She will not go so easily, the doctor said. She may even take fifteen more days to waste away – do you want her to go through that? It is hard, but you have to be brave, you have to spare her the suffering.
Tell me what to do, tell me what to do, I wept, I cannot bear to see her like this.
But I could not bear to let her go either. My father must have had some idea this day would come. A vocal supporter of euthanasia, for human and animals, he had told me several times: Do not let her suffer.
The doctor gave me the number of a vet, someone she trusted, who could come home to help Chinna with her death, if and when we decided to go that way. We rushed back home, and Chinna was sitting in a corner, waiting for us. There were blotches of blood that she had pooped in different corners of the house. N and I sat on the floor, petting her, knowing we could not let her go on like this, even though my heart was protesting. The doctor and another friend dropped by to see us, and for the first time in days, Chinna got up to greet someone, her tail wagging as in the good old days. A few minutes later she was tired and went back to her bed to lie down.
That night, the blood gurgled in her throat frequently, and she threw up as much as she could, and she could no longer control the bloody diarrhoea that was coming out from her, messing her bed for the first time in her life. We mopped, kept her clean, changed sheets frequently. N was tired, and I suggested he go to sleep. But I could not sleep – I did not want to – and stayed up with her all night. She moved from one room to another, regurgitating as she stumbled on, and I followed her. When she got a little respite from the bleeding, she put her head on my lap, and I sang anything that came to mind, anything to ease the weight of the night.
Finally we moved to the living room where she had a little bed. We heard thunder. I opened the door and strong cool winds blew into the house of death. We had a thunderstorm, unseasonal and unannounced but of monsoon-like fury, large heavy raindrops hammering away at the house, the trees around us swaying fiercely, big flashes of lightening. It should have felt apocalyptic, but no, it was like the skies were soothing us, telling us it was going to be okay. Weary and miserable, I lay down on the couch where Chinna and I could see each other. I did not want to be out of her sight for even a moment. We watched the rain, both of us, breathing in tandem, a long journey of togetherness at its end.
Sometime that night, while it was raining, Chinna lifted her head with effort and looked at me, and I held her gaze. Her watery eyes spoke volumes. A sea of compassion, endurance and pain. That was the first moment I knew she was ready to go, that she could not take it any more.
At the first light of dawn, I woke N and told him about the decision. It was time to end the suffering, release this loving soul from a body that had become torturous. The doctor called us to see how the night had gone and talking to her helped us make the next phone call, to the vet who said he would be there soon. We had about an hour with Chinna who had moved into the bedroom, walking with great difficulty. I spread her freshly washed red blanket on the floor of the living room, and I told N we would have to find a way to bring her to it before the vet came. Chinna must have heard me, because in a few minutes, in a last act of staggering kindness to us, she slowly got up and walked over to the blanket and lay down near it. I put her head on my lap and N read to her from the Upanishad.
Nachiketa asks the Lord of Death: When a man dies, this doubt arises: some say ‘he is’ and some say ‘he is not’. Tell me the truth.
Death replies: Even the Gods had this doubt in times of old – for mysterious is the law of life and death. Ask for another boon. Release me from this.
Chinna lay very still and we knew she was listening. I wanted to be brave for her. I did not want to say any words of goodbye or farewell. I had promised to never leave her again, and I did not want her to get anxious that morning. We had had a beautiful partnership and we would bring the best of offerings, our deepest selves, to this parting. Only boundless gratitude can begin to comprehend this gift lying in my lap, this gift of life and love.
I am here for you, I am here.
N continued to read in that beautiful melodic voice of his, wavering now and then but picking up each word with perfect care.
Beyond the senses is the mind, and beyond mind is reason, its essence. Beyond reason is the Spirit in man, and beyond this is the Spirit of the universe, the evolver of all.
When the doorbell rang, we were out of time. The vet called the laboratory to get the readings of Chinna’s blood test again, just to make sure. The creatinine levels were incredibly high, and this was three days ago, which meant she was in great agony now. N and I carefully lifted Chinna to the red blanket – she was limp and unresponsive – and I sat down close to her, pulling as much of her on my lap as I could. Both my arms were around her. I patted her, told her I was right there.
The vet said it would only take a few seconds. I saw the injection go in, her limbs twitched for a few seconds, and then went still. The vet said it was over, that the rigor mortis had set in, and he put his finger on her open eye to show me. No reaction. But her heart was still beating and my palm was right over her heart. Yes, there is still blood circulating in her but she is gone, the vet said. I let my palm stay there till I felt the last beat. I looked up and only when I saw N sobbing did I realize that I had stayed composed, that every ounce of courage in my body had been wrapped around her. I had kept my promise, and Chinna was now a part of me, her heart continuing to beat in mine. I had never loved this much before, and I could never love like this again. This is the sort of merging that comes our way just once in a lifetime, if we are fortunate.
I am.
After, then Before
Why don’t we talk about this, you and I?
You may not see it as I do, but fathers change – it is the nature of things. We are encouraged to think about a fixed category, a man wrapped up in a role, a biological supposition, a social entanglement, Father from when the child is born till one of them dies. But you changed, as you should, as I did. It would have been a lot easier for both of us if we had just talked and agreed that there were as many fathers as there were daughters in our relationship.
When you held me for the first time, in that government hospital, you were just twenty-six years old, barely a husband for a year, and an independent man of means for a little longer than that. What could have possibly prepared you to be a father? You admired your father, but he was not around, a man who juggled detachment and passion, a man of quirks and talents, who wore out and died before he saw your children. Did you always want to be like him?
You look at me from the framed photograph near my bed, ripe with youth and confidence, your eyes intense, like bottomless pools. There are none of those ghouls that I would later spy fleeting across on your face. Back then, yours is a fearless kind of handsome, lean and charming, the flavour of which I can faintly recollect. Just twenty-six. I know that you wanted to be all that your father was, and do even better with me – you wanted a girl child, you wanted to raise her to be bold, independent, competent, and you wanted to be her friend. You tried.
At thirty-six, you were struggling to keep your faith in the workings of the world, unable to find anything to stem your inner storms except rage or some substance to numb it with. You stood at a vital crossroads then, the man I loved unquestioningly, and I was a child of ten, floundering with the weight of secrets I could not tell. You now had another daughter and any preoccupations with the art of fathering had long slipped out of your mind. In the family albums is a darkened version of the previous image, more leathery, leaner, hair and moustache thicker, eyes set deeper, but something about you has turned inscrutable. Surely I am not imagining the wall that has started to go up around you, so early, still in your thirties.
At forty-six, it was too late for both of us. I was getting ready to leave home, all your aspirations and principles loaded on my back. Both of us knew we would now have to learn to live without being the mirrors we had been to ea
ch other, and you were swapping hope for drink. I could still talk to you, and you sent little notes to me, made speeches on the phone or when we met – you did not like that I was not following your plan for me, but you tried to see my dreams, maybe dream them a little too, even when they broke.
I saw you turn the corner of middle age, just a couple of years older than I am now, your hair thinning, an alcohol-fat belly that would only grow, and all your tobacco-stained teeth pulled out to make room for dentures. How easily that indefatigable youth was giving way to a steady erosion, even as everyone confidently said that yours was the heart that would stay forever young – the consummate entertainer, always, my father, you continued to exude the lustre of a falling star.
At fifty-six, it was stormy weather. You had walked away from a job that kept you at work all day to an unknown that could only be buoyed by alcohol, and you were already talking about the end, about death, about a world rapidly deteriorating beyond salvage. The wait for the highly successful daughter was starting to look like one more heartbreak to endure. You were scanning the skies, but I was not flying. I was tucked away in a faraway nest, using words to probe and own solitary spaces. You were on your own now, as was I. Both of us had known the horrors of chronic sadness. Where could we go from here? What chance did we have?
At sixty-six, you were dead.
All photographs of your fifties and sixties are going to lie to me, I cannot look. You were slowly poisoning yourself, with sorrow, with tobacco, with drink. Your belly would bloat with the poisons, the rest of you would shrink, your hair entirely white, your skin lifeless, and that pain, that suffocation in your eyes, as you turned away from us, as you talked about dying, about disappointment, about anger and frustration. Everything you mourned played on your face when you talked – without your knowledge, the toxins were quietly taking over.
In your last decade, it was not me, your child of promise, but your other daughter who would be there for you and your wife. She would be the one to stay close, visit often, arrange for medical treatment, form the backup cavalry to your household. You complained about taking favours, you did not thank her when you should have, but you were grateful for her, you saw her differently, you even shared your feelings with her, that one time during a car ride when you cried to her about your loneliness. All the pictures of your last years have been taken by her.
When your grandchildren arrived, I admit that I worried. Would that old flash of temper show, would that hand swing impulsively, would there be those hard words again? But being a grandfather, I saw with amazement, was not the same as being a father. You were delighted. You tried to be a delight. Your granddaughter, my precious niece, may have been reticent, not the outgoing child you could parade around to your friends, but you beamed radiant love, one could not deny that. It was a little different when the grandson came. This time, you really caved in, grew obsessively attached to that little fellow, probably remembering how your grandfather had once adored you. Our worries stayed. Why lift the child when you are still under the influence of alcohol? Why insist on taking him on scooter rides when your hands constantly shake? You are adamant, proud, completely devoted to his every whim. You are his Ajja, and he has your flair for showmanship.
You pick him up, a month-old baby, settle down in a chair by a window, hold him close to your chest, cradle him in your arms and smile down at him as he smiles in his sleep. It is a world occupied only by the two of you. Your daughter’s camera is gazing at you but you are probably not aware. Ensconced in the photograph, after so many years, is that same old calm, that containment, which was there in your twenty-six-year-old self. It is momentary, this look and feeling, and it will leave, but I am glad it emerged from some long forgotten alleys of life, one last time. Perfect poise, perfect calm, a complete love.
I imagine … this is how you must have looked when you picked up an infant me, and held me close to your chest …
No, not imagine, I do remember – just this one nugget of memory …
Years ago, I had described the scene to my mother, every little detail and sensation, and this was before there were computers and televisions in our lives, so we had to agree that those images had no other source but my memory.
You cannot possibly remember, my mother said, but we had taken you to the Vivekananda Rock Memorial in Kanyakumari. What you describe seems to be that visit. You were just a year old then. It cannot be.
But it can be, because I distinctly recollect a space and a light. A room with large well-lit windows that open to a dazzlingly blue ocean. There were voices, presences, floating in and out, and deep vibrations echoing in that space. And then, even more vividly, the quality of light, so blue, so quiet, and my spirit floating, pristine, a feather in that blue light.
And then I remember something else, not just the light and the airy space.
Being held, suspended in space, cocooned in warmth so bright that it becomes my first memory. Skin, touch, breath.
It was you.
About the Book
Sixty-six years of a lifetime gone.
There would be no funeral. He had donated his body to the local medical college. It was part of his script, his fantasy about death. He would show his hospital donation certificate to anyone who came to our house. No rituals for me, he would announce. To his mind there was some justice in being cut up by medical students. He had wanted to be a doctor.
There is his corpse, lying on the floor, people constantly milling around, talking about his untimely, unfortunate death, while I stare at everyone in dry-eyed annoyance. He had always been a popular man, much loved, generous to a fault to his neighbours, even if angry towards his own family. I just want him gone from the house. When the van from the morgue comes to pick him up, everyone urges us to touch his feet, to ask for his blessings. It is expected from children of dead parents. Everyone watches us.
You first, an old man points to me, my father’s first-born.
I bend down, my fingers touch his feet.
From the aftermath of a death emerges this pioneering memoir of a daughter’s difficult love for a flawed, passionate, larger-than-life father.
If I Had to Tell It Again is a tapestry of conflicting memories of clinical depression, intense togetherness, mourning, healing, and the shattering of spaces between childhood and adulthood. Charting an emotional minefield with delicacy and honesty, this is a haunting story about the sort of suffering that only families can inflict and endure.
About the Author
Gayathri Prabhu is the author of the novels The Untitled (2016), Birdswim Fishfly (2006) and Maya (2003). She teaches literary studies at the Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities.
TALK TO US
Join the conversation on Twitter
http://twitter.com/HarperCollinsIN
Like us on Facebook to find and share posts about our books with your friends
http://www.facebook.com/HarperCollinsIndia
Follow our photo stories on Instagram
http://instagram.com/harpercollinsindia/
Get fun pictures, quotes and more about our books on Tumblr
http://www.tumblr.com/blog/harpercollinsindia
First published in India in 2017 by
HarperCollins Publishers India
Copyright © Gayathri Prabhu 2017
P-ISBN: 978-93-5277-375-6
Epub Edition © October 2017 ISBN: 978-93-5277-376-3
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
Gayathri Prabhu asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
The views and opinions expressed in this book are the author’s own and the facts are as reported by her, and the publishers are not in any way liable for the same.
All rights reserved under The Copyright Act, 1957. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or
stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers India.
Cover design: © HarperCollins Publishers India
www.harpercollins.co.in
HarperCollins Publishers
A-75, Sector 57, Noida, Uttar Pradesh 201301, India
1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF, United Kingdom
Hazelton Lanes, 55 Avenue Road, Suite 2900, Toronto, Ontario M5R 3L2
and 1995 Markham Road, Scarborough, Ontario M1B 5M8, Canada
25 Ryde Road, Pymble, Sydney, NSW 2073, Australia
195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007, USA
If I Had to Tell It Again Page 12
