Part 110: Amor fati Update 2
She was still running, the fine white powder settling in her hairs, only this time she was at Broadway and 5th, to kneel along with the aching and crying victims for their loved ones. Nobody knew what they were witnessing. It no longer seemed like hatred didn't have any physical form and was only carried in the hearts of the people. But instead it was on the white concrete dust that was flying along with burning ash, nestling in the soot black smoke coming out of the buildings that burned from unquenchable fires and taken the shape of life that was being destroyed to leave a mark behind...forever.
The fire department had still not gone into the rubble as the adjacent buildings were still collapsing from the impact. This time the terrorist group had targeted the attacks from the inside setting off synchronized blasts in multiple floors and the basement detonated by cell phones, thus shaking the foundation to bring the massive structure down. Vacuum filled the place where she'd first met him and mistaken for his bride. But she was his bride and everything more now; although she didn't know if that was how it was meant to be.
She pushed her way through the crowd, but the police restrained her from advancing any further beyond the barricade, into the unstable grounds. Somehow the public surrounding her helped contain the incessant tears pouring out her eyes. It wasn't embarrassment that stopped it, but some unspoken commiseration from their gazes took over her, telling her they were waiting too...to see the ones they dearly loved. The crashing of concrete and steel and all those who were trapped underneath called to her, nevertheless. She was helpless trying to think of a way to get around alleyways and see if she could find...It was blasphemy, she thought to assume he was even stuck under the ginormous pile of crumbling concrete, but there was another side of her that didn't let her move from the site.
"Babaji..." She cried and slid down the wall against which she'd been standing. A news reporter scraped past her and stopped after he was a few feet away from where she was sitting then, asking the camera man to direct the lens at something in the ground. She turned her head and buried it in her hands and collected herself to wait until some rescue action started. What was happening with her life? What she'd gone through two days ago was by no means in comparison to what today felt like. Her concern was eating away her insides like they were vile acid.
Unable to disregard the conversation wafting her way, she agonizingly listened in. She heard the reporter instructing the camera guy to shoot him and then he randomly began asking questions into the microphone to a young man and woman standing close by.
"What do you think it is?" The reporter asked.
"I don't know man...it's a human part I think..." He said uncaring for what looked like the bowels of a person covered with blood. Geet lifted her head to watch the most ridiculous information that was being shot for tabloid television. Despite her own anxiety and suffering, her self-righteousness filled her with maddening anger.
"Which part do you think is that?" He addressed the girl this time.
"I think...it's the intestines perhaps..." The woman turned towards the building and gestured to the towering building that had once been there "...there were people jumping off when the upper stories began falling and when the stone and rubble hit those people, they were crushed and all these parts were flying off. There was a lady here who just left...I think she got hit in the head by a hand..."
If she would have to listen to the heartless description one more second, she was certain she was going to slap one of them. She got up from the ashened ground sobbing wildly and rushed down the cross street to another corner. To her luck, she bumped into a paramedic. She asked him if they'd cleared any victims already and what he told her was the first good thing that day.
"At first response, we have cleared a few from the coffee shop and the people who were waiting on the sides to cross the roads. A few traffic accidents here and there...but they are all scattered. We have few at the county general and the less serious vic's are at a camp site that is being set" He gave her the directions then. She swiveled to follow the road to the end, when he called out to her.
"Mam, are you AB - blood group by any chance?" She nodded after taking a few seconds to realize what he was asking.
"There is a pregnant lady in the van. Would you like to donate some blood?" She knew she couldn't say no, but at the same time she also couldn't bring herself to saying yes. Time was running out for her. She watched the paramedic's face still with an expectation; hoping that at least she wouldn't give up on him...just like she was hoping somebody else wouldn't give up on her Maan. She shook her head, tears brimming down her lashes. He took her hands in a firm clasp as if he was protecting her that instance and led her to the inside of the ambulance.
Oh! dear lord. The words of the paramedic came back to her. He'd asked her for blood, like the victim had been his own sister. And when she'd cursed the world of its ugly face, he'd come to resurrect her opinions on the condition of human morality. Compassion still lived in people like him and she was helping him carry it forward to the baby and the mother. Was someone carrying it forward for her Maan? She kept asking herself the entire time she lay there in the van.
What were the odds of him remembering to ask that exact question to the right person who could fulfill his need? Her theory of randomness from the time before their marriage sparked in her mind. She smiled and pushed herself to visualize the near future she would tell him that she hadn't been off mark with that theory of hers. Of course he would have to agree with her, but she didn't believe he would ever stop calling it silly...She was definitive he would be there to call it silly. Shutting her eyes and praying towards that future, she counted time; the relative nature of it showing in the way the seconds stretched into years.
She was jogging again, light headed yet with a vision in her eyes. Honest to god, she was lost, but something made her move forward and she paused to catch her breath near a crossroad. Her palms splayed on the shop glass and she huffed to take in a lung full of air. She wiggled her head to shake off the dreariness that was setting into her being and caught sight of the words neatly hand-written on the board behind the glass.
It read "Have a cozy cup of Hot Chocolate to go!" For a minute she stood there, tracing the chalk outline over the glass and felt her body go numb. Her knees weakened and she fell to the floor, her palms hitting the walkway first to keep her chin from getting hurt. Tears stained the grey concrete and she held her chest with one hand. Her head swirled with the words she'd read on his mail. There had been no one mentioned in the To: box, but upon getting the context, she'd instantly recognized it was meant for his senior director. It must have taken everything in him to find the sense of humor with which he'd started his informal notice to quit and it had hit her with the same impact had their office building collapsed on her instead.
"Don't ask me why I'm quitting, Gail. I would tell you it's all because of a damned Hot Chocolate and I know that this instant, it's making you wonder if I have indeed lost it all being Director here (our company does that to people, true), but trust me, it would make complete sense to my wife if I told her.
I guess it says it all. I'm moving..." And then it was left incomplete.
She lifted her head and looked up to the skies, breathing heavily. He'd accepted her just as she was, even when she had been tormenting him with her silence, when he still misguidedly believed something else was more important to her than him and after all the times she'd plagued him to express his feelings when it was beyond his comfort zone, trying to turn him to be a person that was not him. And yet he'd chosen her with all the baggages and scruples she came with. He'd fought her all long from his very grains, but in the end it had only been 'her' for him.
It occurred to her that he hadn't known words like others. He didn't believe in uttering a simple 'I love you' that didn't go to the same depths of his feelings for her as his actions did. Perhaps he didn't know to say 'I love you' or all what she expected to hear because he only knew to speak her own goofy words... that was 'Hot Chocolate'. And entirely because she'd taught him that, mindlessly at a store and he had caught on to it like it was her life she'd handed him over...making those banal words mean more than what it ever would to anyone.
Obviously guilt was only one emotion that pushed her down to the ground. There were so many others that gilded her eyes assuming the shade of different colors as the light pierced her iris. When could she tell him that she'd accepted him too just the way he was and that was what had propelled her to come down to NY. At first when she'd been clueless and had ignored the entire momentum to be an impulsive decision. But when she'd sat all night in the flight the clarity had come to her unasked for. He'd always been a mirage to her, going a little far, with every inch she covered to get close, never truly letting her see what was underneath all that sparkly shell...and didn't all that pursuit was what got her interested in him to start with? Of course she'd fallen for the man who was 'him' with all the reticence and care he'd shown her in the beginning. Slowly she'd even observed his care transform into a control he needed over the lives of people he did love. If she was the most precious of it all, then it was only fair he loved her the way he could. Her husband was nothing, if not for the complexities he came with and realized she adored and loved him only for 'that'...
Before she could get herself back on her feet, someone called her name from far. She instantly shot in the direction from which she was being sought and saw Rishabh sprinting towards her.
"Geet..." His hands rested on his knees, drawing a sharp breath "Don't you ever do that again..." He said pulling her up. Before they could exchange any more words, a car came from the wrong side of a one-way road and stopped right at the junction. Naini got out and her sister-in-law flew to drag her into a hug.
"Look at me Geet..." She said turning Geet's face "Maan is safe and we are going to find him. They have set up volunteering centers with names of the wounded, Yash is looking into it. But we have other places to look too...and we can't do that with you running all around" She nodded asking for Geet's agreement, while she ran a calming hand over her back.
Geet broke into tears once again and felt her being hauled to the car. Naini constantly rubbed her as she sat huddled in the corner like a scared school girl. They passed a white canvas tent set to the side of the road and her eyes searched for any sign...for the person she was looking for. There was none, but she didn't see Yash either. She grew more nervous.
"We...have to stop. Yash..." She said, trying to get the words in-between her giant sobs.
They convinced her that Yash would be scouring at all counters and call them if he stumbled upon the whereabouts of Maan. It didn't soothe her down any bit and she was growing dead by the minute.
By the time they reached the country general hospital, she was nearly lifeless. She was lugging her body through the corridors bustling with people. She bristled each time she found herself close to a stretcher with victims from the attack screaming in pain, as if they belonged to another world. Her sense of reality began slipping as minutes passed and they hadn't even traced her husband out yet. She was now plastered to Naini's side, losing her strength as her feet dragged on. That is when Rishabh placed a hand on her shoulder and addressed her.
"Geet...you like you are going to faint...I'm going to go to that counter" He was pointing to a Nurse's station in the far end "and check for some information" She didn't respond, but held onto his wrist so tight that her nails were digging into his skin.
"You promised...we will find him here" Rishabh closed his eyes from the pain he saw in in her
"No...don't do that..." She clutched his shirt in her fists and said "You promised Rishabh"
He wiped her tears, nodded in response and started walking towards the station where people were thronging, like angry bees. She never took his eyes off him as he made his way through the crowd and began talking to the person on the other side of the desk. He took a jab from somebody's elbow and winced taking a pad tucked with sheets from another lady. Lifting the pad above everyone's head, he was running a finger down the pages. He flipped and she waited...
Rishabh was scuttling back, his hand holding his head, a nervous smile spreading on his face. Gesturing them to get up, he turned into an aisle, halfway through the corridor. That was all she needed to follow the path through the patient filled hallways. All she'd remembered was to follow the blue t-shirt and that mindless execution of putting her feet one in front of the other brought her to a halt at the entryway of a long hall filled with beds covering every inch of space it had. People flooded the place tending to their wounded loved one and her eyes scanned restless not taking any breaks to miss no nook or corner.
She was now in the middle of the hall when she saw the most glorious...life giving sight of her life. Ironically, her entire time with him was flashing in her eyes, as if she was dying there. A tuck of her hair behind her ears, a gentle graze of his knuckles over her chin, the first time she'd held his hand on the gym sit-out, her Pandora bracelet, his blue shirt from their first meet, him holding her waist in bed, his unbearable toothpaste kisses and so many more random moments that gave her an out of body experience.
Second chances...She was a woman who knew what second chances meant now. And she alone will cherish what that would give her: her life force...the breath of fresh air that makes her go on living. Her little secret that she alone will know and hers forever to keep...
Her bracelet jangled as she took another step towards him, unconscious in a corner against the wall. Her eyes gleamed with a lightness that overbore all those hours of searching. She bent closer holding his cheek, to rest her forehead to his temple.
"Hot chocolate" she whispered, sealing the essence of the moment with the words that meant it all.
To be continued...Amor fati folks...That's all I have to say.
PS. The tabloid interview and the scene where she gives blood are real life incidents from the 9/11 attacks. I wish history never repeats in this case.
Edited by 6thElement - 13 years ago
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