When I was 8 years old, we were asked to write a Hindi essay
on our favourite festival. I knew everyone would write on Diwali or Christmas
or Holi. So I chose to write on Rakshabandhan, because I knew the significance
of it and I knew that my teacher would give me marks on the novelty of my
choice. I swear I didn't do it because you were sick or because I loved you. I was a smartypants as a kid, that's all.
I still have that essay, scrawled in neat pencil marks
across three pages of school-issued stationery, hidden away from prying eyes. I
don’t know what made me keep that essay for so long. It’s a bitter reminder of
all that I am missing today.
I wish you were here. It doesn’t matter that eight years is
a long time and that I can convince myself for having moved on. It doesn’t
matter that I have some of the sweetest friends supporting me. It doesn’t
matter that I have become a stronger, independent woman – an adult with
responsibilities, progressing in my career. It doesn’t matter that when I
phoned Mom and Dad to tell them I got my first real job, I heard both of them
beaming right through the screen. I know they opened a bottle of wine to
celebrate that night.
I wish you were here because things would have been
different. Its not things are bad now, or that we wouldn’t have had problems if
you were around. My life is now filled with so many important people, and you
don’t know half of them. I would have liked you to meet the boys I dated.
Probably would have appreciated having you around to warn me about some silly mistakes
I made. It would have been nice to see your face when I went to my school
farewell. You would have probably driven to pick me up and I can imagine my
teenage friends having a crush on you and never admitting it to me. I recall
that “coffee date” in Modern Colony where we sat on the car bonnet, eating
Masala Pav and having that intense conversation on what Bachelors I should
study.
Remember that time you tried teaching me how to ride a bike?
Your instructions were simple. Sit on it, switch on the ignition and go for it.
You were laughing as my stocky feet struggled on the gravel-ridden path behind
our society parking, as I accelerated in the miserable hope I could figure it
out. Well, I learnt how to drive a car and did a fairly good job of it without
you, mister. I still wish you were there so we could have taken midnight trips
to Lavasa in the rain. I think that would have been nice.
I can’t play the guitar anymore. I carry your purple Jim
Dunlop in my wallet. It’s what you did, so I try to keep the tradition on.
Everytime I hear the intro to Hotel California, I think about the summer nights
when we sat on the floor and practiced the chords with our toneless voices
warbling as an accompaniment. Coldplay has been performing in India…It would
have been fun to go to a concert. We could have probably gone backpacking
across Europe, filled Facebook with ridiculous selfies.
I see all your friends doing so well in their lives and I am
happy for them, truly, I am. But it clenches my heart to wonder how well you
could have been doing too. You would have probably left home, gotten yourself a
fancy girlfriend and it would have be so convenient to dislike her. Maybe
adulthood would have come between us and we wouldn’t be very close. Maybe we
would only converse through Mum and call each other once a month. I don’t know.
All this distance and time that separates us has stolen so
much from me. How can I not be bitter? Mom and Dad provided for me but you are
the first part of my family. There are so many secrets that only siblings can
share and how do I unburden myself to anyone who has not experienced the love
we had? I wish you were here. I would probably be a different person. I
probably wouldn’t be this happy. Probably I wouldn’t do half the crazy things I
do because I wouldn’t be living for both you and me. Words cannot describe the
emptiness I feel -despite the years and all the wonderful people I have met.
I wish we had more time together and I hope you know how much I love you, even
though I was naïve to never say it enough number of times. I hope you knew.
