अनुभूतियां -- Perceptions

PROTECTED

He entered the room with some hestitation in his feet. The dull faded colours of the curtains, withered lifeless daffodils sitting in the corner, continuous irritating yet assuring beeps of the machine, smell of puke worthy medicines and her slow breathing welcomed him. He walked further into the room and stood by her bed, her appearance told the story of a battle well fought. Her skin wasn't glistening as he remembered but was dull, all her beautiful curves gone instead a structure of skeleton wrapped with skin lay there on the bed, her lips were no more rosy red but were chapped and pale. He sighed and touched her cheeks with his knuckles fearing he might hurt her with his soft touch. She opened her eyes slowly and tones of emotions crashed him in that very moment. Those black beautiful eyes which enthralled him a decade ago, the ones which carried all her dreams and emotions, which were the gateway to her soul; were now tired , he found nothing in them but the void blackness.

"The last time we saw each other you said you won't even visit my grave" she said with a smile on her dry pale lips.

"But I never said I won't visit you when you are still out of it" he said replicating her smile.

"So finally you deciding to set aside all your resentments, anger, complaints regarding me that brings you here or is it the dying poor lady who fought cancer which brings you here" she said with amusement in here eyes.

"I think I let go of all the anger, resentments and complaints years ago. It's what I had for you over a decade ago which bought me here. And I still have a small part of it inside me, safe and secure" he said softly holding her hand.

"I wish we still had what we shared a decade ago"she said with a hint of longing in her voice.

"At the end, the decision was yours. I did what you wanted"

"But when we see at the brighter side, you didn't end up with a dying wife in a hospital bed. You are a free man now. You should be thankful to me"she chuckled.

"I always wanted to be attached to you. I wanted to be there with you when you fought all alone. I wanted to work on us"he said gazing into her eyes.

"It doesn't matter anymore. I walked out. I gave up on us. Now I admit I was a coward to admit a lot of things, I was a coward to be scared of a lot of things"she confessed.

"What were those things?"he asked.

"I was scared of loving you. I was scared to let myself feel the power and pleasure of it. I was scared that if I will let myself feel it and enjoy it then it would take control over me. I was scared of all the feelings you gave me, all the emotions you made me feel. I was scared that if I will open up, if I will love you the way I wanted to, with all my heart and my existence then I would end up suffocating you and let myself drown into it to never come back to the surface. I never wanted to unleash the feelings, emotions and love I had for you because I feared of loosing control of myself, I feared of loosing myself into you. I did fell in love with you but I didn't wanted to stay in love with you"she said looking at him with glossy eyes.

"Did you feel better to be in control?"he asked.

"I thought I chose sanity, I chose normal, I chose to be on the surface and breath. But I was wrong. Sanity became boring, breathing felt unnecessary, I didn't feel any purpose of my existence. I still drowned. And I was too hard headed to accept all of this and come back to you"

"I always waited for you. I never understood why you left me, why you never wanted to work on our relationship. And now when I think about it I wish I had loved you even harder to show you that love keeps you afloat, it never drowns you, it consumes you but it also gives a new life to you, it makes you loose control and leads you towards a better way. I wish you would have let yourself love me" he bent down and kissed her forehead.

"And now when I think about it I wish I have had let myself love you" she closed her eyes and exhaled.

He looked at her as she fell into a deep sleep with calmness and peace on her face. He stood there beside her with their hands entwined and reminisced the time they spent together, all the memories, all the fights, all the laughters, all the tears, all the silly jokes and her beautiful soul.

A few nurse came rushing and pressed some buttons on the machines attached to his wife. The air of the room got filled with panic, anxiety and restlessness.

"Sir you have to wait outside" one of the nurse said untangling his and his wife's hands.

Then he realized that the irritating beeps of the machines has stopped, the slow breaths of his wife has become non existent. She was gone and so was his share of love buried deep inside her.

Written on :- 1 October 2019