Ija's old glass and tumbler

Six months before Ija died, I'd dreamt she was dying and took the first bus to the village. I reached home at 7 in the morning and it was cold in the mountains. I reached at the right time because I found her curled like a foetus n the middle of the large bed in her room. Her body had turned blue with pain and lack of breath. The women of the family were out in the cowshed, the men - as usual - were asleep. I walked 13 kms to the town and managed to bring Dr Shrivastav home in a cab.

She recovered.

Two days later, as we sat talking by the fireplace - she was telling me about her brother (she said I always reminded her of him...that he was a scholar...a learned man...his sanskrit was fluent and his pronunciation impeccable) - she suddenly rose and opened her cupboard and brought out an old brass tumbler, bowl and plate. She pressed them into my hands and asked me to keep them. They had been given to her by her mother on her marriage. She asked me not to tell anybody that she had given them to me because all her sons would want them.

Ija, I never ate in your plate, never drank from your glass and never used the bowl you gave me. Because I could never be the man your brother was. I could never leave home n search for knowledge. I could never be the scholar or the monk. I know I had the makings of one. But I just could not. I was too weak. Every time.

And everytime I see that glass and that tumbler by my bedside, I think of you only 13, standing like a pillar by the side of a man disinherited and poor, I see you toil in the fields, I see you build with your impeccable character every brick that went into building grandfather's great financial empire. I see you command villages, I see your empathy, your pity, I see your firmness of resolve, I see your beautiful lips curved down with pain, I see your beautiful hands, your petite frame that nobody, NOBODY could ever transgress. And I wonder if they make women this way anymore.

I miss you Ija. And unlike the old times, I think even your appartition does not stand by my bedside anymore.

Could you give me another chance? Just one more chance to be the man you wanted me to. Just come to me once and I will.