by Ruchi Kokcha
After a few minutes my sister’s cries subsided. Mom was really angry and she came up to my room. In all these years, she had hardly ever entered my room; she always said that she could not bear the stench of urine. She entered that day only to beat me black and blue. Slippers, shoes, ruler, broom, she beat me with everything that she could lay her hands on. For nearly ten minutes I could feel the blows on my body. According to her it was a befitting punishment for my action. I couldn’t understand which action she was referring to, that I wanted to love my sister or that I had accidentally dropped her on the bed.
I had loved my sister for one minute and received a beating for ten minutes. That was my fate. I had heard many elders say that to be worthy of love, one should first give love. I gave love and got thrashed in return. I kept asking myself if love was so hard to get.
My mother narrated the incident to my father over the phone and he wished to speak to me about it. I was summoned from my room. As I walked to the phone, I kept thinking about what he would say to me. Would he also scold me or would he listen to me? What if he never wished to speak to me again? The thought made me shudder. As my hand reached for the receiver, I realized that I was weeping, not because I had been beaten but for the fear of losing his love. On hearing me sob, he asked me to tell him what had happened, though I was sure he already knew. It made me feel better. I promised him that I did not intend to hurt my sister and that I would never do it again.
The following week he gifted me a pup. My joy knew no bounds. When all others failed to understand my basic need for love, he saw through me and gave me a sweetheart to hold and kiss whenever I wanted. I called my puppy Ray, as he had brought hope into my bleak life; hope to give love and this time to receive love as well.
Ray was a real companion at home. As soon as I returned from school and entered the main gate, he would rush out to lick my feet in adoration. He would accompany me to my room. Wait for me as I changed my clothes. His food and water bowls were kept in my room. My mother did not want him to make the entire home untidy. I used to leave him out in the garden so he could ease himself. I never chained him. He was a smart dog and returned after emptying his bowels on his own. In the evening I would run around in our garden and he would chase me. He was a true friend, the only friend I made in my life. Day after day my love for him increased, but my mother’s tolerance was inversely proportional to my love. One day she asked our gatekeeper to blindfold Ray and leave him somewhere far away so that he would not come back. She could no longer see my dog disturbing the sanctity of her home. She told my father that the dog was unhygienic and harmful for the baby. He could not argue; after all, he did not wish any harm to come to the baby either. Ray left me. Love left me too.
One day Radha forgot to place a clean towel in my bathroom. After taking a shower I stood in front of the mirror, naked, to dry off the excess water from my skin. I noticed that my body had developed fatty areas on my chest. I was confused, as I was skinny otherwise. How could they grow overnight? Or had I not paid attention to my body before that day? I stood there looking at myself. Suddenly someone knocked on the door. I went to the door and peeked out. It was Radha. She had brought me my towel. I noticed that she too had the same fatty areas. As I thought about it, I realized that so did Mom and my teacher. It seemed every woman had them. Was I also becoming a woman? The sight of myself in the mirror pleased me. But then there was something else that appalled me, the dark hair under my armpits. I had seen Mom wearing sleeveless dresses. She was so clean and beautiful while I had these ugly black curls that shamed me. Not only in the areas visible just to me but also above my lips. I had thick eyebrows and side locks that made me look grotesque. I felt like crying. I cursed God for making me like that.
My school prayers taught us that every single person is God’s own creation. If I was also made by His hand, why was I not considered beautiful? There was madness around me for a certain idea of beauty. I could never be a part of that madness. I remained an outsider forever. My sister was an angel. A healthy and happy child. She was showered with everyone’s love. She was perfect, according to my parents, a daughter they could boast of, in beauty and manners.
When Priyanka was five, my mother decided to teach her how to swim. I saw them in the swimming pool. Mom was holding her by her waist while she moved her hands and legs to and fro; it was as if a little tadpole was swimming with its mother. That day I realized the extent of the lack of a mother’s love in my life. I went to the edge of the swimming pool and called out to my mother. She looked at me and asked me to wait. I shouted that I too wanted to learn. She told me that since I was bigger now, she would not be able to bear my weight in the water. She told me that she would send me to a professional instructor if I wanted to learn. I had always been given into the hands of others by my parents. My childhood had been lost to their business. Now that they were millionaires, they could spare time for Priyanka. But how could I rewind my clock? How could I get my childhood back to relive it the way I had always wanted it to be? I could not and neither could their money. I felt doomed. Just then an idea struck me. I thought that if I could end my life and be born again as a baby, I could gain back those lost years. Radha had once told me that people who die are born again. There is something within us that never ends. That something comes back when the body is gone.
I stepped into the pool, going down the steps one by one, the water rising higher and higher with each step. I could feel it at my throat. I stopped to think that if this was the last time I was alive, who would miss my presence. Would my mother miss me after my death? I did not think so. My sister was too young to even notice my presence. Radha might be upset by my untimely death, as it would mean the loss of her job. My death would bring sadness to only one person in this house: Dad. The thought was more suffocating than the water around me. But then he had his work, Mom and Priyanka to cheer him up. I held the least priority in his life too. After mourning me for some days, he would be back to going on his business trips and the memory of me would fade away in no time. When my living presence did not cross his mind when he was away from home then how could the memory of me trouble him when I was gone? He would be fine too eventually.
I closed my eyes and bent my knees. I could feel the water gushing into me through my nose, mouth and ears. I felt as if the entire swimming pool was floating in my head. After that I ceased to feel anything till I woke up in my father’s arms. He had saved me from drowning. He looked worried and held me for a long time. That was the first time I remember being hugged by him.
‘Don’t you ever do anything stupid like that ever again. Your life belongs not only to you but also to the people who love you. You have no right to take it away. We all love you. You don’t want us to feel cheated, do you?’
I felt loved and cared for. Some of my assumptions had been proved wrong. I mended the neck of the Barbie he had bought for me when I was seven. I ate well and kept myself tidy. Soon my health and physique improved. The curls on my head grew till my waist. I let Radha braid them for school so I would look neat. I started to take care of myself, not for my sake but to gain his affection. He began to work from home most of the time while my mother went to her office. I stopped going out to play so that I could spend more time watching him work, doing my homework by his side.
When Mom was travelling for work, Radha would take care of Priyanka while I was left on my own.
Once in her absence I had to braid my hair myself. No matter how much I tried I could not do it. My hair was not in my control. Even Mom could not handle it. Only Radha could manage my curls. I went to my father’s home office to fetch a pair of scissors. I opened the drawer of his desk and took out the scissors without his permission while he watched. I held the scissors in one hand and my hair in the other and was about to cut it when he shouted out to me from the couch. He rushed towards me and took the scissors from my hand. I started crying in desperation. He picked me up and took me to my room, made me sit on his lap and oiled my hair,
braiding it beautifully. How pretty I looked. For a child like me who had never received even a glimmer of attention from anyone, his caring help, however little it was, sowed the seed of a deep-rooted affection in my heart.
Ever since I could remember, I was indifferent to people, detached from everyone, not only because everyone was too occupied with their lives but also because no one cared to make any effort with me either. A child only needs its parents’ time and love, nothing else. No matter how much wealth my parents accumulated, no matter how many toys they bought me, no matter how reputed an international school they sent me to, it all came to naught in my eyes. A child’s worst fear is loneliness, but not just a child’s—it can kill the most powerful of creatures. I felt as if the loneliness within me had developed jaws that sucked my marrow more with each passing day. These jaws fed upon me and grew stronger. My father was the only one who tried to save me from being sucked into those jaws completely. It was he who erased my indifference by his acts of caring. But he never showed his affection in the presence of my mother. He loved my mother a lot and listened to every word that she said as a command. She did not like to spend anything on me, be it her time or money; only she never said so openly.
I was about to enter my teens. It is the age when parents play the most crucial role in one’s life—that of a guide. Just as Lord Krishna gave the knowledge of the Bhagvada Gita to his disciple and friend Arjuna to prevent him from straying from the right path, such is the parents’ duty towards their teenage child. The right guidance by parents can encourage a child to make the right choices at the right time, but the lack of such guidance can lead to lifelong repentance.
I was good at literature. In fact, I thrived on it, Shakespeare in particular. It soothed my tormented senses. I wanted to become a poet, for I was gifted with imagination, although I lacked proficiency in language. I wanted to join a language class so that I could paint my imagination in words that would not fail me. But the age of poetry had died long ago, according to my mother. The world of my imagination waited for the right words and direction, but just like Godot, they never came. I felt like I was sailing in an endless sea of my imagination, not knowing in which direction to sail, not knowing where the shore of language might be. And so poetry perished.
Asking for artistic guidance from my parents might have been too much for them, as their life was based on finance. But asking for physiological guidance from a mother is never too much. My mother never cared to notice my maturing physical self. I learnt about the things that a mother should explain to her daughter from various other sources such as classmates, magazines and television. I remember the day I got my period for the first time, soiling my white uniform. Everyone in my class saw the stain, but I did not know the reason for their stares. The boys giggled, the girls were shocked, but no one approached me to help. My stomach hurt like hell. I thought I should pass urine to ease the pain. I saw blood. I could not understand what had happened. I had not fallen or gotten hurt, so why was I bleeding? I started crying and would not come out of the school lavatory. Finally, one of my classmates told my teacher that I had not returned from the girls’ toilet. My teacher sent her to check on me. I feared I would die from the continuous bleeding from my insides. I told her what was happening to me, to which she replied that it was normal and happened to all females.
She knew about it, I did not. She was prepared for it, while I was taken aback, totally unprepared. She took me to the school clinic where I was given a sanitary napkin and a skirt to change into. My classmate taught me how to use the pad, disconcerted at my lack of knowledge. I didn’t tell my mother about my period for a long time.
It was because of my mother’s apathy and my father’s uxorious nature that my birthday had never been celebrated; at least, I don’t remember it. It was only on my fourteenth birthday when she was away on a business trip that my father decided to celebrate it. He asked me to invite all my friends. He was surprised to find that I did not invite anyone from my school or the neighbourhood. I had no friends to share this moment of my life. Radha had prepared my favourite dishes. Dad brought a cake for me in the evening. It was a replica of our home. He gifted me my home as my birthday present. He sang the birthday song and handed me a knife while I blew out the candles. I looked at the cake. After fourteen years of my life my father had given my home to me. How could I cut it?
Tears trickled down my cheeks, leaving him stunned. He came and stood next to me and whispered in my ear, ‘Just close your eyes and capture this moment in your memory, and then it will stay there forever.’
He wiped away my tears and made me smile. I looked at the cake-that-was-home, then turned my gaze to him and closed my eyes. I wished for many more returns of this moment and cut my birthday cake. It became my best memory with him.
Memories have always been very important to me. For it was Dad who told me about the power that resides in memories. They turn everything immortal, showering permanence on otherwise fleeting moments. I kept saving memories of love and kindness whenever I could find them. I had become a memory gatherer, to the extent that I lived not only in my memories but in the hope of adding more memories to my existing cache.
Everyone has their special moments in life, everyone remembers them. But simply remembering them was not what I did. I relived them in my mind, in empty moments of desperation and pain when I had no one around; I started performing memories from my cache to fill the vacuum in my spirit, as if the theatre in my mind staged the show of my life. Were the characters real? I did not know. I lived in two worlds, the empty pragmatic world that gave me nothing but affliction, and the one in my mind, the world of infinite bliss. Day after day as my store of memories filled the void, I began to immerse myself more and more in the world of my memories. I would spend hours in my room, living within the play of my memories.
Radha noticed that I would stay locked inside my room for long periods of time and started to worry about me. She thought that I talked to myself more than I should. Once I tried to explain to her that I didn’t talk to myself but to them. She did not believe me. Instead, she told my father what I had said, and he became really worried. He came to see me every evening and asked me the same questions over and over again. ‘Who do you talk to?’ I told him that I was able to spend time with Ray despite his absence, I told him that I spent time with him too, but he did not believe me, telling me that the things I spoke about had never happened. He thought it best to take me to a doctor who asked me strange questions, after which he jumped to the conclusion that I spoke to imaginary people because my mind was cheating on me.
But the people I saw were not imaginary; they were the real people from my life, my best friend Ray and my father. All I did was enact some of the memories I had of them. I confess that some events I did invent, but only things that I wished would happen in my life, nothing else. I never saw or imagined any random person. But the doctor thought otherwise. He asked my father to keep a watch on me and prescribed some medication too.
Dad gave strict instructions to Radha to monitor my medication and my mind’s plays. Everyone was after me to wipe out this imaginary world of mine. But this world in my mind was the real world for me. It was the source of my existence. My happiness was secured in this personal space, which was now being intruded upon by my own people. It was time to lock the door and throw away the key. The stage shifted; the action and dialogues became internal. According to them I was getting better. Radha no longer heard me talking to myself. She saw me sitting on my bed most of the time, or in my rocking chair, eyes closed. No one realized that a storm was approaching. Not even me.
As I grew up, I realized that God’s best creation was not the human being but the human mind. And not just any mind, but a mind that could feel and relive the memories that it stored. Memories that could bring back lost happiness and complete an otherwise incomplete life. I gained another level of understanding about the power of memories. Not all memories please one; some are there to haunt one fo
r the rest of one’s life. I was fifteen years old when I encountered one such memory that not only tormented me but also changed the course of my existence.
It was the night when a part of me died forever, while a part of me blossomed in a new light.
My parents were hosting a terrace party. Mom had always been the perfect hostess. My parents enjoyed collecting rare artefacts. But my mother differed from my father in one aspect: not only was she fond of buying rarities but also of showing them off. And whenever they made a new acquisition, she would throw a party to let the world know what a great eye she had been born with.
Most of the guests had arrived. My parents were busy attending to them. At least I thought so. I never liked these gatherings. Being around too many people suffocated me. I did not want to join the party and told Radha that I was not feeling well. She told me to go to bed and went to get my medicine. Half an hour passed but she did not return. I left my room to get the medicine myself. The medicine box was not in its usual place in the den. I thought Mom must have taken it to her room and forgotten to put it back. I went to my parents’ bedroom barefoot. I was scared, for if she saw me like that, she would scold me.
The door was open. I peeped inside the room. It was all clear. I tiptoed to Mom’s desk and started searching for the box. It was not in the first drawer. I opened the second one without making the slightest noise. A sound startled me. It came from the bathroom attached to my parents’ bedroom. I went to the closed door of the bathroom and pressed my ear against it. Someone was in there. But my parents were upstairs. I thought a thief had broken in. I clutched the doorknob tightly and slowly opened the door. I peeked in. There, in the shower stall, stood a man covered in white foam from head to toe. He was tall and looked like a snowman, only a little leaner. He was the first naked man I had ever seen. His was the first frame I had ever known. Every single part of him looked desirable. The sight mesmerized me. I felt no guilt in looking at his naked body as he rubbed his nether parts. It was a moment of glory. But then every moment of glory is packed within a bubble that must burst as soon as it shows itself. While I stood captivated, staring unblinking at him, he turned on the shower, and as he turned his face towards the door my sanity was washed away with the foam. He was my father.