by Durjoy Datta
‘What happened to her?’ I asked. Before she could answer I saw Manoj walk towards me—big strides and anger writ on his face. ‘Benoy,’ I said. I shook his hand. His expression did not change. He hugged Shaina, who disappeared into his arms.
‘What happened?’ I asked.
He looked at Shaina, took her away and made her sit on one of the steel benches. He came back to where I was standing. I already did not like him. His eyes were vacant and there was something inherently evil in him.
‘She had an accident,’ he said. ‘She was coming home in a rickshaw and a truck knocked it over. The rickshaw puller died on the spot. She’s out of danger now and though she will live, the doctors have asked for another forty-eight hours.’
‘Has she regained consciousness?’ I asked.
‘Once,’ he answered.
‘Why the fuck didn’t you call me earlier?’ I said, furious.
‘You have no business here, Benoy. The doctors are taking care of her,’ he said, staring me down.
‘Go to hell,’ I said and walked away to call Dad. His phone was unreachable and I dropped in a text explaining the turn of events.
I waited outside the door, with the crying, lamenting women and the two of them—Shaina and Manoj. I did not want to punch Manoj in his face and exacerbate their woes. I have caused all this. Diya was not supposed to attend the Career Launcher class that day. Had she not come for the class, she would have never taken the rickshaw. I am responsible.
Dad called me back and within an hour he was there. Walking beside him was the director and a senior doctor at AIIMS, Dr Juneja. My father introduced the doctor to an elderly man, Shaina’s dad, and the doctor assured him everything would be okay.
‘Mr Gupta, don’t worry,’ Dr Juneja said to Shaina’s dad.
They were joined by Mrs Gupta. She was still crying and covered her mouth with her pallu to drown out the cries.
‘Bhaisahib, you can do anything … please save my child, please save my child,’ she cried.
‘Don’t worry, behen, very experienced doctors are taking care of Diya. I am sure things will be fine. He’s the director and he will personally take care of this case,’ Dad said.
A few more doctors joined in the conversation. They said a few things in medical jargon, and then they left. Mr Gupta hugged Dad and thanked him profusely. Dad asked Manoj and me to leave, took Diya’s parents into a corner and reassured them. I saw Diya’s dad cry out suddenly and almost fall at my father’s feet. Dad kept him from doing so and hugged him again. I found her parents sweet. They hardly looked or acted the way I had heard they did.
It had been three hours and she was still inside the operation theatre. The doctors working inside kept sending updates. She will live. Things are getting better. Every time they had good news to give us, we used to hug each other, and her parents thanked Dad. He kept saying he had done nothing, and it was the doctors who deserved the real credit, which was true.
Finally, the door flung open and the three doctors in green overalls came out rubbing their hands and talking to each other. All of us crowded the three of them and bombarded them with questions.
‘She is safe,’ the oldest doctor said. ‘Can we talk to the parents of the patient, please? Alone?’
Diya’s parents held each other’s hands and followed the doctor. Diya’s dad asked my father to come too. My dad followed them as they disappeared inside the doctor’s chambers. The other relatives hugged each other in joy and relief. We all stood there and waited. Shaina was with her relatives, trying to console the aunts.
‘Benoy?’ Manoj said.
‘Yes?’ I said.
‘I think you should leave now,’ he said. ‘And so should your father. Don’t you see what you have done, Benoy? She was with you yesterday. She was supposed to be with her sister. Not you! You are responsible for all this. Get it?’
‘But—’
‘What will you get after ruining this family? First Shaina? Now this? Why don’t you just go away? Nobody needs you here.’
‘I was just trying to help.’
‘We don’t need your help! Shaina hates you for doing this to her sister. Just GET LOST,’ he almost shouted and walked away.
Shaina hates me? She thinks I am responsible. Maybe she is right.
Though what Manoj had said was unpleasant, I was more worried about the conversation inside the doctor’s chambers. I was too scared for Diya at that point to think about anything else. I wanted to see her. I still thought it was just a rude dream and I would wake up soon.
We waited outside the room and tried to overhear the conversation but we could not. We peered inside through the stained glass but we could not make out much from that either, so we just waited and fidgeted. I tried not to look at Manoj, who constantly stared me down. You are responsible. Get lost.
After a long time, they came out. My dad had his arms around her dad and her mother looked totally lost as she staggered out of the room. We all said our little prayers. Mrs Gupta fainted on one of the women and everybody rushed forward to pick her up. I was sick with worry now. I went up to Dad, my hands trembling and my ears ready to hear the worst.
‘What did he say?’
‘She is fine. But, she cannot walk right now. She’s paralysed waist down.’
What! I felt sick in the pit of the stomach and could have puked. Images of Diya bedridden and in a wheelchair flashed in front of my eyes. I felt her pain and it felt so wrong.
‘What?’ I asked, ‘When will she be all right?’
‘They are not saying anything.’
‘What do you mean they are not saying anything? They must have given some time frame?’
‘Benoy, they can’t tell. She may walk some day, she may not. Nothing is certain.’
‘What do you mean nothing is certain? Can’t you do something about it? Better hospital? Better doctors?’ I begged and blinked away my tears.
‘We are looking at that,’ Dad said.
Fuck. I am responsible. Every time this thought went through my head, I felt everyone looking at me and saying, ‘You are responsible. Go away.’
Diya’s dad walked up to us and motioned that he wanted to talk to my father. Dad sent me away. I saw her dad folding his hands and my dad preventing him from doing that. They hugged each other for long and separated when Manoj went and told Mr Gupta that they could now meet Diya. Her parents and Shaina went inside the room that she was shifted into. They did not take long inside, hardly ten-odd minutes, and they came out. Her mother was still crying profusely and so was Shaina.
I asked Shaina about Diya and she shook her head. As I waited amongst those crying people, I felt bad to have caused pain to so many people. They did not need me. I had only brought in pain for both the sisters. I could not see them like this.
I have to go out of their lives.
Chapter Thirty-four
It had been quite some time that we had been waiting. It was three hours past noon. Manoj’s family had gone back to their home. Manoj stayed back and his stares kept getting nastier. A few more relatives dropped in, talked to Diya’s parents and left. We sat there motionless, waiting for the time that we could next talk to her. I desperately wanted to go inside and tell her that no matter what, I would always be there. But then, family comes first. I was just an outsider. They did not need me.
All this while, Dad had been making frantic calls everywhere and people/doctors had been coming in and out of the office of the doctors who operated on Diya. Nothing much came out of these conversations, except that the operation was carried out in the best way possible. There were talks about shifting her to another hospital, but they decided it was too early and right then she was too weak for that.
Although visitors are not allowed to stay on in the hospital, my dad pulled some strings so all of us could be with Diya. Over the night, the nurses came and went as we all stayed awake. Her parents and Shaina periodically went to meet her. I wanted to go and talk to Shaina about Diya, but Ma
noj never let her out of his sight. The nurses told me Diya was in her senses but in a lot of pain. She had to be kept on a constant dose of painkillers and morphine. The corridors were quiet in the night; I had heard Diya shouting from inside.
Loud cries. Curses. And sobs.
Maybe she had now been told about the unmoving legs. As I sat there, I was horrified to even think about what she must be going through. One moment she was in a rickshaw, looking forward to her sister’s function, and the other moment, she lay in a bed, her legs motionless and with only a slight chance of recovery. She had her whole life in front of her. I shuddered. All the times that she had mentioned her LSE dreams came flashing in front of my eyes. Diya used to talk about them with so much fervour. She had such big dreams.
I closed my eyes and my first teardrops hit the floor. I hoped that when I opened my eyes, it would all be a dream and I would wake up in my bed. And everything would be the way it was. I sat alone on the steel bench thinking of what lay ahead of us. I needed someone to talk to, but that someone was on the bed, staring at a crippled life in front of her.
And it’s because of me.
Chapter Thirty-five
It had been three days since Dad and I were there. They had begged us to leave, but I was not going anywhere until I saw her with my own eyes. And Dad just did not want to leave me alone. He had won me over in those three days. He was the person who took care of everyone. Dad made sure everyone ate on time and every time anybody needed a shoulder or a blanket, he was right there. Everyone slept at one point or the other, but he did not. He did all the running around, and took care of all the paperwork. He made sure that no one disturbed her parents.
‘Uncle, you should leave now,’ Shaina had said this at least a million times now, but Dad just lightly smiled and brushed aside the issue.
‘Milk, beta? It’s already late evening and you ate so little in the afternoon.’
‘No, Uncle, I am good. Why don’t you go back home and rest awhile? I am here. I will handle everything.’
‘I don’t need rest, beta. I will just get you some juice,’ he said, ruffled her hair and left.
Shaina looked angrily at me.
‘He is not going because you are still here. Why don’t the two of you go back home and rest a little, Benoy? You haven’t even slept in two days. You will fall sick, Benoy.’
‘I will not.’
‘Humph. Like father, like son,’ she said and walked away.
Over the last few days, I had prayed day in, day out, for Diya’s health and her recovery. It made me sick to think about what happened to her. No matter how much time passed, I could not come to terms with it. Shaina and I had hardly talked during those three days. Manoj had been there for more than a day and a half and never let her anywhere near me. Finally, his parents dragged him home.
It was the fourth night and I hadn’t seen Diya yet. The horror and the pain of what Diya must have gone through had not lessened in my mind. Finally, Dad had dozed off in a chair. His mouth was wide open and his legs were on the chair in front of him. Shaina was still awake, but was sitting four or five benches away, occasionally tapping on her cell phone and sometimes just looking blankly through the wide-open spaces. She had been incredibly strong all this while. She did not cry much, took care of people around and encouraged everybody.
It was three in the night when I saw the nurse walking into Diya’s room. I waited for her to come out and walked up to her. Shaina joined in too.
‘Can we see her?’ I asked the nurse.
The nurse motioned that she had just given her the medicine and that we should not take more than five minutes. She left. I looked at Shaina and asked if I should go in. She nodded, held my hand and we went in.
Wrapped in bandages and tucked inside a white blanket, Diya looked tired, her face was swollen and there were needles sticking into her skin. She looked drowsy. The monitors beeped. She could hardly react when she saw us. Shaina kissed her on the cheek. Diya smiled and she looked at me. We sat on both sides of her bed and smiled at her. I hoped she would feel better with us around. We didn’t say anything.
‘It would have been better had I died,’ she said.
‘Don’t say that,’ Shaina said.
‘I am a cripple. I will always be that way. I should have died.’
Tears streamed down both their cheeks.
‘You will always be our Diya. You are bigger than this. And we want you around. Ever thought what we would be without you?’ Shaina asked.
‘I just want to die.’
She did not stop crying, just looked at Shaina and me with tears in her eyes. Her eyes begged us to take her out of the pain of living the rest of her life confined to a wheelchair. It just sucked.
‘You will be fine,’ Shaina said.
Diya started to doze off. We settled her head on the pillow and left the room. Shaina was in tears again. We walked wordlessly towards the pharmacy to get ourselves a water bottle. Shaina started sobbing loudly and clutched me. She staggered and her legs gave way. I thought she would faint. I helped her up. We stood in the middle of the hallway and she kept crying. Her howls were loud. She bit me a few times, and dug her nails into me as she tried not to shout.
I don’t know how much time passed. She just kept on crying. Every few minutes she used to lose her ground and fall over me. A little while later, we sat on a bench and she kept crying and hugging me. She kept repeating the same thing—that she loved her and how she wished it had happened to her and not Diya. I just hugged her and told her that things would be fine. I wished I could make it better for her.
‘You know what?’ She looked at me. ‘I used to be so jealous of her. That she was so smart. And ambitious. I always used to feel bad about it and then taunt her on her clothes and her spectacles.’
‘Hmm.’
‘I never used to mean it. Never. She was always the most beautiful sister anyone could ever have,’ she said and broke down again. As she cried, between her sobs, she kept telling me how much she loved her.
She drifted off to sleep and when she woke up, she realized that she was sleeping on my shoulder. She stood up with a start and smiled at me sheepishly. There were still tear marks on her cheeks. Her kajal was completely rubbed off and her naked eyes still looked as beautiful. From the corner of my eye, I saw Manoj and his older brother sitting on another bench. Shaina noticed it too. She looked at me.
‘He is here,’ she said.
‘Yes, it’s okay. Go.’ I smiled.
As she started to leave, she said, ‘Thank you, Benoy. I needed this. I needed to cry.’
‘It’s the least I can do. I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Had she … not come to meet me—’
‘Shut up, Benoy. Never think of that. Never,’ she said and touched my arm.
Then she walked away. She sounded genuine. Maybe it was just Manoj who blamed me. Manoj hugged her again and looked at me. Probably to send me a message—Shaina is mine.
I was sitting on the bench, fiddling with my phone when for the first time in those days, Mrs Gupta came up to me. She was an elegant woman, but the last few days had been hard on her. She was in a terrible state and hardly looked like the two sisters had described her to me. She was sweet.
‘Beta.’
‘Arre, Aunty. Sit.’
She sat down next to me and said, ‘Beta, you should go home now.’
‘No, Aunty, it’s okay. I can be a little help around here.’
‘You have already done a lot, beta. You need some rest,’ she said and ran her fingers through my hair. It reminded me of my mom.
‘Aunty, you need rest. I am young and can handle this.’
She did not say anything for a while. I could see that she was trying too hard not to cry.
‘Beta? Will you forgive us for that day? I cannot say anything to bhaisahib. I am too ashamed.’
‘Not your fault, Aunty. Shaina must have felt that.’
‘I don’t know, beta. But you’re a nice boy,’ she said
and got up. I could sense she was about to cry again. Her eyes were starting to tear up.
It was mid-afternoon when a doctor, who had flown in from Mumbai at my father’s request, called Shaina, her parents and Dad to the chambers. As they moved in, Mrs Gupta looked at me and asked me to join too. I looked around and followed them. I could see Manoj standing in the corner, fidgeting in his place. He was furious at being left out.
‘What is the news, doctor?’ Dad asked the doctor as he looked through reports and results from various tests.
‘Umm. The good news is that she doesn’t suffer from paraplegia. Given the type of accident, she is very lucky.’
All of us looked at him with wide eyes, because we did not know what paraplegia meant.
‘In paraplegia the patient loses all sensation in his or her legs, often up to the chest area … so that is not the case.’
He continued, ‘See, when there is an injury to the spinal cord, it is usually incurable. What is done in the first thirty minutes of the trauma is what decides the fate of the patient. In this case, satisfactory care had been taken so she was saved from paraplegia. But since the injury was still significant, there was sufficient damage to the spinal area. So right now she suffers from partial paralysis.’
‘Partial paralysis?’ I asked.
‘It is usually to one side of the body, but Diya has been lucky that her loss in movement is limited to her left leg. Though there is some loss on the right side too, but with the right treatment it will be okay. Even her left arm is fine only that she might have some trouble coordinating with that hand. With the right therapies she might get cured.’
‘Might?’ Diya’s father asked.
‘Sir, since the spinal cord cells don’t have the ability to regenerate or repair, often such damage is permanent.’
‘So you mean there is a chance she may never walk again?’ Mr Gupta said.
‘There is always the worst-case scenario. But, there is a very strong chance that she can improve and with the right therapies she should be able to do most of the things that a normal person can do,’ he said.
