tales of Suchita

As soon as the doorbell rang, Pari ran from the bedroom as fast as her little feet could carry her and clung to the nearest part of her father – his leg – she could find. Rudra, laughing, dropped his bag and umbrella in the interest of picking up his daughter, and swung her up in the air.

He almost dropped her when he heard her chanting da, da, da, in the midst of giggling. Clinging to her, he looked at his mother who had followed Pari.

“Did she just…” he said disbelieving, as the bundle in his hands started to squirm. He let go but didn’t put her down.

“Yes,” said his mother, eyes sparkling. “She has been saying it since morning, since you left in fact.”

Rudra laughed, a tear trailing down his cheek which he hastily wiped away. Pari was still chanting da, da, da, only now, it was close to his ear. She had burrowed into his arms, nose in the crook of his neck. He knew what that meant.

“Is there anything to eat?”

His mother laughed, motioned for him to sit and disappeared into the kitchen. Rudra sat on the chair, placing Pari on his lap. She was making patterns on his shirt now, and had stopped her chanting.

He started speaking to her then, about his day, everything he had seen, some of the things that had happened at work. Slowly, the knot in his chest that on most days represented the guilt of leaving his five-year-old daughter behind with her grandmother, but today was a result of being called da for the first time, started to dissolve.

His mother came back just as he wrapped up his day’s report, with a plate filled with food. He smiled gratefully, shifted his now sleeping daughter to his hip, as he attacked the food.

“She’s drooling,” she said, wanting to take Pari so Rudra could eat in peace.

“Shirt needs to go for a wash in any case,” he said. “I’ve got her. Sit, tell me, how was the day?”

Rudra’s mother thought back to her day. Pari had finally been able to hold a crayon and draw a line on paper. She had gotten up on her own and danced when the music came on, and had even gone to the loo to wash her hands by herself.

“Today was a good day.”

He smiled. He knew how rare those were. “Tell me about when and how she started saying da?”

They had been trying to get her to associate da with Rudra for the better part of three weeks. He wished he had been there when Pari first uttered the word. He knew there was a possibility that she was only repeating a word, the association still not very strong in her head, but he had been waiting for her to call him da for five years now. He would take what he got.  

“You remember the picture we have of us in her bedroom? She pointed at you and said da. That easy.”

The knot and the disbelief were back. So were the tears.

“Shhh,” said his mother. To distract him, she asked, “What are the plans for tomorrow?”

It was the weekend, thank god. Rudra could finally play an active role in his daughter’s learning. “I was thinking I’ll take her to the park. She had liked the swings and…”

“You know she gets scared of loud noises.”

“I know ma. But last time it had been decent and she had liked the brightness of the park, all the children and the energy there.” It was an exaggeration, he knew. Pari had clung to his leg the whole time she had not been on the swing, terrified of the sensory information she was receiving.

His mother seemed to know but did not contradict his wish. It was…challenging…to work and work and work and not see the results as soon as you wanted. But then that was why he had her. So she could tamper his enthusiasm and provide support when needed.

“You should put her to bed.”

“In a minute.”

“You know it’s not a good habit…”

“Ma, in a minute.”

Rudra’s mother raised her arm in surrender and went to her own bedroom. She was exhausted after spending the week with her granddaughter, trying to teach her things she should have naturally picked up. She shook her head. Giving in to the melancholy helped no one.

Rudra sat at the table, supporting Pari with one hand, while the other had bits of daal and chawal stuck to his fingers. He had the sudden, jarring image of his wife’s laughing face, tutting because he had eaten food with his hands instead of a spoon.

Today was a good day, his mother had said. He would hold onto that.

He put his daughter to bed, picked up the grey notebook that held her daily schedule and went to his room. He followed the neon pink tape that led from Pari’s room to his room. It was the route she took if she woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t go back to sleep. With a shock he realized it had been months since he had found her curled in his bed. Was Pari getting more and more independent then?

Today was a good day, he started writing in his journal. After spending ten minutes writing, he opened the schedule and started putting down tasks that his mother and he needed to tick off by the end of the upcoming week.

“We got almost everything this week,” he said aloud, wonder filling his voice.

He went to bed then, a smile on his face, the knot in his chest dissolving into a sigh. Today had indeed been a good day.

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Written as part of Blogchatter’s #MyFriendAlexa.

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