The Secret wish List (10 page)

That night, l am awake for a very long time. The more I think about it, the surer I am. I feel light and happy and also excited and frightened. It is as though a weight is off my shoulders and I suddenly know what I want. I haven’t felt this way in a long time.

As I fly back to Bangalore, back to my normal life the next day, I make up my mind that I am going to strike off each and every item on my wish list except perhaps No. 6 which will remain my secret fantasy.

No matter what it takes.

Vibha is right. I have never really
lived
my life. But, now I want to.

But there is only one thing: I have no idea how I will do it.

Ten

S
O THAT IS HOW IT IS BORN
. M
Y SECRET WISH LIST
.

In the darkness of the night and the suspended isolation of the plane’s interiors where your life is on pause mode, my wish list seems to be believable, achievable even and, most of all, perfectly sane.

But the moment I land in Bangalore and take a pre-paid cab home (Sandeep does not come to the airport—his team from Korea is still visiting), the vacuity of my wish list begins pressing down on me, like a phantom ghost whose weight you feel but cannot see.

I wonder what has got into me. Why did I ever listen to Vibha? What a crazy thing to do—write down a wish list which I don’t have a hope in hell of achieving. And how foolish was I to feel determined about achieving it. How could I? Ordinarily, I should have been able to dismiss it as just as something I did for a lark. Just something I did to please Vibha. But the wish list seems to have taken on a life of its own. I am unable to dismiss it. It is as though the words I have written on paper have transformed themselves into a coil of rope which has wrapped itself around my neck and is pulling me towards my desires.

I open the paper once again. As I look at it, my heart begins to beat faster. The words beckon me, taunt me, mock me, ask me to
live
my life, and bring my wish list to fruition.

I sigh, fold the paper neatly and put it away and pull my thoughts towards what I will cook for dinner, and how happy Abhay will be when I pick him up from his grandmother’s house. It is almost as if I have shoved the list into a bottle, shut it tight, thrown it into the sea and returned to my normal life.

To my surprise, Abhay does not seem to have missed me at all. In fact, he looks mildly disappointed at my return.

My mother-in-law gives me a knowing smile as if to say, ‘See, this is how you raise children. See how happy he is?’

I do not mind at all. I am relieved that he has been happy in my absence.

‘You should do this more often, Diksha. The child is very comfortable here. This apartment complex has so many more facilities than your house. So many children to play with. We have a pool, the park, tennis—everything. I really don’t know what Sandeep sees in staying in that independent house, when I myself prefer an apartment. People have to change with changing times,’ she says.

She is truly modern, my mother-in-law. She is so practical and correct in her thinking. But Sandeep loves the independent house with the tiny oasis of greenery that surrounds it.

‘Ma, you know how he is. He hates “living in mid-air” as he calls it,’ I answer.

‘I know. It is not that we haven’t had this conversation so many times before. Anyway, I do enjoy having Abhay over. He is such a lovely child. You really should do this more often, you know. Get away from the husband, kid,’ she winks and there is a twinkle in her eye.

I smile back at her, thankful for having such an understanding person in my life.

‘And how is Vibha coping?’ she asks.

‘She is being brave. She is holding up remarkably well. But this has come as such a sudden shock. She now wants to take a sabbatical from work and spend more time with Monu,’ I answer.

‘And rightfully too. These moments with children, they never come back,’ she says.

On the way back home, Abhay quizzes me about my trip. I tell him that Mohan Mama has gone to heaven. We talk about death. He is at an age where the adult world doesn’t completely make sense, but he is beginning to understand that certain things are irreversible. I feel a bit awkward, so I change the topic deftly and ask him to tell me all about his school and his stay with his grandmother. He is still not old enough to realise when the topic is being changed. He happily chatters about all the delicious food that his granny fed him, the new friends he made, and how he even took a free swimming lesson at the apartment pool without the coach realising.

‘Oh my God! How did you manage that?’ I ask in surprise.

‘He doesn’t even know who the students are, Mummy. He should know better. Else he will get cheated of his money,’ shrugs Abhay.

I smile inwardly but nevertheless do my motherly duty and tell him not to do it again.

When Sandeep returns in the evening, it does not occur to him to ask me about Vibha. He merely hands over his briefcase (like always) and waits for his customary cup of tea.

I long to talk to Sandeep all about it. To tell him how difficult it has been for me to be the strong one and cushion Vibha’s shock. To describe how I sorted out the finances and what a big difference my being there has made to Vibha. My eyes beg him silently to ask me how it all went. My heart begs him to show a little concern. I want some conversation, some understanding from his end. I do need him—can’t he see that?

But he is so immersed in his BlackBerry, furiously replying to mails or whatever it is that he does on his phone, that he hears neither my heart’s whispers nor notice the plea in my eyes.

We continue to sit and sip our respective cups of tea and even though we are sitting close together in a serene beautiful garden, we are a million miles away from each other.

It hits me with a sudden pang of realisation that I have never ever felt lonelier in my marriage of fifteen years.

I feel like lashing out at Sandeep, telling him we need to talk, or rather I need to talk and I want him to listen. But, remembering the last showdown I had, I say nothing and I continue sitting there and watch him fiddle with his phone, increasingly resentful of my relationship with the man I married and the path that my life seems to have taken.

The next day, I wait for Abhay to leave for school and for Sandeep to leave for work. I desperately want to talk to Vibha and find out how she is coping.

I call her as soon as the house is empty.

Her phone keeps ringing but there is no answer.

After a few seconds, I get a text from her:

With neighbours. Check mail.

I rush to the computer and log in to my email account. There is a long mail from Vibha.

Hey, my lovely sis,

Just want to give you a huge big thank-you for being around when I needed you most. I am deeply grateful. I know how it must have been for you to leave Sandeep and Abhay behind and stay on for so many days. You have no idea how much it meant to me.

I wouldn’t be lying if I said I couldn’t have coped without you.

My decision to take a sabbatical has left me with copious amounts of time. My home is in perfect running order, as I had organised everything in clockwork precision to cope with my absence from it due to the demands of my career.

Diksha, I am so used to being busy all the time that I am finding this sudden change a little strange. Of course, I do not regret it, but it just struck me that I am actually writing a personal email after ages! I have written nothing but work-related mails.

I spend every waking hour with Monu when she is around. But when she goes to playschool, I find time hanging heavy on my hands. It is still so hard to accept that Mohan is gone. I have discovered that the best way to pull myself out of the grief mode is to immerse myself completely in something or the other. I try to switch off, Diksha, and try to think of other things.

Ever since you left, I have been thinking of your wish list. Just do it, girl! Don’t dwell too much on it. I am going to make it my personal mission to see that everything you wrote on it is ticked off. Every single thing. Okay, not the last one. I do not approve of extramarital affairs, but everything else on that list is doable. Life is indeed so short. Consider it my way of saying a thank-you to you for all that you have done for me.

And before I forget, I took the liberty of registering you at this really cool site I discovered called ‘Blast from the Past.’ An office colleague had recommended it to me. It lets you list all the places you have worked at, lived in, studied at and helps you find common friends. You would have got a confirmatory email in your inbox. Check it out please, and if you do not want to, you need not accept. But do look.

And hey, let’s video-chat soon.

Love you, my beautiful sis. I feel so lucky to have you in my life.

Stay blessed and beautiful,

Vibha

I read her mail one more time and feel ridiculously happy. She does sound like she is coping. I am happy to help her in whatever way I can. I am glad that she is ticking off stuff on
her
wish list, stuff that matters to her most, like spending time with Monu.

I take out my wish list from my bag and look at it again.

All my wishes seem outrageously impossible given my current circumstances. How will I go alone on a vacation, do snorkelling, wear a bikini? Yet here is Vibha urging me to complete them. And to top it, she says she will make it her life’s mission!

I check the mail and, sure enough, as Vibha said, there is an email from the site asking me to click on a link and confirm my email id.

I click on it and it opens to a site which shows some people smiling happily apparently in the company of long-lost friends. There are testimonials and success stories of how people found friends they had lost in touch with forever.

There is a profile form to fill.

I look at it and think for a minute. Then I decide to fill it. After all, what do I have to lose?

I complete it fairly quickly, filling in all the details, listing the school I studied in, the college I went to. I wonder if anyone from school will even remember me now. Eighteen years is a long time. I highly doubt the possibility of someone
actually
contacting me. I have never worked anywhere and so that entire section is blank. I list my hobbies as ‘art’ even though it has been ages since I have held a paintbrush or painted.

Then I click ‘register’ and an icon pops up, thanking me for registering and asking me to wait by my mail box.

‘You never know who will get in touch with you,’ it says.

I smile and close the site and then I compose a mail to Vibha.

Hey Vibha,

I love you too! Deeply. But you are mad!

You have way too much time on your hands, woman! What is this? You are making it your life’s MISSION to see that I achieve my wish list which I wrote on a lark and because you forced me to!

You are hereby certified MAD.

And by the way, I did register at the site you asked me to. It cheekily said, ‘You never know who is going to get back into my life.’

Yeah! Right! Like my life is going to change because someone from my past gets in touch.

I am really glad that your sabbatical is going well and that you are enjoying having time with Monu. I do know I want something more from life, Vibha. But I am not sure what.

It gave me great pleasure to help you look after Monu, and likewise to have been of use in sorting out Mohan’s financials. I felt needed for the first time in years and I must admit, it was a great feeling.

You’re holding up awesome, girl. I am so proud of you and the way you are coping,

We will video-chat soon.

Love,

Diksha

I think about Vibha and how remarkably well she seems to be holding up. I think about how she is pushing me to achieve my wish list. Maybe she does have a point. Life is indeed short. Even thinking about the things on the wish list fills me with joy. Is it because it seems like a forbidden fruit bringing some excitement to my otherwise dull and mundane life?

Or, is it because I have finally listed what I want, as opposed to what my parents, or my son, or my husband want for me. But whatever it is, even if I acknowledge that I do want to do all the things on the wish list, how in the world is Vibha going to help me achieve it?

She did sound determined and sure in the mail.

And even before I log off, her reply to my mail pops up in my inbox. I realise that she must own a BlackBerry or one of those fancy phones which allow you to access your mail instantly.

Diksha!

You say you want something out of life. And you do not know what!

Well, I know. You just need to
find yourself
. It is not some new-age women’s lib mumbo-jumbo I am feeding you.

You need to do the things YOU want, Diksha. When was the last time you did that?

Now open your wish list and go!

Do it, girl!

Live your life. Take it from someone who really knows.

Will call you soon.

Lots of love,

Vibha

Is it really possible? I read my wish list again.