Paritosh entered his home at five in the evening to the sound of his daughter’s frantic cries and the sight of a flustered Rupali.

“What happened? What does Meenu want?” Rupali was asking her and was looking around desperately, but she was unable to spot anything that could possibly be a problem. She turned around to go to the phone, probably to call him, when she ran into him.

“What happened?” he asked.

“I don’t know, Sir. I can’t figure out. I was about to call you.”

“Meenu,” he rushed towards her. Rupali could not help noticing how he took efforts to stop himself from touching her. Something so counterintuitive to any parent whose child is crying. Picking her up and trying to calm her down would have been the obvious thing to do. But he didn’t do that. He couldn’t! The child may not like it. Rupali felt really bad for him. He looked at his daughter carefully, almost with the eyes of a detective. What was amiss?

Rupali saw him bending down and redoing her shoelaces. Meenal stopped crying. “The bow was lose,” he spoke as he turned towards a visibly relieved Rupali, “Just slightly. But…” It wasn’t anything she did, Rupali sent up a thousand thanks to God!

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize,” she said, “She was all right the entire day.”

Paritosh nodded, “It takes time to understand. There are too many things.” He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t blaming her. Rupali’s day was saved!

“Good evening, Meenu,” Paritosh turned his attention back to his daughter and greeted her. After a pause of few seconds, she responded by copying him. “Good evening, Meenu.”

Despite everything she had read about, including echolalia, something autistic children were prone too, that little exchange was jarring. In her own trying life, the one source of satisfaction and happiness she had was the affection of her brothers. When they smiled at her, or hugged her lovingly, or showed any signs of care for her, or expressed how much they missed her, the life became meaningful. Crushing down her own dreams to take care of them started making sense. If Sugata didn’t shout, and Soumitra didn’t frown, with worry, if they didn’t appreciate what she cooked for them, if their eyes didn’t glow with happiness when she got them a long-awaited gift, if they never talked to her about their school and friends, if they didn’t tell her that they wanted to make her proud, would she still be able to go through her life? Unlikely. Then what about Dr. Khanna? The one creature in the world he seemed to be living for and with, was incapable of showing emotions and affections.

She would have liked to offer some comfort to him, some assurance. But she remained tongue-tied about it. “Can I leave now, Dr. Khanna?” she asked.

“Yes. And I hadn’t expected that she would stay with you from day one like this. Good job.”

She was surprised. She had no expectations of a praise after he had found his daughter crying on coming home. But he understood!

“Th… thank you, Sir,” she stammered a little, “I will try to not disappoint you in future too.”

He nodded.

“Mamma… Mamma…” Meenal said without looking at anyone as Rupali made to leave. She was distressed about the idea of her leaving.

Rupali kneeled before her and said, “I will come tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow,” Meenal repeated the last word. Rupali hoped that it meant she understood.

“We will play with play-dough.”

“We will play with play-dough.”

“Bye Meenu.”

“Bye Meenu.”

—

“I’m sorry for disturbing you on a Saturday, Ms. Banerjee, but Meenal is frantic. I think she has gotten used to seeing you at nine every day. I am unable to calm her down. Is it possible…” Paritosh’ voice drowned. He sounded so miserable that Rupali couldn’t have said no. But she was just frying pooris for her brothers. Their weekend treat!

“I can leave in another fifteen minutes, Sir,” she did a quick mental calculation and replied. Her brothers would have eaten by then.

“Thanks. I… We’ll wait for you.”

“And if you had to become a nanny, you couldn’t find any child in the world other than this mad girl?” Sugata was livid yet again as Rupali hurriedly dropped the fried pooris in their plates.

“She is not mad, Sugata,” Rupali replied and went back to the stove.

“And even if she were,” Soumitra added, “This is no way to talk about anyone. It’s not her fault that she is that way.”

“Is it our fault? Is it Didi’s fault?”

“It is nobody’s fault,” Rupali came with the next set of pooris, “Now, will you please focus on eating. Some hard work goes into making food. Show some respect.”

“I wish they would show some respect for our time. You had promised to come for cricket match,” Sugata whined.

“I am sorry,” Rupali softened, “But Sugata. You are lucky that you can express yourself. That little girl… When she feels something, she can’t even express it. She is crying incessantly for last one hour. She could have been your own sister.”

“Emotional blackmail,” he mumbled. He was obviously affected by her reasoning, but won’t admit it. Rupali suppressed a smile. He was a boy trying hard to become a man. All this aggression was a manifestation of that.

“Aren’t you going to eat before leaving?” Soumitra noticed her picking up her purse.

“Don’t worry about me. I will find something to eat. Do go to his cricket match, Soumitra. Please!”

“Okay, I will.”

—

To be continued