So Near Yet So Far
It happened this way:
“Hello?” The voice at the other end was soft, hesitant. “This is Shohini.”
I dropped the receiver with a clang. Ruby, who sits next to me, raised her eyebrows in a quizzical look and let it go at that.
I picked up the receiver and dialed again.
“This is Shohini Roy,” the voice said, a little impatient.
“So it’s true,” I thought. “Her mind’s off her work these days” I’d heard so, and as proof of this, there she was at home, bunking.
“Sho,” I said, “shouldn’t you be at work?”
“That’s just like you,” was Sho’s response. “Learn to let go; chill!”
Deeply disappointed, I rested the receiver gently in its cradle. There were times I wished I could be like her, carefree, don’t give a damn, but a rope held me back tightly.
I remember rainy days and Sho. I loved rainy days too, but she would make a production of it. As long as the raindrops fell pitter patter, she would stand outside, face up, running in only when they turned to great dollops. Till then she would be trying to pull me out along with her. “I hate getting my glasses wet,” I would say. “Take them off then, take them off,” she would chant, dancing an impromptu dance. “But then I won’t be able to see, “I would retort. “Why do you want to see?” she would ask, “feel, just feel.”
Breaking my reverie, my eyes fell on my overloaded ‘in’ tray and with a nod and a sigh I got back to work.
I thought I should call her back post lunch; perhaps I had been a bit harsh. Then I recalled how she treasured her afternoon naps the days she stayed home. It took me back to the days I had looked forward to this midday ritual. There would be a languor about this time of day. Night always gave way to day with its new problems and uncertainties; by afternoon the problems mellowed and time stood in delicious suspended animation. This was the time when morning jitteriness was a thing of the past, inviting peaceful slumber. I envied Sho her sleep. Only she could be reckless enough to shun work to stay back and sleep.
We were friends for as long back as I could remember. We were similar, yet poles apart. I was jealous of her for being able to do whatever she wanted. No doubt she tried to pull me into her hair brained schemes. My heart said yes, but my mind said no. I could sense her sneaking out of the school gate at lunch time to gorge on the unhygienic wayside goodies. No amount of admonitions by the school authorities had been able to shoo the vendor away. I would stand toeing the gate, my mouth watering. Of course, Sho would bring some back for me, but the thrill lay in stepping into illegal territory, an adventure I denied myself.
Perhaps it was something to do with parental influence. I took after my mother, reticent, scared of the world at large. I couldn’t adopt Sho’s devil may care attitude or gay abandon. She, unfailingly, tried to inveigle me into doing those things which came to her with such ease. She took absolutely after her father. They always had their necks craned out for adventure; opportunity awaited them at every bend. A classic example would be the periodic school trip. While Sho would be all excitement, I would think up dozens of excuses, reinforced by my mother’s spoken and unspoken strictures in weird frowns and pursed lips. Sho and her father would always win the day. Lugging enough stuff from Band-Aids to flyswatter, I would go with trepidation in my mind, albeit with an infectious touch of Sho’s enthusiasm in my heart.
It was sad that though we practically walked hand in hand, we couldn’t see eye to eye. I often wondered whether I had an iota of influence on her, considering the command she had over me. Did she ever react to me? There was that time though, when I had taken a tumble down the stairs, jarring my elbow badly on the edge of the stairway. Sho’s face had been screwed up, as if in pain. Pulling myself up, I had caught that abject look of misery. “She feels for me” I had wondered but almost immediately she had said, “don’t be a crybaby now for heaven’s sake. People are watching.” As if obeying instructions, I had gritted my teeth, dusted myself off and got up.
This one sided balance of emotions upset me as it did when I caught Sho bunking work the other day. My emotions never seemed to affect her. I must have explained to her countless times how foolish it was to treat a good job so lightly. Granted that it was quite monotonous, how many people had the luck to come by one? “And that one dreary reason is to be the lodestar of my life I suppose,” Sho would grimace. “Don’t exaggerate,” I would retort,” After you retire you’ll have ample time to do what you want, and enough money to do it too!” Sho’s exasperated look would pierce me as she would say,” And eternal youth will go hand in hand I’m sure.”
I began to realize that Sho was becoming an obsession with me. Her remarks were more like taunts and I couldn’t take them with a pinch of salt anymore. And then I did the unthinkable. Almost as if challenged by Sho, I answered a ‘jobs vacant ‘ ad I had perused without any real interest. Before I could catch my breath, I was off to another city with a job quite different to my safe, familiar one. “I did it,” I rejoiced.” I’ve crossed my boundaries.” Sho started fading from my mind as I found new friends, colleagues and neighbors. I didn’t feel too guilty about this distancing myself from her, as I knew she would be proud of me. When I started going around with someone, all that remained of Sho was this almost forgotten conversation in our deeper moments, about marriage.
“So, what kind of a guy would do for you?” Sho had asked.
“What do you mean ‘what kind’?” I spluttered; “the normal type..”
“I mean, dashing, handsome, strong and silent, or what?” she managed between little hiccups of laughter at my discomfiture.
I had to think awhile before I spoke. A word out of place and Sho would catch me fast as lightning. Not quite sure what to say, I grasped for an interesting if not witty repartee. This was like trying to lunge to catch a piece of paper which flies with the breeze, always out of reach just when you think you have it. Sho spoke for me. “You should want someone who will give you the freedom to be you. You don’t want to have to be the one always toeing the line while allowed a free run only in your mind.” On that philosophical note both of us had fallen silent. These deeper moments Sho called ‘her take on life.’
Was my current partner dashing or handsome? I didn’t know. What mattered was that I was accepted, that now I was equal in the eyes of my peers. Afraid that I might lose my newly gained status, I desperately wanted to turn this into something permanent. Around this time, however, things started to go horribly wrong.
“What do you like about Nita?” he asked one day, “she jabbers too much.” It’s true that Nita often went off track but she was a harmless girl who exuded warmth. I dropped her. Why mess up things over a small issue likes this, I reasoned. I might say the same kind of thing to him someday; only I never did, not about boring Ravi, lechy Neel, and drunken Varun. I didn’t protest when I had to give up seeing funny movies, romantic movies, sitting through action movies which bored me to tears. And it was at this time that Sho’s words came back into my life with a bang. It happened the day my partner and I were at a restaurant, I looking helplessly at the plate of food lying in front of me as on countless occasions. My tentative efforts at ordering for myself brushed away summarily, there was this unwanted food and me, separated by a thin film of tears. To my credit, the tears remained a sheer curtain that clouded my vision but did not fall as I blinked them away furiously. In that instant I knew that it was all a sham, this new found freedom of mine. I was still a prisoner to myself.
So, though far away, it was to Sho that I turned. “Don’t say I told you so, “I implored. “No, I won’t” she said in a voice without inflection; “but you can’t play with shadows all your life. Shadows move away, making place for reality. You will never learn to live life the way it is meant to be.” In defeat I bowed my head and let the tears fall freely. Sho had joked with me, made fun of me, but never had she made such a pronouncement. She was getting tired of me; she was giving up on me. I couldn’t let that happen.
I went back to my old job and colleagues where I was accepted back thankfully. Their kindness irritated me; perversely, I felt they should have left me to rot. I hated the sympathy I got; I hated these ungrateful thoughts too. I almost waited expectantly for Sho’s taunts but she seemed to be evading me for some reason. I had to do with fleeting appearances and cut and dried answers. I tried to call her over and over but she didn’t respond. “Don’t abandon me Sho, “my heart cried out. I found it hard to keep my mind on my work; in fact, it became increasingly difficult to focus on ordinary, routine matters. I spent ages matching my clothes or deciding what to have for breakfast. I stopped reading the headlines in the mornings; I could barely make time in my befuddled state.
I developed headaches that worsened each passing day. I could now only handle one thing at a time. Too many things at the same time caused a sudden surge in my head followed by a plateau of heaviness, like a dense low lying cloud. Sleep brought relief; The more I started to look at sleep as an universal solution the more it eluded me. It was a battle warding off daytime grogginess. This need for sleep clamped my head into a tight band. Sometimes the pain would not stay locked up and tried to burst out from wherever it could. It peeped out from behind throbbing temples, it throbbed in the back of my neck and sometimes it danced triumphant bang on top of my head, pounding away.
In desperation, I dreamt of Sho. There were hazy things she said, words which made no sense. She would always be that much far, beyond touching distance. We grew further and further apart. I dreamt of happier times, times when we had been free with each other, times of laughter and happiness. I woke up to sadness.
Ruby’s story
She was quite a sweet kid really. She sat just next to me at work. There was nothing overtly wrong with her but she seemed to think otherwise. There are so many things we shrug off but she took everything to heart. We shared the same cabin, the same boss and our lunches but not our thoughts. I would freely chatter about whatever came to mind, but she tended to clam up. It was almost as if she had a set of rules by which to live, rules that curtailed any wayward thought. When she went away to her new job I wished she would find her happiness. And as happens, I got busy with my world and left her to hers. When she came back, she was different somehow. She was even more restrained, somewhat unmindful. While exuberance had never been her forte, she was now lackluster; one could almost smell the air of despair she emanated. And then she became erratic. She would pick up the phone to call someone but never seemed to be able to connect. I pretended not to see as she surreptitiously picked up the phone every now and then. Curiosity however got the better of me and I asked one day, “Who are you trying to call?” “My friend,” she said and changed the topic.
Day by day her appearance deteriorated. There was a constant frown that brought her eyebrows together. It gave her a stern look but to me it was the defenseless look of one warding off unseen enemies. I could see that she was gradually unable to cope with her work and tried to take the load off her shoulders in many ways. The rest of the office had designated her my personal protégé and I tried my best by her. “Are you not feeling well?” I had to ask her one day. The dark circles that defined her eyes had spread alarmingly. Somehow, my words entered through a gap in her vulnerability. “Head aches.” She now spoke in this staccato style. I picked up the courage to ask, “Have you been to a doctor?” She looked at me blankly as if she had not understood, and said, “I have been trying to call up my friend.” “Well, that’s fine,” I said, “why don’t you make the doctor’s appointment and let your friend know, so that she can be there with you? I’ll come along too.” As if in a trance, on reflex she nodded, and in a pathetic whisper that trailed away, added, “But she is not talking to me anymore.”
I watched as she fixed the doctor’s appointment a week from that day. I hoped she would not back out. I doubt she remembered at all during the week; I reminded her the morning of the appointment. We left fairly early to be reach in time. While she went to the reception desk, I looked around, hoping her friend would turn up, but dared not ask, fearing that I may upset her. As we awaited her turn, on impulse I said, “Give me your friend’s number. I will call her. If she’s not picking up your call, she may just pick up mine. “At the same time, I determined I’d ask her friend what kind of a friend causes pain like this. I wrote down the name and number she spoke out; it didn’t make sense. I asked her to repeat it again. She did. “But,” I babbled on foolishly, even as a growing dread clutched at my heart as I studied the piece of paper in my hand,” this is your home number and your name. Does your friend stay with you? “In the background, a voice intoned mechanically,” Next patient Shohini Roy, please report to room no.6.” Getting up, she transfixed me with a beatific smile and with a proud toss of her head that transformed her, said,” My friend is Shohini Roy and where else should she live but in her own home?” The PA system droned on,” Shohini Roy please report to room no. 6.”
“Hello?” The voice at the other end was soft, hesitant. “This is Shohini.”
I dropped the receiver with a clang. Ruby, who sits next to me, raised her eyebrows in a quizzical look and let it go at that.
I picked up the receiver and dialed again.
“This is Shohini Roy,” the voice said, a little impatient.
“So it’s true,” I thought. “Her mind’s off her work these days” I’d heard so, and as proof of this, there she was at home, bunking.
“Sho,” I said, “shouldn’t you be at work?”
“That’s just like you,” was Sho’s response. “Learn to let go; chill!”
Deeply disappointed, I rested the receiver gently in its cradle. There were times I wished I could be like her, carefree, don’t give a damn, but a rope held me back tightly.
I remember rainy days and Sho. I loved rainy days too, but she would make a production of it. As long as the raindrops fell pitter patter, she would stand outside, face up, running in only when they turned to great dollops. Till then she would be trying to pull me out along with her. “I hate getting my glasses wet,” I would say. “Take them off then, take them off,” she would chant, dancing an impromptu dance. “But then I won’t be able to see, “I would retort. “Why do you want to see?” she would ask, “feel, just feel.”
Breaking my reverie, my eyes fell on my overloaded ‘in’ tray and with a nod and a sigh I got back to work.
I thought I should call her back post lunch; perhaps I had been a bit harsh. Then I recalled how she treasured her afternoon naps the days she stayed home. It took me back to the days I had looked forward to this midday ritual. There would be a languor about this time of day. Night always gave way to day with its new problems and uncertainties; by afternoon the problems mellowed and time stood in delicious suspended animation. This was the time when morning jitteriness was a thing of the past, inviting peaceful slumber. I envied Sho her sleep. Only she could be reckless enough to shun work to stay back and sleep.
We were friends for as long back as I could remember. We were similar, yet poles apart. I was jealous of her for being able to do whatever she wanted. No doubt she tried to pull me into her hair brained schemes. My heart said yes, but my mind said no. I could sense her sneaking out of the school gate at lunch time to gorge on the unhygienic wayside goodies. No amount of admonitions by the school authorities had been able to shoo the vendor away. I would stand toeing the gate, my mouth watering. Of course, Sho would bring some back for me, but the thrill lay in stepping into illegal territory, an adventure I denied myself.
Perhaps it was something to do with parental influence. I took after my mother, reticent, scared of the world at large. I couldn’t adopt Sho’s devil may care attitude or gay abandon. She, unfailingly, tried to inveigle me into doing those things which came to her with such ease. She took absolutely after her father. They always had their necks craned out for adventure; opportunity awaited them at every bend. A classic example would be the periodic school trip. While Sho would be all excitement, I would think up dozens of excuses, reinforced by my mother’s spoken and unspoken strictures in weird frowns and pursed lips. Sho and her father would always win the day. Lugging enough stuff from Band-Aids to flyswatter, I would go with trepidation in my mind, albeit with an infectious touch of Sho’s enthusiasm in my heart.
It was sad that though we practically walked hand in hand, we couldn’t see eye to eye. I often wondered whether I had an iota of influence on her, considering the command she had over me. Did she ever react to me? There was that time though, when I had taken a tumble down the stairs, jarring my elbow badly on the edge of the stairway. Sho’s face had been screwed up, as if in pain. Pulling myself up, I had caught that abject look of misery. “She feels for me” I had wondered but almost immediately she had said, “don’t be a crybaby now for heaven’s sake. People are watching.” As if obeying instructions, I had gritted my teeth, dusted myself off and got up.
This one sided balance of emotions upset me as it did when I caught Sho bunking work the other day. My emotions never seemed to affect her. I must have explained to her countless times how foolish it was to treat a good job so lightly. Granted that it was quite monotonous, how many people had the luck to come by one? “And that one dreary reason is to be the lodestar of my life I suppose,” Sho would grimace. “Don’t exaggerate,” I would retort,” After you retire you’ll have ample time to do what you want, and enough money to do it too!” Sho’s exasperated look would pierce me as she would say,” And eternal youth will go hand in hand I’m sure.”
I began to realize that Sho was becoming an obsession with me. Her remarks were more like taunts and I couldn’t take them with a pinch of salt anymore. And then I did the unthinkable. Almost as if challenged by Sho, I answered a ‘jobs vacant ‘ ad I had perused without any real interest. Before I could catch my breath, I was off to another city with a job quite different to my safe, familiar one. “I did it,” I rejoiced.” I’ve crossed my boundaries.” Sho started fading from my mind as I found new friends, colleagues and neighbors. I didn’t feel too guilty about this distancing myself from her, as I knew she would be proud of me. When I started going around with someone, all that remained of Sho was this almost forgotten conversation in our deeper moments, about marriage.
“So, what kind of a guy would do for you?” Sho had asked.
“What do you mean ‘what kind’?” I spluttered; “the normal type..”
“I mean, dashing, handsome, strong and silent, or what?” she managed between little hiccups of laughter at my discomfiture.
I had to think awhile before I spoke. A word out of place and Sho would catch me fast as lightning. Not quite sure what to say, I grasped for an interesting if not witty repartee. This was like trying to lunge to catch a piece of paper which flies with the breeze, always out of reach just when you think you have it. Sho spoke for me. “You should want someone who will give you the freedom to be you. You don’t want to have to be the one always toeing the line while allowed a free run only in your mind.” On that philosophical note both of us had fallen silent. These deeper moments Sho called ‘her take on life.’
Was my current partner dashing or handsome? I didn’t know. What mattered was that I was accepted, that now I was equal in the eyes of my peers. Afraid that I might lose my newly gained status, I desperately wanted to turn this into something permanent. Around this time, however, things started to go horribly wrong.
“What do you like about Nita?” he asked one day, “she jabbers too much.” It’s true that Nita often went off track but she was a harmless girl who exuded warmth. I dropped her. Why mess up things over a small issue likes this, I reasoned. I might say the same kind of thing to him someday; only I never did, not about boring Ravi, lechy Neel, and drunken Varun. I didn’t protest when I had to give up seeing funny movies, romantic movies, sitting through action movies which bored me to tears. And it was at this time that Sho’s words came back into my life with a bang. It happened the day my partner and I were at a restaurant, I looking helplessly at the plate of food lying in front of me as on countless occasions. My tentative efforts at ordering for myself brushed away summarily, there was this unwanted food and me, separated by a thin film of tears. To my credit, the tears remained a sheer curtain that clouded my vision but did not fall as I blinked them away furiously. In that instant I knew that it was all a sham, this new found freedom of mine. I was still a prisoner to myself.
So, though far away, it was to Sho that I turned. “Don’t say I told you so, “I implored. “No, I won’t” she said in a voice without inflection; “but you can’t play with shadows all your life. Shadows move away, making place for reality. You will never learn to live life the way it is meant to be.” In defeat I bowed my head and let the tears fall freely. Sho had joked with me, made fun of me, but never had she made such a pronouncement. She was getting tired of me; she was giving up on me. I couldn’t let that happen.
I went back to my old job and colleagues where I was accepted back thankfully. Their kindness irritated me; perversely, I felt they should have left me to rot. I hated the sympathy I got; I hated these ungrateful thoughts too. I almost waited expectantly for Sho’s taunts but she seemed to be evading me for some reason. I had to do with fleeting appearances and cut and dried answers. I tried to call her over and over but she didn’t respond. “Don’t abandon me Sho, “my heart cried out. I found it hard to keep my mind on my work; in fact, it became increasingly difficult to focus on ordinary, routine matters. I spent ages matching my clothes or deciding what to have for breakfast. I stopped reading the headlines in the mornings; I could barely make time in my befuddled state.
I developed headaches that worsened each passing day. I could now only handle one thing at a time. Too many things at the same time caused a sudden surge in my head followed by a plateau of heaviness, like a dense low lying cloud. Sleep brought relief; The more I started to look at sleep as an universal solution the more it eluded me. It was a battle warding off daytime grogginess. This need for sleep clamped my head into a tight band. Sometimes the pain would not stay locked up and tried to burst out from wherever it could. It peeped out from behind throbbing temples, it throbbed in the back of my neck and sometimes it danced triumphant bang on top of my head, pounding away.
In desperation, I dreamt of Sho. There were hazy things she said, words which made no sense. She would always be that much far, beyond touching distance. We grew further and further apart. I dreamt of happier times, times when we had been free with each other, times of laughter and happiness. I woke up to sadness.
Ruby’s story
She was quite a sweet kid really. She sat just next to me at work. There was nothing overtly wrong with her but she seemed to think otherwise. There are so many things we shrug off but she took everything to heart. We shared the same cabin, the same boss and our lunches but not our thoughts. I would freely chatter about whatever came to mind, but she tended to clam up. It was almost as if she had a set of rules by which to live, rules that curtailed any wayward thought. When she went away to her new job I wished she would find her happiness. And as happens, I got busy with my world and left her to hers. When she came back, she was different somehow. She was even more restrained, somewhat unmindful. While exuberance had never been her forte, she was now lackluster; one could almost smell the air of despair she emanated. And then she became erratic. She would pick up the phone to call someone but never seemed to be able to connect. I pretended not to see as she surreptitiously picked up the phone every now and then. Curiosity however got the better of me and I asked one day, “Who are you trying to call?” “My friend,” she said and changed the topic.
Day by day her appearance deteriorated. There was a constant frown that brought her eyebrows together. It gave her a stern look but to me it was the defenseless look of one warding off unseen enemies. I could see that she was gradually unable to cope with her work and tried to take the load off her shoulders in many ways. The rest of the office had designated her my personal protégé and I tried my best by her. “Are you not feeling well?” I had to ask her one day. The dark circles that defined her eyes had spread alarmingly. Somehow, my words entered through a gap in her vulnerability. “Head aches.” She now spoke in this staccato style. I picked up the courage to ask, “Have you been to a doctor?” She looked at me blankly as if she had not understood, and said, “I have been trying to call up my friend.” “Well, that’s fine,” I said, “why don’t you make the doctor’s appointment and let your friend know, so that she can be there with you? I’ll come along too.” As if in a trance, on reflex she nodded, and in a pathetic whisper that trailed away, added, “But she is not talking to me anymore.”
I watched as she fixed the doctor’s appointment a week from that day. I hoped she would not back out. I doubt she remembered at all during the week; I reminded her the morning of the appointment. We left fairly early to be reach in time. While she went to the reception desk, I looked around, hoping her friend would turn up, but dared not ask, fearing that I may upset her. As we awaited her turn, on impulse I said, “Give me your friend’s number. I will call her. If she’s not picking up your call, she may just pick up mine. “At the same time, I determined I’d ask her friend what kind of a friend causes pain like this. I wrote down the name and number she spoke out; it didn’t make sense. I asked her to repeat it again. She did. “But,” I babbled on foolishly, even as a growing dread clutched at my heart as I studied the piece of paper in my hand,” this is your home number and your name. Does your friend stay with you? “In the background, a voice intoned mechanically,” Next patient Shohini Roy, please report to room no.6.” Getting up, she transfixed me with a beatific smile and with a proud toss of her head that transformed her, said,” My friend is Shohini Roy and where else should she live but in her own home?” The PA system droned on,” Shohini Roy please report to room no. 6.”
