn’t know who she is to me; she has no recollection of the memorable time we spent in each other’s company; she doesn’t even remember my last visit to her which was only a week ago, as she doesn’t remember herself.
It has been a little over one year since the accident, and she still looks the same. Medically too, her condition has not improved much. Apart from the broken bones, nothing inside her has healed, and nothing in me has been fixed either. I am still haunted every night and every waking moment. All I do is pray for a miracle.
Her body is functional now and she sits up with assistance. Her mother is her sole caregiver. A mother’s love for her child is so pure and unconditional that no one can ever replace it. She is there for her morning and night, caring for her as if she were a newborn baby. I have apologized to her for my behaviour towards her in the past; I still do every time we meet, and all she tells me is to limit my visits now as the doctors have almost given up.
‘Move on now. You need to. This is what she would want too,’ her mom tells me every time I have my Sunday morning breakfast with her, at her home. I know that secretly she doesn’t want me to move on, just as I do not wish to forget the past and start afresh. She too believes that a miracle might happen some day, and that day Adira would want me to be with her; and I would be there, no matter what anyone tells me. Her mother greets me at the doorstep every Saturday with the hope that one day, her daughter will react to my presence there; one day she will respond to my love for her.
Adira was discharged from the hospital after a month-long stay. The doctors said that the swelling in her brain had gone down considerably, and yet they could not find out why she was not reacting to anything. Her stats were that of a healthy individual, her injuries had healed, but her condition remains the same. During her last days at the hospital, she had started sitting with support as she was lifted up from her bed by the hospital staff. However, she was force-fed liquid food, and her facial expressions never changed; they still don’t. She keeps on staring at something far away, with her hollow eyes which have no hope, joy or sorrow in them. Earlier, her eyes were pushed open by the staff or her mother every morning. What has changed since she came back home is that she now opens her eyes on her own in the morning, indicating that she is awake, and closes them at night. We know that she is there with us, but she does not realize or acknowledge our presence.
My parents and sister had come back to Delhi and got to know about Adira’s accident while she was still in the hospital. They came there to meet her. They saw her, and they also saw me being there for her but said nothing. No one brought her topic up in our house. I had confined myself to my room whenever I was at home. I left work to be with her during the morning hours, and locked myself up in my room in the evenings. I skipped meals to reach the hospital on time and help her mother who wanted to take care of her all alone. But none of my efforts matter now, for I did not do what I should have done when I could.
The day she was finally discharged from the hospital, her mother proposed that we visit my house once, for it might trigger something in her; the memories might bring her back. I told my parents who were as helpful and understanding as any parents could be. I had not been communicating with them. I never allowed anyone to enter my room, not even the maid for cleaning. I had printed out all the pictures of her that I had ever clicked and framed them, in delicate golden frames; for golden is her favourite colour and suited her best. They were all over the room, occupying every inch of the now-barren walls, and I wanted no one to disturb them.
When Adira was wheeled into the room, I hoped she would remember something. I looked at her eyes, for I believed that I had seen them respond, no matter what the doctors told us. I had seen them twinkle when I sang ‘Chod do anchal . . .’ for her in the hospital, and I saw her pupils dilate every time I told her how much I loved her. Her mother too vouched that she had seen her daughter’s eyes dilate at times, but the doctors dismissed our claims and told us that it was all in our head.
‘This is common. The loved ones feel and see movements even when there aren’t any. Your mind is trying to trick you,’ we were told every time. That day, when we took her into the room, I saw nothing in her eyes. Her soulful eyes had become hollow and empty, and I cannot forget the look in them.
Her mother took all her pictures with her. She also made me promise that I will not fill the room with her photographs any more, for she thinks that I do not deserve all the pain that I am going through. How can I tell her that I deserve that and a lot more? She is wrong in thinking that not looking at her pictures will help me move on.
I shall wait for her all my life if I have to.
When I last visited her, I told her that I was writing a book about us, about our love story. She did not react to my words, but I know that one day, she will be reading this book, lying next to me on the bed, by the light of a table lamp with her reading glasses on.
This book is for you, Adira.
For a long time, I have not been able to find myself, for I am still lost in you.
Acknowledgements
The world is a better place because of people who help others achieve their dreams. I want to thank Ravinder Singh for being my mentor and guide throughout the journey. His words have inspired me and my writing.
A special thanks to my editor, Vaishali Mathur, and her entire team at Penguin Random House for their editorial help.
Finally, a big thank you to all my readers who motivate me to complete my stories.
THE BEGINNING
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This collection published 2019
Copyright © Shravya Bhinder 2019
The moral right of the author has been asserted
Jacket images © Devangana Dash
ISBN: 978-0-143-44590-6
This digital edition published in 2019.
e-ISBN: 978-9-353-05475-5
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
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Something I Never Told You Page 18