Moyurakhkhi's Cigarettes

6| Bear-shaped Vitamins

"You just have to lose some weight and your periods will be as good as normal." Dr Jahanara, my gynaecologist, tapped an arthritic finger on the glass desk and leaned back in her chair. Silver hair shone as she adjusted her hijab.

"So, I should consider eating less sugar?"

"Cut down on the rice, yes. But more importantly, we must increase your physical activity. That's the only way to get your PCOS under control."

I nodded. I was fat - huge boobs, heavy arms and calves, stretch marks - all that jazz. I didn't mind. But I didn't want to highlight my lack of fitness either in front of Dr Jahanara's new student.

He must've been a couple years older than me. Straight bangs covered his forehead, ending just above bushy brows. He chewed lazily on gum, something which normally annoyed me, but seemed kind of hot on him. Svelte fingers clad in silver rings scribbled on a tiny notepad. I tried not to stare.

Dr Jahanara studied me. "Your mother showed me your photo from two years ago. You were so fit," she said. 

In a split second, I was a stone statue. 

The doctor continued: "She told me about the accident, Moyurakhkhi. I think you should give dance another shot. I'm sure your cousin won't mind-"

"It's not possible," I said flatly. "I'm sorry, ma'am. I don't know what Ma told you, but I don't dance anymore."

How could Ma tell her all of this? She had been bringing up dancing from the moment my weight became a health issue. But this was one step too far.

Before she could patronise me some more, the doctor's intercom rang out with a annoyingly merry tune. She spoke briefly into it and got up hastily.

"I have to rush, dear. There's an emergency. He will take care of things," she pointed to the guy.

He bent over to see the computer screen better. His long, smooth fingers worked the keyboard, making it squeak. The old printer whirred to life. It coughed out a prescription, which he handed to me.

I stared at an inky black tattoo that snaked up his collarbone to the nape of his neck. A skull with a cigarette between its teeth.

As I took it, his hand brushed across mine, making me shiver a little.

"Right, um, I'll go," I muttered. As he offered me a polite smile, I pulled the door shut.

He was hot. The dreamy, soft round face. The long eyes lazily looking at me.

For MS' cigarettes thing, this guy was the perfect candidate.

I let out a breath.

Approaching the guy inside and asking him out for coffee - that was all there was to it. But the past sucked me into a sinkhole, standing before Arsh, feeling myself disintegrate cell by cell.

People on the movie set stood and watched.

The movie in question was Uronchondi, based on the novel of the same name by Mihran Sir. It was 2 weeks into shooting, after I begged MS to cast Arsh as the lead.

In the shade of a neem tree, a guy was doing his makeup with sharp, precise movements. Arsh seemed more interested in the makeup than the confrontation.

"Arsh, are you listening?" I felt like I was talking to a dense brick wall, impossible to penetrate.

"Hmm."

"Well say something!"

"What else is there to say? You saw me with her. Why are you still here?"

I stared at him incredulously. His rudeness was so abrupt. Perhaps I was wrong to be shocked. I should've seen it coming. All those times he was quick to apologise when I knew he didn't feel remorse. Subtly invalidating me. To the point where I was the one apologising whenever he would make a mistake, for 'overreacting'.

Angry tears spilt from my lashlines.

He got up, combing gel into his hair. "You love so much, so quickly. Nobody will love you back like that, Moyurakhkhi."

Nobody will love you back like that.

Nobody will love you back like that.

Sighing, I twisted the knob once more. Let's see where this goes. "Hi again," I piped up, making the guy turn to me.

"Hi," he said, looking surprised. He'd taken his doctor's coat off, revealing a Paramore t-shirt.

"Um, it's just that the doctor gives me a vitamin C tablet every time I visit, can I get one?"

Bemused, the guy eyed me for a second before getting up and stepping towards the desk. I strode across the carpeted floor, reaching for the tablet when he offered me a round one wrapped in shiny foil. I frowned. "No no, not this one, the bear-shaped one."

His lips quirked into a lopsided smile, revealing a dimple on his plump cheek. "What're you, six?"

"Hey back off, those make me happy," I defended, an embarrassed smile breaking out across my face. He rummaged through the drawer again.

The boy's pretty fox-like eyes twinkled momentarily when he found one. "This works?" he asked, holding up the teddy bear-shaped foil.

"This works. Thank you." I unwrapped the candy and popped it into my mouth. 

I wanted to talk to him more, but Dr Kabir entered the chamber with her new patient, and I had to leave.

There was a sinking feeling in my stomach when I realised that I'd forgotten to ask for his name.

Ma wasn't there in the lobby. I called her cell, to be sheepishly reassured that she was caught up shopping for vegetables in the nearby bazaar. It'd take her twenty minutes to return, so I took the hospital elevator to Dr Sam Nguyen's floor.

None of the people milling about the Department of Nephrology spared me a second glance, so I started to look around for her chamber. Sick people moved around tiredly, nurses dragging along their IV stands. One nurse was trying to get a man in a wheelchair to drink from a bottle, but he kept pushing her away.

How long till MS is one of them?

Dr Sam's door wasn't hard to find, she was the department head. I rapped my knuckles on the door.

I had to crane my neck to make eye contact with the tall Filipino.

"So how're you doing, love?" she asked with a lilt I loved.

"Good. What about you? I came to ask about Mihran Sir, actually."

"I'm quite alright, but Mihran isn't."

"Yeah, that man doesn't tell me much," I muttered, staring into my lap. "What's his scene?"

She ran her hand through her brown hair in frustration. "We might have to start dialysis in a week or two, by the looks of things," she muttered. "And he's so convinced that he's going to die, it makes me so mad, Moyurakhkhi!"

"Yeah, what's up with that?"

She sighed. "I really don't know. Why don't you ask him?"

I stared at her dubiously. "But, you're Mihran Sir's best friend. You're his only friend, now that I think of it."

Dr Nguyen didn't reply.

Most of MS' peers were insincere people jealous of his success, and his pompousness drove away the ones that weren't. If only they'd wait and stay, they'd see his goodness. I guess adults don't have the time to stay.

I suddenly teared up for MS, my insides wrenching. He doesn't deserve to be this lonely. Nobody does.

-