Evenings in North Bengal are
abrupt, sudden and often monotonous. Summers, with the last strand of breezes
sweeping across faces, can have a real soothing effect. Monsoon evenings, on
the other hand, can be more beautiful for some, like me, with that incorrigible
romantic heart that throbs for George even now. With the dark tumultuous clouds
hovering above the cyclop-like gothic, colonial, spired Darjeeling buildings
and hotels, monsoons often offer no respite to many. But for me, they keep on
weaving messy stories each and every time. Was it the 3rd or the 5th
of May, 2015, when George said he no longer...that he cannot...that we
should...that the paths better get diverged? I really wonder how to react when
my friends and colleagues still keep blabbering, “it wasn’t a break-up, it was
a blessing.” My classes in the quaint little hill-college still look the same,
my lessons often interrupted when I see him fidgeting with his golden spectacle
in the Principal’s room, or else when I still find him humming ‘two old friends
meet again’ by Michael Murphy. Strength, madness, love, sex, anaesthesia, a
shoulder to cry upon, rhododendrons...I feel desperate and forsaken, with an
insipid taste in my mouth, perhaps even more insipid than the words he blurted
out last. The last one, yes, maybe the rhododendrons can be of slight help, now
that I am all inside this huge cottage of mine, one more pair of doe eyes
observing me intently, often crawling by my side, waiting for my care and
attention.
“Why doesn’t he call you
anymore? What about the poinsettia flower beds across the college alley? Will
they not be watered anymore because you had the worst break-up of your life?”
the doe-eyed devil was inquisitive.
“They will now be looked after by
Narayan, he is there to help but...” I stammered.
“But what? How are you going to
recover? What about your classes?” doe-eyed was impatient now.
My classes. Ah, my
classes. I still remember the first day of the interview. It can also be called
a break-up of an interesting variety, as I keep explaining doe-eyed sitting in Vajrasana position right now on my
tattered mattress. It was also a break-up, a blessing in disguise, breaking our
silence, the interview and the ice-breaking session (as it is technically
called). I was dubious if I could be the chosen one, frantically trying to
adjust my bra strap and the sheaf of papers in my hand, completely oblivious
that I had almost entered the interview room. I expected a volley of questions
as settled down on the revolving chair, but instead, there was just a baritone,
and a bouquet of rhododendrons resembling a flurry of colours all splashed
across a palette, and...and...a pair of eyes that instantly reversed my entire
world order into an amalgamation of god knows what. A pair of greenish brown
hazel eyes minutely checking my printed credentials as I sat benumbed,
besotted, longing to be immersed into a thin film of spring pool of ripples in
front of my eyes. For the first time in my whole 30 years, I fell in love and
that too with the principal of a hill-college.
“What happened after
that? Why the break-up?” Doe-eyed now started fidgeting with the ends of her
drawing copy, trying to paint clusters of rhododendron by dabbing colours into
the inflorescences with her thumb.
Happened? As in? I mean this was
never going to be even the worst love story possible ever. Nestled amidst the
snow-capped mountains of North Bengal and Bhutan, this college was just a feast
to the nature-lovers. Misty mornings, myriad moments, magical mountainscapes
and lulling-lullabies that tottered across my dreams at night- my life was
surely going to change for the better.
Away from the bustles of
myopic city life, I could rediscover how enchanting literature could be. First
flushes, tea-buds, teaching British Romantic poetry and Indian English drama
was never so fascinating. College meetings were as usual dismal, with a bunch
of half-researched, moronic questions hurled at newcomers. My students were
very fond of me. From the ‘new English ma’am’ it took them very less time to
include me in their local college community, as ‘Sree’ mam, with all the warmth
that I craved for. College excursions and community building programs were fun.
Teaching role-based plays through voice modulation and enactment became
livelier with outdoor sessions and rigorous library works. George was always
there as a live encyclopaedia. He had been a globe-trotter; I never was.
However, although initially I could not decipher why we talked about obscure
philosophical facts, or why the first electric chair was invented by a dentist,
or even when he ridiculed me with a chuckle because I did not know that
Stewardesses is the longest word in English, that can be typed only with the
left hand. The only thing that was a common bond between us was the
rhododendrons in multiple colours. Excursions were the only platform where
George made me familiar with rhododendrons. He never plucked the flowers. But
he just took me to his side, looked straight into my eyes and started
explaining:
“Look, Sree, bluette,
the blue variety, and there, on the branches up there, you find the lovely
Dexter’s Victoria, almost pale lavender to mixed white in colour as per
seasonal variations. The locals call the rhododendrons laali guras.”
“Oh, these are
wonderful,” I said.
“See this, come here,”
at 50 he was nothing short of a Hercules remorphed, it seemed. I staggered on
my way to the lofty undulated peak areas, but George, with an inimitable gait
and charisma, could easily manage me by holding my hand, helping me to climb up
very near to the flowers-so near, that the fragrance of the magnolias, the
orange clusters of the laali guras dissolved into his clove-scented
breath that only I could feel. I...I could...I felt...I said...and stopped.
“Ok. Understood. It was love
at first sight, then at second sight and then at every sight.” Then what?
Doe-eyed was intently looking at me. “Come on. There must have been some more
romantic encounters.” Doe-eyed was chuckling. I observed, and felt very uneasy;
I was searching for some kind of anomaly but could find none. Chuckling...the
right facial muscles resembled...
“If you are so
impatient, I think it is high time I go back to my diary. I do not want to tell
you anymore about it.” I looked vacantly at a Golden-breasted Fulvatta as it
flapped its wings on my window louvers, perhaps indicating an impending
disaster. Doe-eyed perhaps felt repentant for snubbing at me like that. She
came to me and clasped my fingers and started playing the criss-cross game with
them. It started raining. I tried to smell the drizzle pattering on my window
sill as the conifers, and the aromatic anthopogan shrubs in my garden sparkled
with a fresh lease of life. I started humming my favourite...our favourite...
‘Rhapsody in the rain.’ Suddenly I remembered. Was it a rainy day? Or did it
rain the other day? I felt a convulsive sensation now; it was very tough to
remember anything. Doses of medicines, anaesthesia, ampoules, ambulances, red,
orange and greenish-blue syrups- greenish blue...red...orange...my past and
present almost congealed into an abyss of nothingness now. I remembered,
faintly.
“I think there is
something between us, Sree”, George was a bit hesitant. It took him one whole
year to find out what that ‘something’ was. It rained that day when we were out
for a community development program in a small village at Alipurduar. The Terai-Dooars
weather forecast department predicted a storm, thunder, lightning, and average
to heavy rainfall. The distance from Panchak
village to our hill college was more than 95 km and therefore, we decided to
stay back in that village. There were few local people here and there, trying
to shield themselves from the rain. The community church was the only huge
shelter that we had there. Rests were small hills and some undulated stretches
of forlorn land, often taking us nowhere.
“Something, means?” I pretended
to be as naive as ever. His eyes sparkled a little, the rustling wind trying to
camouflage his enthusiastic spirit.
“I mean it is about
love, relationship, commitment for life...come on Sree, you understand.” George
was feeling helpless now. We decided to walk a little more along the blasted
heath. The storm had subsided although the rain was still lashing with an
indomitable spirit across the landscape. After walking miles, we could see the
rhododendrons all washed by the slanting gashes of rain. The village roads were
mainly made of broken bricks and clay, and I was suddenly at the brink of
slipping. But when you have the messiah by your side, in all probability,
nothing can go wrong anywhere. George held me strong, pressed me hard to his
chest, so hard that I could feel him entirely. It was a forsaken rain-kissed
land it seemed now, and each and every drop of water, along with his frantic
kiss, triggered in me the tremendous urge for a sublime bodily union. The
raindrops were more frantic then, and so were us. We nibbled, kissed like never
before, as George’s hands were searching all across my landscape, for his
prized possession-
“My rhododendrons are
lovely,” he kept on foraging into the darkness of a deep abyss, as I moaned and
wreathed in ecstatic pleasure. The rain-kissed explorer was ecstatic to find
his desired spot, as he kept on rowing till the pirate’s boat reached its
destination. The rain stopped early in the morning. We decided to go back to
our college; our small guest room behind the church vibrated with the gongs of
the morning bell.
About four months passed
after this. Classes went on as usual; the poinsettias in the college garden
were more vivacious with proper pruning and watering. There were new batches of
students, with the previous batches bidding us farewell. I was busier, and so
was George, with more academic and administrative duties. Some new teachers
joined, some were about to leave for better monetary opportunities. Those days
I was not keeping well. Pangs of nausea, weakness and bodily discomfort took
sway over me. A well-churned distance was developing between us. We did not
discuss poetry or rhododendrons anymore. Rumela, the new Geography teacher, was
now closer to him. He often fell embarrassed now when I entered his room
suddenly; there were animated discussions going on with Rumela, about something
that I did not find it worthwhile to find out. She was everywhere now-in the
community development program, with George in different social and academic
programs, often taking care of his files, his spectacles and one day, as I
found out, also, about his diet plan. Everything seemed perfect in the
cloistered hill college with two people falling in love again, except that I
needed to talk to George now regarding the new life that was growing in me.
“Responsibility?
Fatherhood?” Doe-eyed almost chewed the words as she spoke. I pursed my lips in
anguish.
“Sree, I do understand, but
you see, we live in moments. It is not about camouflaging, or commitment of a lifetime,
it is pure and sublime love that surpasses any type of social commitment.” His
oracular stance made me impatient; I tried to clench my teeth and looked
longingly at him, trying to make him understand:
“But dear, it is not
about you or me now, it is about the third voice, it is about our child. I hope
you understand.”
“Yes, I do. I do. But
there are multiple ways in which this rash decision of giving birth to this
child can be avoided. You know how medical science has progressed. Just accept
this as God’s will.” He seemed almost nonchalant about the moments and the
rhododendrons now. And somehow, a bit more interested in where Rumela was,
perhaps.
This was the end of
everything. Somewhere the roads diverged; somehow I could not come to terms
with the raw sensation that I must move on. There was nothing to move on,
except that the poinsettias and the college building looked blurrier. I could
not gauge if it was the storm that was brewing outside or inside. I wanted to
say the final goodbye to Narayan as he stood in the gateway. I decided not to
come back anymore, but then I stopped. I wanted to change this college, but not
the city. North Bengal hills were my greatest shelter. Narayan just glanced at
my face and like some ancient clairvoyant, he uttered:
“Didi, it is the third
time, God will not accept this anymore. He has crossed all limits. It is the
time for the apocalypse now; aandhi, toofan, God is going to exact the penalty.”
He kept on muttering and looked at the Christian graveyard at a stone’s throw
distance. To my horror, I discovered much later, that Dorothy Ekka was
Narayan’s only daughter and the cursive engraving on her tomb read: For the child unborn, for the moments that
passed by, for your hazelnut eyes, thanks to George, and my rhododendrons.
The rains stopped now.
Doe-eyed had fallen asleep. I decided to open the louvers and smell the
rain-soaked nature outside. It was no time for delirium. I needed to remove the
tanned zones of my life now. The local doctor had prescribed me high doses of
sedatives, after that incident...that...I really detested this amnesiac tendency.
I closed my eyes for a minute, waited, again looked outside, could feel the
clove-like breeze, and then swallowed the pinkish-white tablets, resembling the
colour of his favourite rhododendrons...
“Who prescribed her such
heavy doses of anti-depressant and anti-hallucinatory drugs?” the head of the
neuro-psychiatrist department asked the warden as she stood by Sree’s frigid
body in the mental asylum. “The patient had a clear case of tactile, visual and
auditory hallucination after the loss of her first child through an ectopic
pregnancy. How can all of you be so irresponsible in administering the
hallucinatory drugs? We need to make a report on this. God knows how the
medical commission will now react to this suicide case.” She was furious and
helpless.
As per the latest news
reports circulated the next day, the principal of a reputed Christian
missionary college was found dead in his room, the medical reports said massive
heart attack. After primary investigations, the police could only find a red
leather diary in his room. The last few words were, “Sree, I could not save
you, for the doe-eyed that I could not save, for the rhododendrons that will no
longer bloom. Pardon me...” Nobody except the Almighty could find out that both
the deaths occurred exactly at 11:56 in the night. Narayan looked at the table
calendar. It still showed the date as 5th May.
