The Journey - Part 5

"Love and Biology  "

I was looking at the calendar. I had forgotten the date of previous month, I never had to remember. I wish I had. I felt cold, I felt urge to sit. I thought I would faint if I won’t sit. I somehow managed to walk to the chair. I again counted days, twice, thrice. The calculation gave same figure every time. The natural instinct was to be afraid and it was strange I was afraid and happy at the same time. I had missed my period.

“Suman, please come in the kitchen, I need some help”. I recognized it was my mother shouting but words didn’t get registered me, only the voice did. I wanted to run and tell someone about this. I wanted to get it out of my system. Mother? No, she will freak out. Harish? I was not sure how he would have reacted. Chinu? Yes, I can tell her that she was probably going to be an aunt of junior Chinu. Her reaction will be definitely –excitement! But no, I can’t tell her, she was not a small kid anymore to accept this without questions or not grown up enough to understand the answers either.

So I had no one to run to when I was happy? Nobody that close who will not judge me? Really? Am I that lonely? I thought.

“Suman, where are you, if you are with Chinu, ask her to spare you some time now, you have to finish this work and go to college.”  She assumed I was with Chinu, that’s the only time I used to be lost in my world. I and Chinu had a funny secret name for my mother - “Alarm clock”. Only difference was, we could never set time to our wish or switch it off when we wanted. She was successful every single time to wake us up from our dreams, sometimes daydreams.

I went to the kitchen, completed my daily chores. I never spent time on looking better since I knew nothing can make that face or body better looking. But I spent 10 more minutes that day in front of the mirror. I laughed because I could not believe that I just checked if I was looking fat. I was excited to meet Harish in the evening.

“So you and the guy from your childhood story were in a relationship?” Anu asked eagerly.

Suman laughed. “No dear, we were not in a relationship, I think we were in love. I was.”

 “Women always know when they are in love, on the other hand, guys are always confused. Traditionally women are famous as over thinkers, but lately I have been thinking about changing my perception.”

“#13, why do you have to make everything about being a woman or man. You are such a gender biased person.”

“Anu, First of all I am not a person, I am Yamdut. And about being gender biased, I have completed my masters in Human resources, and I have got to find a subject for my PHD soon. I think I am going to pick …”

“You are a know-it-all Yamdut by the way. If you have not noticed, that’s typical male on earth.”

“Now who is making it about gender?”

“That was exactly the point! Please don’t tell me that you are picking ‘Women from earth’ as a topic!” Anu said sarcastically.

“No, I surely want to complete my PHD someday so I am not picking that topic for sure.” #13 answered sincerely.

Anu wondered if #13 didn’t understand the sarcasm or he ignored it on purpose.

“Okay, you both, stop fighting. This reminds me of my grandchildren and happy memory is painful. Let’s not add any more emotion to our already emotionally flooded minds. Let Suman continue with her story. Suman?” Mrs. Sarpotdar took grandmom role and she was really good at it.

“Yes, where was I “, Suman came out from trance.

“You were going to college  ...”

“Yes, I was professor in college and my college was located in a town. Nobody knew me in that town, so I decided to confirm my news. I took the test from medical store and I prayed for it to be positive. It was! I was going to become a mother. I was going to have Junior Chinu in my arms in few months. After that I was almost a zombie - doing everything mechanically. Either extreme pain or extreme happiness causes this - where brain controls your body so that you can be with your mind completely. Everything else is just reflexes. Your actions means nothing to you, it is like you hypnotize yourself.

I met Harish in the evening.

“I have a good news”

“Let me guess, Chinu won some prize in elocution which you wrote for her? Your world and joys revolve around her, I am not sure when I am going to be as lucky as Chinu.”

I was too excited to react to the remark.

“I have not talked to her today.”

“Wow, then this has to be something big. You forget almost everything around you when you talk about Chinu.”

“Yes it is. I am pregnant.” I could not look into his eyes. I think I was blushing and I was lost in our future together. I didn’t realize for some time that Harish had not blurted out a single word.

“Harish, where are you?”

“Yeah. I am here.”

“It does not look like you are, well, now is the good time to say something.”

“I really don’t know what to say, are you sure about this?”

“Yes, I am”

“Is it cause of that day, when we went out to sit near the lake, but it started raining so we came back…”

“Does that really matter now, which day it was?”

“Yes it does, we need to see if we can take care of this matter without anyone knowing about this.”

“This is all you have to say about this? Taking care of the matter?”

Later we had the same discussion which you can have with a guy who didn’t know how to take responsibility, didn’t know how to stand up for his love, apparently who didn’t know what the girl, he claimed to love, wanted in her life. He had fallen in love with me that day because I was like a mother to Chinu and now I ‘becoming a mother’ was just a ‘matter to be taken care of’? How did that happen?

“Listen to me Suman. Don’t be dreamy, think practically. This matter is too serious to be handled emotionally. My parents or your parents will not accept the grandkid which was conceived before marriage, will they? Think about it.”

“It is hard but not impossible Harish. We can try convincing them.”

He was now frustrated that his words were reaching me but his thought was not.

“Oh please. You are an intelligent person, think straight. You know how that can end. My father is an orthodox, forget support, he will kick me out for this. You love me, don’t you? Try to understand the situation, this will not do any good to anyone, not you, not me, not to our families. And we can have the baby anytime you want in future.”

“I don’t know, I was so happy from the morning, you know how much it means to me”

He pulled me close, hugged me. He had thrown that card on my face ‘prove-your-love-by-sacrificing’.

“Suman, we love each other and we can’t risk our future for this. It’s too high price to pay for our carelessness”

Carelessness! I cried, a lot for a long time. I took a step back, relieved myself from his embrace.

“I love you Harish, I really do.” Finally I gave in, I touched my belly but I could not feel what I felt in the morning, feeling had already moved on before I could.

Suman took a pause. No one was sure if she finished her story. It sounded incomplete. It was incomplete. Mrs. Sarpotdar finally broke the silence, “I can understand how tough that decision would have been, it is not easy to let go your own part.”

“It was not just part of me, it was more than that. I wanted a family, I wanted to be a mother my whole life, and I didn’t know what else to be as I had been taking care of Chinu all these years. It was the thing I enjoyed the most.”

Anu was too inexperienced to understand this, she knew the world as black and white. “But Suman aunty, why didn’t you marry Harish and had kids later?”

Mrs. Sarpotdar didn’t like Anu’s question “Anu, that might be too personal and something she does not want to share.”

“I think I have already come too far to give up on who I am.”

“Ladies, don’t bombard the questions, it diverts the main topic. What is that you wanted to change in this day Suman?” #13 was back in role of quizzer.

“I wish I would have believed myself rather than illusion Harish showed me. I wish I would have been more firm. I wish Harish would not have convinced me to prove my love by not keeping the baby.”

Anu was still confused. She was thinking to herself and didn’t realize she was talking loudly, “But why didn’t you get married, why didn’t you adopt later? How can one abortion be a life changing thing? It just does not make sense”

Mrs. Sarpotdar was about to say something, but Suman stopped her, “It is okay Nalini. Anu is right.”

#13 and Mrs. Sarpotdar both smiled as they realized that Suman called Mrs. Sarpotdar by her first name. Mrs. Sarpotdar deserved that respect. #13 was impressed by Suman’s nature to understand people even when she was reciting the toughest part of her life.

“I think she is asking right questions and I have asked them to myself before. Those answers are morally questionable, but will satisfy her curiosity. So Mr. 13, do I have permission to go beyond that particular day and let Anu know what happened?”

#13 made a call and checked something on his iPad.

“Yes, I can surely give that exception. We just had a news flash that there was a terrible landslide on the earth so my colleagues have left for earth on emergency to collect dead bodies.

There is a heavy traffic jam on the way to heaven. Thanks to our earth construction department, we have time.”

All three ladies were now used to #13’s casual tone while talking about death. Besides, death didn’t seem as scary as they had thought.

“Okay.” Suman took a deep breath as real landslide started from here. Like Mrs. Sarpotdar, she also believed in this group now, she decided to tell plain white truth and not her version of it.

“From that day Anu, everything started changing slowly. I will not say that we were same old us but we still loved each other, at least I thought so. Harish always made me feel that he needed me and I loved that since it satisfied my ego. I was almost 27 then, way passed right age for marriage in a small village. My family was financially dependent on me, so they were not in hurry as such. My grandfather was very fond of me, he respected me to be the man of the house. He was worried, so he asked Harish’s father about alliance.  But as they say, life is what happens to you when you are busy planning. I was planning my future with the guy who rejected me for marriage.”

“Really? Don’t tell me. Guys are such jerks.” Anu was furious, she had found another villain in the story now. “But what was the reason?”

“His parents and my grandfather tried to convince him but he was firm on not marrying me. He had never met me in village, so no one knew about us, not even his close friends or siblings. We used to meet in town, our meeting spot was very far from my college, I was not sure if he did this on purpose to protect me or protect himself or was just ashamed to be seen with me in public. Somehow his parents got to know about my abortion, then my parents, then my grandfather, maybe he told them this in one of weakest moment. His parents could not accept girl like me after knowing that. This news was a good gossip in village, obviously nobody was ready to marry me. Not even Harish. “

“That’s really pathetic. Our society is such a ... is such a …” Anu wanted to use ‘f’ word, but then Mrs. Sarpotdar was sitting right in front of her.

“Harish got married to a pretty girl later that month and I could not leave my family due to responsibilities so I had to see him every day.”

Mrs. Sarpotdar felt bad. “Life is never fair. You deserved more than that Suman, being man of that house. You sure did. ”

“Wait, don’t feel sympathetic so soon. I don’t want you to regret your words later. His wife was not a very kind person. She used to fight a lot with Harish, his parents too. But I convinced myself every day that they were having a good life. But they were not, one day he came back in my life.”

“Then? Did he leave his wife?”

“It was old days Anu. It was not possible to leave her, she had no one to go to. He talked me into believing that he needed me more than anything else and how stupid he was not to marry me. Call it blind love or fear of loneliness, but I forced myself to believe him. My conscious told me not to, but what option I had. What kind of life I was living? Earning for my family? Trying to take my mother’s place for Chinu? Taking everything on my shoulders and keep myself busy all the time so that I don’t think about being Happy for myself? Was I ever going to get married again? Have kids? Have family? Was I not supposed to have any kind of emotional and physical needs just like any other person? Wasn’t I paying too much price for trusting someone? I knew I was being unfair to his wife but I still decided to be with him. I was convinced that this was my best chance at happiness.

This time everyone knew about us. His wife had no option that to accept it. She had kids so she’d found new purpose of her life. Unfortunately I was with him, love of my life and was still alone. I treated his kids like my own, I did everything , but after all I was not his wife , or was not their mother , I was just a caring aunty who loved them like a mother , yes , ‘like a mother’.  ”

Suman felt guilty - one more time! No one said anything. Suman did not expect anyone to say anything. She was used worse reactions than silence.  It didn’t matter if she was a good daughter, aood g friend, a good sister, a good teacher if she was someone’s extra marital affair. Suman thought for a second if she made mistake by revealing this part of her life, but she was ready to pay this price to know about how she died.

“I knew it was not right thing to do her and Harish was not worthy of my love. I was probably weak, stupid and thought ‘love’ will be sufficient to find eternal happiness. I never forgave myself or expected anyone to forgive me.”

Mrs.Sarpotdar’s eyes were wet. “Suman, I respect you to be so brave to share the truth. Very few can own up to something like this with such clarity in the thought.”

“Yes Suman Aunty! I think you were born in wrong generation. Society which is morally imperfect has no right to judge you, even if they do, then Harish should not be spared either.”

#13 surprisingly had something good to say this time “See it is hard to let go and you are not the only one who couldn’t. Harish also could not. Your parents could not. His wife could not. None of them could not let go what they had.

Besides, Death Department strongly believes that every decision is a combination of complex entities like sufferings in the past, support from loved ones, survival instincts, spontaneity and majorly the situation. It is not just based on being fair and being morally correct. It is a very very thin life, not visible to bear human eyes. We are equipped with special glasses for that.

We also have a research team which is exploring this complex algorithm to come up with perfect formula to decide to differentiate between good and bad, right and wrong, Goodness and Sin. But it is taking forever since the birth Departments’ research head is not a cooperative person, rather his thinking is very orthodox, he does not understand the need of innovation and how useful this algorithm will be. It will make our lives so easy and save the cost of operation so much, plus reduce the Yam-Error.” #13 felt this was the best way to console Suman.

“Too technical and corporate Mr. 13” Anu laughed.

“Oh Sorry. But let me assure you Suman, that Chitragupta-Excel’s current version 99.99 isn’t too bad. Formulae will consider that you have been so good in all the other areas. It does not work the way humans do.”

Suman didn’t expect such subtle reactions rather than harsh judgments. Maybe it was the quiz or opening up about our bad decisions made then sympathetic. If she knew death will introduce her to such imperfect world accepting imperfect people so gracefully, she would have embraced it long ago.

The iPad notification popped up. #13 informed “See the traffic is bit cleared now, so I think Anu should start with her story, so that we can have time for next question.”

“I want to change my story. It is very clichéd, uninteresting and short compared to Mrs. Sarpotdar and Suman.”

“Now please don’t tell me Anu, that it involves a guy. You ladies are following pattern now.”

“We are so incomplete without guys you know.” Anu hit Mr.13 with another sarcastic reply.

“And you are supposed to be supportive Mr.13. You are our Yamdut. I found and read newsletter of yours, you are supposed to comfort us as per your goals in next appraisal.”

#13 replied, “That was confidential. And change the story if you want to. But choose carefully, since you want to remember about how you died, right?”

Suman stepped up like a true professor “You should not use someone else’s scale to measure your life Anu, create your own scale, maybe your story will be like a fresh breeze for old ladies like us. Go ahead.”

“Alright.” Said Anu, thinking she was ready to look back in the past.