The Small Plant In Your Window

By Dr Manasi Naphade

It was mid of summer.

When we first started going out.

I remember we were just lying around in your room.

Reading our favourite books,

When you first brought her.

It was a Bougainville plant.

It was just 3 leaves then.

You kept it in your window,

I playfully teased you,

Don’t forget to nourish it now that you’ve brought it,

I thought it’s pot looked too plain for your room.

We ended up deciding to paint it

Two handprints holding hands, our handprints,

You had bought a tiny fancy watering can,

Because you knew how much I loved cute things

But we ended up using that old mug with tiny cracks near its brim to water it.

We thought of naming our plant something,

There was a lot of debate

I wanted to name her lily

You were like “my girlfriend wants to name my Bougainville Lily”

We never really named it anything

One afternoon

I was sitting on your study table

That was when you kissed me for the first time,

A ray of sunlight from the half open window was scarcely lighting up your room,

I looked at the window, and saw our Bougainville had it’s first bud.

We were playing scrabble and I kept taking off my glasses

I never liked wearing glasses

You took a hair strand and tucked it behind me ear and told me you loved my glasses,

I think you were the only boy who had said that to me.

The Bougainville now had a beautiful little pink flower.

The flower I said was the only pink thing in your room.

It was raining heavily

I guess it was the first rain of that year,

Our Bougainville flower had wilted that day,

I had come to say goodbye

The summer break had ended and I had to go back to my city.

You said, “I am just sixteen, I am too young to be this heartbroken.”

I had no idea what to say so I just hugged you and said take good care of our Bougainville,

And I just left and never looked back.

Years passed by

2 or 3 I guess

I came back to visit my uncle’s house.

I was cycling in scorching summer afternoon, to get my cousins those colourful pepsies.

I passed by your house but I didn’t have the heart to look at it,

So I just sped past it.

While returning from the shop,

I decided to stop for a while under a tree’s shade,

I looked up and saw your room.

You had changed the curtains,

The colour was a darker shade of blue now

You still hadn’t repaired the broken glass of your window,

And there it was, the pot with smudged pink and blue handprints housing in it the most beautiful Bougainville plant I had ever seen.

By Dr Manasi Naphade