"To Be Gone From Here, Is The Last Thing I Need!"

"To be gone from here, is the last thing I need!"

"To stay here alone, is a punishment indeed!"

-V

We wake up every morning

to nurture the same thoughts

we killed when we drifted off

the night before.

That's not monotony dear,

but life throwing us in the same circle

every-damn-day, to make our corner

in its circumference.

-Vanshika

When you love the rain too dearly,

You are not scared of her storms.

Since you danced in the flowers she shed,

You must accept her worms.

Like two paths to a destination,

one a beautiful road, one a scary wood.

You must know all creatures on earth,

have an evil devil, and an angel good.

-Vanshika

I was almost six years old, when I felt a small bulge in my mother's womb that my mother said was a monster eating up her stomach because she refused to eat cereals. I was perplexed at that concept and the fear alone forced me to be compliant to her, whenever she asked me to eat what I hated the most.

Months down, I come back from school, having so much to tell her about my day only to find my neighbour waiting for me. Everyone, my father, mother and brother were not home. I was disappointed and hurt that they would leave me behind. Not that I didn't love playing at our neighbour's place, but after school I always desired to come back home to my mother.

The whole day passed, but no one came back. I was certain they left me behind. And I promised myself to wage a revolt for this. They must be having fun somewhere, while I was here lying in an unfamiliar bed among not so familiar people. They promised me that a gift will be brought for me, but I glared at them portraying that I am not a material girl and a gift wouldn't convince me after this behaviour.

My father came back the next day before I woke up, but my mother was not with him. Only my brother, who looked just as lost as me. Only that he had something to tell me that he couldn't because of all the crowd surrounding us. He is a timid one among the two of us.

I was told my mother is going to bring a baby brother, to which my otherwise shy brother nodded eagerly.

"Did you already see him?", I asked.

He shook his head, "In..In a towel..small..", his broken words were not beyond my understanding. I was used to having such conversations with him.

What I felt about having a baby brother, one more to our family of four was sheer distaste. I was the first child and used to having all this attention towards me. This timid brother of mine already took a half of it, because his long hair and lost looks made him look cuter, than the angry little pouty me, who was on a mission to fight the world. A third one, means the attention being divided into one third, which was anything but acceptable.

My baby brother was born on the fourth day of August, and I met him on the ninth day, on the occasion of Rakshabandhan. He was small and pink, sleepily gazing at us, sprawled in our mother's lap. I do not exactly remember what I felt in that six years old heart, but it definitely had a change of the lifetime. I say this, because the next thing I remember is making that little fist grab my forefinger and wanting to do this for the rest of my life.

I have loved no human more since that ninth day of August. He was not a normal baby, I was told. I didn't know what it meant then. Too much complications in the world of science. But for me, all that mattered was the most simple promise my child heart made then- to protect this little human from all the harshness of this world.

He was not well. His head was abnormally big, and his hands was covered with a white bandage. I had never seen that before. He was diagnosed with hydrocephalus. The days following that discovery were not easy. Not atleast for my parents. I was too small to know what was happening, only that my parents don't come home for days, and our grandmothers and aunts come to take care of us.

It was after three years, and four complicated surgeries that he was able to utter his first words. His first word was 'Papa' and I now know that was all it took for my father to know that all these struggles for his new child were worth doing.

I do remember the day he addressed me, called me clearly in words. Ofcourse he recognised us, knew us, loved us but he was unable to utter words. Guess all that fluid in his head only sharpened his intelligence. He is way more sharp than any child of his age till date. And it made us love him more than we thought we could.

His health graph was moving up the slope. There was no prominent neurosurgeon who was left unaware of his existence. Not only they were intrigued by the medical records, and how such a small body survived such life risking operations, but their jaws dropped the moment he began talking like a professional. As if he was not the supposed patient, but the cure for their depressive medical careers.

Though there was one doctor who claimed there is no permanent cure to this. Five to six years of wandering to find a suitable treatment was supposed to end by a ruthless claim that such children do not live a long life. A seven-eleven years visit is all they are meant to give to the world. If pain is a word, it started making sense then.

How do you prepare yourself for an impending end? I did not know it then. I do not know it now. At that time, when we were probably too small to know about this predicament, I happened to overhear this when my parents were talking. The heart wrenching claim by the doctor. It scares me to the core. It did so when I first heard it, and it does now, when I just think of it.

So many things have changed about me since that age. My life has been an evolutionary course of events and I have always found myself at a better place. But this particular thing, the claim still sends me into a deep panic attack.

Ofcourse, it did not stop us from witnessing better days. He was just one doctor. But every time, a sneeze escapes my baby brother's little body or he complains of a silly stomach ache, we are left shaken at the probability, that most likely has no meaning.

He's been doing better, than most kids of his age and type. We've been doing better seeing him do so. There have been few fake scares here and there, but we have made it. He has become a centre of our lives, and his personality has fetched him many admirers other than us.

He is here today, alive and kicking, annoying us to our last nerves and truly taking away all the attention from us, but that ninth day of August really gave me the best gift of my life. I was not a material girl, I am not so even today but if this is the gift you get everytime someone makes you angry, I'd probably spend my whole life in anger.

-The ninth day of August, Vanshika.

At the end of the day, we all crave for recognitions. To be recognised as a perfect outcome of our parent's nurturing, or to be recognised as a good friend and companion, to be recognised as a good social element, or to called a worthy human. Everything revolves around this, someway or the other. What we miss on our part is to recognise the ones we should. 'My father without questions spends on my education, I am grateful for life.' , 'My friend texts me twice a month if I am okay, that always lifts my spirits.' , 'My cousin gives me a bear hug everytime we meet, I've never felt more comfortable anywhere in the world.' , 'My teacher punished me to write essays when I hated them, I love writing more than anything.' If only we said it all out aloud. If only we did not wait for people to feel our feelings from disguised, undercover actions but had enough courage to bare ourselves by pouring our recognitions for everybody. It takes a lot to feel, but it doesn't take much to say.

-V

My worst point academically was my sixth grade. I had just changed schools and the new environment made it hard for me to adjust. I had no friends and the air of sophistication around suffocated me. My mother did not live with me that particular year, and I have never shared details with my father. I was practically alone and hated every bit of that time.

My class teacher was a fine, young lady who took pride in being an English specialist and a history veteran, both subjects that seemed mountains to me. When she discovered I was the new one, and not academically well off, she developed a special dislike for me and explicitly expressed it through her actions and harsh words. She was lady with a vicious vocabulary.

There was one morning when I had a bad start by giving a wrong answer, and then later she found mistakes in my assignment that seemed unforgivable to her. She pointedly told me then, "I suggest you look at your horoscope everyday because I can see how bad it is!"

I had a bad day. Her words had a special power to push me in a hole of insecurities. I even started considering telling my father that I can't manage in the school and I quit.

But I believe her 'advice' did me some good, when at the end of the day, I did look into my horoscope. "You will have a memorable day."- It said.

This was a phase, which was over even before I could tell. I left that school as a passed out. English is my power subject now. And history? Well, that is no more a mountain for me.

My horoscope was right. That day was indeed memorable. Because whenever I find myself being surrounded by negative thoughts and feelings, where I see no way out and find myself a failure, I look back to that day. If I managed to get out of that as a loner child, who was at the verge of hating her existence, I can definitely manage now, as an adult who knows life is love.

I developed certain habits in my life as lessons from that time. Firstly, to treat people right because people forget their worst time in life, but not how we treat them. The fact that I did not write about my favourite teacher yet but 'she' seemed worth mentioning. Secondly, I never look at my horoscope, not because I do not believe in them, but because it gives me a sense of satisfaction to everyday rebel a little against her and feel powerful about it, my so called bad times.

-My Horoscope, Vanshika.