Single mom. Young widow. 30-something dying of a cardiac arrest. These were alien concepts to me until four days ago. I was mid-way through my evening walk on 6th December, when I received a startling phone call from my husband’s boss. He told me that Rajarshi had collapsed midway through the presentation and that I must rush to Bombay Hospital immediately. He told me it would take a bit of time and advised me to keep the child at home.
I rushed home, informed my in-laws about what happened and jumped into an Uber. I was all set to spend the night with him and dressed accordingly.
My mother in law was in tears and my father in law was breathless. But I was at peace and was sure that he was just plugged up with wires lying in the emergency ward. I was all set to give him a whack on the head and a pinch on the bum, telling him to stop working like a machine, at least now.
We hardly had a married life. I met him on the weekends. He was flying to another city on Monday and that’s how our life was for eight years.
We long distanced before marriage and even after that. It always pinched me. But I tried my best to look beyond that. I cribbed to all and sundry about how I was left to fend for myself on the weekdays. But come the weekend, my husband would be home with his signature brand of mischief. Those sparkly eyes and naughty smile was a forewarning that he was about to do something nasty. The child and I were his eternal targets.
I digress. Coming back to that fateful day, we reached the hospital and ran to the emergency ward. Someone caught hold of me and said,
“Gayatri, sit down”. It was Rajarshi’’s boss and colleague. I vehemently shook my head and said, “Just tell me. What’s going on?”. He replied with, “Rajarshi is no more”.
I lost balance and howled on the floor holding his shoe. My mother in law, looked at him and said,
“You killed him”. I didn’t argue. I was glad she said it. I screamed at them to take me to him. They took me to a corridor and there he was, my beautiful Rajarshi, covered under a white sheet, eyes closed, blue lips. I hugged him tight, he still felt like my telly tubby man, the one I had hugged all night long just a few hours ago. I cradled his head in my arms, kissed him and told him to wake up. But he didn’t respond.
My world had ended. There is no God. How can there be? Why did he take my perfect husband? We had a son to raise, a life to live.
I took my mother-in-law and son to see him. My son didn’t understand much, or maybe he did, after all he has the brains of his father. He frowned and looked away. The formalities took forever to end and we finally brought him back home.
I didn’t sleep on the first night. I slept next to the icebox he was placed in. The following day went by in a whirl of activities.
kissed his cold face repeatedly and wiped the liquids flowing out of his nose. The crematorium had too many flies, so I swatted them vigorously off his face. I rubbed ghee on his hair, face, chest, hands and feet. His hands especially I rubbed a little more, because I knew that would be the last time I would ever hold hands with him. I also wanted to lessen the unnatural stiffness on his hands.
I pushed him towards the fire along with the crematorium workers, prayed for his soul and watched him go up in flames. Two days later,
I collected his ashes, inhaled it deeply and flowed it away into the Banganga Tank. That was that.
My husband who had filled my life with laughter, madness, dirty jokes and immense joy, was dust. He was finally asleep after years and years of slogging like a machine. He didn’t love his job, he inhaled it. Climate change, hydrogen, green energy and natural gas were his life. On weekends he brought books from Amazon on the topic and watched videos on Youtube. Our romantic drives were filled with conversations on climate change and him clicking pictures of piped gas and green vehicles. His passion killed him.
Riaan, our son, will never forget his father. I will make sure of it. He will be raised exactly how his father wanted him to be raised.
I only live now to continue his legacy. I will keep the professional, personal and musical beacon flying high. Mrs Rajarshi Bhattacharyya’s work is just beginning. A full life to lead keeping all his goals in mind. But after that, I will find him and never let go.
If there is another life, I want to be born again only as Mrs Rajarshi Bhattacharyya. I’m conflicted between letting your soul go now or hanging on to you. But as always, you will decide. You lived life on your terms. And I will respect that even in death.
Riaan and I will love you forever.
