December 2nd, 2016; 4:15 p.m.
You don’t expect an expected call to deliver you an
unexpected news. The words reverberated in my ears continuously. “Take the
first flight back home.” It was as if I would wake up by the shrill voice of my
phone’s ringtone, and the nightmare will be over. “Papa calling”” will flash
across my screen and he will talk to me. About life, about business, about how
proud he is of me, about my flight itinerary post end-term exams.
The floor beneath me sank, and so did my heart. My trembling
legs ran as fast as they could. “Take the first flight back home.” I had
bookings to make. Laptop in one hand, charger in another, shivering like
anything, those two hundred meters felt like walking over ice. The lift was on
the 3rd floor, I needed to be on the 5th. Right now. Climbing close to a hundred stairs, gasping
for breath, with a sunken heart and close to a thousand cramps in my stomach, I
reached the fifth floor, ran straight to my friend’s room, threw the laptop in
one corner of the bed and when my legs couldn’t hold the weight of my body and
the heart couldn’t hold the weight of the shock, I tumbled down onto the other
side and sobbed. Some distant voice sounded like a confused enquiry, a hazy
frame holding my shoulders. All I could manage to utter from my choked throat
and trembling lips was “Papa…”
The phone buzzed. “Papa calling.” It was as if he had called
to talk to me. About life, about business, about how proud he is of me, about
my flight itinerary post end-term exams. But he wouldn’t. He couldn’t.
December 3rd, 12:54 p.m.
This was the longest journey back home. I kept wiping my
tears in the car, promising myself not to cry. There were a lot of cars parked
in the street. We had to stop some distance away. As I pierced through the
crowd, all eyes looked at me. Pity. Sympathy. I don’t know what it was. All I
knew was I had to be near mom. Nothing less, nothing more. The crowd made way, it
felt foreign in my own driveway. The backdoor entrance was cleared for me to
pass. I took off my shoes and walked up to another crowd with familiar faces.
Papa slept in the centre. His skin was darker than usual. There was a flower
petal near his eyebrow, which I brushed aside. Everyone looked at mom and the
four of us. And babaji’s glasses were dirty. They asked me to go hug papa. I
couldn’t.
Thirty minutes later, the pyre burnt. I held babaji’s
glasses in my left hand, borrowed a handkerchief and wiped the saline water off
his glasses. Everyone moved to the side as the ashes came flying to our side. I
looked as they set him on fire. I saw my father turn into ashes, flying towards
me.
Last night, while I dragged my suitcase out of the lift, I
heard a friend murmur, “Going home? Such a luxury.”
And right in this moment, I wanted to tell her.
“Oh you have a dad? Such a luxury!”
