When we named stars...(short story 5)

She was my sister. Yes, she was.That doesn’t mean she isn’t anymore…but it means…that the title is not held by anybody.
She was wild, rebellious, fiercely independent, fun and sometimes responsible. She taught me to have fun and always pulled me back from the lines that I had strayed close to and that weren’t to be crossed. She also taught me to love myself. She took her older sister duties very seriously, but I could tell her anything. Sometimes she would work things behind the scenes - bringing about disciplinary actions, where the directives came from my parents but were suggested by my sister in private. She had a dry wit and a quirky sense of humour. She was always laughing and smiling…and was very effervescent. She never felt the need to go with rest of the flock and loved to be different…but she did have a dark side…
she was sometimes insecure,moody & morbid … often thinkin about death…wondering about the ‘after life’.
I remember the day she told me….there were no tears in her eyes…I assumed this was because she was shocked by the news. But some part of me told me that she was never meant to be here…she knew it too…life was a bit too serious for her…
The last few days were spent in the hospital. I remember the penultimate day clearly…her friends had come over and she was joking about life & death…and I couldn’t hold my tears back. I couldn’t imagine a life without her. A life without her silly jokes, her insightful yet ironic remarks bout life, her hugs when I was sick, our gossip sessions…how would I ever live without her? Yet she was acting like a silly teenager, cracking jokes about something so large and so destructive, that it seemed like a train coming at you from the opposite direction.
When she saw me crying she asked her friends to leave us alone for sometime. She called me bunny…nobody but my sister called me bunny..that was her gift for my second birthday – a pink stuffed bunny, which I had taken a fascination to, at a toy store. I loved it so much that she started calling me a button-nose bunny.
I walked up to her bed with my head in my hands. She patted the bed, signalling I sit next to her. I did….and jumped right into her arms. She asked me what the matter was….and I accused her of being infantile…immature…of being unable to see how serious the matter was…all my frustrations and fears of the last eight months were etched in the language I used and the manner in which I spoke…
And she said in a half-consolatory manner, hey bunny….” then she paused and said “I’m more scared than you’d ever know…I’m scared of what lies beyond…about where I’m going next….even more scary is wether there is anything next…anything beyond…but im sure you’ll do fine without me. I’m sure you’ll think of me…remember me…whenever something happens…you know..when you get married, in the typical movie style…..you’ll think of the funny quotes on marriage I used to message to you and laugh….or when you have kids you’ll think of our childhood..or when you have too many chocolates and I feel very jealous I’ll come and haunt you..maybe like in “ghost”..i’ll communicate with coins…and probably throw some coins at a guy, if he’s the wrong kind of guy for you..but im telling you right now,im not possessing whoopi …” she declared, “she’s too cranky for me…”she ended.
For the first time, ever since she was diagnosed with leukemia I laughed…at her silly joke. I hugged her tight and said, “I love u, jiju”…and for the first time ever since her diagnosis, I saw two tears roll down her cheeks…as she said, “I love you bunns”.
The next one hour was the most special one in my life.We spoke about how she was one of the first few people to see me as soon as I was born..how pink & small I looked…and how happy she was to have a baby sister to play with as soon as she came home from school…how lucky she was to have a sister like me…and other memories came flooding back - how she dressed me up in teddy’s clothes, how when I was two and she was five she tied me up to our cockerspaniel, scampy and let him loose in the house..which he did, dragging me…how I used to hide her books behind the cupboard so that she would get into trouble…
We stopped reminiscing when her friends came back in to say goodbye. Little did I know she would breathe her last the next night…and I wasn’t there with her. I got the news at ten in the night. I didn’t go to the hospital because I was not to travel in the night, the roads being unsafe.Besides I had to make the arrangements to receive the body.
I went to the terrace…our favourite place…where we sometimes had our impromptu midnight picnics during the summer holidays…with lemon juice & potato chips…we sometimes named the stars…but invariably forgot the location of the stars we had named and would start naming them all over again…
But that night I got down on my knees & cried…I cried till I was numb…till I felt hollow inside. I felt I couldn’t face seeing her body the next day.. I just couldn’t…but I did. Because the very next morning I got the letter she had written addressed to me… she seemed to give me courage from beyond…and the humour made me smile…when I thought I would never smile again. She was always the emotional & sensitive kind.
Santosh is back.. I better give him somethin to eat. Besides I don’t want to frighten him.. I always see fear writ on his face,when he sees me this moody. He’s scared itll affect the baby. I hope this one too is a girl child. I’m sure sudiptha and the baby would have as much as fun as we did. I would love to name her bunny but I know what Sanjana would say- “that is positively traumatic for the child…being named after an animal that is associated with ugly huge teeth and carrot breath….!”