“Look…” I struggled to recall his name. I had always referred to him as the patient and even though he had introduced himself earlier, it took me a while to recall that, “Naman, right? Naman. There is nothing you need to do for me. Treat me as a stranger who helped you because she could, and move on. You didn’t know anything about me like you yourself told me. So, just let go and let me be. I am Sarah Jacob. I never was and I never can be Niharika Goenka.”

“I am not trying to change who you are. In your place, I myself would have no interest in being a Goenka,” he gave a sad smile that managed to tug at my heart. “You have treated me like a stranger whom you helped because you could. But would it be so out of place to keep in touch with the stranger whose life you saved? Or to let him express his gratitude once in a while.”

“Don’t lie to yourself, Naman. You didn’t come here to befriend a stranger. You came here to know a sister. But that sister doesn’t exist. Just leave and let everyone be at peace.”

“Guilty as charged. I got carried away in trying to win an argument. I did come to know a sister. And I can’t shake this feeling away that the only reason I fell ill was so that I could find you again. Believe me Sarah, I had never known about you. If I had…”

He stopped talking suddenly and in a moment I knew the reason. Tears had betrayed him. He got up from the chair and went to the window. He stood there for a long while, facing away from me. The window looked over a noisy, crowded, narrow street. It wasn’t the view that kept him there, but the tears.  At last he wiped them off, rubbed his face with his hands and turned to face me.

“I’m sorry. I should leave…”

“Sit down.”

He was startled and looked at me uncertainly.

“Would you like to have some tea?” I asked ignoring his looks.

“That… that would be great.”

A corner of the same room served as my tiny kitchen, which I used to make tea. He also took two spoonful of sugar in his tea like me and we sipped it in silence for a while.

“You stay in Bangalore, don’t you?” I broke the silence.

“Yes. But I used to travel a lot for business. And I expect to start doing that again now that I am better.”

“Already handling business?”

“Dad doesn’t keep well. So, I had to start while I was still in college. You are working as a teacher, right?”

“Is your detective still following me?” I frowned.

“He won’t. Not any longer,” he assured me hastily, “I’m sorry about all this. I wish circumstances were different. ”

I let out a sigh and then resumed conversation. “Yes. I teach at a school nearby.”

He was good at making conversations. Soon, we had discovered that we shared an interest in painting. Unlike me, however, he had trained in his student days and so I assumed he would be much more accomplished than me. He had done most of his schooling outside India. But came back to Bangalore for college when his father’s health deteriorated and he needed a helping hand. He liked golfing, skiing and playing guitar, all the things I had no exposure or experience of.

Despite reminding me repeatedly of what all I had lost in life, the conversation made me feel good. I hadn’t talked much in last six months I realized and the friendly tete-a-tete had uplifted my spirits.

“Can I come again?” he asked hesitatingly while taking his leave.

“Yeah,” I replied briefly trying not to sound too eager.

“I plan to stay in Pune for a while. Can I come tomorrow afternoon, after you are back from school?”

I smiled this time, “You know my schedule.”

He looked contrite though. “Nobody will follow you any longer, I really mean it.”

“I believe you. Come tomorrow.”

—

Protim

It was the six-month anniversary of Sarah leaving me. What had my life come to that the anniversaries I remembered were of incidents like those, incidents of loss and desperate measures? How had I been in all these months? Terrible. And I would be like this forever now.

Sarah was an adult who had left of her own accord. I wasn’t a relative or anything. So, police was not going to be of any help. I drove down to Bangalore and first tried my luck at her orphanage. Nobody was of any help. An old nun mumbled something to the effect that she never expected anything good to happen to that girl. She must have gone to the devil. Then I swallowed all my pride and drove down to meet Rajesh Goekna. That man went into a fit of rage on hearing that Sarah had disappeared. What did I do to his daughter to make her run away like that? Now he would lost both his children because his son won’t get the marrow donation he so badly needed. The galls  that man showed threatening to take me to police for misleading Sarah with promises of marriage when I was already married.  I reminded him that he should be taken to police first for leaving his daughter out to die as a day-old baby and took off without waiting for more drama. She was too proud to have come to this father of hers. As much as I loved that about her, I was devastated at losing the last thread that could have led me to her. I also went ahead and hired a detective, but he didn’t have much to go by.

So, there I was. Forlorn, dead from within. Even Annie’s responsibilities did not arouse me enough. I continued with my job in Mysore, just to keep myself from going insane, leaving my daughter to Kaveri and Chanda. It wasn’t as reassuring as leaving her in Sarah’s care. But it was the best I could do. I had started wondering if she won’t do better in a boarding school, but kept postponing the decision.

Nothing changed in all those months after I had given up on looking for her. Until that day, when it was the six-month anniversary of the date that made me a friendless, scorned man again.

Chanda came running to me sometime after lunch, whatever sorry excuse for it I was having in those days. “It’s her!”

“Sarah?”

“Sunita!”

—

To be continued