Echoes Of Her

THE TAPES

जो ख़त्म हो किसी जगह, ये ऐसा सिलसिला नहीं

I always find myself wondering what her last words and thoughts might have been before the grim reaper came over to her with a sly smile as he then extracted her soul to be returned to its creator, residing in the heavens above.

Did she think of me?

Did she have words which were unsaid too, because it was, perhaps too late?

Did she leave anything behind for me to breathe in the essence of her?

Did I even mean anything to her?

I do catch myself thinking if it is all in my head a couple of times but her voice note always proves me wrong. It has the power to pull me out of my reality and put me into this perfect fantasy in my mind where both of us exist happily without any worldly problems and restrictions.

I assume I will never find out. It has been 3 months since her departure from earth.

I too, shall, move on.

I too, shall, force my heart to belong to someone else.

I too, shall, slowly forget about her existence, like everyone else.

I too, shall look for someone else to hold on to.

How could I ever? How could I let her go? Because, all my heart does is chant the rhythm of her name, not minding if the sun is ruling the skies.

She means everything to me, like oxygen to the aerobic and light to the photosynthetic, despite never exchanging any words because the longing stares and secret glances we shared are equivalent to making love in my terms.

I agree, the touch of one's beloved is a way to ascending heaven in a lover's terms but her smile intended towards me is worth more than a place ruled by selfish gods.

The doorbell rings, pulling me out of my trance as my mother calls my name. I do as she asks me to; receive whatever is intended for us to be delivered. I open the front door and the cold winter air grazes my cheeks as if kissing them with love while my skin reacts to it shyly, turning red. Oh dear, everyone is indulged in romance while I couldn't even hold her hands on a winter morning. Were her hands warm or cold by touch? Guess it's too late to find out.

The delivery woman says my name and it pulls me out of my trance. It is surprising to see when she smiles at me as I tell her the person she's asking for is me. She hands me a small cardboard box whose contents make a rough sound when shaken. I sign the paper she hands me and close the door softly when she leaves. I take it inside, placing it on my table as I stare at it, then decide to open it with the scissors on my desk. My mom yells from the other side of the house about what I received so I tell her I haven't opened it yet.

This little box addressed to me contains dry flowers framed in and audio cassettes along with a cassette player tucked in its corner. It says something, as if speaking to me or mocking me in a certain way because looking at the contents, I don't think it was all in my head. Fate is indeed a tragedy for us but a means of comedy for the residents of heavens to mock us and be entertained.

I rummage through the cassettes marked with numbers in hopes of finding my answers. I grab the one marked number 1 and then grab the player before placing it inside it, side 1 up. Something reminds me to grab my wired headphones, so i do, plugging them in and pressing the play button.

My heart stops beating for a split-second as a tear drops from my left eye and onto the player while her voice echoes in my mind.