Saudade Of Rain

I see the rain descend. I admire it for its beauty and the love it showers. How proud mother earth is to have a flourishing child-like rain. Unlike my mother and I, who constantly fought over silly things and never made things right. Being a single mother could be challenging, but the worse is to let your child detest you for feeling abandoned.

I envied rain for its beautiful relationship with the earth. When I learned about floods, I despised them for causing devastation but later realized that they avenged her mother for being tainted. 

Mother never asked me how I was feeling. She's just too busy with her own business, I suppose. All this started after Baba's death, and sometimes I curse him for taking away maa's love with him. I wished for a normal life, not yearning for mother's love after being snatched the fatherly love I deserved. But after his death, nothing had been normal.

The raindrops rippled over my garden pond. To my surprise, mother was standing there looking at the sky, dampening herself wet as she closed her eyes. 

"Do you want to get sick again?" I shouted, remembering how hard the last month was when she got severely ill. She didn't let me take care of her. When the doctors visited her, she handled them herself.

Without flinching, she stood there while I continued to shout. Though she had been a bad mother, I cared after all she had birthed me. 

"I will die," she shrieked as she turned around with puffed red eyes under smudged kajal. 

"Let's get inside. You have lost your mind, maa." it was the first time in two years that I had called her maa. After Baba died, she isolated herself. I tried my best to give her the support she needed, but I gave up on her sooner than I realized. 

"Get inside, ma," With teary eyes, aghast at what she had said. No one could discern the raindrops splashing on my face from the tears I had been reluctant to shed at Baba's funeral. It felt like he waved at me from heaven, telling me to let go of all the grudge I had against him, maa, and everyone who left me alone at the stairs of vulnerability. 

I dragged her inside while she continued to sob. For the first time in two years, she talked with me like the mother I had been missing. She told me how the doctors said an unknown disease-causing her lung infection diagnosed her. Her cells die quicker than average, while her cell regeneration is at a slower pace, gradually decreasing. I was taken aback for a moment. The doctors' appointments over the past year made sense now. 

"Why didn't you tell me earlier?"

"I didn't want to burden you." she wept bitterly.

It was rare to see her break loose of her emotions. The sky was enveloped with grey clouds. The new normal of loneliness I had adapted was more than it had always been. 

A little more, I wept silently, only if I had tried a little more. I walked to her side to put my hand on her shoulder. The rain had finally touched the ground. I knew I had to be her strength; I knew all I could do to help her was to be with her. 

It's been six months since that incident. My mother died last week; a peaceful death. I miss her, but the previous five months have been the most beautiful time of my life. I'll always miss her, but the memories I cherish kiss me each night as I go to bed, thinking at least she is at peace, happy with Baba. I wake up each day recalling my last few months with her. The alternate-day doctors' appointments, college, and household chores together. Our echoing laughs. She told me how she met Baba and the happiest day of their life when I was born. I smiled.

I knew this change wouldn't stay long, she knew it too, but we didn't give up till last. I knew my new normal would be without her, but with each moment I carry her and Baba with me, they complete the normalcy in me. 

I finally became the rain of my mother, a proud mother. Every time I look at the water puddles through the window, my eyes well up, but my heart has a drought of love. And no rain could fill it, so I will love the rain till I hate it. I will love the new normal life without the two most precious people until I meet them, so when my mother asks me how my new normal was - I would look into her eyes and proudly say, It was incredible.