AbhiRa Short Story: Broken

Part 5 - Abhimanyu

"You've known since the hospital?" Akshu's shock at my confession was evident by the quivering of her lips and the disbelief in her own words.

It was at that precise moment when I realized I'd backed myself into a corner and dug myself a deeper hole than I had anticipated.

"I wasn't 100% sure but I had an inkling. The constant disconnection in my fingers, the slipping of things randomly from my hands. Everything just felt disjointed. Incoherent even. Pehle laga that theek ho jayega in a few days. That my body was just overwhelmed and it just needed a break. Per phir..."

"Per phir theek nahin hua," Akshu acknowledged.

"Do din, teen din, paanch and dekhte dekhte, it had been over a week and instead of showing signs of improvement, the stability of my hand kept deteriorating."

I keep a deep breath to collect my thoughts. "And just as my hand movements kept decreasing, my frustration and irritation on my inability kept increasing. I'm sorry, Akshu. I should have told you."

"Yes, you should have." Akshu quipped without hesitation.

"Per main tumhe kya batata when I myself didn't have all the answers. I had a feeling, a fear, but I wanted to be sure. Ek darr sa beyth gaya tha mann mein ki aage kya hoga. Ki sab kuch normal hoga, nahin hoga. Would I be able to be a surgeon again or no? Bas, woh darr ki wajah se aur tumhe uss guilt se bachane ke liye, nahin bata paya."

I turned to face away from Akshu and lowered my eyelids. She had seen me vulnerable before. But this was the first time I was feeling ashamed. Ashamed of my own foolish decisions. Ashamed of pushing my Akshu away because I had been too afraid to face my reality.

"Mere Chidkuram kab se Buddhuram ban gaye?"

Akshu's hands wrapped tightly against my chest and her face was nestled firmly into my back. I could feel her the wetness of her cheek seeping through the thin cotton of my shirt. Her grip on me was tight; almost as if she was planning to never let go. I cocooned her hands with mine and pulled them closer so they were both touching my heart.

"You were hurting and suffering in silence all these days. You never once thought of sharing your pain, your fear, your doubts with me. Ulta tum mujhe protect karne mein lag gaye. Tum ek baar share karke toh dekhte."

"Next time se, I'll be more careful." I turned around to face Akshu, my hands still gripping hers, tightly.

"Next time?" Akshu raised her eyebrow in question.

I grinned softly at her, "sorry, joke tha."

"Acha ji," she teased.

"Haan ji," I teased back.

"Toh phir, next time main bhi tumhe forgive nahin karungi. No matter how much you beg or plead with me."

"I don't know, someone just recently told me it's not about forgiveness but about being honest with each other. I wonder who that was." I bit my lip playfully and raised my eyebrows gently in confusion.

Akshu gently tapped my forehead, "meri billi mujhko hi meow?"

It felt like forever that Akshu and I had shared a proper conversation or even a smile. The past two weeks had been nothing short of a twisted game that fate had played with us —a game that I actually had allowed fate to play with us.

Telling Akshu the truth may not change many things but it for sure felt like a load had been lifted off my chest. She knew now where I was standing, physically, mentally, and emotionally.

The thought of never being able to operate on my patients ever again, being unable to help then as a surgeon had been consuming me for the past weeks, living in my head like a parasite. Slowly killing me, bit by bit, piece by piece and I had been powerless to stop it.

"Abhi."

I glanced at Akshu who was now fidgeting with the wrinkles of my cotton shirt. I could tell she was thinking about something and trying to think of he best possible way to put her thoughts into words.

"Hmm?"

"Toh phir woh report? The one which Parth bhaiyaa was talking about?"

"X-rays. I had gotten X-rays done of my hand to confirm my suspicions once I realized my hand was getting worse instead of better."

"And?"

"Nerve damage. There is nerve damage to my hand. Mere haath ki wiring mein, uss din table ke pressure ki wajah se thodi problem hai," in layman's terms.

"Does that mean that you can never perform surgery again?"

"There is a corrective surgery. Success rate is less than 1% and after that it's months of therapy, regular check-ups, then practice surgeries and then finally, agar sab theek hua, then I can go back to operating on patients. It can take a while before things go back to normal. IF they go back to normal."

"You don't look too optimistic..."

"Less than 1% chance ki sab kuch theek hoga. Doctor hoon, that's why I know and understand that the odds of everything going back to normal is next to impossible. It's hard to be optimistic about something which I know will most likely be a failure."

Akshu gave me a knowing and unimpressed look.

"What?"

"Next to impossible but impossible toh nahin na?"

"Kya bol rahi ho, Akshu?"

"Main nahin, tum. Tum bol rahe ho. Tumne abhi toh kaha that the success rate is next to impossible. But impossible toh nahin hai na? Maana ki less than 1% chance hai ki surgery successful hogi, after which you have to go through therapy, but chance to hai na? Hope toh hai na? The entire world is based on hope, the hope that 'kaash mujhe ek chance miljata'. And that's the thing about hope Abhi, you just need a little bit of it. Even the smallest amount of hope can result in big miracles."

"Akshu, this hope, this chance...it's not that simple."

"I never said it's simple, but it's a belief. Agar tumhara dil saacha hai, tum saache ho, toh tumhari hope ko koi nahin rok saktha. Abhi, you don't want to get the surgery done because you don't want to be disappointed in the case the surgery isn't successful. Fine, but what if it is? Kya tumne woh soocha hai? What if you are a part of that 0.99%?"

"It's so easy to say all this, but it's not as easy to follow."

"Life is not easy. You should know that. Agar life easy hoti then you and I would been together long ago. But no, life had to teach us a lesson the hard way. We had to hurt each other first before we realized that no matter how far we tried to run away from each other, our destiny just brought us closer. You are a doctor, don't you tell your patients' families 'We did our jobs, so now let's just hope for the best'.  That's why I'm asking you to please hope for the best."

I nodded my head. "Hope."