With Love

Sapna picked up the Swarovski gift box and held it in her hand. Ashish had given it to her on their first day of marital life. Full of love and harmony, the dazzle of studs had simply added to the beauty of their equation. However, only this time the dazzle looked slightly hollow.

She looked thoughtfully out of the window and after a moment or two, took off the crystal studs and wore it.

The baby was wailing somewhere behind her. She turned around to look at the baby, who with his arms wide open invited the mother to pick him. Smiling exhaustingly, she picked him and caressed his soft brown wavy hair. The baby broke into a gentle smile and hug his mother, providing the only solace she could think of these days.

However, Sapna gently took the baby to his cot, to guide him back to his nesting cups game. She had a four course meal to cook for Ashish’s friends today. Frustrated and flustered as to how little time she had with the baby, she went back to the kitchen to get started.

After an hour, with 2 meals and baby’s incessant whining and crying for being picked up, Sapna decided to once again talk to her in-laws about it.

“Pranam amma!”

“Ha beta! Tell me. How’s baby Vishu doing? Has he started walking? You did not send any video of his for this week? Beta you know how eagerly we wait for it every week. You should be a little more considerate now!”

Sapna felt a stabbing pain somewhere deep down, yet she decided to stay quiet.

“Amma, did you talk to Ashu about that baby sitter?”

“Oh I completely forgot!” the woman said from the other side. “But beta, why do you need a baby sitter, it’s just a matter of a few months. Once he starts going to pre-school, you too can go back to work.”

“It’s not about work amma”, Sapna cut the woman in between. “I’m not getting time to rest or do the rest of the work. I have to stay back pretty late to do everything, which tires me a lot!”

The woman sensed Sapna irritation, but instead of sounding concerned, she chuckled.

“Arrey, why are you getting so worked up? Every mother has to go through all this na? I’m sure your mother must have had a hard time too. Even I worked and slogged day and night, but my intention was to completely devote myself to children and nothing else. All this free resting and Jobs can wait.”

The casual tone and again the sarcasm in the woman’s voice irked Sapna once again and she quickly hung up. She went to the dining table, poured herself a glass of water, gulped it down, trying to dilute the growing frustration within and banged the glass hard on the table.

The baby looked up from the carper, feeling amused at the new activity. He slowly picked his blocks and banged them to each other, feeling all the more amused. However, this new activity did nothing to amuse Sapna, who felt more flustered with the sounds.

In a fit of anger, she went and jerked the blocks away from the baby’s hand and threw them on to the floor. The baby looked sad and stared at the mother with quivering lips. Sapna knew another outburst was on its way. She went to the other room and then the baby burst into tears. She bit her lip, but stayed away from the baby, fearing of doing more harm. This time she too cried silently.

Evening came and so did Ashish’s friends.

“Hello bhabhi! Wah! What lovely smell! What’s in the menu?” said Prakash, one of Ashish’s friend’s from college.

“Nothing much. Just the regular fare”, Sapna said looking tired. “Please sit. I’ll quickly change and come.”

She quickly went to the washroom, leaving the baby in Prakash’s custody.

She changed into a lime and fuchsia pink chiffon saree and tried to dab some concealer under her eyes. The constant crying and sleep deprivation were making her look like a raccoon. Post several touch ups, camouflaging those puffy eyes, Sapna managed to look a fresher self.

As she walked back into the drawing room, she saw Ashish seated there with Prakash and two more of his friends.

“Hey Sapna, can you get the starters ready? I’ll quickly change and come”, said Ashish as he brushed her past.

These days he didn’t even bother to ask if she had slept or eaten or anything.

Sapna felt irritated, yet she quickly went to platter the starters.

Starters, drinks had already finished. Sapna had just laid the dining table with her final dining spread, when the baby threw a fit of rage.

“I need to put the baby to sleep. Can you people manage without me?” she asked the friends, who quickly agreed.

The baby cried and cried, but refused to sleep. Sapna was juggling hard to put her 11 months old baby to sleep, but the baby refused. She looked haplessly at the clock, which struck 11 and back at the baby. Suddenly she remembered the amount of work that was left back in the kitchen. She had to clean the kitchen, clear the mess, clear the….

“Sapna!” Ashish brought her back from her time table.

“Why are you taking so long? Are you not going to join us?” he asked looking irritated.

“I’m trying to put him to sleep, but he won’t, so…”

“Oh please Sapna. Stop making baby themed excuses! If he isn’t sleeping, then maybe he doesn’t want to!” and saying this he picked the crying baby, who had miraculously stopped crying as well.

Sapna felt a sudden surge of hot tears in her eyes. They stung, but not more than Ashish’s words.

“We need to talk Ashu!” she called out to him.

Ashish peeped back. “Not now. Please don’t create any scene and come out!”

Sapna hardly ate and her disappointment was evident on the table. She simply swallowed lots of whatever with some starters, while people kept throwing glances towards each other.

“Is everything alright bhabhi?” Prakash asked. “Are you not keeping well?”

Sapna tried to hide her tears and said “I’m fine”, without looking up. She quickly gave an excuse and left from the place. Tears kept flowing incessantly from her eyes, like the running tap water in the kitchen sink. She let them both on before Ashish came at her side and jerked her arm.

“What are you trying to prove with this ‘tamasha’?”

Sapna, although angered by the tone, continued to clean the dishes at the sink.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you, goddamn it!” and Ashish almost pulled her behind the sink, to which Sapna jumped and a couple of steel dishes fell. The clattering sound was loud enough to bring Prakash and his friends into the kitchen.

“Hey, what happened?” asked a friend, looking from the mess on the floor to both of them.

“Oh nothing, Sapna just accidentally dropped a few dishes.” Ashish said quickly picking the dishes from the floor, while Sapna wiped the floor.

The friends smiled and tried to help Sapna by helping her clear the kitchen.

Throughout the episode, Sapna stayed quiet and even after the friends left, she went to bed to sleep next to her baby.

“I need to know if you asked that baby sitter for a few hours.” Sapna asked Ashish the next morning. Ashish, who was engrossed in tying his shoelaces, didn’t answer back.

On being prompted again, he angrily retorted. “I won’t tolerate an ayah handling my baby. As it is, you don’t have to go to any office, so why a baby sitter?”

“I need it, so that I can get some rest Ashish!” Sapna tried to explain again. “I need some time off, to do things which interest me, so that I don’t feel bogged down by being with baby whole day. Also I need to plan to get back to work, so I have to start app…”

“Oh, so that’s it. It’s all about you and your work. Isn’t it? The baby is not even a year old and all you could think of all day is how to get away from him, how to get back to work and never be there for the baby, how to…”

“Ashish!” Sapna shouted, shivering from head to toe. “How dare you think of me like this? I have always been there for my baby. It’s you who has never been there or even done anything for me or…”

Ashish smirked and picked up his suitcase.

“I’m going to Jaipur for three days and will be back by Saturday. It would be better if you can get over this sick idea of you getting back to work or getting a nanny. I’ll not tolerate any more of this in my house. Did you understand?”

“No”, Sapna said strongly looking straight at him. “I too wish to work, while taking care of my baby. I have never shunned my responsibility as a mother nor do I feel I have to do it with my work either.”

“Fine” he snuffed. “But let me tell you, if you start working again, I’ll send Vishu to amma and appa. I think they’ll be all the more happy, while you can stay happily working.”

The door slammed shut, but there was something else inside Sapna that had shut closed.

It was hard to say who cried more, Sapna or the baby, who cried every time he saw his mother in tears. Distraught, Sapna tried calling her mother in law again to put some sense into Ashish’s brain, but she received a call from her.

“What is this I’m hearing?” the woman started accusingly.

However, before Sapna could ask what the issue was, the woman started again.

“We have been telling you again and again that no baby sitter will ever step into our house. If you are inadequate to handle the baby, then it’s nobody’s fault. Stop pressurizing my son for a baby sitter.”

The woman was now shouting, ill mouthing and making her feel small and small as a mother, as a wife and as a human. And to top it all, Sapna had been too shocked and in surprise to react.

“You are just naïve and clumsy that’s why you feel like a failure while handling Vishu. I can understand, but look you have to learn. It’s going to be one year and still you are more of a cry baby than Vishu is. Why don’t you get over this ‘getting back to work’ idea? Is my son not paying enough for you or your demands have gone up?”

Sapna was clutching the receiver too tightly, unable to speak, unable to breathe. When the woman had screamed and shouted for a good half an hour, Sapna simply disconnected the line without saying a word.

She slowly went to her closet, opened her locker and watched the paper that lay there for more than a year now. She had refused the offer blatantly, but somehow the manager had still made her keep the letter. Just in case.

She opened the letter.

It was a job offer from her last company. She was promoted in her last role and was made the product manager with the company, but with a different location. It was Mumbai. Considering it to be a difficult relocation choice for Ashish, she had never discussed this with him.

Sapna stared at the letter for some time, before she decided to make the call at the number mentioned at the end of the letter. It was her manager’s number.

Ashish came back after three days. He opened his plush looking apartment, to find it neat and clean and as always in shape. However, something looked amiss. The house was too clean, especially with the presence of a toddler. He slowly put his suitcase down and walked over to the kitchen, to again find it neat.

The house bore an eerie silence.

“Sapna” he called out. “Vishu”. There was no sound. He went from room to room, but nobody was there. Ashish looked at the clock, which said 10.45 p.m. His heart raced suddenly.

He was about to rush down to ask the security, when a package on the living room sofa, caught his attention.

It was a Swarovski gift box with a letter over it. Slowly, he opened the letter.

“Ashu I am going to Mumbai to join work. Vishu too is travelling with me. Do not worry about the how’s and why’s of our travel. Vishu will be happy to be with a mother, who is happy in herself. I’m writing to you because I felt I needed to explain to you, yet again.

I was never thinking of going back to work. All I wanted was a few hours of rest, some ‘me-time’ to do things that I like, so that I could get back to myself and spend some quality time with all of you, including my baby. However, in the past one year, you have made me feel inadequate, incompetent and overall a bad mother in various ways.

I don’t want to make it sound like a complaint letter, because actually I’m grateful to you and your family to make me feel this way. Had you not nagged me all this while, I would have never realized my self-worth and tried to work at it. Thanks to you, now I do.

This isn’t a goodbye letter nor am I telling you to divorce me. However, please understand I will never like to stay with a man, who doesn’t respect me or my sense of self. It will also inculcate the same values in our son and he too may grow up ridiculing me or disrespecting me and my choices in future. Hence, it’s best if we live separately.

You can always come and meet Vishu, but please never dare to take him away from me. I’ll be more than happy if he spends good time with you, but not based on false rumors like how ill-equipped the mother is.

I’ll send you my Mumbai address soon.

By the way, I’m enclosing the studs that you had so lovingly given. Somehow, both the words and the gift seem incoherent in our equation now.”

 

Ashish’s head reeled as he read the letter. He slowly slumped on the sofa.

He slowly opened the box to find his wife’s pair of crystal studs in place. Even the tag on the box still remained in place, reading “With love”.

–END–