The days that followed settled into Lakshmi’s life like a quiet tide, steady and unannounced. At Shanti Niketan, mornings began with soft footsteps in the corridor and the distant clink of steel cups. The neem tree outside her window rustled gently, its leaves filtering sunlight into patterns that shifted across the floor as the hours passed.
She learned the names of the nurses, the rhythm of their shifts, the subtle differences in their voices. Meena hummed while arranging medicine trays. Another nurse, Savita, spoke little but always adjusted Lakshmi’s shawl with care when the evenings turned cool. These gestures were small, yet they carried a dignity Lakshmi had not realized she had been missing.
She joined the others during morning walks, her pace slow but determined. Kamala often walked beside her, sharing stories that wandered pleasantly between past and present. Sometimes they laughed over trivial things. Sometimes they simply walked in silence, listening to birds and distant traffic, sharing a wordless understanding that came only with age.
At night, Lakshmi sometimes lay awake, her thoughts drifting back to Aarav. She imagined his hands, once wrapped around her fingers, now holding crayons, toys, his mother’s dupatta. The ache was still there, a quiet companion, but it no longer hollowed her out. She had learned how to hold it without letting it consume her.
Riya did not return.
Days turned into weeks. Phone calls came, then stopped. Messages were typed and erased on both ends, never sent. At her daughter’s house, the absence had become impossible to ignore. Meals felt incomplete. The rooms echoed. Aarav grew quieter, his questions fewer but heavier.
“Why doesn’t Daadi come anymore?” he asked one evening, staring at his untouched glass of juice.
Riya had no answer. She turned away, the memory of that afternoon replaying in merciless detail. Her own words echoed back at her, sharper now, stripped of justification. Each recollection felt like pressing against a bruise.
She tried to return to routine, but the comfort she once took in her mother’s constant presence was gone. The house demanded attention now. The work Lakshmi had done invisibly began to surface, one unwashed corner, one forgotten task at a time.
And beneath it all lay something heavier.
Leave a Comment