‘I think the ghost has called it quits.’ I said, on the third day from our visit to the temple site. ‘No sign of life, if you can pardon the paradox.’
‘Aren’t you too early to pronounce your judgment?’ My friend said, relaxing in his chair and reading a book on ‘Strange mental illnesses’ by a Czech Physician, researcher and author, who smiled good-naturedly at its back cover. He always carried a couple of his books on our every journey.
I shook my head in the negative. ‘I get a feeling that the ghost has now renounced all worldly activities and retired to eternal peace as, mind you, it should have done from the start. The world is much populated as it is. We need no ghosts to complicate matters further.’
‘If it really is a ghost, that is.’
‘Point’ I conceded. ‘And you think who…’
‘Stop it right there, Sutte.’ he barked back. ‘I don’t like you treating me like a machine for predictions.’
I tried to distract his mind from the annoyance he felt towards me. ‘What’s that book you are perusing? I saw it in your shelf sometime ago and thought some Psychiatrist client of yours must have presented it as a token of his gratitude. I never thought you would actually get down to reading it.’
‘Nothing of the sort, man.’ he replied with eyes still trained on a page in the book. ‘I have bought it with good money. It set me back seven hundred and ninety nine bucks but it is worth it.’
‘What? You purchased it? But why?’ I asked, amazed.
‘There are some peculiar case studies here that I wanted to read. That’s all.’
‘Like?’
‘Like a Danish business tycoon who has a fetish for cartoons. He cannot function normally if he does not get a daily dose of his favorite animated characters. He is a perfect example of a fine gentleman in every other way but for this habit.’
‘Can I have a look at his picture?’
‘Sure’ he said, turning a page from the book towards me.
It was the photograph of a man wearing a pin striped, business suit. He sat smartly on a swivel chair and his face beamed with the radiance of humor and intelligence and also that of pride of a self-made man.
‘He looks like a typical successful businessman.’ I observed. ‘I can see nothing in him that could reveal that he suffers from such a mental illness.’
‘The picture is not clear.’ said Bhrigu ‘If we could meet him in person, I’m sure we’ll be able to observe subtle symptoms of his condition.’
‘Does it affect his work?’
‘Only when he does not watch an hour of his favorite cartoons.’ my friend replied. ‘He becomes restless then and is not able to concentrate at all.’
‘Even on medication?’
‘He is not on medication but accepts his condition as it is. He says he does not want to depend on medicines for life. I fully support him there.’
‘Do you really think this habit of his needs treatment? What if it’s just a hobby that has become part of his routine now?’ I said, trying to form a diagnosis.
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Can be, Sutte, I don’t know. But I think he needs some difficult part of his childhood resolved if he needs to get better. Medicines are not a permanent solution. They just keep the disease such as this at bay. They do not cure it.’
‘Hmmm.’ I said, slowly. ‘Do you think you can help him?’
‘I don’t know.’ he replied. ‘But I think I understand his problem.’
As he said this, his face sagged with the painful memory of a condition he himself was afflicted with not a little time ago; the torment in the form of his aunt, Nirja. I was happy that he could get over it but by the looks of him, I knew that he still had a long way to go before getting completely free of his painful past.
‘Bhrigu.’ I said gently. ‘Are you reading this book for yourself?’
‘Not really.’ he replied, dully. ‘But this man reminds me of…me.’
‘Do you really think you are mentally ill?’ I cried, alarmed. ‘That’s ridiculous! You don’t suffer from such strange habits. You are as fine a man as I have ever known. Stop entertaining such thoughts at once. I…’
My heated speech was interrupted as Savita coughed at the threshold. I knew she had come bearing our lunch. I don’t know why but her presence at the door had made me uncomfortably excited and…alarmed. ‘Come in, S…Savita.’ I said and was embarrassed at the delicate way I had spoken her name. I could see my friend’s face light up at once as he took in my odd behavior. ‘S…Savita’ he repeated with a slow, impish smile.
‘Your lunch.’ she said, placing our tray gently on the table. ‘I hope you like cabbage.’
‘I love it.’ I said, involuntarily.
She smiled and was about to leave the room when Bhrigu hailed her. ‘Savita ji, a moment.’
She stopped and looked at my friend with a question in her eyes. ‘What is it, sir?’
‘I beg your pardon if I am intruding into your personal affairs but your brother, Nataraj Bhakti, is very worried about you.’
Surprised, she stared at my friend and so did I. When did the man confide such a worry in my friend regarding her sister, I mean, cousin, was all that I could think of. He must have done so when I was not around as I did not remember him giving tongue to his alleged worries for Savita.
‘Worried for me?’ she asked, surprised. ‘And why’s that?’
‘He…um…how to say…’ my friend stammered as if embarrassed to be put in such a situation.
‘Please tell me.’ she said, now clearly intrigued. ‘Why is he worried about me?’
‘He said that he cares for you deeply and from the moment your marriage, forgive me if I am being blunt, ended, he has always been concerned about you. He thinks that you should have a partner to spend your life with.’
She did not say anything but kept staring at my friend, listening to his every word with rapt interest. ‘Really?’ she said.
‘Why, yes. Of course.’ my friend replied warmly. ‘Your brother loves you, don’t you know? He was hesitant to talk to you about the matter himself so he requested me to act as a mediator. Get to know your feelings on the matter. You see, Savita ji’ he said and cleared his throat. ‘He wants you to get married again.’
‘What?’ she cried. ‘Is that what he said to you? Please tell me.’
‘Yes. Those were his exact words. “I want to see her get married.” That’s all.’
‘This sudden interest in my welfare is quite curious.’ she said, with a hint of mockery in her voice. ‘And then too when I…’ She stopped herself abruptly and was I dreaming or did she bit her lip?
‘When you what, Savita ji?’
‘No…nothing.’ she said at once. ‘I was just saying that my husband died seven years ago. He never cared what happened to me after that. Why this sudden interest in my second marriage? And anyways, who will marry a widow with a twelve year old son?’
‘There can be many suitors.’ Bhrigu said, and almost involuntarily I supported him vocally before being glared down to silence.
‘Really? I don’t see any.’
‘You have not looked properly.’
‘And what do you mean by that, sir?’ she said, a trifle annoyed.
‘Only that you should give him a chance to try to see you settled once again.’
‘I am already settled.’ she snapped back. ‘Why do you people think that a woman can’t go about her life without a husband, huh? I married because I fell in love and not because I needed to. I will marry a second time only if I happen to fall in love again and not a day before that. As for my needs, I am an educated woman. If I can earn a decent living in this village alone, I can manage quite well for myself. Please tell him that he need not pretend to worry about me. Especially with his friends.’
‘That I most certainly will.’ replied my friend. ‘And I am happy to meet a woman as confident as yourself. I will relay your message to him but…’
‘But what?’
‘I am sorry but Chiranjeev ji can be quite talkative at times. From him I gleaned the fact that you are their cousin and quite an heiress at that. It is out of my own curiosity that I ask this. You are an educated woman, with a good college degree and money to back you in making a home for yourself and a career. Why do you waste your life here?’
She sighed deeply. ‘I like it here.’ she said slowly. ‘There is peace and quite here. In the city these two things are very hard to come by.’
‘Peace and quiet?’ he said, surprised. ‘When you run the risk of confrontation with people like Chiranjeev and Premkala? If I was in your shoes, I would have wasted no time in relocating as far away from those two as possible.’
‘They don’t affect me anymore.’ she said again. I could hear her voice become heavy with such grief that I was overcome with the urge to hold her and keep her away from all that was evil around her. The happiness with which she had charged into the room was now gone and I could see the marks of great suffering on her face that where till now, hiding in plain sight, waiting to appear at the slightest notice. ‘And I think that even with them around, I can be more peaceful here than anywhere else.’
‘Savita ji, I think you are hiding many difficult pages of your life.’ my friend went on with a gentle smile and eyes bright with compassion; his S.O.P while interviewing his suspects. ‘If only you could express that which you have buried within you, you’ll feel light again.’
She was quiet for a time, staring blankly at a void of space before her and visiting a period in her life that she had, with all her will, forced somewhere deep within her. ‘I was happy’ she said ‘So happy. Life was ripe with the expectancy of a bright future. I wanted to study…to achieve something and my parents, because they were my parents in every sense of the word, supported me but…but…one mistake…one mistake and the talk of the village was enough to change the way they felt about me. And what was my mistake, sir? Tell me? That I brought a male friend along when I came to the village in my fifth semester? I thought everyone would be happy to meet my best friend but, to my horror and humiliation, all hell broke loose. Tongues wagged and talked what not and suddenly I was an outcast in my own family.’ she sighed. ‘Is love so cowardly that it can vanish at the slightest challenge? My parents said to me that if I was a good daughter, I had to send him off. I asked them whether they trusted me or the villagers who had no business interfering in our matter…but…but they kept quiet. They said that if I loved them, I had to send him off. The problem, sir, was not that I had any trouble sending Ganesh back but the problem lay in the fact that my parents trusted the counsel of the villagers; outsiders, over the integrity of their own daughter. And that really hurt me, sir, more than I could tell you in words. I went back after the holidays and I did not swear at all that I would never come back, as rumor has it, but I was so shook up at the loss of faith my parents had showed in me; the parents whom I valued above my own life, that I could not muster the willingness or the courage to face them again. I had seen the lurking suspicion in their eyes with which they had sent me off at the railway station. I knew in my heart, that I would be greeted by the very same suspicion if I ever dared to go back again. Hence my feet faltered and I could not return…’
She was quiet for sometime and I could hear the window panes straining with the force of wind hitting it violently. The clouds had foregathered in the skies and the growing darkness outside had now eclipsed our room and I could see the bright, beautiful eyes of Savita, glowing in the dark with the dull sparkle of grief. ‘After graduation, I joined a convent as a Hindi poetry teacher. There I met my husband, Prakash.’
‘He was a good man, Prakash.’ she continued, ignoring the noise of lightening and thunder outside. ‘He was caring and affectionate and a lover of poetry too. Although he was a chemistry teacher of + 2, he was studying to compete in the G.A.T.E exam. We used to lunch together in the cafeteria, discussing our favorite poets, going over those beautiful words…I married him after two wonderful years of courtship. We saved a little from our combined income to buy a small but beautiful house in the suburbs and settled quite comfortably in our new lives. The pain that I had to endure at the absence of my loved ones at the wedding was now also in the passing. Everything was so good that sometimes I feared if it would last forever. A further two years passed and our love for each other strengthened to the point that I stopped thinking of myself as one person. Prakash and I were a team in every sense of the word. We were so perfectly matched that I secretly congratulated myself on finding my soul mate. After all how many people are that lucky? We worked at the same school and then retired to a quite, happy and peaceful life. I often think about that part of my life. It pained me before to relive those beautiful memories, realizing that they were gone, but now I have become numb to my past…’
‘But what happened to destroy that happiness?’ I asked.
She looked at me briefly and then sat silent for a few minutes. The sky outside had darkened and it looked as if it would rain the whole night. ‘One day, Prakash told me in the cafeteria where we were having lunch that his parents were about to pay us a visit. I had met them once at the wedding as before that they had gone for a lengthy pilgrimage and could not meet me. I was excited at the news and wanted to do my utmost to please them and stand to gain their love and admiration. I could see that Prakash was not quite happy to receive the news and could not reciprocate my excitement. Well, I thought little about it at that time and eagerly anticipated their arrival. When they came, they were very happy to see me and showered me with their blessings and all the religious knick-knacks they had collected from the pilgrimage. My mother-in-law was a very talkative woman and soon she was pouring out colorful stories from her trip. My father in law was of a retiring disposition and spent most of his time in the balcony reading Bhagvad Gita or the daily newspaper. He also used to water the plants I had bought but due to my busy schedule, frequently forgot to take care of them. Apart from the volume of talk of my mother in law, I had remotely nothing to find fault in them and it looked that they too had accepted me as their daughter in law.’
‘It looked?’ I asked, softly. ‘Why is that?’
‘I am coming to that.’ she replied. ‘When six months passed, I knew that my in laws had come to stay with us for good. Prakash was their only son so they had every right to put up with us as long as they wanted. My mother in law also hinted that she was in no particular hurry to return to their house in their native village. My father in law would go at times to meet his friends and look after a piece of land he had in the village but my mother in law resolutely denied that. She said she was comfortable living here with us. I had to adjust to this new arrangement but with effort I had made myself as comfortable with my surroundings as possible. Prakash was happy to see the way I had learned to adapt. Although I did not have as free a life as I had before and my mother in law had taken it upon herself to educate me in her way of doing things, I had my job and there I could relax a little with my husband to give me company. Soon, I was promoted to higher classes and with that, my work load increased. Prakash applied for a job at a reputed university after clearing G.A.T.E that year with very good marks and soon landed the position of an Associate lecturer in his department. This ended our co-working hours but I was happy for our progress. As Prakash and I got busier with our new responsibilities, my mother in law had to actively take part in the household chores, instead of being a passive observer and an occasional fault finder. I expressed my gratitude freely for her much needed help. She looked a trifle sad because I could not lend her more of my time and my father in law was either sitting in the balcony or taking a trip to the village. Prakash, I had observed, talked little to his mother. He told me it had always been like that.’
A bolt of lightening momentarily illuminated her face as I could see a pale face, drained of all color and life. ‘In the following months, Kamala, my mother in law, started losing the warmth that she had displayed towards me. She would no longer look or smile at me or approach me bearing her colorful tales. I sometimes tried to talk to her but she would not pay attention and bark at me without the slightest provocation. I thought it best to leave her alone. I also observed that ochre, the one vegetable I had a mild allergy too, and had made her aware of the fact, started to become the staple food for either lunch or dinner. At first, I thought she must have forgotten but when it started slipping from her mind way too often, I understood that memory had little to do with her conduct. Soon a time came when my mother in law and I had become strangers co existing together. We would go without talking to each other for months and as I adjusted to this new situation as well, Kamala struggled. It was her decision not to talk to me for reasons that I could not, for the life of me, fathom but and I could clearly see that she was looking gloomier and had lost a lot of weight too. She would sometimes pray in her room for hours, refusing even to come out for her meal. I talked to Prakash about her deteriorating condition and he said that with time her mother would be fine. She must be missing her home in the village and we decided that when my father in law took a trip there next, we would send her too.’
‘When she heard of our decision.’ Savita went on. ‘We thought she would liven up but it only helped to further spoil her mood. She started crying helplessly, calling the Lord to come to her aid. I did not know what was happening to her and for the first time in my life, I could see clear signs of worry on Prakash’s face. Before our very eyes, she fainted and we had to rush her to a nearby private hospital. The doctor said that she was suffering from low blood pressure and that there was nothing wrong with her that proper rest, medicines and nutrition could not cure. We came back with Prakash repeating to me again and again that we should now take better care of her.’
‘I don’t know what happened but after that incident, Kamala’s behavior changed towards me a second time. She was no longer cold or hostile and her affections for me were back with renewed energy. Prakash, on my insistence, would now take some time out for her mother and talk to her at length, listening patiently to all that she had to say. The only person who came out untouched here was my father in law, who continued to take his trips as if nothing had happened and his pact with the balcony grew even stronger.’
‘I could see that Prakash and his mother were bonding very well and she was now improving and regaining the kilos she had lost. Everything was going as well as before and when I discovered that I was expecting a child, the picture of our happiness was complete.’
I could see that there was nothing in the story that could account for the loss of color and the pain in her voice but still I listened attentively. My friend was sitting back in his chair but I knew that he was following her story closely, rapidly fitting the personalities involved with their proper ‘effects’.
‘Everything was going well when the worst happened. Prakash met with an accident and his right leg was badly hurt. He was given a medical leave of three months from the university and he started recuperating at home. Kamala was happy because now she would get to spend quality time, alone with her son. I did not know then that my life was now taking a turn and that too, for the very worst.’