That intensive zone

What do you do when a dear one is in danger zone? Discuss cricket scores, exchange daily reports, and tell each other to keep the faith. My ...

What do you do when a dear one is in danger zone? Discuss cricket scores, exchange daily reports, and tell each other to keep the faith. My mom was in intensive care, lost somewhere amid the tubes that ran through her and the monitors that loomed over her. So were five others, separated by a thin curtain. Ahuja uncle, whose sons hovered around him constantly, the old lady in the bed next to mom’s, the maverick husband struck by several ailments, the aunty whose daughter tirelessly did the rounds of hospital and home, and the striking young girl across mom’s bed. Outside the ICU, we — the patients’ families and friends — fought exhaustion. And as we marched back and forth to look in on our patients, we connected. Dad hit it off with the sisters — they who had come from Kerala to Mumbai in search of work and my dad who had long left his native place.

The first lucky one to make it out of the ICU was Ahuja uncle. But that gave his sons more cause for worry. Because their dad was a cricket buff and the special room had a TV. Worse, India were playing Australia. Everyone crammed into their room that day. And uncle was out on his walking stick the next.

There was no comfort for the old lady’s relatives. The young girl, who never left her bedside, complained ‘‘dadi’’ was refusing to eat. It turned out they were not related. The old lady and her husband had taken her in as a child after their children left home. Now, with her husband gone, her own life in peril, dadi made rasping pleas that the girl be looked after well.

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In the bed across was Sonali, the braveheart. I usually think twice about parting with a book, but when I saw Sonali, her face whiter than the sheets she was swathed in, I went up to her. We couldn’t have been more than a couple of years apart. She was a young mother and a professional. I learnt she was a regular at the hospital. The docs, nurses — everyone knew her. This time, she’d called to announce her arrival.

The offer of the book was readily taken up. The next morning, Sonali told me it had helped her sleep after a long time. From then, I stopped by her bed every day. She never ceased to surprise. While the other patients ate whatever the hospital dished out, her meals were delivered from restaurants around. She even picked and chose her medicines. She knew what was best for her, she declared, and no doc was going to meddle with that. The “heart has its own reasons which reason knows nothing about”. And though it was acting up, she was not going to stop listening to what it told her.

Soon it was time for Sonali to go home. Phone numbers were swapped along with promises to stay in touch. Mom was discharged soon after with a fond farewell. I went to visit Sonali. And we continue to keep in touch. Hospitals are not supposed to do this, but sometimes bonds are waiting to be forged in the strangest of places.

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