The Chain Smoker Saga

The headache

Ravinder woke up from his bed. His body ached with pain. He looked around his bed and could not make out his surroundings at all. There were a lot of wires and pipes connected to his body. A slow realization started to creep in. His mind went on to a full questioning mood. “Was it because of the fight he had? But what happened to his wife? Where is she?” With no answers coming forth quickly, he got out of his bed in search of answers. There was a sharp pain in the head as he got up. Now, other answers can wait. He wants an immediate answer for the pain in his head. He pulls out all the wires and tubes connected to him and walks out of the room.

Meeting the patient

Dr. Jones was making rounds in the hospital. That morning it had been a relatively good day for Jones. All the patients were recovering well, and no patients’ families complained. He was in a good mood and was about to complete his rounds when he smelled some cigarette smoke. Jones hated people who smoked, and he hated second-hand smoke which hurt innocent people. He angrily walked briskly towards the direction of the smoke. As he reached the origin of the smoke, he saw a man who looked like he had not had any solid meals for years. It was Ravinder.

Jones walked close to Ravinder and looked into his eyes intently. Ravinder said, “I cannot share this cigarette. I begged everyone to get a single cigarette”.

“Are you stupid?”

“Even if I am stupid, I will not give you the cigarette”, replied Ravinder.

“Don’t you know you are in a hospital? Don’t you know you should not smoke?”, asked Jones.

“Till now, you wanted to smoke. I said no and you want me to stop smoking. What is this?” Ravinder replied to Jones.

“Idiot, I never asked you for a smoke. This is my hospital, and I don’t want anyone to smoke.”, ordered Ravinder.

“What will you do? Complain to the police?” asked Ravinder jestingly.

Frustrated Jones replied, “Yes”, loudly.

“And they will arrest me?”, laughed Ravinder.

“They will fine you.”

“For what?”, asked Ravinder.

“For smoking in public”, Jones replied.

“Don’t say stupid things, doctor. I smoked a pack of cigarettes with a constable yesterday in front of the court”, Ravinder replied.

“You could not have. See here, the law clearly states what I said. A constable will never do that”, said Jones handing his 6.1” iPhone.

Ravinder took the phone in his hand and was overwhelmed by what he was seeing. He did not read through the law, instead spent time intently investigating the phone.

“What is this? Is this a pocket computer? Where are the buttons?” asked Ravinder.

“Don’t you know what a mobile phone is?”, asked Jones. Before Ravinder could reply he checked on Ravinder closely. Jones had a doubt and he dragged Ravinder’s hand close to read his patient’s tag.

Name: Ravinder P

DOB: 1972-06-28

Ailment: Coma from 1996

Jones realized his mistake after reading the patient tag. The doctor in him took over and he started checking Ravinder’s vitals. The heartbeat was fine, the breath and all looked okay. It, however, felt like he was short of energy. His only food was through liquid tubes in his veins all these days. That too he disconnected before coming out for a smoke. So, Jones held Ravinder and asked him to follow. Ravinder replied, “Let me finish my cigarette” even forgetting about the technological marvel in his hand.

“No, Ravinder. You came out of a coma after twenty years, I need to urgently give you some tests”, said Jones.

“Two more puffs”, Ravinder replied and had two long drags. He saw there was a little more left, so he did a final small drag and threw out the bud.

The symptoms

Jones and Ravinder were walking towards Ravinder’s room. Jones never visited Ravinder’s room before. A twenty-year-old case meant all doctors had already given up on Ravinder's recovery. Ravinder’s wife, however, was patient and was waiting for Ravinder to come back from the coma.

As they were walking Jones got a little curious. He asked Ravinder, “What happened? Why did you go into a coma?”

“I am a chain smoker….”. Before Ravinder could finish, Jones stopped him and said, “That was why I say smoking is bad”.

Ravinder interjects and says, “No, it is not smoking that caused the coma.”

“Then?”

“If you don’t stop me in between, I can tell you”, Ravinder replied.

“Okay,” signalled Jones.

“I am a chain smoker. In a day I smoke four to five packs of cigarettes”, started Ravinder.

Jones wanted to jump in and say something. But he stopped himself.

“Before marriage, me and my wife had an agreement that she would not complain about my smoking. One fine day we went to a wedding and came home. That day I was very tense reaching home. What happened was that I lost a lot of money gambling. I did not know how to tell that to my wife. I came home and was lost in my worries and was smoking the third cigarette when my wife came and asked me something. We were married for three years by then, and I know what all my wife wants. So, I was not hearing her well and was lost thinking about my gambling worries. After ranting for some five minutes my wife said, this is why I get very stressed.”

Jones was eagerly listening to Ravinder and nodded to tell him to proceed. Ravinder continued telling his story.

 “Hearing the word stress. I said to my wife if you are stressed you should also smoke. The worries will go away like this and snapped my fingers once. Before I was snapping the second time a steel roti stick came flying to my head. That was the last thing I remember”, concluded Ravinder and turned to Jones.

Jones had his mobile recording on and was recording every word coming out of Ravinder.

Ravinder asked Jones, “What are you doing?”

“Recording, for later listening”, Jones replied.

“Why?”, asked Ravinder.

“I record all my conversations.”

“Do you have some kind of memory loss problems?”, asked Ravinder.

“No. This is for a better recording of facts. When I have any doubts about anything I can go back and listen to them”, said Jones.

Ravinder gave up understanding Jones and kept walking towards his room.

“This is the best way of managing the day. Technology is the best thing to solve any problems. That is why I keep my phone all the time with me and actively use it”, added Jones. That was the same moment he saw the poster on the wall, free cancer screening. Jones took Ravinder directly to the screening.

The test

Jones and Ravinder were waiting outside the diagnosis room. Jones was browsing through his mobile phone when he saw a notification, “Should I back up the messages to the cloud?”. Jones was going through all the recordings to back up only the important ones. He quickly finished the backup process. The recording he heard earlier reminded Jones something.

“Four to five packets a day?”, exclaimed Jones, forgetting everything else and sticking to the smoking problem Ravinder has.

“Yes”, Ravinder replied proudly.

“What is so great about cigarettes that you are feeling proud?” asked Jones.

“Million things. “

“Tell me few for my understanding”, asked Jones.

“If you are a smoker, you can make friends easily. You ask for a matchbox, and he has one you are friends with them already. If you fight with someone, ask them to join you for a smoke. Before you finish smoking the problem solves itself. If not, light another one. If you are not able to decide something, go to a tea shop and light a cigarette. Before you finish the cigarettes, everyone there will give you the answer you want. There are many more. Should I continue?”, asked Ravinder.

That same moment some guy came out of the screening room. He looked like he was in a lot of pain. Ravinder immediately turned to Jones and asked, “Is it going to pain?”

“A little”, replied Jones.

“I am not going to take the test then”, said Ravinder and started to walk out.

“Don’t worry man. It will not pain that much”, Jones said trying to calm down Ravinder.

Ravinder was not listening and was trying to forcefully leave. But could not as Jones was holding his weak body. But Jones could feel the doubt in Ravinder’s mind.

“Okay, let me do one thing. Let me also take the screening test with you”, said Jones.

“What will I get from that?” asked Ravinder.

“If it was going to be painful, would I take the test?”, asked Jones back to Ravinder.

Both Ravinder and Jones go together into the screening test.

The result

Ravinder and Jones had to wait for some time for the test results. So, Jones took Ravinder to have tests done for his other condition, his coma. He did some tests on Ravinder with his other regular doctors. They were all surprised to see everything was fine with Ravinder. They decide he can start to have solid food right away. The nurses brought food to Ravinder in a Styrofoam container. Ravinder opened the box and started eating the food with a plastic spoon next to it. Ravinder finished his lunch alone and Jones went back to his room.

A few hours later Jones heard the familiar smell of the cigarette. He quickly came out and saw Ravinder was the one who was smoking.

“Please don’t smoke”, said Jones.

“If I have cancer, I will die anyway. Let me smoke a little bit”, requested Ravinder.

Jones gave up fighting and stood with Ravinder.

Ravinder smoking said, “I liked the packing of food. In our days it used to be a big steel container that was dragged everywhere. People eating on a steel plate. The cleaning of the plates was a mess and don’t forget water wastage.”

Jones nodded in agreement. Ravinder finished his cigarette. Jones wanted to give directions to the nurse to make sure Ravinder did not smoke anymore. So, Jones followed Ravinder to his room. As they reached the room the compounder brought the reports to the room. The compounder also had the report of Jones and handed it over. Ravinder was scared to open his reports. After twenty years he just got out of a coma, and he doesn’t want to know he has cancer. Jones came to the rescue again.

“I will open both”, said Jones and took hold of Ravinder’s reports. As he was opening both his and Ravinder’s reports fell on the floor. Jones picked both and froze.

Ravinder asked,” What happened? Cancer?”.

Jones nodded to mean yes and ran out.

Ravinder started crying and immediately searched for a cigarette.

The cancer doctor came to Ravinder’s room and asked Ravinder for Jones. Ravinder replied, “He left from here”.

“Where?” asked the doctor.

“Don’t know” replied Ravinder.

“Tell me man where is he?” asked the doctor in a hurry.

“What happened? What is the hurry?” asked Ravinder.

“I just came to know Jones has cancer. I need to find him and give him treatment”, replied the doctor.

“OMG, Dr. Jones also has cancer?”, asked Ravinder.

“Who else has cancer?” asked the cancer doctor.

“Me?”, asked Ravinder doubtfully.

“No. You are clean”, replied the cancer doctor and went in search of Jones.

The coma

Ravinder’s wife came to take Ravinder home. She had tears in her eyes seeing her husband walking and talking. She hugged him tightly. Handed him a pack of cigarettes.

“Don’t smoke here”, she said.

Ravinder had happy tears and wanted to ask what their fight was about. Before he could ask anything, she started.

“Do you remember we went to a wedding on the day you had the accident?”, asked Ravinder’s wife.

Ravinder nodded yes.

“That day you said my sister’s green saree was looking good”, Ravinder’s wife reminded him.

“Yeah, the green saree was good”, confirmed Ravinder.

“That was the same saree I wore the previous week for our marriage day, and you had nothing to say”, said Ravinder’s wife and walked back towards her bag.

“I was awed by your beauty and did not notice the saree”, said Ravinder trying to gather all his wit.

Ravinder’s wife’s heart melted, and she started having tears of joy. Her husband loved her and she did not understand him.

Ravinder’s wife hugged him and said, “I asked you the same question that day and you kept quiet. Then you made a stupid remark about smoking. Sorry, I threw that roti stick”.

Ravinder remembered the saree very well. He also remembered that his then-unmarried sister-in-law wearing the saree and he complimented her even after twenty years in a coma. But he had zero recollection of his wife ever wearing that saree.

P.S.: I am not encouraging smoking. I am just giving a reality check that we have many other ways of getting cancer than a vintage smoker.