11 Years, 127 Letters

For the last eleven years, on the 2nd Wednesday of every month, the letter would arrive unfailingly at his doorstep. It wasn't delivered by the postman or a courier guy. A silent stranger would drop it off at his doorstep at the wee hours of the morning. He'd tried to snoop in on the harmless intruder twice or thrice, but to no avail.

"Thrice", Rajesh Nambiar convinced himself in his mind.

It was the 12th of August, 1989. The 2nd Wednesday of this month. It was 10:25 am already.

"Strange that the letter hasn't arrived.", Mr. Nambiar thought to himself.

At 77, he'd learnt to read himself quite well over the years and deep inside, he was beginning to get worried that the last emotion he'd read off himself was 'worry'.

As he sat by the windowsill on a nice plastic chair, ignoring the easy recliner his wife had gifted him on his last birthday; he took another sip from his steaming cup of freshly ground coffee. Coffee always had a soothing effect on his nerves. He hoped for it to work on him more than ever today.

"Maybe the messenger got stuck somewhere. Suhas always writes".

He looked up at the clock. It was close to 11 am. A good time on a usually laidback post-retirement day.

Today, it spelled one word. Panic.

As Rajesh Nambiar hurried to the door for the 20th time in 35 minutes, he knew one word would do what the coffee had failed to do for him today.

"Lakshmi", he called out lovingly, trying his best to camouflage the worry in his voice, "Has Suhas called by any chance?"

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"Do you want some help with that bag, Uncle?".

Lakshmi looked up at the 20-something boy addressing her husband. He looked extremely presentable and genuinely pleasant. Dressed in a casual short kurta and blue denims and chappals to boot, he looked like quite an enterprising fellow.

"The antithesis of Suhas", Lakshmi subconsciously thought to herself as she heard her husband gracefully refuse the young man's offer.

"Oh, come on, Mr. Nambiar , at your age, its a wonder you can easily lift yourself up! Stop playing coy dear! What if it were Suhas? Would you not allow him to carry it for you?", Lakshmi playfully chided her husband.

"This was the thing that had attracted me to her in the first place", Rajesh thought as he searched for an answer to his wife's question. She hadn't lost her sense of humor in all of their 47 years of married life.

He remembered the time when he'd been to the hospital with her in a time of extreme crisis, the open heart surgery of her aged father. He'd been there to lend support and had turned out be the one who needed it the most! He'd watched with amazement as she went about the whole situation in an extremely focused, stressed and yet light hearted manner, never allowing the pressure to show on her face.

"Drink up your coffee, Rajesh! You look flushed. The doctor's said dad's out of trouble now. He'll be okay in a few days’ time".

The words said 35 years ago rang in his ears like an echo of time.

"Mr. Nambiar??? I am telling you right away! I am beginning to sense you are beginning to develop Alzheimers!".

Rajesh looked up at his wife. They were in bogie no. S-3 of Ernakulam Express, searching for their seats and travelling to Trivandrum to search for the answer to their son's missing letter.

It had been 2 days since the Wednesday when the first time in 11 years, the letter from their son hadn't arrived. Rajesh Nambiar couldn't hold his worries any longer. So what if Lakshmi had tried her best to convince him to wait for the next month.

"Maybe the messenger got stuck in some of his own problems". "Perhaps Suhas was too busy to write". "Maybe he's just angry at you for not replying last month!".

Lakshmi had tried her best to pacify her husband but Rajesh wouldn't listen and finally after 2 days of harrowing behind closed doors, Lakshmi had got herself and Rajesh on-board the train that would take them to Suhas.

"Hopefully", Lakshmi thought now as she settled into seat no. 28 of the 2nd class compartment and looked at her husband lovingly.

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"Of course, we've done all we could before coming here, Sir. We tried calling him on his landline and his mobile and at his office. We spoke to his friends. We spoke to his colleague chefs at Westin International. We tried everything, Sir. This was our last resort".

Inspector Shinde looked at the aged Malayalee couple seated across the table and noticed the old woman lovingly hold the old man's hand.

"Sweet", Shinde thought to himself. "Pyaar abhi bhi zinda hai pata nahi insaan kab tak zinda rahenge".

He chuckled at his own little joke.

"Inspector?".

Shinde looked up at the couple. "Err... yes...so your son’s a chef, eh? We'll do what we can. Do you have a recent photograph of him?"

Shinde saw the old man gesture towards his wife. She took out an old, shredded piece of a little square paper from her purse.

"This is him".

Shinde looked at the black and white photograph of a tense looking boy in his late 30's. He had deep set eyes and a receding hairline. He wore ungainly braces and looked a bit malnourished. Shinde could see his rib cage peek out of his shirt in the photograph. He wore thick spectacles, beneath which those dark eyes seemed to convey an angry intelligence.

He turned around the picture.

'February 1977. 20th birthday. Grandma's house.', it read.

Shinde looked up the old couple, amused and perplexed, but a bit concerned as well now.

"Your son was only 20 when this photograph was taken? Which means he’s 32 now, eh? Don't you have a more recent photo?", he asked the woman, who seemed to be the one in charge here.

Shinde saw his questions trigger genuine surprise and concern in the old man's face too. The old man didn't know that his wife didn't have a recent picture.

"Strange", Shinde thought, finding himself getting a little more drawn into the matter at hand.

He listened to the old woman tell him that this is what she had with her now as she always carried it around in her purse and other recent photographs were left back at their house in Mumbai. She persuaded him that it was ok and she had come to the police station just for the satisfaction of her husband and that they were sure that their son was ok and would contact them soon. She refused to file a missing person's report.

Shinde made a note of the old man's disillusionment and dissatisfaction at his wife's answers as they left the police station.

"Nair", he called out to his deputy and handed over the Xerox copy of the photo he'd taken while pretending to go for a glass of water inside his cabin, "Go feed this to the database and check if one Mr. Suhas Nambiar ever lived in this town".

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"What was that all about...that day at the police station, Lakshmi?", Rajesh thundered as he refused to have his regular dose of blood pressure tablets for the 2nd day in a row. He’d not eaten well either.

It had been 4 days now that they'd arrived in Trivandrum. There was no sign of Suhas. Lakshmi seemed to be behaving strange and not giving him too many answers.

He looked at Lakshmi keep mum yet again. He knew he was beginning to lose his cool.

"If only I didn't have to rely on you for getting through to Suhas! It’s been 11 years now dammit! And all the boy does is write one goddamned letter to me every month! How many times do I have to accept and apologize for that one mistake I made in 1977??? So what, yes, I did become a little narrow minded and scowl at the idea of him leaving his engineering and deciding to become a chef. I didn't want a goddamned cook in my house, alright!! I screamed at him, called him names.. but look… all that was 11 bloody years ago, Lakshmi! Do I have to pay such a steep price for one little mistake?!!".

Lakshmi looked at her husband worriedly and tried to get hold of his hand. She knew she could do nothing to calm him right now. All she could do was control the damage. Let his emotions flow.

"And now my own bloody son refuses to talk to me. Refuses to take my calls. Refuses to turn up at my house to see me. Goes into hiding when I go to see him at his house. What am I supposed to do, Lakshmi? Watch you play mediator every damn time and be happy at that?!?"

"My own son's become so haughty that he refuses to let you show me even the photographs he sends. All I know about him is through you and those stupid letters he writes. I don't know what to do anymore, Lakshmi. Please, please speak to him and tell him that I'll die if he keeps doing this to me, Lakshmi. Please tell him."

Lakshmi looked at her husband breaking down so badly before her own eyes and knew she could do nothing.

"Just a day more and it’s all going to be alright", she thought to herself as she looked deep inside the setting sun from the tiny window of their hotel room, trying to find some answers, and perhaps, a bit of herself that she lost 11 years ago.

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Inspector Shinde was sifting through his usual dosage of porn magazines when Deputy Inspector Nair placed the Suhas Nambiar case-file report on his table.

He would have usually let it lay on his table for another week before finally gifting himself the time to look at it, but he found it strange that he was more interested in reading that report than in looking at pictures of voluptuous women in his magazine.

"Perhaps my libido is going down, eh!", Shinde thought to himself as he looked down at his pants and crooned "Dost dost na raha" and then went on to chuckle at his own little crude joke.

"Time to read the report then. Chala Shinde, kamala laga", he muttered to himself before opening the case file.

***** CASE FILE - 00002010 ******

NAME: SUHAS NAMBIAR

GENDER : MALE

DOB: 2nd February 1957

Died on : 31st of December, 1977

AGE at time of death: 20

PLACE OF BIRTH : MUMBAI Place of Death: Trivandrum

DATE OF MISSING PERSON'S REPORT: 16th August, 1989

CASE REPORT:

On 1st of January, 1978, a body of a male, 20, was found in room no 301 of Hotel Chanakya, District lane, Trivandrum. No relatives/ friends claimed the body for 7 days. The coroner's report stated that the boy had died of cocaine overdose, which combined with a hereditary heart problem, lead to multiple organ failure.

Time of death was noted as 11:58 pm, 31st December, 1977.

The boy was last spotted at 2:02 pm in the afternoon by one Mr. Rajan Murthy, a local shopkeeper, who noticed him post a letter in the local postbox. Mr. Murthy noted the boy as looking extremely ill, dejected and in Mr. Murthy's own words 'gasping for breath'.

The local municipality decided to dispose of the body on its own, having found no identification on the body and the coroner's photographs being of no use, for the boy had a badly disfigured face due to months of extreme self-abuse.

One Mr. Natrajan Ramesh had come up to the police on the 3rd of January, 1978, claiming that he worked at the Westin International and knew Mr. Suhas Nambiar since his training days and also shared a flat with him. He claimed his colleague and roommate had suddenly gone missing from the training sessions and his family had put in his papers on his behalf.

The last time he saw Mr. Suhas Nambiar, he claimed, was on the night of 11th December, 1977, at about 1 am in the morning, near Hotel Chanakya.

Mr. Ramesh claimed he approached the police just in case they were looking for an identification. However, on the 4th of January 1977, at the coroner's office, he couldn't positively identify the body as that of his colleague Mr. Suhas Nambiar.

The file was closed as a case of 'suicide' by a 'homeless man' on the 20th of February, 1978, the police finding no further clues and leads.

Today, with advancement in forensics, we could confirm the body as that of Mr. Suhas Nambiar, using the hair samples collected from the dead body in 1978 and hair samples from some items of Mr. Suhas Nambiar which Mr. Ramesh had deposited with the police when he approached them.

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Lakshmi shifted restlessly in her uncomfortable bed as she made sure for the nth time that her husband was deep asleep. What she was about to do was unthinkable. She was going to break the promise she made to her dead son 11 years ago to keep her husband alive.

She woke up and quietly removed a hairpin from her thick veil of hair and fished out her purse from the bedside drawer. She then stuck the pin into the underlining inside cloth and began to tear through the stitches. Stitches she'd made 11 years ago.

"Why wouldn't you change your purse, Lakshmi? I’m fed up of seeing you use this bloody old one. I keep buying you so many new ones! Try one na, for me at least?", Rajesh would tell her with a childish grin.

How could she tell him it was because of a letter that she received 11 years ago from their son Suhas that she'd hid in there, away from the world, away from him, away from herself.

She slid the old piece of paper out and read it once again after that fateful night of 2nd January, 1978.

She then took out a little felt pen and scribbled a couple of lines on it, before putting it beside the table and beneath her husband's spectacles, where she was sure he would find it.

Waiting for him along with his cup of hot coffee, first thing in the morning.

She then kissed Rajesh goodnight and watched him cuddle up to her in his sleep.

11 years ago you'd have died if you'd listened to the truth.

Today, you may end up in heaven sooner than I would have thought, Mr. Nambiar, if I don't tell you the truth.

Love you . Forgive me.

Lakshmi.

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Dear Ma,

How are you? I am fine, writing this letter tucked under the bed in my seedy hotel room, feeling a bit under the weather and a lot under life as well.

Cocaine isn’t good, Ma. I learnt it after 11 months of extreme abuse to ward off my guilt and anger and frustrations and fear. To get rid of all of them and a bit of myself as well.

Gasping for a few little breaths and vomiting onto myself every night is a feeling I’d rather not talk to you about.

Breaking off all ties with you, with Pa, with Grandma, with my friends and colleagues doesn’t feel good one bit, Ma. But that’s the way my cookie crumbled.

Remember the cookies I used to bake for you every new year, Ma?

There was this time when all I had was deep yearning to cook and feed 20 people and now the time has come when food finds it difficult to find me. With just 20 rupees left in my pocket and the Rs. 2 lacs that I owe to the friendly neighborhood coke guy, I don’t know whom to turn to, Ma.

Today is the 31st of December, my big day. Remember last year, Ma? We were all at Grandma’s place in Cochin, dancing to old film songs and munching on banana chips.

Oh, how I miss those chips that Grandma used to make. I make do with cheap packets of snacks to go along with my cheap bottles of liquor these days.

Too bad, Ma, that I had to fall to such depths.

But sometimes, all of this feels much better than what Pa said to me that night. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t fit in. Maybe I don’t gel. Maybe I’m not the Suhas that you and Pa had dreamed of. And maybe I can never be him.

Perhaps in another life, Ma.

Love you always,

Suhas.

P.S. :

Please don’t let Pa know about me. Do whatever it takes Ma. Let me not cause any more grief to him while he’s alive. And tell him I have always loved him. And tell him I tried.

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Before removing his spectacles and placing them unsteadily on the bedside table, the last thing Rajesh Nambiar managed to notice through his moist eyes was how well Lakshmi had managed to forge Suhas’ handwriting.

He remembered the days when she used to forge the professor’s signature on his incomplete answer sheets while in college and managed a smile to himself before going back to blissful sleep.

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4 years later

Lakshmi watched the funeral pyre settle down slowly under the restless rain.

It had rained when she had met him first, at the corner most table of their college canteen, sipping on a hot cup of coffee. It had rained when they dated and sat by Juhu beach, eating hot bhajiyas and sipping on hot chai. It had rained on the morning when the marriage took place. She’s almost ruined her wedding dress in the slush. It had rained when they made love for the first time in a houseboat in Kashmir. It had rained when Suhas was born and brought out by the nurses, a bundle of joy wrapped in cozy towels. And it had rained on that fateful night when she had received the letter from her dead son.

And now, at Rajesh’s funeral, it was raining again.

“Perhaps the heavens want me to listen to something they have to say, Mr. Nambiar. Perhaps they want me to let you know that you’re a wonderful man. Don’t let your one mistake ruin your afterlife”, Lakshmi said out aloud as she looked up into the hazy skies.

As the ashes settled on the ground and ran into the murky waters, Lakshmi fetched out a sealed envelope from her purse, which her husband had left for her on the bedside table four years ago, urging itself to be opened only after his death.

Inside, was an old photograph of the three of them – Rajesh, Lakshmi and an unusually smiling Suhas and scribbled on the back of it were the words:

“In another life, my son. In another life.”

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