The Football Kick

Ravi called it, ‘The Sunday Special’, the football game which he played with Anand and his school friends after a late breakfast on the lawn. Ravi became a child, when he played football with Anand. On Anand’s 7th birthday, Ravi gave him a lightweight football. The football became Anand’s prized possession. He kept it by his bedside when he went sleep. Ravi’s friend was a football coach. Ravi sent Anand to him. Six months later, the coach told Ravi that while passing the ball in the field, Anand was faster than his team mates”. “The boy has magic in his legs” said the coach. Ravi hugged Anand. When Anand was selected as captain for the junior football team in his school, it was as if Ravi had won a gold medal at the Olympics.

 From the balcony of the two storied bungalows, Leela could see agile brown legs fly in the air. Anand was passing the ball so deftly. Some legs! The boy has got, she thought wryly. Her hand slides down her bulge. She caresses it. Anand brings the ball close to the net and kicks it hard. The ball neatly falls into the net.

Ravi spreads out his arms and shout’s “Goal”. “AttaBoy! That was wonderful kick” he says, smiling proudly at Anand. Leela winces at the word ‘Kick’. If only the baby in her stomach could kick as hard as Anand had kicked the football, she would then know that her baby was alive. But the kicks had not come at all. The deep lines of worry throbbed on her forehead. She bit her lower lip.

Leela was nearing her seventh month. She could feel that there was something inside her, she craved for the movements. Only the kicks could assure her that her baby was alive in her womb. Her sister Anita had three children. “You can feel the movements in the fourth or fifth month itself. Then you know that your baby is alive and kicking”.

“Why isn’t the baby kicking me? How will I know if the baby is alive inside me if I don’t feel the kicks”?   

The doctor leans over at Leela across the table and says “Sometimes in the first pregnancy like yours, the kicks start late. But don’t worry you are doing fine”

Leela is not convinced. “If everything is fine, why hasn’t the baby kicked as yet?”

The doctor is getting slightly exasperated. “Your sonography report is showing that everything is normal. You are going to have a safe delivery, so just relax”.

A deep frown appears on Leela’s forehead as she protectively holds the bulge below and asks Ravi, “When will I feel the kicks in my womb?”.

“I know this is your first pregnancy, but you are worrying too much Leela, just go by the Doctor’s advice and everything will turn out fine”.

So practical! But then Ravi was always like that except that one instance when his mother had died. He lost all control and refused to let go of the lifeless body on the hospital bed. Her mother-in-law was in the Intensive Care Unit. She was dying. Holding Ravi’s hand, she had pleaded, “You love kids. Adopt a child. Even after eleven years of marriage there is not even, a worm in your wife’s womb”.

To Ravi’s protests, the old lady with sadness in her eyes said, “When I die, I know   you are there to perform the last rites. Who will be there for you”, the old lady left the sentence unfinished? But Ravi and Leela, understood the inference.

After undergoing many tests, making exhaustive rounds to hospitals and the fertility clinic which conducted a sperm test on Ravi, the results came normal. The analysis from doctors was baffling, “Everything is normal with both of you; some women conceive soon, others may conceive late”. Leela went into depression.

Her thighs wide open, Leela was moaning with pleasure at Ravi’s thrusts. She wanted his seed to trickle into her womb and make her pregnant, heavy with a child.   She wanted her breasts which Ravi caressed to spurt milk.

“Our love life is good. Why is it that we are not able to make a baby?”

Laughing Ravi rolled over the bed and placing his head on her lap, he said, “I am your baby”.

When Ravi’s mother was alive, she had suggested that they go to temples and pray for divine intervention. When even after going to temples, Leela did not conceive, her mother-in-law said, “You have no faith in God, that is why you are childless”

Forty days after his mother’s death, after performing the last rituals, Ravi over   breakfast said, “Why don’t we adopt a child?” From his voice, Leela knew that he was serious.

No! Leela was angry. Her anger surprised Ravi. He hastily left for office with an   unfinished breakfast on the table.

“He is sulking like a child, his mother has made him a spoiled brat”, she said to herself. Two weeks later, Ravi once again brought up the subject. When Ravi tried to gently reason it out with Leela, she burst out. “I don’t like this business of adoption at all. Your cousin got a baby after twelve years of marriage. Let us wait for some more time before we take any hasty decision”, said Leela Flatly. But Ravi did not give up. After a few days he brought up the topic once again.

“There is nothing wrong with us, the reports are all normal. Why should we adopt a child?

 “We should adopt a child because we don’t have one. Our family is not complete without a child”. Ravi said it so gently.

 “We may get a child later; I have not given up hope”.

 “What if we don’t get a child at all”, even as he said it Ravi knew he was piercing the arrow in Leela’s heart. Leela’s eyes had become moist. There was so much of pain on her face.

“So, what if we don’t have a child, we have each other don’t we? Leela’s voice was choked with emotion. “It was Amma’s dying wish that we adopt a child”, said Ravi.

Even in death, the old lady still had the power to strike an emotional chord in Ravi.

Leela’s outburst of, “I cannot accept another woman’s child as my own”, left Ravi unfazed.   

Hugging her, he said softly, “I know you more than you know yourself Leela. Once the baby is in your arms, you will be a wonderful mother. You also want a baby as much as I do. I know it.’’

“I want my own baby; the baby should grow in my womb. I don’t want another woman’s baby”, said Leela stubbornly

But because she loved Ravi, she succumbed to his wish of adopting a baby although not wholeheartedly.

And so, on a bright Sunny day Ravi and Leela brought home a one-month-old baby from the adoption center.

Holding the baby in his arms Ravi said, “We will call him Anand (joy), because, he has brought Joy to our lives”, said Ravi.  

When Ravi held Anand in his arms, there was joy on his face. He said, “I love being a father”. But when Ravi put Anand on Leela’s lap, he reminded her of the painful fact that Anand was on her lap, because she had no child of her own. Anand was the intruder.

It was Ravi who changed the wet diapers for Anand at night while Leela slept. The first word that Anand uttered was “Papa”. “Mama” came much later. Leela carried Anand, fed him with baby cereal and took him out in the evenings in the baby pram; it was all done with detached precision. The hugs, the bonding was missing.

When Anand smiled the first time Ravi’s face glowed with tenderness. Leela’s      face was expressionless. Leela often wondered why Anand’s parents had dumped him at the adoption centre. She hoped Anand had not inherited any genetic disease from his unknown parents.

Not once did Leela raise her hand at Anand. Not even, when he broke the expensive flower vase which Ravi had brought from Hong Kong. When Anand was with Leela, he looked like as if he was always on guard. But with Ravi, there was spontaneous naughtiness, laughter, a natural ‘letting go’ of him, which never happened when he was with Leela. When the teacher complained to Ravi, that Anand had pinched a boy in the class, Ravi was angry. He spanked Anand even when, Leela had tried to stop him. Two hours later Anand was happily perched on Ravi’s lap. Both were eating popcorn and watching, ‘Spider-Man’ on the TV as if nothing had happened. Leela felt left out.      

Leela’s friend Mercy was a nurse working in Dubai. When she came over to visit Leela, she said, “In a late pregnancy, like yours after the age of forty, there is always the risk factor”. Why don’t you take a second opinion from another Doctor” Leela went to Dr. Matthew at the ‘Holy Cross Hospital’ for a second opinion. Lying on the bed, Leela could feel one end of Dr. Matthew’s stethoscope on her stomach. The other ends were plugged to the doctor’s ears.

Relieved, the Doctor said “Ah! This is what I wanted to hear”

“Hear what”?

“The heart beats of the baby. They are strong. You are going to have a healthy baby’’.

“But why hasn’t the baby kicked?”

“Sometimes the baby kicks could occur during the night when you are asleep and you may not be aware of it”.

“But I am awake most of the nights. How can I not feel them?

The doctor says, “Fears and erratic behavior are not uncommon in women in their first pregnancies. Blame it on the hormones. One of my patients used to eat mud in her first pregnancy, can you believe it? After a pause, the Doctor says, “You are suffering from OCD- ‘Obsessive Compulsive Disorder’, which is why you repeatedly keep thinking of not experiencing the baby kicks. You need therapy. “Why don’t you see a psychiatrist? Leela never went to one.

The nausea started after dining out at the ‘Gaylords’ with the Nairs. Ravi said that they served delicious butter chicken at the ‘GayLords’. The chicken tasted good as Ravi had said it would. When even after three days of eating out at the ‘GayLords’, the nausea and the uneasiness did not stop, Leela went to the doctor.

“We will have to do some tests”, says the doctor.

When the results come Leela is stumped.

“Congratulations, you are pregnant”.

“What! Are you sure?”. Seeing the shocked disbelief on Leela’s face the doctor assures her. “Of course, the results are positive”.

Leela is stuck to the chair. Her mouth opens, but words don’t come out.

“You should have suspected pregnancy when you missed your periods for two months”.

“My periods have always been irregular, so I didn’t take much notice of it”

“Well, you are pregnant now”, says the doctor.      

It felt strange to be pregnant at 44 after twenty years of marriage with a nine-year-old adopted son, just when she had almost given up the hope of ever becoming pregnant.

Ravi was surprised at first, then happy, then skeptical, “Are you sure?”

“Yes! The tests are all positive. The doctor has confirmed the pregnancy”.

“How did it happen”.

“As if you don’t know”

Eh! Winking at Leela, Ravi grins mischievously.

“I am happy too” said Ravi. “Anand will now have brother or sister to play with”. Leela thought why should it always have to be ‘Anand’. She was angry. Ravi never said we will now have our own child. But when kissing her tenderly on the lips, he said that, he would take fifteen days paternity leave to take care of her and the baby, Leela broke out into a smile.

Anand was laid up with Flu. The cold and cough made him look weak and pale. Leela was finding it difficult to pin him down to the bed. He was fidgeting beneath the grey, cool, bedsheets. The football was near his feet. When Ravi called, Leela told him that Anand was getting restless. Ravi suggested that Leela should switch on the football match, where Brazil was playing versus Spain on the T.V. “That should keep him quiet in bed”, he said.

Propped up in bed, Anand was keenly watching the football match. Leela was reclining on the arm chair. She was dozing off. There was thunderous clapping and shouts from the T.V. Sergio Ramos had scored a goal for Spain. Anand is elated. Just as he jumps out of bed shouting, “Goal”, in his excitement, he kicks the football on his bed . The football passes over Leela’s belly and falls on the ground. Leela is startled. Her hands instinctively slide down to her bulge, which she shields protectively. She is furious at Anand. Just as she gets up to thrash him, her hand stops midway. She closes her eyes. Something is happening to her. She cannot believe it. The baby inside her had just kicked. Even before she can collect herself, there is another kick. She sits down on the armchair. There is one more kick, this time it is stronger. She looks at Anand. Her eyes have become soft with affection. Anand is scared.

“I am sorry for kicking the ball Mama”, Anand is almost in tears.

Leaning back on the armchair, with closed eyes, biting her lower lip, Leela is savoring the baby kicks.      

“My baby is alive. I can feel the kicks”. There is a soft glow of relief on her face.

Anand is worried. He comes and stands close to her.

“Did the ball hurt you? Are you all right mama?”

Leela smiles at him. There is so much of warmth in her smile, it was as if she was hugging him with her warmth. She picks up the football from the floor. Holding it in her hand, she shows it to Anand, “See, the football is light, it is soft and it did not hurt me”.

Anand is relieved.

Leela takes Anand’s hand and puts it on her belly. Her eyes are moist. Pointing at her belly, she says, “Baby is doing fine in here. I can rest easy now”.

For the first time Anand feels wanted by Leela. It makes him feel happy and secure.

Then drawing him close to her, she plays with his curls, “You are going to be a great football player. I know it”. There is pride in her voice.