Tea for Two and a Piece of Cake (21 page)

I go shopping for the ingredients and am able to easily get the chicken, the noodle cakes, vegetables, and sauces. But the spring onions and ajinomoto have been sold out for the day. Both are highly essential in Chinese cooking for that extra bit of taste. I speak to the guy at the supermarket who assures me that both the spring onions and the ajinomoto will be there tomorrow by eleven. I tell him I will need a large quantity and request him to keep it aside for me and to give me a call as soon as it comes. I also take his phone number, and give him a missed call to ensure that I indeed have noted his number right. I am so nervous that I make sure of taking care of every possible contingency, as I want to leave nothing to chance.

This is truly a huge opportunity for me and I so want to make good of it.

Akash finally manages to arrive only at eleven thirty in the night.

He looks at the paraphernalia in the drawing room and whistles.

‘Impressive,’ he says.

‘Terrifying,’ I respond.

‘Don’t worry, Nisha, it will all go smoothly, like a knife through hot butter,’ he says.

But despite his ready assurances, I sleep an uneasy sleep.

Early next morning, I wake up Akash with a cup of coffee. He rubs the sleep out of his eyes and says, ‘Whoa, Nisha, what time is it?’

‘It’s 7.30 a.m., you lazy bum. Get up now. We have to go and get the spring onions and ajinomoto. I have already started chopping the vegetables.’

‘Relax Nisha, we have plenty of time to get it all sorted. And we have to be there only at 7.15 in the evening.’

‘Yeah, but I am wearing a saree, and I need at least an hour to get ready after spending the whole day in the kitchen. I don’t want to smell like the food I am cooking!’

He laughs, and we both go to the balcony to have our coffee.

Mrs B rings our doorbell just as we are finishing our coffee.

‘Do you need help, my dear?’ she asks.

This time she looks at Akash and smiles and he wishes her a good morning.

I really would have appreciated help. But the thing is, in Chinese cooking, chopping the ingredients just right plays a major part in the taste of the dish. The carrots
have to be sliced just so, longitudinally. If one messes up with the cutting, one messes up with the dish. I had explained all this to Akash and he had understood and confessed that he knew nothing when it came to cooking, and he couldn’t cut vegetables even for Indian cooking, let alone for Chinese.

But I don’t feel like explaining all this to Mrs B because if she chops the vegetables wrong, my dish would be spoilt. So I tell her it is okay. Mrs B graciously understands and tells me to ring her doorbell if the kids are getting in the way of the preparations.

She is a real sweetheart. I thank her profusely and she waves me away.

Akash says that he can manage to make fried eggs and toast for both of us and I ask him to do just that.

I have washed piles of carrot and have scraped them all. I sit cross-legged on the floor with my cutting-board and begin chopping.

An hour later half of the chopping is done, but Rohit and Tanya have now woken up.

So I ask Akash to fix Tanya her breakfast and I get busy feeding Rohit, after which I give him a hurried bath.

Tanya is excited about all of it. So is Akash. I am just plain nervous.

Finally it is Rohit’s naptime, and I make him sleep, so I can resume my cooking in peace.

Tanya sees how tense I am and she does her best to comfort me, saying, ‘Don’t worry, Mummy, I will watch over Rohit.’

I kiss her and thank her.

Akash asks me what I want help with. To be honest, there is nothing he can do really. He cannot chop, and unless I finish all the chopping, I can’t cook. So I tell him to organize lunch for all of us. I tell him to order whatever he wants from a restaurant nearby and he tells me he will take care of it.

I also tell him to connect my gas cylinder to the stove we have hired and fill water in the huge vessel so that we can boil the noodles. Akash does that, as I get busy breaking the noodle cakes into large chunks, and when the water starts heating up, I drop them all in.

Tanya has brought along her book
365 Stories for Children
and asks Akash if he will read it to her. Akash, as usual, willingly complies.

I watch and smile as she happily climbs into his lap, and he begins reading to her about a very naughty monkey who just would not mind his business. I find it amusing to see Akash reading aloud a children’s book and smile at the domesticity of this whole scene.

Suddenly, there is a very loud THUD somewhere close by, and it almost makes me drop my knife in fright. It is followed by an ear-shattering wail.

‘Oh my God, Rohit,’ I scream, as I throw the knife aside, jump up, and rush to the bedroom. The sight I see almost makes me faint.

Straight to Nowhere

R
ohit is sprawled on the floor on his stomach, with a porcelain pen stand shattered around him. There is blood gushing out from his arm where shrapnel from the pen stand is still lodged. And there is a gash at the back of his head from where blood is spurting out.

It takes me less than a few seconds to figure out that Rohit must have woken up, crawled on to the table next to the bed, and must have tried to stand up on it, in the process of which he toppled over.

It takes all my will power to control myself from crying out loud.

Akash and Tanya have followed me, and Tanya screams seeing the blood. I am frozen in shock, even though I have picked up Rohit and am trying to calm him.

Akash is right beside me saying, ‘Nisha, there is this piece still lodged in his hand.’

‘Yes, I know.’ I can barely speak.

Rohit is screaming his head off in pain. My eyes fill with tears at the pain he must be going through. But this is no time to be a sissy, and so I tell Akash to hold
Rohit. Akash sits down on the bed and I place the bawling Rohit on his lap. I tell Akash to hold tight and not let go.

I then pull out the piece of crockery wedged in his hand. Rohit leans back and screams with the pain, and Akash’s white t-shirt is now full of blood from the back of Rohit’s head.

‘We need to rush to the hospital. Quickly ring Mrs B’s bell so that we can leave Tanya there for the time being,’ he says. It is hard to hear what he is saying because Rohit is screaming so loudly. Tanya has placed both her hands over her ears and is looking at me like a frightened rabbit.

‘I want to come to the hospital, Mama,’ says Tanya. But this is no time to reason with her or make her understand.

‘Tanya, no arguments, please? Just do as I tell you. You are staying in Mrs B’s house,’ I say as I carry Rohit outside while Akash reaches for his car keys.

Mrs B is shocked to see all the blood. She tells us not to worry about Tanya and simply speed to the hospital.

As soon as we arrive at the hospital, we are rushed straight to the emergency room. Akash has driven at a breakneck speed, and now my t–shirt is drenched with blood as well. During the car ride to the hospital, I felt like I was going to vomit. I feel so scared and so darn worried. I am totally freaking out because of the huge gash that is spouting blood continuously.

They have taken Rohit inside and told us to wait outside for a few minutes. I am clutching Akash’s hand
in sheer terror. My palms are icy cold. I can barely speak.

‘The baby needs stitches at the back of his head. Which of you want to hold the baby while we put the stitches?’ asks the doctor on duty.

I break into tears.

‘It’s okay Nisha, I will hold Rohit,’ says Akash.

‘Don’t worry, your son is a tough guy. We will do the stitches first to get the bleeding under control,’ says the doctor to Akash as they walk inside.

Both of us are too dazed to tell the doctor that Akash is not the father.

I am all alone now, sitting on the cold steel chairs outside the emergency room. I badly want to call up Samir. After all, Samir does have some responsibility, doesn’t he? It is Samir who should be here with me today. Not Akash. Samir should at least know what has happened to his child, his very own flesh and blood.

With trembling hands, I dial Samir’s number. It is a number that I have dialled so many times that I can even dial it in my sleep. The phone rings for a few seconds. Finally, he answers.

It is the first time since he walked out on me that I am hearing his voice. It feels like a thousand butterflies have been let loose inside my stomach. It is hard to figure out what I am feeling. It is a mixture of love, hate, confusion, anger—all rolled into one.

‘Nisha. Why did you leave that house?’ is the first thing he says.

I am thrown so off-track by his question that it takes me a few seconds to even comprehend.

‘Samir, you were the one who left, remember?’ I finally manage to say.

‘You can stay there, you know. I have moved in with Maya,’ he says.

I feel like a prisoner whose death verdict is being repeated by the prison warden, even though the judge had declared it long back.

Why is Samir emphasizing it again as though I do not know it? I have no idea.

‘Yeah, and I have moved into my own house, Samir.
My own house.
Not yours,’ I spit out the words.

I cannot believe that we are fighting over the phone in a hospital while my son is inside, getting his head stitched.

But I am also so hurt at how Samir is behaving. There is no excitement, no eagerness, and not even the tiniest trace of love in his voice. I immediately regret calling him. What the hell was I expecting? A sudden change of heart?

I have half a mind to hang up, but that would just be silly. Also I guess, one small part of me still hopes that Rohit being in the hospital will somehow bring Samir back to me.

‘Samir, Rohit is hurt,’ I say.

‘Oh,’ he says.

And then there is silence.

I hate him at that moment. I hate him with all my heart. What kind of a man
is
he? Has his heart turned to stone? Has Maya blinded him so much that he cannot see just how much the mother of his children needs him at this moment?

Finally he says, ‘How did he get hurt?’

‘I am calling from the hospital Samir. How he got hurt is not important. He is inside the emergency room now. Anyway, I am sorry I bothered you in the first place,’ I say and I hang up.

I wait desperately for the phone to ring. I want Samir to call back and ask which hospital I am at and whether Rohit is going to be okay. I want some shred of evidence that he does care for us. I want him to tell me to come home. I want to know whether his children matter to him at all. How can he wash his hands off us this much?

His call never comes.

I die a thousand deaths, waiting outside the emergency room. I sit with my face buried in my palms, trying to remember all the prayers I know. ‘Please God, let him be okay. Please God, please God, please God…’ I keep repeating the prayers over and over inside my head, in a desperate bid to calm myself. I have never been religious, so I have no idea how to pray. I only have vague memories of my school prayers. I have never had affinity for any one religion in particular. And so I strike up a bargain with God. I promise that if Rohit is okay, I will make an offering of ten coconuts at the Ganesh temple near my home. I promise that I will light fifteen candles at the Holy Angel Divine Child shrine which we passed on the way to the hospital. My stomach churns, and my hands and legs feel like iron bars at the thought of a permanent brain damage or something incurable happening to Rohit. I am so darn tense and frightened. I should have known better than to have left Rohit
unmonitored like that. I should have told Akash and Tanya to watch him. I chide myself and kick myself mentally over and over again. I am a second-time mother. I know how dangerous it is to leave a baby unattended, yet I slipped up. I truly feel stupid, and I feel so bad for my son. What kind of a mother am I?

They emerge after what feels like forever. Rohit has stopped bawling and there is a huge bandage around his head.

I break down again on seeing him so calm and I carry him and kiss him over and over. I am relieved to see him safe and also feel awful to see that he now has stitches on his head because of my negligence.

‘How many stitches?’ I whisper to Akash.

‘Six, but we have a brave little soldier here, don’t we?’ says Akash to Rohit.

Rohit looks at him and gives him a smile. It is hard to believe that it is the same baby who was screaming in pain only a little while earlier.

‘So can we go home now? What has the doctor said?’ I ask.

‘He said that most probably Rohit would be fine, but they cannot be one hundred per cent sure. But since Rohit did not lose consciousness immediately after the fall, it is a good sign. He has also advised us to keep a close watch on him and see if there is any vomiting, dizziness, or an apparent change in his usual behaviour. If we spot any of these signs, we have to bring him back, after which they will do an MRI scan. If not, we’re all good.’

I almost collapse with relief when I hear this. He is more or less okay. But still, we can be a hundred per cent
sure only after two days. I am thankful that the immediate danger has passed now.