Seven Months, Six Days

Just 7 months and 6 days ago, I was here. I had come for a routine checkup and to my surprise, had found that I had been pregnant for a couple of weeks. My husband was taken aback by the news. He thought I was bluffing. He wasn’t ready. Neither was I. But when I told him that we had a choice to abort the baby, he was even more dazed. He was always against abortion, he thought it was murder. And he isn’t wrong. I agree with him. You are killing a living being, which is a result of your negligence. Had you been more careful, this wouldn’t happen.


We decided to give birth to the baby. My husband took up a part time job to meet the needs of the to-be-born family member. I started making room for the baby. My husband accompanied me for the checkups and tests that we had once in every month. And I even learnt to knit from the old woman, next door. She is an eighty year old, fragile looking woman. Although she is much older than me, she is still the coolest woman I’ve ever met. I spent every day with her and she told me about the time when she was pregnant. She shared her experiences with me and told me everything I needed to know about pregnancy, gave me a book called, “what to expect when you’re expecting,” and some DVDs that her husband had made her watch, when she was pregnant, for the mental development of the baby.


In the last 2 months, my condition had worsened and I had become weaker than before. The pain had grown on my nerve and it was excruciating. The doctors said it was alright and normal and that’s what the books said, too. But they were worried about the health of the baby. Everything I tried to eat made me throw up. The smell of every food item, made me nauseous. It was a very bad phase but I knew that the outcome of this was gonna be beautiful.


Today, I’m back, here. After 7 months and 6 days. It is gonna be a premature baby. My water broke weeks before the given date and my neighbor (the old woman), rushed me to the hospital. She even rang my husband at work and asked him to get to the hospital as soon as he could. Nice lady, that one!


I am about to pass out because of the pain. The doctor and the nurses are trying to keep me awake, to keep me going. But I just can’t. My body is giving up. My whole body is burning, my heart is thumping vigorously, my hands are numb and I can’t feel them anymore. I can hear myself screaming out of pain. All my efforts to get the baby out are failing. It is like the baby doesn’t wanna come out of me. My husband is waiting outside the ward, waiting for his baby. But we don’t have any. Not yet.


“It is coming out.” The doctor says. “I can see its head. Keep pushing.”

“That’s it, keep going. Just a few seconds more.”

I give one last push and give up. The baby is out, finally. And I can see it. It is my baby. I gave birth to it. It is so petite, so delicate.

“It is not breathing,” the doctor says.

And the next moment I see the doctor asking the nurses to get some prescriptions that I do not know of.

“What’s going on?” I ask, now screaming. “What’s happening? Why is my baby not breathing?”

“Relax, ma’am. We’re doing something.”

“Doing something? You perform thousands of deliveries every day and my baby isn’t breathing?”

They take my baby to another ward, to do ‘something.’ It is out of my sight. I start to pray. Pray and cry. Sob.

After 15 minutes, one of the nurses comes in with my husband. The moment he sees me, he comes and hugs me. I can feel him shivering. He knows something I don’t. I know it. I know he knows something I don’t know.

“What happened? Tell me, please!” I burst into tears, again.

“It is gone,” he says, his voice trembling. “The baby is no more.”

The End

It feels so different today. But nothing around me has changed. Everything is the same. People are going to work. Some are crossing the street. Some are driving, riding. Kids are playing in the park… and on the street. (Kids!) And what am I doing here, on the ground, amidst all this dry grass? It is all over me. Geez! What did I do last night? Did I drink, again? Oh no, if I drank and got sloshed again, my wife will kill me. She had warned me. My head hurts. Ugh! What’s that smell? Crap! It is coming from my shirt… and me. I stink. I need a bath.

If I am here, and if I spent the night here, which I am guessing is right, then it means I haven’t gone home all night. Oh God, no! My mum would be worried. I should walk faster and get home and check on everybody. Hey! There’s a telephone booth, there. I should probably call home first and ask if everybody is okay.

Where did all my money go? My pockets are empty. Did I get mugged, yesterday? NO! This can’t be happening. Why on earth did I go out, anyway? My money is gone, I stink like I’ve never before and I don’t have any memory of what happened last night. It is like I can totally empathize with Alan, Phil and Stew from Hangover. Is that a… a coin? Somebody must have dropped it. If I quickly pick it up, would anybody see? But that would be stealing, wouldn’t it? Ah! Forget it. Right now I’m worried as shit and I need to contact my family.

It is a five rupee coin. I need change. Er... I can ask that lady there. “Hello, Miss. Do you, by any chance, have a change of five rupees? I need to call my family. Uh Miss? Hello?” She isn’t responding. She’s so profoundly engrossed in her telephonic conversation that she’s least bothered to even say no. What a witch! I should find another person. Hey! I remember this place. If I walk for more five minutes toward the east… here, I am. This is where I teach. What day is it today? It was Thursday, day before yesterday, and since I don’t remember what happened yesterday, I presume that it was Friday, yesterday, which means its Saturday, today. Great! School’s closed. Wow! Wait, the school remains closed on Saturdays, but the office remains open.

There’s no one in the office. What time is it? Oh! The clock shows 1:30 pm. But I need to call… eh! Who cares? I’ll make the call and leave. It is just one call and the school earns a lot, anyway. It is ringing. “Hello? Priya? Uh, Hello? Can you hear me? What is that noise behind you? I can hear you, stop saying hello. Hello? Hel-“

Dear lord! I guess it is the network. No issues. I think my wife is okay. She sounded fine. I’ll go home now. She doesn’t seem mad either so it is safe.

Okay, if I enter from the back door, she won’t notice and I can tell her that I came early morning and slept in the lawn.

No one’s in the bedroom. Good.

God, I look hideous! I really need a bath. “Priya, can you switch on the geyser for me, please? I stink pretty badly. Priya? Perhaps, she’s in the living room. Pri-“
Why are there so many people wearing white? Is my mum alright? Did something happen to her? “Mama?” No, no. she is fine. Why is she crying? “Mama? Why are you crying? What happened? Tell me, what-“

What the hell, is that… my body?

“I warned him to stop drinking.” I hear Priya talking. “But he didn’t listen to me.”


“Where did you find his body?” That’s Aunt Sophie.

“Somewhere… near his school. He had passed… out, there. So we brought him home. He was breathing then, but… he was badly injured. He got into a-a… fight again, I think. So, we-we took him… to the hospital and after spending about… 30 minutes there, he-he passed away.”

“No, no. Don’t cry, Priya. I’m here, right here.”

Maybe if I try getting inside my body, I’ll come back to life.

It is not happening. But it happens when people get possessed. Perhaps I should try possessing someone. No. What am I saying?! I can’t do that.

Oh god, my consciousness is failing me…

The diary of a harlot's child

The diary of a harlot’s child

I heard her scream from the room next to mine

I knew how she would look tomorrow

She’ll be having those bruises

And I’ll be looking her right into her eyes; filled with sorrow,

She wanted to tell me,

I wanted to question.

But how could she explain why she was with him, still?

Hadn’t he given her enough reasons to leave?

But she’s a woman; she says she’s weak,

And has nowhere to go, no shelter to seek.

So I told her, “Ma, I’m with you.

So what if you had to choose this work

And do what you do?

I go to school, Ma.

The NGO will help me be a better person.

Not better than you for you’ve sacrificed every bit of your existence

For me to have a better life, a life you never had

For me to not get married to someone like dad.”

She held my hand in hers and squeezed it gently.

She closed her eyes and prayed silently.

She gave me a talisman.

She said she would always be with me.

She kissed my forehead

Gave a peck on my cheek

She waved at me as I started to leave

I couldn’t concentrate in school that day

I wanted to go home and hug her

But when I got home that day,

I saw her body hanging from the cover.

Such is the life of people who work for men.

Men, that don’t respect women and consider them objects,

Another one gone, thousands still alive,

Who knows, another kid’s mother might have just departed from this life.

Let there be light

I stood in the balcony and watched little kids burst firecrackers. The sound of their laughter filled the air and I… I felt nostalgic.

It is that time of the year again when people lit lampions, lamps, candles, and also, burst firecrackers. It is Diwali. Diwali has been my favourite festival. It is so bright, colourful, vibrant and joyful. And oh yes, how can we forget about the food? That food! Oh I would give anything to celebrate Diwali at least 5 times a year and not just once. It is that one time of the year when moon is not really required to be present in the sky because the land is already lit up. And I know that people from other countries visit India and complain about poverty, slums, traffics, suffocation, even. But the actual time to visit India is during Diwali. Nowhere in the world, would you ever see such colourful nights and beautiful surroundings.

I remember when I was little, my dad used to get tons of firecrackers and I used to burst them all like crazy and ask for more when they used to get over. And my dad being a festive person himself, would get me more firecrackers. It was every year’s story. And I thought this would never change. But soon, Earth started to turn grey and we, as mature teenagers, had to stop polluting the environment. Kids these days are taught to celebrate a pollution-free Diwali but that’s like refraining from using colours on Holi because it is harmful. And I know it is not mandatory to play with firecrackers during Diwali, but it has been a tradition for decades and it feels incomplete without firecrackers now. When I was a kid, my elders asked me to not play with firecrackers for the same reason, but I still did, because I was a kid. Then how can I expect kids these days to stop enjoying and start thinking about saving the Earth? They deserve a little fun too. And I am totally against those crackers which possess decibels more than required and allowed, but the smaller ones are benign or at least less harmful.

So let the kids enjoy and let us be the responsible adults and do our bit by not bursting firecrackers and save mother Earth. Because when these kids would grow up, they would do the same and set examples then, like we would now.

Let there be light!