Dua is alive

I still can’t get my head around the day I came home to complete disarray. Although I was used to such occasional mishaps, there was a sort of severity in the latest disposition I witnessed that evening. What initiated as something bizarre yet harmless had tuned into a violent farce of a poltergeist. My pillows lay on the floor, sheets creased out, curtains bore huge scissor cuts and my closet was heavily meddled with. I couldn’t hold back my tears the moment I entered the kitchen. Cookie jars were left unfastened and the dining chairs stood aligned on the table one over the other, something my six year old niece Dua was fond of doing. Every time she visited me, she insisted on letting her build castles and tombs using my movables. I lived alone and coming back home to such unsettlement almost every other day made me feel utterly helpless.

Everything started around six days back when one evening while reading I felt someone’s presence under my study table. When I looked down, to my surprise there was Dua tuck sitting in the dark only to startle me with a “Peek-a-boo!” Something did not feel right as I lived forty five kilometers away from her and she couldn’t have travelled the distance all by herself. Moreover, I hadn’t left my house that day for her to sneak in without me noticing. I asked if her father dropped her but she refused to answer and continued playing with the hem of my skirt. Just when I was about to pull her out, my phone chimed and I was informed that Dua had met with a fatal road accident and slipped into coma. Whatever was rubbing my calves under the table had stopped too. I broke into cold sweat and my mind froze for a couple of minutes. Once I collected myself, I peeked under the desk one more time and to my relief, there was no one. I thought it was my mind playing tricks but it was too real to dust it under the rug.

I took a leave from work for a few days to look after her in hospital and every time I returned home, it reeked of someone’s presence. I would often find my pillows dolled up in my clothes sitting on the couch or bed waiting for me. I found one of my soft toys missing the other day which was later discovered in her hospital bed. Everything happening around me was deeply traumatizing and inexplicable. Despite everything, I tried to keep myself sane. I sat hours after hours watching her little immobile body lying so lifeless. Sometimes I would sing to her while stroking her light brown curls. She loved to hear me sing but seemed to have lost all interest. Doctors couldn’t give us a definite answer too.

I’ve often wondered how unfortunate someone has to be to hang around with devil’s own luck. The little girl since birth had already suffered a lot to be lying unconscious in hospital bed for past one week. Dua, despite being loved and cared about had seen some really dark days. From falling off her cradle every now and then to almost drowning in the public pool, she had endured it all. Alas, all I could do was pray for her recovery but my prayers were infested with the negativity I walked home to everyday. It felt like Dua was trapped in a grey zone between life and death. All the contretemps were her doings. My heart would shrink everytime pondering the possibility of Dua slipping away one day. May be it was just her heart that was pounding whereas her conciousness had detached long time ago and lingered in all spaces awaiting the conclusive news.

It was day eighth and I had no energy to pick myself up. So I remained on bed whole day. The sun had set in and my room was dimly lit. There was no sign of anything unusual until my door bell rang. I tried turning on the lights but there was a power cut leaving me with nothing but my flash light. Something was thumping at the back of my mind and a stream of perspiration slid down my temple. In the dark I could figure out a familiar silhoutte. It was my sister, dua’s mother standing in front of me. My heart dropped. I could feel her eyes welling up and voice choking. She started sniveling and soon her bellowing voice filled my whole room with Dua’s name. I stood transfixed like my soul was scooped out of my body. She was holding the teddy bear which Dua had taken in supposedly. My heart could no longer take it. The sight of such a heart wrenching, bizarre and overwhelming scene made my stomach churn. My thoughts went muzzy and I lost clarity of my surrounding before finally passing out, collapsing in a blink. Dark and distict.

1:02 am. I woke up to a phone call from the hospital. Despite having no will to face the reality, I picked the call. My brother-in-law who never shed a tear till this date was sobbing. I could hear his voice breaking but there was an assurance in his usual idiolect. He fumbled a lot before declaring that Dua was showing signs of getting back at life. That was the moment I laughed and cried and cried again; to rejoice the coming home of my little neice and to repent the loss of her dead mother who couldn’t claim her child. Despite efforts. Many efforts.

Nirmali Medhi