“Don’t give up on him.”
Grey eyes smiled, misunderstanding him. “He will be ok. Everybody is confident about him. It’s just a matter of time.” Atharva’s hand came to his forehead. “Don’t think about any of this. Don’t trouble Amaal. She is juggling everything for you.”
Samar’s eyes fell shut — “She shouldn’t.”
“That’s a conversation for you both to have when you have recovered. But remember, if you are struggling inside then she is having it just as bad outside.”
“I may not make it, Atharva. Be practical.” Samar opened his eyes. “Graft surgeries are breeding grounds for infections in the first ten days. My kidneys have not been supporting me. It’s only a matter of time.”
“Amaal won’t let you go.” He smiled. “And I owe you three lifetimes now. Stay to collect the payback.”
Samar found himself returning that smile, if just for the sake of it.
“Did you name him?”
“I am not ready to name him.” Atharva’s voice went low. He cleared his throat and swallowed the next words. Samar heard them loud and clear.Without her.
“Don’t make him think his father has abandoned him too.”
Atharva’s brows twisted together, his eyes glazing over. Samar looked away, letting him live whatever it was that he had to.
“Yathaarth,” Atharva said. Samar whirled his eyes to him. “Yathaarth?”
“Yathaarth.”
Samar blinked. And Atharva took his hand off his head. “Sleep, let the pain pass in oblivion. Be alive when I see you next.”
“I don’t take commands anymore.”
“The fuck you don’t.”
Samar chuckled with tears dripping down the bridge of his nose as Atharva turned and walked out of the room. He did not wish what had happened to Atharva on anybody. But if he couldn’t find Iram, Samar hoped he would be able to accept his son and the life that was left behind. Give his son a good life.
44. Blue was the colour behind his closed eyes…
Blue was the colour behind his closed eyes. And blue was the colour when he opened it. As usual, she sat there on a small chair, dressed from head to toe in ice blue scrubs, cap and mask on, dozing for a change. Samar observed her, feeling like the most helpless man on the planet as her chin dipped without a headrest. He did not have the hands to hold it up. Or to offer his shoulder. He did not have the words to make her feel better if he woke her up either.
The pain inside him was excruciating, the fear unencompassable.
What would tomorrow bring for him, he didn’t know.
He was taken in for two, sometimes three surgeries in a week. That would be the case for the next month. He didn’t know which one would be his last. He didn’t know which table he would collapse on. And he didn’t know how to handle her grief with his own mortality. A moment of making peace with death was acceptable, a lifetime spent excruciatingly painfully in every passing moment closed in this room? Worse than that momentary death.
She made a snoring sound and startled awake. Cerulean eyes popped open and broke into a smile the moment they met his eyes. She sat up.
How was she able to smile at a man who had done nothing but scream at her?
“Have you been sleeping well?” He cleared his throat, hearing his words come out scraped.
“Yes,” her smile widened, nodding back at the chair.
“How many visiting hours are there in a day?”
“Thrice a day.”
“How many?”
She shrugged. “Three hours each.”
