The secret wish

Part 1

She was clutching her hands on her shirt as the doctor said his words and walked away. Anya was feeling the torment that she could never explain. Her only daughter would only live few more days. Even when all these years both Anya and her husband had tried to save their doll from the disease that had started to eat their little girl since the day she was born. But today the monster had grown to such an extent that their little princess was too weak to hold the monster that fed on her.

Anya couldn't stop crying and she was holding her husband as tight as possible when the doctor left. She didn't want to show her child the weak side of herself. The time to meet her child and to know her last wish had come, without letting her know that it was her last. She slowly crawled towards the bathroom as Shaan stood like a stone in front of the doors of the room of their daughter.

Anya stood in front of the mirror for half an hour, to empty off her eye sockets of all the tears they had, and she made sure that there were none left before she left the washroom. But her eyes were red and she looked restless. She made her brown hair and wore the hair clip that her daughter gifted her as a surprise on her birthday.

"Mama, this was all I could bring with the money I had saved..."

Anya couldn't have told that her little princess being there was their biggest joy. Anya had hugged her daughter and had said

"Mama loves this hair clip so much that she will cry now..."

And the yellow hair clip matched her hair color for the day. As she had decided not to cry anymore, she walked out of the room trying to forget everything the doctor had said. As she entered the room that her daughter was in, she smiled because there wasn't a single day the girl had made a sad face and had endured every pain that came in her way. She didn't cry even when she was pierced with needles that were as long as her fingers, didn't cry even when all her hair withered away. Didn't cry even when she couldn't attend her school and all her classmates changed every year. But there was a smile on her face when she looked at her mother smile at her.

"Noah..!" Anya ran to the girl with a smile and held her hands, which were busy in brushing a Barbie doll's hair. The ECG monitor was constantly beeping and the little girl's hands were swollen due to the cannula that was inserted into her vein of the wrist. The smell of the room was intoxicating to Anya not because she hated the smell of blood or the saline, but instead, she could feel the death hovering above her in the room, ready to take her little princess away from her any moment she left her alone.

The door slowly opened as Anya's husband came in, he shut it slowly and said with a smile on his face "Noah! my doll..."

"paa.. paa.."

the little girl struggled to get the words out of her mouth but still, she was smiling as brightly as ever. Anya's husband Shaan was a man with a will of steal but for a moment, he felt the lump in his throat and that made him unable to speak, he sniffed in the wave of tears that would come out if he didn't resist.

He went and sat beside Anya and smiled at his daughter. Anya smiled and asked looking into Noah's deep blue eyes

"Sweety, how is hospital treating you and how is doctor uncle? Is he taking care? And..." She left her hands and took the Barbie doll near Noah's hands and said brushing the doll's hairs "Do you want more of this doll, shall I bring you a doll set house?"

Noah was smiling and at the same time was nodding her head, she was just staring at her father and mother not knowing whom to answer, she picked up her doll from her mother's hands and nodded. Anya felt happy and she nodded to her husband and he got up immediately and said "Wait lovely, I have got some work to do! I will get right back to you..."

He kissed his daughter to her forehead and took an exit from the doors of the room thinking

You do it, Anya... I cannot see my dying child... I can never imagine her in that state...

When her father left, Noah turned towards her mother and smiled again, Anya smiled and asked taking Noah's hand in hers:

"If you get discharged today, then what should papa bring you? A tea set? A mat... Hmmmm maybe the toy slide that you wanted to complete your city, or maybe books of dragons? or maybe a poster... or maybe..."

"mama..."

The girl continued when her mother stopped abruptly

"I want to live!

She smiled after that, maybe she had sensed her death, but she was too young to know it. Or maybe she had said it just like that. How could a mere girl of twelve think of life and death? But either way that left out all the tears that Anya had emptied to make her little child comfortable and not to make her feel what was going through her head. But now it was all gone in vain, she tried to smile even with those tears and listened to Noah as she continued with her sharp groggy tone

"I want to live without these things that uncle puts in my hand, I want to live without taking those bitter pills and tablets... I want to live with my friends... I want to play, I want to make mischief just like every one of my friends do. And..." She smiled "I want to live every moment with you and papa, most happily and like a family! Out from doctor uncle and all these pills and injections..."

Anya was already crying with her tears that welled up near her chin and this time Noah was the one to hold her hands

"And mama, don't worry I will take this all, and I will be just fine! Like papa said, I am a strong girl!"

The girl was not recognizing the depth of her own words but for the parents who were fighting the death, making a living out of their dying daughter 'Life' and 'death' Were strong terms. Anya slowly pulled in Noah and tucked her skinny body

"Yes, my darling... you will do everything, you want to!" She held her tight "You will live!"

The time of blood transfusion that the sister used to push into those weak arteries had come and it was time for her mother to leave. As the sister came in Noah's face lost all the brightness she had, and she said frowning at the sister

"I don't hate her, but she is the one who gives me most pain..." Anya smiled at the sister as she nodded and she stood up from the chair and was ready to walk out, but then she saw her daughter gazing a group of pigeons flying near her windows, and then she kept on staring at them.