It started, the first time, when she had left me. I was 22, and just out of college. Desperately wanting her back and not knowing what was to be done, I was craving for a way out. I distinctly remember disliking it the first time I held. The cigarette. Sitting on abandoned train tracks, climbing up the hillock to be the closest that I could get to the clouds, over the docks dipping my toes in the water, fantasizing a world where I was the hero, and her, the princess, all through, the cigar was my only companion.
As I sit by the window, I see Mimi playing in the ground. She got herself bruised day before, and she is running around like nothing really mattered. Mimi, my daughter. The only time when I felt proud, was when her tiny feet touched the earth. I wanted to quit then.
They say, time heals everything. All those who say so, make a fool out of us. I haven’t forgotten a thing. Not one. I wish I did though. I wish I had forgotten the first time I kissed her, Kiran. I wish I had forgotten the way I got embarrassed in front of her father. I wish I forgot the way she walked back, clad in a chic brown sari. I wish I forgot the way she turned around and gave me that last look. I wish I forgot seeing her yesterday with her son, and her husband.
I used to be an angry b*****d before. I used to get ruffled up for all possible reasons. But that day, that which put me to shame in front of her father, denounced me of my self-respect. I had to start somewhere, and the cigarette was an answer.
Mimi is my, our daughter, the only daughter of my late wife Priya. Priya, the woman whom I didn’t bother about until she was alive. I used to be an addictive smoker, threw tauntrums, beat her, and she would still keep my plate of breakfast ready. She would act like nothing had happened, and considered it her duty since the day she was pronounced my wife. I lived three years, not happy, not too sad either. The time of my life, when I took everything for granted. For sure, Priya must have been through hell. I didn’t give her a reason to be happy. When Priya got pregnant, I was smoking about 20 a day, which was too much compared to any average standard. The doctor warned me enough, that it might affect the baby. And I had to give up. Ten months, I had decided, anything for mimi. Priya was happy. I was getting to live a life. I was being the responsible dad already, until, Mimi was born, and priya dead.
I feel less guilty now, because I had kept priya happy for at least a few months before she left me. I would have been dead of guilt if it hadn’t happened.
It was the whole cycle again, depression, and now, with a kid who didn’t have anyone else but me. I had held on to my career. But the cigarette pulled me back. It wasn’t easy to get away. It has been nine long years.
Now as I sit here, I am at the other end of the cigarette. The last one.
Some type of cancer, they say.
I wished I hadn’t had the first. I wished I knew there would be mimi then.
“Mimi”, I call out to her, as I see the clouds getting dark.
Sorry, I wasn’t perfect,
Lover, husband, father.
I so wanted to be.
Wow !! Did you really write this?! 😮 Awesome! 🙂
^ – Ha ha. I really did write this 🙂 Thank you!
Brilliant flow 🙂
He he. Thanks da
excellent one.
Orey pheelings! But nalla irukku. Write more like this.
Sure bro 🙂
Brilliant! You are growing heaps and bounds.
So much in such a short story.. Amazing stuff.!!!
“Mimi” sounds familiar.