Page 91 of The Circle of Exile
“Like what?”
“Don’t make me say it.”
“Say it.”
Iram glanced at Atharva. She hadn’t shared this fear with him yet. His grey eyes were completely at ease, understanding, ready.
“That he will die too,” she said, not looking away from Atharva’s eyes. They did not blink either, did not change colour or depth. There, with her, in this.
“Completely justified fear.”
Those magic words made her whirl to Dr. Baig.
“Justified?” Her eyes widened.
“Among new mothers, of course. In your case, doubly so. You have already lost a child.”
She said it so easily. Iram wished she could think about it so easily. About that child she had lost. Her daughter.
“Dr. Baig,” Iram glanced at the time. They had taken this appointment for one hour. They were at the tail end of it.
“Don’t look there, look at me,” Dr. Baig asserted. Iram obeyed.
“Now tell me.”
“How did she go?”
The temperature of the room dropped 10 degrees. The air itself turned thick.
“I have your operation notes with me. I briefed Kaul sahab after my return from New Zealand,” Dr. Baig was matter-of-fact. It gave her the courage to remain strong through this. Atharva’s heat was hotter and she realised why. He had shifted closer to her, his thigh touching hers.
“I would like to know now.”
“She was the presenting twin, the one lying down, on your cervix. Yathaarth was lying close to your diaphragm. Her placental cord got tangled around her neck and went on tightening, gradually cutting blood and oxygen supply. Her waters broke first. She pushed you into labour. During the emergency C-section, her cord was too tight, and despite rapid extraction, she suffered cardiac arrest inside. Yathaarth had been sitting in a relatively safer zone, but due to shared maternal stress, contractions, and reduced perfusion, he came out in a state of perinatal asphyxia. Suffocation. His heartbeat was detected but stopped immediately. Standard CPR did not work. Dr. Shankar’s fellow paediatrician declared the time of death. But Dr. Shankar was in within the next minute and Yathaarth was given epinephrine through the umbilical cord. After multiple attempts, he was revived and declared stable enough to transfer to his NICU across town.”
Iram listened, absorbed, gave that horrified morning structure in her head. Her breathing picked up and Atharva’s hand slowly settled on her knee. She pulled in one deep breath, then two, letting her skin feel his touch, anchoring herself.
“I told Kaul sahab something that day that I would like to tell you, Iram,” Dr. Baig sat forward, suddenly not their doctor but a guide.
“Hmm?”
“If she hadn’t gone into distress and pushed you into labour when she did, the cord around her neck might have led to brain death. Yathaarth could have lost placental support and you would have been none the wiser until it was too late. Chances are, we wouldn’t have been able to save any of the children. Your daughter did not survive, but she made sure that her brother did.”
A tear slipped down the corner of her eye. Then another. Then another. Her nose felt clogged. Iram buried her face in her hands. She hid her eyes from the world and let the tears slip. Second by second, minute by minute, lamenting that child she hadn’t been able to save. That girl. That baby. Her baby. Her daughter.
“Was it because of… m…me?” She asked, crying for that little girl who had gone for her brother to live. The girl she hadn’t talked to enough in her belly because she was too busy crumbling over her own stupid past and problems. How could she be so selfish as a mother? How had she been ok with her own mind’s problems over her children’s survival? Had she known that this mountain crumbling over her back would lead her daughter to go away… she would have shut down inside a room and borne every lash of her mind until her daughter was safely out. It would have been terrifying but she would have done it.
“No.”
Iram kept shaking, her palms pools of tears. She felt Atharva’s hand tighten on her knee. She sniffled, and scrubbed her palms down her face. She had to face this. She had to see this, hear this and move on. She opened her now clear eyes to Dr. Baig’s firm ones.
“It was not because of you. It was an ugly hand of fate.”
“If I weren’t so lost, I would have felt something…”
“You did feel it. You weren’t panicking for no reason that morning.”
“You mean it wasn’t my own… thoughts?”
