Twilight Years

By Priyanka Kumar

“I miss Shyam, I don’t deserve this. Not at this age.”, pondered Mr. Ram Dayal staring into the chipped walls of his room, a room that was otherwise dull and sullen, but for a wooden framed picture of Shyam as a newborn that hung there for the last thirty years. With a deep sigh of heaviness, he turned to his wife, Mrs. Seema Dayal, “When was the last time we got Shyam’s letter, hasn’t it been long this time?”. Mrs Dayal counted on the tip of her fingers, “Eight months”. Long time! Mrs. Dayal had nothing to offer save a few words of consolation which seemed to have lost their essence now.

Mr. Dayal, now a septuagenarian, a retired bank officer lived in a simple mid-sized duplex home at small town of Etah from U.P. He loved gardening, but these days, his garden bore more weeds and disheveled pots than flowers and butterflies. It had been five long years since he last met Shyam and yet his patience wasn’t exhausted. Though sometimes tears of frustration would well up his old, crinkled eyes. When he was still in service, his friends respected him as a dutiful family man. Shyam was his only child, whose upbringing he never compromised on, however trying the circumstances. When Shyam was still a young boy, all

his whims of fancy toys and story books were fulfilled by his ever-loving parents. Mr. Dayal doted on Shyam like his life rested inside of him.

Shyam was amongst those upon whom God bestowed what we all consider “fortune”. A boy of exceptional intelligence, striking personality coupled with athletic abilities, all that would swell a parent’s chest with pride. Shyam was the apple of their eyes. His persistence paid off and he cleared the prestigious Indian Foreign Service exam, settled in Australia, acquired a high position in the society and earned a handsome pay. There was immeasurable love in his heart for a son who had brought them good name and gone beyond the family’s expectations. Now he was a married man, living in his own nest, far away from the cocoon that nurtured him in Etah.

“……. and pay my regards to Mummy”

Yours,

Shyam

The latest letter informed him that he had been promoted to ‘Special Secretary’ rank in his service. Shyam’s infrequent, long awaited letters were devoid of emotion and perhaps care that his parents longed for. Those pages from Australia came sealed with coldness of obligation that a father’s tender heart could fathom. Shyam hardly had the time or leaning to call them. And so there was a bitterness that was a part of Mr. & Mrs. Dayal’s aging world, a harsh truth attached to their lives, a hollowness in their joys.

One restful afternoon, the phone bell rang. “It must be Shyam!”, hurriedly Mr. Dayal picked up the receiver, as Mrs. Dayal looked on eagerly, with a lingering hope of being reunited with their son, oceans apart, in their golden years.

“Hello Mr. Dayal. I am calling from ‘Hrudalay’, an orphanage that is run by the missionaries in Rakabganj”, introduced the voice on the other side.

“Yes, how may I help you?”, Mr. Dayal was rather puzzled to receive a call from orphanage.

“We are inviting senior citizens next Sunday to spend time with children. They miss the loving company of parents. We thought it would be great if you could volunteer your time for our children. They are all very talented, and am sure they will be fine company for the elderly”, invited the coordinator.

Mr. and Mrs. Dayal were excited at the prospect of spending a Sunday afternoon with the little children. “I shall pack some puri - halwa for the kids. How much Shyam would clamor for puri halwa upon returning from school!”, declared Mrs. Dayal with noble affections of a mother.

Come Sunday, Mr. and Mrs. Dayal spent a long-extended evening with the kids, who seemed exceptionally thrilled to have them as visitors. Together, they played scrabble, ate puri halwa, exchanged stories of birds and flowers and fairies. The little angles, with tender

impressionable minds, rejoiced in little gestures of love, a bit like tasting the forbidden fruit. Mr. Dayal wondered, “Is it abandonment why these kids value our love?”.

Just when he was lost in a brief moment of pensiveness, a doll like girl of three, Sonu tugged at his kurta with her little fingers, looking upon him with her hazelnut eyes and dangling curls, demanding impishly to be held in arms. Mr. Dayal whisked her in his arms, as she fondled his face in her tiny palms, pecked innocent kisses on his lifeless cheeks and giggled on his frail shoulders. The father in him came to life.

Mr. and Mrs. Dayal made Sunday visits to Hrudalay a part of their routine lives. Spending time with cherubic Sonu made them cheerful. Last Sunday Mr. Dayal clicked a picture of Sonu cuddling a doll in his lap, that now hung on his bedside walls. Suddenly, the walls had a renewed meaning. And the garden had the lovely dahalias and marigolds blossoming again.

By Priyanka Kumar