by Gauri Trivedi
[box]Nandita and Ayushi are thick friends since childhood and nothing could ever come between them to disturb that bond. But do good things last forever? Gauri Trivedi’s short story reveals the answer.[/box]“No! Mommy no….it hurts!” she screamed as I held her little finger and tugged at the nail gently. Her reaction made me stop immediately. I held her close, kissing away the precious droplets, the tears hurting me more than her. A few seconds ago, she had come looking for me, crying in pain. “I bumped into that wall” she complained, showing me her littlest finger.
Surveying the damage was proving to be an arduous undertaking considering the age and the restiveness of the injured party. A closer look revealed that the tiny nail of her last finger had come loose all the way and was barely hanging on to its cuticle. I shuddered within but put on a brave face just so that I didn’t scare her. Clipping the nail away seemed to be the only way out but for now, her finger was too sensitive to even attempt getting a nail cutter anywhere close to it. So I wrapped that finger in her favorite ‘Hello Kitty’ band aid, wishfully thinking that maybe the skin and the nail would come together again. ‘Hello Kitty’ seemed to have worked wonders as she bounced off my lap and ran to show the newly acquired finger ornament to her sister.
Still holding the first aid box, I wondered if the situation that had cropped up in my life a couple of days ago was any different.
Actually, it would be incorrect to say that the said circumstances sprang on me out of nowhere some time back. What happened was merely a culmination of events that were set in motion exactly three years back, when Ayushi, my best friend got married.
Ayushi and I had sat side by side on our first day of Kindergarten at school, neither of us crying. Inseparable since, we were buddies; confidants and sisters; bound by a friendship so strong that it invoked the envy of many around us. Our growing-up years were bliss for our parents as we did well academically, made wise choices and constantly motivated each other. People would often question me, “Nandita, what makes Ayushi and you this close?” Perhaps the answer lay in the fact that we were a good influence on each other which made our bond stronger. There were no secrets between us and luckily, we never fell for the same guy!
I got married a year and half before Ayushi did. Other than a limitation on the time spent together, nothing much changed. We continued to share the same rapport and exchange of daily banter. The day she introduced me to the guy who came over with his family with a marriage proposal, I expected nothing to alter. But it did and embarrassingly so. Ayushi’s husband-to-be had a roving eye and unfortunately it settled on me.
I laughed off his outrageously direct compliments to me on their wedding day as harmless and all in the fun of the big day, though in my heart, it didn’t seem right. The flirting continued, slow and subtle; a flash of a smile; a word here and there; meant only for me to notice. Caught between my discomfort of how to react to the whole issue and my friend’s happiness, I suffered silently, and so did our friendship. Rather than opening up about this to Ayushi, I chose to solve the problem by withdrawing myself from this equation. I made excuses whenever she suggested we all go out for dinner together or catch up on a movie. I timed my phone calls to make sure that he wouldn’t be around. Ayushi suspected something was wrong and asked me several times but I didn’t have the courage to open up about her husband. The main reason being, I saw him as a harmless flirt, someone who liked to verbally have some fun. Or rather I convinced myself that he wasn’t a real threat and was positive he wouldn’t do anything to hurt my friend or their marriage. His presence and funny advances were irritating but not enough for me to share them with Ayushi and create a rift in her marriage. And because I didn’t say it, a stress unknown to our companionship, all these years, started building up.
It was in the party on their third anniversary that the volcano erupted. A sly brush of his hand on my back jolted me. The fun was no longer harmless. Quietly, I carried my daughter who was seated in Ayushi’s lap, called out for my husband in the middle of the party, who was surprised but trusted me enough to follow me, and made an abrupt exit. As I tried to make sense of the past events amidst a teary outburst on our way home, he held my hand and listened. When I told him how I had felt I would be betraying my closest friend by talking about it even with him before I let her know about it, he nodded in silent understanding. It dawned on me then, why things never changed when I got married. He accepted Ayushi as an important part of my life and felt secure enough to let it remain.
Ayushi landed at my door early next morning, furious with questions. As gently as I could, I told her. She looked at me as if she had seen the last of me and she left. No tears, no apologies, no explanations asked for. I was prepared for an outburst, an argument and even an accusation of hiding things from her all this while, but she left. For this, I wasn’t prepared.
This was the situation that arose, few days ago, leaving the state of our friendship like that broken nail, hanging in there barely, by a thin thread of trust. I do not know if she feels torn between her spouse and her best friend of years or if she feels let down by me or if she is contemplating ending her marriage considering the doubts I raised on her husband’s character. But in the pause that followed my revelation and her walking away silently, I saw a flicker of doubt, a disbelief, as she looked at me and that is how there was one thing I knew for sure – I had waited too long.
Some things heal by themselves. Things that don’t heal need not be.
I encountered my daughter’s broken nail once again a week later when it was time to change the band-aid like every day. I twisted the nail slightly to check if I could clip a part of it away. To my surprise, there were no screams or tears from my daughter. By then, the nail was dead and all it took was a couple of seconds to cut it off completely without causing any hurt.
I couldn’t help contemplating as to how relationships that are alive bear the potential to hurt you, not the ones that are dead. When the tissue that binds the nail and the skin together is no longer present, separation is inevitable. You scream in pain and you dread to think what happens next, but it is the law of nature that when you cease to feel, is when you are ready to leave.
For Ayushi, an essential glue that sealed our closeness came apart that morning at my door. It was, therefore, easier for her to break all ties sooner. For me, it was more like ‘bumping into a wall’ kind of an accident, the wound raw and the nail still attached to its core. Pulling it out and discarding it will take more than a couple of years, but it will happen, it has to. It isn’t a choice I would have ever willingly made, letting go of a friendship so precious, but sometimes, somebody else takes the decision for us and if we love them enough, we honour it by complying.
Gauri Trivedi is a former business law professional who makes the law at home these days. A Mom to two lovely daughters, her days are filled with constant learning and non- stop fun. All of her “mommy time” goes into writing and finds itself on her blog pages http://messyhomelovelykids.blogspot.com/ and http://pastaandparatha.blogspot.com/ and if she is not writing she is definitely reading something!
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brilliant..