Yash hesitated a moment before ringing the door-bell. He had come to the one person he could discuss the...strange situation he found himself in. Yet, he hesitated...
His parents had spoken to him about his punar-vivaah on new year's day. And his immediate response had been a cold, and what he thought was a final, no. But they did not let up. They had made him sit down and listen to their reasoning, highlighting Ansh's needs. And much as he wanted to deny it, he knew in his heart that he was not able to give Ansh everything he needed. If Bhabhi had not been there to help him, he would have been at sea. And Payal needed her mom too - Vidhi spent most of her free time with Ansh precisely because he was so cranky and he would go to no one but Yash or Vidhi.
And then his mother had pointed out a fact he had willfully blinded himself to - Ansh went, more than willingly to Arti. Artiji! His parents were contemplating his punar vivaah with her? For some reason that thought was not completely abhorrent to him. It was true, she and Ansh bonded really well. Perhaps more than Arpita....Yash quickly squelched such a traitorous thought.
He had not agreed to the marriage; instead he had asked for time to think.
Two weeks later his parents had told him they were going to Indore to meet Arti's in-laws. They wanted him to come with them, him and Ansh. They wanted that Arti's in-laws, who in effect were in her parents' place, should meet him and the baby before any decisions were taken. Yash had refused outright - but had allowed them to take Ansh.
Gathering his thoughts and his courage, he finally rang the doorbell.
"Yash!" the woman who answered the door said in obvious pleasure.
"Mayadidi - thank you! Thank you for agreeing to see me at such short notice" Yash said as he went into the house.
Dr. Maya Thakkar, also known as Tack-train to her loving students, had taken an early retirement three years previously when her father fell very sick. She returned to Bhopal, the city she grew up in and settled there to take care of her ill parent. She continued working, becoming a visiting professor at Bhopal University and getting back in touch with her favourite student Arpita and her husband Yash.
"Of course! How are you? And how is little Ansh? Why didn't you bring him with you?" Maya asked.
He had been wondering how to start and took the inadvertent opening Maya provided. "My parents took him to Indore...to meet with his prospective new grand-parents."
Maya hadn't become a professor and vice-principal at a young age for nothing - she immediately understood what Yash was saying and why he was here.
"Are you getting married again?" she asked gently.
"I...I don't know" he sighed. Nodding in understanding, she bade him sit as she made some tea for him. He followed her into the kitchen, something Arpita used to do whenever she came here. Instead of going back to the living room, they both settled down at the dining-table nursing their chai, a plate of biscuits between them.
"Tell me", she said simply.
Yash looked at her pleadingly, knowing only she would understand. Even Arpita's parents had urged him to marry again for Ansh's sake. Mayadidi had been Arpita's friend, her philosopher, her guide, her most trusted confidant. And when she came back to Bhopal and re-entered their lives, she became Yash's friend too. She probably knew and understood Arpita even better than he did. He told her about Arti and what his parents wanted. And then he waited, sipping his now luke-warm tea.
"Arti? Arti Sharma? The same one who had been at our college?" asked Maya trying to confirm the identity from the names Yash had mentioned.
"Yes. Yes, she was at St. Xaviers - a few years our junior. Bhabhi's friend".
Maya nodded. "She married her boyfriend...Prashant I think his name was."
Yash nodded, "Prashant Dubey from Indore. They shifted to Delhi after marriage. He...he died last year in a car accident...And Artiji lost her baby in the same accident – she was in her last trimester."
"Oh my god!" Maya exclaimed. "Poor girl!...She had always wanted a family of her own."
Yash looked at her in surprise, "You knew her then?"
She nodded, "Yes. She was a very capable student. I did indeed know her." Better than Arti suspected...after-all, though their situations had been very different, their pain, fear, insecurities had been very similar.
Yash finally articulated some of his predicament, "My parents are right Mayadidi, Ansh needs someone...no....he demands someone who can give him dedicated attention. I...I don't want to marry again....I can't...not after Arpita". She nodded in understanding, fully aware of all the layers in that one phrase not after Arpita.
Yash continued, "Ansh and Artiji already bond so well, if you see them together you will think they are mother and son. Even I..." he swallowed and took out the photo he had brought, the one Payal had clicked of Arti and Ansh. He told her then of his first reaction to the photo, his eyes glazing over with tears, his longing for Arpita constricting his throat.
"Has she agreed for the marriage then?" asked Maya.
Yash shook his head, "I don't know...I don't think she even knows yet. My parents wanted her parents to meet me and Ansh before any decisions were taken. I...I could not go, didn't want to go...but they left today with Ansh."
Maya understood now the urgency she had heard in his voice when he had called, the relief when she had agreed to meet him.
"What do you want Yash?" she asked, in a gentle tone.
"I don't know!!" the tortured words were torn out of him. Looking at her he continued, "I don't know Didi. I want what is best for Ansh. But I can't marry again. But how can I provide a mother to Ansh without marrying?" He clenched his fists, his knuckles turning white as he said, "I can't marry again. I can't do that. You know that."
She did not reply. Instead she got up from her chair and collected the tea cups. Yash followed her lead, picking up the now empty plate and following her into the kitchen. She washed the cups and plates and he dried them for her before she put the delicate china away. She gave him a cloth to wipe the table down while she wiped the kitchen counter-top. Once they had completed their mundane tasks, she took him to the back garden and they settled into the chairs there under the afternoon soon.
"Do you know why Arpita was so attached to me?" she asked, seemingly at random. Yash shook his head no, but he wasn't surprised at the apparent change of topic. Mayadidi had her own way of telling him things...
Maya looked straight ahead as she told him about her life, "I am an army widow. My husband died at a skirmish at the border when I was 25...We had been married for three years only. He had encouraged me to study after marriage and I had completed my post-graduation in English. He was supposed to come to my graduation ceremony - he died the day before his leave was to start."
She continued, her eyes looking back into a distant past, "I was in Mumbai at that time. His posting had been at a border-town and I was in my last semester. He told me to finish up, graduate and then we would go back together to his posting...he never made it and I never left Mumbai. His parents were there and I stayed with them, continuing on with my PhD and then taking on a lecturer's job at the same college. His parents hadn't been too keen on my studying further...but he had been. And what else did I have? I convinced them and continued...His parents died a few years later... and St. Xaviers became my life...the students and staff my family."
She turned to look at him then, "Arpita found my story...romantic." A bitter smile curved her lips, "She was so naive in a sense, she did not always realize the realities of life. For her it was the epitome of romance that I had lived my life in the memory of one man. She did not understand what it had really been like, chose to ignore the struggles I had had to face, the pain of being alone, the loneliness of being without a real family."
"You came to get her permission, didn't you Yash?" she said softly, ripping apart with her words the confusion and hesitation he had surrounded himself with. "I am afraid I can't say that Arpita would give you permission to move on. She chose me as her thesis guide because of her romanticized perception of my life - how then can I think she would be ok with you marrying again?"
She stretched out her hand and took his limp, cold fingers in hers. "But I think towards the end of her pregnancy she was changing, becoming a little more practical. Who knows? If she had lived perhaps she would have found a balance between her romanticism and the practicalities of life."
Yash did not reply, looking straight ahead this time, a pain he could not hide or curb filling his eyes.
Maya sighed and left his hand. After a few moments she said, "It may or may not be what she would want Yash. But she is no more. Ansh however is very much alive. And so are you. You have to focus on the living my friend - on what your son, Ansh wants and needs. Not on what your dead wife Arpita may have wished for."
Yash winced at her words. As always Mayadidi stated the bare facts with a simplicity that stripped away any illusions, any romanticism.
"Live for the living Yash. Do what your heart tells you is the right thing for Ansh... and for you." Her parting words rang in his ears all the way home.
Indian Mythology
Hindi TV Shows
Cricket
