20 December 2014

The Bench

The air was sticky and still, ripe in the middle of summer. Thigh against thigh, shirt clinging to a wet back, electrified hair, damped moons peeking through underarms – yes, humidity had started to rear its ugly head.
As if to compensate for all the discomfort, the skyline was a vibrant orange with streaks of pink thrown in for good measure. Along the sidewalk, in front of an insignificant little garden lay a desolate bench, a seemingly ordinary looking one made of grey stone. Under the shade of a huge oak tree, it speckled with golden light.

On the bench sat a woman old enough to be called a grandmother. She came to sit on that very bench every day, unfailingly, knitting a pale pink garment, shaped dubiously like a sweater.
Her eyes twinkled with unbridled residual youth of yesteryears; a sharp contrast to her grey hair and shiny wrinkled skin. Life across that path was a blur, with people walking, rushing, moving, and knitting their own veil of busyness, the only constant was this old lady, floating in her own bubble, distant to the rest of the quick paced world.

One of such typical days, a young girl who must be in her twenties walked on that sidewalk. Her eyebrows were in a knot and her shoulders were hunched with tension. Nobody knew that the streetlights were blurry orbs to her. The moisture in the air had accumulated and condensed in her eyes instead. She kept on walking until she couldn’t anymore, eyelids didn’t come with windscreen vipers, you see.
She sat down next to the old lady, who didn’t look up from her knitting, which was good for the girl for she wasn’t currently in the mood for either small talk or sympathy. She sniffled and let the tears fall uncontrollably; her face in her hands. The cascading waterfalls slipped between the ridges of her hands, puddling her charcoal suit. Her sniffles slowly transformed into sobs. She knew this would happen, she never used to cry, always guarded, but when she did; it was as if an unstoppable faucet had been turned on.

The old lady stopped clicking her needles and finally looked up, confused. “What happened, child?” she said to the girl.

“I..um..he..I” she mumbled between moans.

“What is your name, dear?”

The girl finally looked up, her face a mess, like a fresh oil painting given in the hands of a toddler; her kohl smeared across her cheeks.
“I’m Suhani” she said, wiping her eyes. “I’m sorry to have disturbed you, it’s nothing. I’m fine.”

The lady put her knitting aside and said, “Have I greyed my hair in vain? You must tell me. There is no problem that can’t be solved.”

Some might call this kind of intervention into another’s life as intrusion but sometimes all you want in life is for someone to hear you out, to listen even if it is to just nod and pat your arm.

The girl looked into the lady’s eyes. They looked huge, magnified behind her cylindrical glasses. Her teeth were perfectly straight, being obviously dentures and her whole aura glowed with radiance mixed with some inherent sorrow associated with the past. There was something very comforting about her presence, as if you’d keep your head in her lap and all your worries will be forever hers.

She twisted her hands in apprehension and began, “Well, there is a boy. He loves me. And I love him. But we cannot be together.”

“Why not?”

“Well, it’s not that easy. He’s got a job posting abroad and I have my job here. So, I thought it’d be easier on us if we both broke up. I broke it off myself, he agreed too. He leaves tonight.”

“If you did it yourself, then what is the problem?”

“There is so much heartache. We live in a world of ephemerality. An age where profile pictures last longer than relationships. It is highly unrealistic of me to expect a love so old-fashioned, for it to go on forever. You know, what is the definition of love in today’s world? It’s called convenience.
Maybe. I’ve been born in the wrong world, the wrong time. I’d be better off in your age, Aunty. I can’t bear the pain.”

The old lady blinked twice at her sudden outburst and then she stroked her arm. “You didn’t have to break it off with him. You could have gone abroad too, gotten a job there and settled down.”

“Settle down? All these years together, marriage has never been the topic of discussion. Who has the time you know? And I know I won’t be able to last a relationship without being in the same city as him. It will fade. I’ll be suspicious and he irritated. Hence, I thought it’d be most convenient to stay apart. When you cage your heart, the more protected it will be right?”

“But how long will you cage your heart, as you put it? Do you think you’ll be able to live without him?”
The bluntness of the lady’s question made her shudder. She had known the answer all along.“I don’t know.”

Beta, I don’t know why your generation has become so confused. You are given more freedom and you choose to listen to your brain. When I was your age, I used to work as a receptionist. A man used to take the same bus as me, every day. I’d catch him looking at me at the bus stop. One day, he finally got a seat next to me. The moment I saw him, I knew he was the one.
We used to sit together and talk every day. I still remember his lopsided smile. That time, there was no cell phone, no internet. All we had were those few precious hours.
 One fine day, he didn’t come to the bus stop. A whole week passed by, still there was no trace of him.”

“Then, what did you do?”

“I had no idea what to do. I talked to a few people and got his number. Imagine, in those days! I was quite the talk of the town, asking for a boy’s number. Eventually, I reached his house. Turned out his father was on his death bed and he had to leave town in a few days.”

“Then, what happened?” asked Suhani, wide-eyed, clutching at the lady’s hand.

“Well, I knew he was too shy to say it on his own. So I proposed to him and we were married off soon.”

“And all of this happened in a span of how many years?”

“About ten months. When you know it in your heart, time and space mean nothing.”

“Wow! Aunty, I never knew you were such a diva!” Suhani was almost laughing now.

“We have been married for 45 years now. All I tell you is never regret anything you do in life, especially if you do something out of love.”

Aunty, thank you so much for your time” she squeezed her hand, a smile flooding her face and coloring her cheeks red. “But I have to go now and find him.”

“Good luck, dear. May God always be there with you.”

*** 
It was early in the morning. The sky was a turquoise blue today. Birds chirped in the distance but alas they were overpowered by horns blaring out of shiny cars rushing past the street.
The old lady was sitting on the bench again, knitting an overtly long sleeve; the ball of wool rolling on the floor.

A man walking by the street picked it up and handed it to her, he sat down next to her and started to read his newspaper.

“I still remember when they put his picture on the newspaper in the obituary section. It was heartbreaking.” The old lady looked as if she was about to cry.
“I’m sorry, what?” the man was confused, not to mention unprepared to handle the sentiments of an old woman.

“My husband. He was in the army. Our love story is one of those typical Bollywood movies. He was Sikh and I, a Jain. Our love was doomed from the day we were born. But you know what did we do? We eloped! It was quite a scandal.
We had three lovely kids and we spent our life in Patiala. But life had other plans. He was killed in the Kargil War, after just ten years of wedded bliss. I’m sorry, dear. Look at me! Crying and spoiling your mood right in the morning.” She blew her nose silently in the extended knitted sleeve of the pink sweater.

The man, unaware of the appropriate social etiquette, handed her a tissue and quickly finished the rest of his paper and caught his taxi.

***


“Did you have your morning medicines? It’s way past your lunchtime.” A woman in white clutched the old lady’s hand and walked her to the building besides the garden. 


    

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