What Did Tashi Do

by Anangsha Alammyan

  Careful? The gods must have been laughing, Tashi thought bitterly.

  She remembered how her heart had jumped to her throat when the pink patch on the test strip had kept moving upwards after showing the first line – how it had climbed steadily ahead to settle at two pink lines – clear and distinct. The confusion in her head had changed instantly to shock.

  Then, to denial.

  They were barely twenty-two then, struggling with their studies, with no clue what they would make of their lives.

  She had screamed on the phone – “Fuck, I’m pregnant”.

  “What? No! How can that be possible?” Akash had begged for an answer.

  “I have no fucking clue.”

  “This has to be fixed. You have to get rid of the baby at once.”

  “Of course, we will do it together.”

  “Yes, yes. It’s a big headache. I want you to go to a doctor tomorrow and confirm this. Ask him how to kill it the soonest.”

  “You will not come?”

  “Um, I wish I could. But I have an exam until 5 PM. You visit the doctor. Let me know what he said.”

  “You don’t want to be there with me? Fine!” she said and hung up.

  She had feigned anger, hoping he would calm her down; that he would apologise for his behaviour and offer to accompany her to the hospital.

  She sat by the window for a long time after that, waiting for him to call back and set things straight.

  Her phone never rang.

  ***

  The next day, she went to the hospital unaccompanied.

  The gynaecologist had confirmed she was six weeks pregnant. Citing possible future complications, he had urged her to get her pregnancy terminated the next day itself. When she called Akash up and told him everything, he instantly agreed.

  On the next day, only an hour before the doctor’s appointment, the two of them were sitting in the college cafeteria discussing the course of action. Akash was dressed in a blue tee and black jeans; his hair was straight that day. Tashi moved from across the table to sit next to him and hold his hand, when he got a call. It was from his friend, Ravi, saying the recruitment interview of one of his dream companies that day.

  After he had hung up, Akash bit his lower lip and looked at her with regret in his eyes. “I really wish I could go, but I can’t miss this interview. Can we reschedule the procedure for tomorrow?” he had asked.

  “But I have fasted since last night and already taken the prescribed pre-abortion pills.”

  “Uh so this means-”

  “There is no way I can postpone. We have to do this today, Akash,” she had pleaded.

  He looked dejected. “You are brave, Tashu. I know you can do it without me,” he had given her a sad smile offered to walk with her to her hostel room before she could pack some clothes and leave for the hospital.

  Tashi was in shock all the way. The moment he left, she lost it. She felt to the floor of her room, breaking down in helpless, uncontrollable sobs. She didn’t know how she could go through this on her own, and in her desperation, had called up her best friend Manav.

  She was breathless with sobs when he answered her call. She asked him if he could go with her to the hospital. He agreed instantly without asking her why. Within minutes, he had booked an auto-rickshaw and arrived at her hostel gate to pick her up. On their way to the hospital, she told him the full story. Manav nodded and put an arm round her shoulder as if to shield her from the atrocities of the world.

  Hours later, she was lying unconscious on a cold bed, with metal spoons being inserted into her womb to scoop out the life growing within her. Manav had been there through it all – rushing to the nearby medical stores to get medicines when the doctors prescribed something new. After she woke up from her anaesthesia-induced unconsciousness, she shivered and cried for Akash.

  But he wasn’t around.

  It was Manav who put an extra blanket around her and held her hand till her grogginess subsided. Tashi had suffered from a bout of debilitating depression for several days after. She stopped attending classes and going about her daily routine. All she could obsess over was the baby she had just murdered. Whenever she tried to force herself to focus on something else, her thoughts inadvertently returned to that hospital bed and the look on the face of the doctor when he told her she was no longer pregnant. Her friends and classmates kept going on about life as usual, and many of them stopped to ask her if she was all right. She faked a smile, assuring them that everything was fine, that she was only feeling under the weather. Only in her heart, she knew how much she longed for Akash’s company and support. The two of them had survived a fierce whirlpool of emotions, and he was the only one who could truly understand what she was going through. She wanted him close by.

  But Akash was resolutely in denial throughout.

  Manav had been her sole support in that dark phase. Though his ways of trying to make her laugh didn’t always work – in the end, he brought the old happy-go-lucky Tashi back.

  Apparently, he had supported her a bit too much.

  Because right after she had recovered from the post-operation bleeding and stomach cramps, Akash had taken her out on a date to their favourite park. Tashi still remembered the day like it was yesterday. Akash had worn her favourite red shirt with black stripes, and his hair had set itself to an adorably curly mane. He fed her ice cream and asked her in a serious tone: “You and Manav seem to have grown,” he cleared his throat, "close these days.”

  His emphasis on the word “close“ caught her attention. She stared at him, not sure what to expect.

  “All my friends have been saying,” Akash continued, fumbling with his watch, refusing to meet her eyes, “that from the beginning of this semester, you have been spending more time with him than you did with me.”

  “May I ask which friend of yours said this?” she said contemptuously.

  “Ravi did. But does it matter?” He looked down again. “I have a question, Tashi.”

  She waited, arms crossed, her foot tapping impatiently on the sidewalk. She felt as though she was on the edge; that all that was needed for everything to go berserk was one push.

  “The baby you just killed, are you sure it didn’t belong to Manav?”

  She could only stare, as the world around came crumpling down.

  This man, the one for whom she had nurtured so much love that she hadn’t even blamed him for his callousness during the abortion, had the audacity to suggest that she had cheated on him. A mad rage was boiling in her heart, but it manifested itself in hot tears streaking her flushed cheeks. “How could you?” she spoke quietly, her voice trembling with anger. “After everything I did for you, how could you allege this?”

  She threw her bag to the ground in a huff and walked away.

  “Wait, Tashi. Tashi!” Akash had called out. He picked her bag up and ran after her.

  Tashi didn’t heed his pleas.

  That had been the deal breaker – the last straw that sealed the relationship in her eyes. He had come round a few hours later, calling her incessantly and begging for forgiveness, but she had turned a deaf ear to his cries.

  How could she be with a man who didn’t have an iota of respect for her?

  Months passed and the day of their graduation drew close. Tashi had blocked Akash on every social media platform. She had taken to turning in the opposite direction every time she spotted him in the corridors. It was hard for her - the decision to break up with Akash had torn her apart. But she couldn’t just stop loving him because he hurt her, although things would have been easier if she could. She tried her best, though, to erase Akash from her conversations, the same way she had erased him from her memory - not without pain, but thoroughly.

  On their last day in college, he had cornered her when she was least expecting it. Looking dapper in a fitted blue suit, with his hair sleeked up with gel, Akash had gone down on his knees, head hung in shame. There were tears in his eyes when he said how sorry he was, and ho
w he would consider himself lucky if she forgave him.

  Tashi didn’t want to create a scene in front of their classmates who had gathered around them. She agreed to part without any hard feelings. They shook hands as their friends cheered and hooted. When the crowd had cleared, Akash held her elbow, pulled her aside and asked, “There is no turning back, is there?”

  “Even if we could turn back, do you think we would end up where we started?” she asked drily. Akash stared at her for a while. Then, he shook his head slowly and turned away without a word. That was the last she had seen of him.

  After college, they hadn’t kept in touch – until one night a few months back when she assumed he had drunk-dialled her number. It was almost 2 AM, and she had woken up in confusion by the incessant ringing of her phone. She stared at his name on the screen for a full minute, her heart racing, before keeping the phone on silent and going back to sleep. She answered none of his twenty of so calls that night, and he hadn’t called back to follow up the next day.

  This isolated incident was the only reminder that Akash still existed in her life. This, and that terrible day three weeks back when she had called him up to hurl accusations at him in her desperate state of mind.

  The shrill ring of her phone broke the stillness of the night into a million shards. Startled out of her thoughts, Tashi turned violently and picked up her phone, expecting the worst.

  It wasn’t an unknown number. It wasn’t her mother either.

  It was Akash.

  Hands quivering, she put the phone to her ears and in a trembling voice, said, “Hello?”

  “Tashi, I have something terrible to confess,” came Akash’s voice from the other end.

  He had been crying.

  Chapter Five

  But he was my best friend

  Tashi sat up straight, not sure of what to expect.

  “Do you remember my friend Ravi from section B?”

  “Yes, Ravikant, your so-called best friend. I could never bring myself to like him - he made me uncomfortable at times.”

  “He and I were friends from the first year. You know how close we were. So, um, after you broke up with me, Ravi – sort of – asked me for your nudes sometimes.”

  Tashi was horrified. “What? Don’t tell me you obliged?”

  “No, I never let him save your pictures, I swear,” his voice sounded more uncomfortable now. “But there were times when I… uh, when I showed him some of them.”

  She was disgusted. “How could you have done that? I trusted you so much, I never -“

  “Calm down, Tashu,” he said using the name he had called her all those years back. “I was an asshole and I accept it. This is something I am extremely ashamed of, and I - I swear, if there was a way I could undo it, I would. But right now, you need to stay calm and listen to me.”

  Tashi waited, her face set in anger. Akash had made all her memories of the relationship feel like a sham in retrospect. She wanted to hit him on the head with something heavy.

  “When you called me up the other night, I was terrified that somehow Ravi was connected with the blackmailing. I was so angry, I drove straight to his apartment and confronted him. He was nearly driven to tears trying to convince me he had never saved a single picture of yours. I know he can be an asshole, Tashi, but to people who knew him well, he had always been a terrible liar. I believe him – he doesn’t have a hand in this.”

  “Fuck you, Akash. Apart from Ravikant, how many others have you shown my pictures to?”

  “There is nobody else, I swear. I only showed a couple to Ravi – that too when he got really insistent.”

  “Insistent? I don’t believe this! Didn’t you have the slightest bit of respect for me?”

  “Always, Tashi. I always respected you. It’s just that I was young and heartbroken back then. There were times when I wanted to pull my hair out and scream at you for leaving me like that. But you weren’t even speaking to me. It was hard to figure out – I hated myself for letting you down, but I wanted to get back at you for making me feel that way. I’m not defending myself, but those days I felt helpless and the only way I could vent my anger was by indulging Ravi’s wishes.”

  It sounded like he was crying again. She scoffed. “At least tell me you have deleted those photographs now?”

  The silence on the other end was punctuated by his sniffs.

  “You still have them?” she yelled.

  “Tashi, I -”

  “I knew you’re an asshole, but I couldn’t have believed you would stoop to such levels. I am ashamed I had anything to do with you.”

  “Tashi, please. I deleted them the night you called me. I –”

  “After everything you told me, do you still expect me to believe you had nothing to do with the blackmailing? Do I look like a fucking retard to you?” she shouted.

  “Tashi, I-”

  “I am going to the Police straight away. Make sure you hire a good lawyer because I promise I am not letting you get off easy.”

  She hung up and tossed her phone aside in anger. She held her head in her hands, her long, black hair falling over her flushed face. She picked a bottle from her bedside table, poured herself a glass of water and emptied it with loud gulps. Her blood was boiling with rage, but somewhere deep inside, she felt betrayed. Whatever the blackmailer might have taunted her with, when they were together, Tashi had given her heart to Akash. And had things gone on alright, she would have tried her best to marry him.

  But with one confession, he had made every beautiful memory of the past feel like an illusion, as if everything she had held on to for so long was a mere facade, a palace built on lies.

  Tashi had prided herself on being a good judge of people, but with Akash’s confession, she couldn’t help feeling disgusted at her choices of men.

  She felt exhausted, all energy drained from her body. She lay on the bed, her head hitting the pillow with a soft flump, and wiped bitter tears from her eyes.

  Her phone rang again. It was a WhatsApp call from a foreign number she hadn’t seen before. Her breath caught in her throat - a gut feeling told her it was from the blackmailer. She was dazed after Akash’s unsettling revelation and the prospect of attending a call from her tormentor filled with dread.

  With shaking hands, she put the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

  “Why haven’t you replied to my emails?” the voice on the other end sounded muffled as if the caller had a cloth stuffed in front of his mouth. “Do you want me to come and ring your doorbell now, to show you I can do anything I want.”

  This was the first time she was speaking to her tormentor on the phone. She was horrified, her skin covered in goosebumps. “No, no. Please don’t,” she begged.

  “Look out of your window.”

  Trembling with fear, she obliged.

  “Do you see that black bike parked beside the curb? That’s mine.”

  Her heart started beating frantically. “You- you are... Please don’t... I will -” she sobbed. Fear - mind-numbing fear - the likes of which she hadn’t experienced filled her veins like ice.

  “You didn’t buy what you needed, did you? I know your mother just left for the store. It will take at least half an hour for her to return. What if I stop by when dear little ‘Tashu’ is home alone?”

  “No no no, please don’t do that. I will do whatever you ask me to. Leave. Please leave,” she sobbed.

  “You better do whatever I tell you to. Otherwise, I’ll be back. And next time, I’m not going to leave without you doing some nasty things for me like you did for Akash, do you understand?”

  An unfeeling dial tone greeted her ears. She kept the phone away in haste, her chest heaving. She gulped as a figure dressed in blue jeans and a black jacket walked out from her building and climbed on the bike. A black helmet covered his face, obscuring his features. From the distance, he looked up and stared straight at her.

  Tashi felt as if a chunk of ice was stuck in her spine, refusing to melt away, refusing to
let warmth in.

  Through the helmet, she could feel him sneering at her. Then, as if in slow motion, he started his bike, and, with a last glance her way, drove off into the distance.

  Her fear was no longer a stranger on the internet. It had a face now; it was tangible, and it could physically harm her if it so intended.

  She stood rooted to the window, staring at the dusty ground long after he had left.

  Her phone pinged with a new message from the same foreign number. “Check outside your door,” the message read.

  Tashi was close to tears now. Her legs feeling like jelly, she walked up to the door and looked through the peephole. There was no one outside. Shuddering violently, she opened the door to find a neatly wrapped package placed at her doorstep. Looking around to make sure she was safe, she picked it up and stepped back inside, locking the door behind her.

  She held her breath as she opened the wrapped package. It was a remote-controlled vibrator – a toy used by couples for sexual pleasure.

  The thought of all the humiliating things her blackmailer could make her do with this filled her with dread.

  Her heart felt like a heavy stone, slowly sinking to the bottom of a deep, black pond.

  Chapter Six

  The only way out of this mess

  Sleep is an enemy these days,

  it hardly stops by where I lay -

  staring at the ceiling,

  heart beating in rhythm to the relentless ticking of time-

  as the hands of the clock gouge my face

  like fingernails made of steel.

  My thoughts flow out in black rivers:

  some get lost in the darkness beneath my eyes,

  and some come back to haunt me -

  words stripped of meaning clogging my veins,

  making my heart stop,

  choking me up

  as I try to take one desperate lungful of air

  before I go down,

  before I lose myself.

  The sun has lost significance-