Letter from the grave

DISCLAIMER: This is a fictional story. All the characters are fictional. The incident itself is a creation. Any resemblance to people or to the situations in the real world, is purely coincidental.

--------------------------------------------------------

Anne walked in the middle of their dinner and said, “Dad, I need some cash. I plan to go to a trip along with my friends.”
“No”, he said.
“I need it Dad, I promised I would be there”, she whined.
“We cannot afford it Anne”, he replied.

He could see her temper flaring and he knew any moment now that the words would flip out.

“You are just incapable of taking care of a family. You just do not have the spine to fulfil the needs of the family”, she shouted.
He kept quiet and continued having his dinner.
Anne was getting all the more frustrated and she finally bellowed, “I need the money.”
He concentrated on eating his dinner, ignoring her.

Mia was about to say something, but Anne just cut her short, saying, “Oh, dad is doing every thing honey, do not talk to him like that…”, she mimicked her mom to perfection.
“Mom, please. He cannot fulfil his daughter’s wish, what sort of a father is he?” she whined.

Mia had a tough time controlling her anger. Despite knowing that her daughter needs therapy, it is not easy for her to accept someone pointing at her husband. She just cannot stand to hear a word against him.
After a few minutes of silence, Anne started again, “Dad, I need the money now. I don’t care what you have to do for it. I just need it”, she said.
And that is when he had enough and all hell broke loose.
“Do not take that tone with me Anne, I do not have patience for your tantrums,” he warned his thirteen year old daughter. His six year old son, Peter was standing in the corner of the room, hovering behind his mom and looking wide eyed at the exchange.
“Honey”, he heard his wife’s reasonable tone and looked at her and said, “We cannot afford it Mia. If we could, you know I would never say no, right?”
“Let me talk to her honey, I am sure we will sort it out. You are scaring Peter here,” she said quietly.
“Anne, go to your room and we will talk”, she pleaded.
“I hate this family. I hate it. I just cannot stand a moment in this house and I am getting out”, Anne roared and started moving down the stairs.

Mia moved in front of her, blocking her way, “We are going to talk Anne. You need to understand”, she said, folding her arms over her chest, a clear defensive stance and a warning that she is not to push too far.
“I do not want to talk”, Anne said stubbornly and tried walking past her mom. But she could not. Her temper out of control, she shoved her mom aside and took the stairs two at a time. Mia was down at the force of the shove and her father, barely in control of himself slid down the stairs and grabbed her hand and pushed her into the kitchen and locked her in there.
“When you are ready to talk, just knock and I will open the door”, he said quietly. He walked upstairs and sat down beside his wife who was crying quietly.

“What can we do?” his wife wailed.
“If you do not open this door this second, dad, I am going to kill myself”, he heard his daughter’s threat.
“And I am going to write a note to the police that you were responsible for my suicide”, her threat continued.

Anne had some issues reining her anger in and her irrational demands were just getting out of control and so was her temper. They were considering therapy, but, Mia was apprehensive about the institutions and worried that they may not treat her well. The truth is that there is no hope and Anne was suffering from a neurological disorder that was detected when it was very advanced. The treatment can only delay the inevitable. So, it was exceptionally hard for Mia to let her go, even if it was for the duration of the treatment, knowing that these were the last moments that they could spend together as a family. Though the hospital staff was friendly, the atmosphere was very depressing, with the howls and the angst of the people there.

Mia was sobbing uncontrollably.

“Shh.. honey,” he said to her.

“I think it is already late, but we need to admit her in the hospital”, he said to his wife.

He went downstairs and said, “Anne, do you want to come out?” and waited a couple of minutes before opening the door. He found his daughter sitting quietly near the sink with a hysterical expression on her face. He approached her cautiously and sat down next to her. He enclosed her hand and tried pulling her closer and suddenly bolted to reach the carton lying next to her. He quickly checked the sign of her heart, the faint thud of her heart beat was enough to give him some strength to call the ambulance.

“Mia, Mia… get down this minute”, he shouted frantically.

His wife was at the door and she looked at Anne and at him and the truth dawned on her face. She had a resigned expression as she walked towards Anne and sat next to her. Then she began slapping her in the earnest, tears sliding down her eyes and her hands mechanically slapping her hard and fast.

"Mia?? Mia?? Honey… ", his voice was touching the extremity of agony and he was at a loss for words. The pain that is cutting through his heart, at this moment, was like a thousand girders falling over his head. He looked at his wife and tried to hug her close, but she pushed him away and he let her be.

“You will not talk to your father like that. You will apologise to him right now”, she was saying.

He could hear the sirens and rushed to the door. The paramedics took one look at the scene and took Anne to the hospital. Mia was given a tablet to fight her shock. He was a man in agony. His family, his bedrock is shattered and his son was crying out loudly. He was hopeless, helpless and in pain. After an agonizing thirty minutes of frenzied action, the doctor walked out of the emergency room with a sombre expression, which said everything that should be said.

“She committed suicide drinking a pesticide, though, it would not have killed her if she was not already suffering from a neurological disorder. In plain words, the strain and the pressure along with the pesticide just took her blood pressure to a high and she had some difficultly breathing. The control to her brain snapped shut and she had a stroke of paralysis and heart failure. I am sorry”, said the doctor.

He took a deep breath. His world was crashing down on him, the agony of a loss brought the composed man to his knees and he was clueless as to what to do. His wife, his bedrock, his personal saviour, his companion…

“My wife? How is she?”
“She will be fine in a couple of hours,” the doctors assured him.
He nodded. He was preparing for this, but the reality is much harder to bear than the imagined depression. He was worried for his wife, who has had a tough time accepting the inevitable and he wondered, if she could cope with the reality that came faster than they imagined and in a way that was different than they imagined.

When she finally came through, she was completely devastated, “I am sorry honey, I let it get out of control. I never realized it would come this far. I did not see this coming. When we went to those wards to find out about this, I just could not take the sadness of all those people out there and I was not willing to leave our daughter like that. But I did not see this, it is my fault”, his wife wailed into his chest. He had no words of comfort and he had no strength in him to even find a voice that would help him get through the formalities involved. His son, sat next to him and held his mother’s hand. He hugged them closer and held them to his chest, while trying to calm himself down.

After the funeral of Anne, he walked to her room and started going through her things. So many things, he did not know about her or assumed he knew about her. The teenage little hellion, did not allow them into her room. He stepped into the room and looked around. There were a couple of posters on the wall, facing the head rest side of the bed – the posters of their family. The first one, was the picture of her newly born brother, taken in the hospital, with her, her mom and her little brother. He took that snap in the hospital. The second one was that of him, holding her on his shoulders, when she was three. A single tear slid down his eyes as he looked at those snaps. The room was completely bare and the drapes closed, with a post-it on the drapes, that read, “Do not open”. He sat at her desk and opened the drawer. One by one, he laid the items on the table. There was a chocolate box, his gift to her on her eleventh birthday. He opened the box, to find a pen, a key chain, a photo of her and her friends, an eraser, a pencil and a post-it set. There was a diary – that had smilies on it. He opened it and shifted through the pages, looking at her beautiful writing.

“HOPE – the ONLY beacon of life” – was written on the first page. He flipped through the pages, reading through her words. They were mostly about her school. Anne never spoke much about school, but, in her diary she wrote a lot about it. She wrote a lot about her teachers and her class mates. He flipped through the pages and all of a sudden, the diary was blank – nothing more. He flipped through the remaining pages and nothing was written. He closed the diary and on an impulse, he flipped through to the last page in the diary, checking the cover.

“BLANK – that is how I feel, right now. To know that I would not survive my teenage and to know that I would kill my parents by dying, I am just feeling numb. I wish I can do something to ease their pain. I hope they would find the courage to let go of me and I hope, I will have the courage to let go of them. I love them so much. I hadn’t even had the chance to boss around my little brother, yet!!!”

He re-read those lines again and again and finally closed the diary and laid his head on the desk. As tears rolled down his cheeks, he felt a hand on his shoulder. Mia walked quietly into the room, or perhaps, he was just lost into some world that he did not hear her. She stood next to him and took the diary from his hands and flipped through the pages of the diary. She quietly placed it back on the table and looked at the other items. There was a small box, that Peter picked for her on the Raksha Bandhan. Peter was four then and was the most naughtiest kid. She recollected that day, when she went to the shopping mall to pick the Rakhi, when Peter picked this small jewellery box from the table infront of him and started playing with it. On an impulse, she decided, this might as well be the first gift Peter shall give Anne. She opened that box and saw a small chain – the second gift on the second Raksha Bandhan, when Peter was five. It also had a small drawing he drew, with his little fingers, that made little sense, but, just looking at it made Mia ache for her daughter. How much love did Anne hold in her heart, for her brother and she did not even have a chance to spend time with him, at least until her puberty? Mia let the tears slide down her cheeks unabashedly. She sat down on the bed and took the pillow case and held it close to her. When she felt something, she slid her hand into the pillow cover and retrieved an envelope.

“If you found this, then I am already dead and I sincerely hope that this is found by my parents and that they are coping with my early departure, just as I am coping with their absence. I assume there is hell or heaven or a third world, where we go – the dead people and I am sure, I would miss my parents and brother there. But, there is little I can do about it. So, if you are not my parent, could you please pass this on to them? This is my letter to them, from my grave…

Dear Mom and Dad, and my dearest Peter,

Please forgive me for my behaviour over the last few months. I have been difficult to handle, but it scared me that I will leave you all so soon. I am not fully aware of how it would be, to not ever see you again, but I know that, I would miss you all. Will you remember me? The clock keeps ticking and every second brings me closer to my end. The countless tears that Mom wept and the countless hugs Dad gave her, shows how much I am loved. Peter, though young, looks at me as though he knows that something terrible is about to befall me. I kept wondering, Why me, but I never got any answer.

Dad, despite ALL the words I threw at you, you are the greatest Dad, who ever walked on this earth. You are the kindest, patient and most loving Dad and if I ever will be born again, I wish to be your daughter and wish to live till I have the chance to take care of you and reciprocate ALL the warmth you blessed me with. I love you.

Mom, you are a personal saviour. Many a time, you saved me from the wrath of Dad, especially when I got myself into a lot of trouble at school, by not doing the homework or scoring good marks. Only your soothing voice ever gave me the strength to show the report to Dad for asking the sign. I know that you stood behind the curtain, while I hovered near his study, waiting to be slapped and I know you would rush through that curtain, if Dad would ever have to raise his voice and ask me to come closer. But, as it happened, Dad never said anything. He must love me a lot to accept those grades or he values his life a lot, knowing you were standing outside that curtain, ready to explode at the slightest possibility of his frown. I love you too, for everything you ever did and for everything you are.

Peter, dear brother, if you ever read this letter, then you must be ALL grown up and know enough about me and our family. I only wish to tell you that, I love you and I used to lull you to sleep many a time. I treasured every single gift you ever gave me. I wish, I could atleast survive another six years, if only to see my little brother stand up for my defence against my X-boyfriends. Ha, that is not the case. Do you already have a girl friend? Just between you and me, brother and sister? Don’t worry, I won't tell mom or dad, we will work out our understanding. I wish, I could stand beside you, through your first broken heart or through the first heart you broke, but, I am not. All these are mere wishes. Will you please remember that I love you very much?

-    Anne”

She read through the letter for what seemed to be the hundredth time, as the misery shook her very essence.

How many secrets has Anne buried in her heart? How much love did she hold for them? What else did she felt like conveying, before abruptly ending her life? She frantically turned the room upside down, in an attempt to find something, anything, even a piece of paper with a word on it, like a treasure hunt. Treasure hunt articulated by her daughter from the grave.

He looked at his wife and started reading the letter. He read that letter a few times and he too joined the search, turning the room upside down. Finally, he opened the drapes that had the post-it on them, which opened to a window that overlooked their garden. There stood the swinging porch, Anne’s favourite porch. He felt that she was sitting there, waiting for them to embrace her. He looked down from the window and felt a ripple of peace overcome him. Mia walked to stand next to him and they both looked at the swinging porch, thinking of all the things that were left unsaid. Whatever was said, though, filled their heart with heaviness, yet left them strangely at peace with themselves, knowing that their daughter knew that they loved her very much.

Death, though inevitable is unsettling, especially if one is young and hadn't yet started dreaming. But, as it happens, sometimes, life’s battles are lost and there is nothing anyone can do about it.