“There is always an alternative to killing someone”….
The voice whispers just softly behind in my ear.
I am facing the window in the biology lab overlooking the green pond. I haven’t turned back yet and I don’t recognize the voice. I don’t talk to very many people in the class, barely even show up once in a while.
The lab is a dull dreary place. Long aluminum tables line the corner walls with wooden stools as designated seats for each student. Before us is a petri dish with a frog splayed on the back. On the left is an array of surgical tools waiting to be used.
I see those frogs jumping up and down in the big glass jar before a lab assistant picks one each and drops them in a jar of white smoking gas rendering them unconscious. The bio lab is a dissection class and each of us is now staring at an unconscious frog, its heart still beating. We all will be taught to cut them open deftly, without killing them at first as we cut the skin, then slowly examine each organ. As science students, this is our initiation into the world of biology, but also into the world of life and death. Some of us will go on to be exemplary surgeons saving thousands of lives. Some of us will end up being killers. Most of us will find our lives somewhere in the middle. We have a whole world ahead of us. We are barely 17.
I look at the frog that I have sliced open in front of me. Its heart still beating outpaces the beating of mine as I look at each organ, lifting, probing, watching. However, I am consumed by a question that I have been meaning to ask someone around here for a while now.
I see the lab assistant pass by and stop him for a bit.
“What happens to them once we are done?”.
I am half hoping to hear that they will be stitched back close by students who are more senior to us, restored back to whole. A mythical fantasy of a young idealist, at best.
“We toss them in the ditch behind the building. They will be used as fertilizer soon”, he laughs. I laugh with him, but internally I am screaming. I look at my frog with a new-found urgency. How much will he suffer once he is back to consciousness? How long will he live in that ditch before the inevitable takes over?
The lab is almost coming to an end as I imagine myself instead of the frog- left in a ditch, sliced open, waiting for what will be coming. The legs are moving slightly as the anesthesia is wearing off. I look at it in dismay as I will it to go to sleep.
Then, I suddenly decide what I need to do. I pick up the splice, look around the lab where everyone is heads down, and with one stroke pierce the heart clean. The beating heart stops as dark red blood gushes out covering most of the organs in a pool of red. A fleck of red drop splashes on my white shirt and becomes dark immediately. I stare at it.
I pick the frog, throw it out of the open window, walk outside the lab, and stand there breathing the fresh air. Every pore of my skin is permeated with the smell of that frog, slightly pungent chloroform…. and death. I want to go home and take a shower. The career option of practicing medicine has reached its logical conclusion.
That’s when I hear the voice whispering inches away from my ear. She is standing right behind me, as tall as I am, wearing a knee-length coat in the summer, covering an above knee length dress underneath, risqué and conservative, both at the same time.
As I turn my head slightly, the first thing I notice is her silver bangles. 5, 7, 10…I lose count as she stands there in my face, inches away from me. Most Indian girls would maintain a distance, look at boys with an oft practiced disgust or avoid any form of eye contact lest it be misconstrued as unwanted attraction and yet this girl is different. Her brown eyes are looking directly into mine, watching, probing, questioning without making any overt attempt.
“What do you mean?”, I ask, slightly dazed.
She laughs easily.
“I saw what you did in there”, she points an elbow in the direction of the lab. Her hands are still in the pocket of her obnoxiously improper coat. It's summer, 93 degrees, and no Indian girl wears a dress cut above her knees along with a long coat. I would have classified her as weird, except she is stunningly beautiful, way above my league in terms of money or elegance.
“ You didn’t have to kill that thing. There is always a way if you could look to find one”
I laugh nervously and follow her as she circles the lab, walks to the window and looks at the dead frog on the ground, and then back at me.
Chastised, I stand there looking at her. I am not used to talking to girls, least of all someone like her who is in complete control of herself and her surroundings.
“Let’s pick him up and give him a proper burial”, she says as she stands there looking at me, her hands eternally glued to her coat pockets. I am spellbound as I comply, picking up the little frog, carry it to a corner under the big banyan tree next to the pond. The soil is wet, easy to dig as I lay it down and cover it with leaves. She towers above me with an amused look.
After the semi burial, we walk slowly along the length of the pond, a path less traveled towards the college posterior. The slight wind in the afternoon sun provides a much-needed relief as the leaves rustle while we walk by.
She asks me about my major and tells me about hers. I don’t think she cares about it either way. She talks as if we haven’t met 10 minutes ago. Then she suddenly stops.
“I know why you did that in there. It was a kind deed. You just didn’t want it to suffer, and I understand that…but ….”.
“What do you mean?”, I ask.
“It’s quiet up here. So peaceful”, she evades my question easily.
I look at her as she starts walking again, her back straight, chin up looking straight ahead, balancing her feet on the rocks as the afternoon sunlight shimmers in the pond just to her right. Her silver bangles continue making music.
I am still slightly confused as to what we are doing while we cross over closer to the pond before I suddenly realize that the path that she has taken is an almost dead end.
We are standing inches away from the water, green and slimy, the algae floating along its periphery.
“What would you have done if you were in my place instead?.”, I have finally found my voice.
She stands facing the pond with me on her right as she looks at me straight in the eyes. This girl is tall and has the most beautiful brown eyes that I have seen. I would never get used to that.
“As I said, there are always alternatives”, she laughs, bends down, and finally takes her hand out of her coat pocket.
The frog jumps from her hand and drops down into the mud shakily before gliding off into the water as she stands up and lights a cigarette.
Taking a deep puff, she leans against the tree, lost in thought. For a minute I don’t exist.
She finally turns towards me, shifts the cigarette on the other hand, and extends a wet handshake.
“ I am Hetali Champaneria”.
My life, as I know it, will never be the same again.
