It’s a sunny afternoon on Lexington Avenue, and I’m walking home from work when I see Mitali moving towards me. I shake my head, thinking of this as an illusion — From the leafy suburbs of Jogeshwari in Bombay to this glitzy street halfway across the globe, the universe can’t explain this as a coincidence.
At first, I almost don’t recognize her. She’s changed — dressed in a sharp suit, heels clicking against the pavement, her hair swaying just above her shoulders. On her left hand, a glittering gold band cradles a sizable diamond, catching the light as she grips a sleek leather briefcase. Everything about her says, “I’ve made it.”
Meanwhile, here I am in jeans, clutching a battered manual on ACH processing for banks.
By the time I realize it’s Mitali, it’s too late to avoid her. I wonder for a brief second if I should slow down and stop, but then instinct kicks in. She doesn’t miss a beat, holds her head straight ahead and walks towards me unflinching. Maybe she did not recognize me? After all I am no longer that gangly 21 year old. I lower my eyes and hold my breath as we pass each other, and suddenly I feel a hand grabbing my arm, and the force of that hand shoving me hard into a mailbox on the side. I whip my head around and stare at her, stunned. Passersby slow down to watch anticipating something coming.
Mitali keeps walking, then turns around, still in motion.
“Mother Fucker,” she tosses over her shoulder.
I hear people snickering.
“Mitali !” I call after her. “Wait!” But she doesn’t stop.
I stand there, watching as her back recedes into the crowd.
I head home in a daze, her voice still in my ears. I walk across the park, hating myself. She’s right. I’ll never live this down. No matter what I do, what I accomplish, for the rest of my life this will never go away.
When I get to my hotel room, I flop on the bed and stare at the ceiling. I wish I could talk to Ana if only to process my thoughts. Mitali looks as if she’s gotten her life together — or rather, that she never let it fall apart the way I did.
With her briefcase and sharp little suit, she might be a lawyer or an investment banker.
The cell phone rings an hour later, and I have an instinct that makes me answer it instead of letting the voice mail pick up. It’s the first time we’ve spoken since that night eleven years ago, when I had to load her into the back of a rusty ambulance, her hands bound crudely with gauze, blood pouring out at a rapid pace staining my shoes. I shake my head to get rid of the thought. I don’t even pause to wonder how she had found my cell phone number.
I sit up straight in bed. There is no formality of a hello or even an acknowledgment to check who it is she is talking to.
She doesn’t care to identify herself.
“You’ve gotten over her , haven’t you?” she asks.
She is talking about her dead sister.
“For a long time, now,” I lie.
“I could tell when I saw you on the street. You looked healthy. Handsome even. You have color back in your cheeks.”
Her voice, lilting and musical, is as familiar as if we’ve suddenly slipped back to our Bhawans college days.
I am silent as I breathe ever so slowly.
“Do you still think about that night….?”, she asks in a voice that sounds more like a yearning than a question.
“I try not to….I have barely stopped having the nightmares”. This time I say the truth.
“Why did you call me first that night before you…..?” I hesitate. “before you slit your wrists” , isn’t something I can throw casually at her, even after all these years have passed.
There is an annoying buzz on the line just when I want to hear even her breathing. Then she speaks again.
“She trusted you and you betrayed our trust. When she needed help, you disappeared.”. The pain in her voice is apparent but her tone is still flat.
“I told you I couldn’t help her — why didn’t you just let me be? I ask. “Why didn’t you tell someone? What started that night came close to ruining my life.”
I can hear her breathing. I don’t want her to hang up.
“It’s hard to explain,” she answers slowly, “but I had my reasons.”
I hold my breath but there is silence. I am afraid she has hung up but then I hear her breathing again.
“You never did understand, did you Z?”, her tone is sharp for a brief second.
“It was me who really loved you. She did not see you that way. I wanted you to see me, but you always looked at her. For you, I was just her little sister, wasn’t I ?…”
Seconds pass. There is a quiet on the line that feels an eternity in space.
“Say something,” There is a plea in her voice. “Anything.”
“Why did you hurt yourself Mitali?”, my head is reeling but I am starting to piece together things that have been a mystery for eleven years.
She sighs. I have never seen her this vulnerable or this distraught — Certainly not the person who sucker pushed me just an hour ago.
“I had hope that once you saw through what wasn’t there with her that you would look at me. But then she….”
Her voice trembles. “How could I compete with a dead sister, Z ? She took her life and snuffed out any hope I had.”
I hear her sobbing openly now, and her words settle heavily between us — years of devastation condensed into a single moment.
“I’m so sorry Mitali,” I say. “I never meant for any of this to happen.”
“I never meant to hurt you,” I say those words, as if my intentions could possibly matter. And for a moment I imagine that all things, even terrible burdens of love and hate, these betrayals, could somehow be healed.
I hear a faint rustling on her end — a child’s voice, the shuffle of papers, maybe the jangle of keys.. The image surfaces unbidden — Mitali standing by a sleek kitchen counter, her gold band catching the light, a life meticulously organized, someone waiting just out of view.
“Listen, can I see you? Can we talk?”
“I don’t think so,” she says gently, almost as if she were trying to forgive me.
“You’ve gotten rid of her nightmares. Be grateful for that. She took the easy way out and left us here without respite. She was the daughter to my mother, and she will always be my elder sister.
“I’ll never be rid of her or you for the rest of my life….”
