Dobie and Me: Chapter 16

Click here for the previous chapter

Gautam left at around 10. We were chatting on Whatsapp, reviewing the dinner, when he suddenly vanished for a long while. Just as I went to bed at 11.30, he messaged, “Mother unwell. Taking her to hospital.”

She passed away later that night. The funeral was to be the next day, by afternoon after his uncles reached from different cities.

I went to his house by around 10, not the first, not the last. His sister Vandana was at the door and held my hands. She whispered, “He is holding himself up well, but I think it hasn’t sunk in yet.”

Stupid girl, I thought affectionately. Her own cheeks were wet but not a wrinkle of sorrow creased her face. “What about you?” I asked. Her hands were trembling and her voice shook. But she was trying to smile and be bold.

“My mother suffered too much,” she said succinctly. I put my arms around her and she hugged me tight. Then, loosening the grip around me, she said softly, “I must let her go peacefully, not see me crying,” she said. I patted her cheek. She was probably 32, at the most 35. Her mother’s illness had taken its toll on her, for she looked older. Though she was in a relationship, she was also in a limbo.

Gautam was standing by his mother’s body, talking to someone. I went to the body first, paid my homage and then turned towards Gautam. He welcomed me politely but grimly. We had to maintain decorum since there were too many people in the house. But I took his hand in mine, squeezed it warmly, and asked him how he was. “Wasn’t it too sudden?”

He shrugged. “Yes, she had seemed fine all evening, which is why I came last night. But the nurse called me out of the blue – heart attack it seems,” he said.

As he was talking to me, his gaze shifted and I sensed a change in him – surprise, shock more like. He stepped away from me, and I had this feeling that for him, I had ceased to exist all of a sudden. I turned to see who had brought on this reaction. I saw him approach a lady in white sari, her head covered, walking in urgently. She went to the body first, touched her head to the icebox and then turned to Gautam. Their eyes met. I shied away instantly, feeling like an intruder. The intensity of the expression, the familiarity they displayed, the stark concern…

“That’s Shivani,” Vandana startled me as she whispered in my ears.

I realised why it is said you burn in jealousy. That was the only way to describe how I felt. Instinctively, I had known she was no mere acquaintance or even a friend.

I quietly excused myself, even as I hoped Gautam will remember me and call out to me. I walked to my car, every second hoping that Gautam would come looking for me, but all I got was disappointment.

The hurt made driving back difficult. I felt a pressure in my heart. I rushed into the house. I entered my bedroom, shut the door and threw myself on the bed, crying. Dobie, who had entered the room with me, kept vigil.

Even when I stopped crying, my heart continued to hurt. I waited for Gautam to call, say something, even if it was to speak about his own feelings – be it about his mother’s death or Shivani’s sudden appearance. In vain.

Only Vandana called once to share her own anger at Shivani’s sudden appearance, and how Gautam was with her the entire time she was there.

I disconnected as quickly as politeness allowed. Her words only drove the knife deeper.

A couple of days later, my sons returned to their respective cities. I felt the emptiness surrounding me. Dobie became the centre of my life again. I resumed work with a vengeance. I checked my phone frequently. But while friends continued to plan for dinners and lunches as usual, there was resounding silence from Gautam. I didn’t miss a single date with my friends, reaching early and leaving last. But even when I was with them, my mind was on my phone, waiting for a message or a call. I never put it in silence; and if I had to, then the phone remained in my hand.

(Read Chapter 17 here)