Page 94 of The Circle of Exile
“One strike on your bad children name, but you pass for today.”
Iram laughed, pushing her face up to drink back her tears — “You’ll think I have come back with an open tank.”
“No,” he got up and rounded his table, covering the distance between them. His hands held her face and tugged it straight to wipe her eyes. “I don’t think that.”
Iram stared at his face, counting today as a big win for her. As many small wins, truthfully. But then her eyes remained on his, and the shadows behind his smile began to slowly slip out. In the quiet of the night, his breaths were audible to her, as loud as her own.
“Why did you leave the room?”
His eyes blinked, that smile still on his mouth.
“Honesty, Atharva. My win is your win today, and your loss is my loss.” She cupped the side of his face and pressed her thumb to the corner of his eye. It wasn’t wet but she knew the beginnings of his tears.
“Tell me. All of it.”
He shook his head, his head bowing in her hand — “I have never been this man to keep looking back. I don’t know what’s happened to me.”
She cupped the other side of his face and pushed it up like he had done to hers just minutes ago. “We both have grown into newer people who don’t seem to conform to their old moulds. But I promised to love all the people you will become, Atharva. Tell me. Is it me? Did I do something? Are you angry? Sad? Thinking about Yamma?”
His hands came over hers, patted, then pulled them down. Iram began to push with more words of encouragement but he tugged her hand and led her to his couch. They sat down side by side, their shoulders pressed. Silent. Iram let him ruminate on whatever was churning inside him. She sat there without another question, without another nudge. His chest expanded in a deep breath, then relaxed. And she let her head fall on his shoulder. His chest relaxed some more. The tic in his breath slowed down.
“Can you hear about her?” Atharva asked. One of those rare times he asked her to be his crutch. How could she deny it then? Truth be told, she didn’t want to.
Iram nodded. “Yes.”
He did not say anything for a long time. And then, quietly, his words began to flow.
“She was five pounds and seven ounces.”
Iram closed her eyes, feeling her chest cave in but holding it steady for him.
“Fully formed. I hadn’t seen Yathaarth yet, when they showed her to me. They were supposed to show me my alive baby before they showed me my dead baby, officially. But I raged and pulled my weight to see her first.”
“Was she… you said she was wrapped,” Iram opened her eyes, tears already pouring down untethered. She knew her tears were draining into the sleeve of his shirt. She did not stop.
“She was wrapped but they gave her to me. I held her. Her swaddle wasn’t too tight. And the nurse opened it up to let me see her. Her hands. So small,” his voice broke. It went to half his pitch. “Pink fingers. She was… her nails were also formed.”
Iram held her chest tight lest it begin to rattle with how her insides were shuddering.
“What did she look like?”
“Like those dolls in toy shops. White skin, tiny lips, her eyelashes were like that unicorn toy Ada brought home the last time she came. Long, thick, closed. She would have been alive… if only she had breathed she would have been alive… I was supposed to hold her, talk to her, name her, grieve her, say goodbye to her. They did not set a time limit on it but I was running on borrowed time. Altaf and Captain Husain were combing the street cameras for you, a team was sent to Leh to Mama’s house, Budgam was being sealed… and I had to see Yathaarth across town in Dr. Shankar’s NICU. I couldn’t even hold her longer than fifteen minutes,” he broke down. His body curled over itself until his head was rattling on his folded hands, loud sobs echoing in the room. “How I hated you in that moment. How I hated the world for tearing me away from even a minute extra in my daughter’s presence.” He sobbed. She curled herself over him, holding his broad shoulders tight. “I was torn in three parts and this one refused to leave her. I had to leave her and I had to go. It felt like I was leaving her alive to die there.” His body rattled. “It felt like if I spent just a little more time with her she would open her eyes, she would come back to me, be mine…”
Iram held him tighter, her tears stopped now to let his flow. She inhaled sharply and pulled his head on her chest, lying back on the couch to let him cry. He buried his face there and cried — loud, unfettered, his hands holding onto her with claw-like anchors. Like he had once held after the passing of his mother.
“I haven’t cried…” he sobbed. “I am sorry…”
“Cry,” she embraced him. “Cry, Atharva.”
“I was so alone.”
“Cry.”
“You left me.”
“Cry,” she patted his hair.
“She left me.”
