Uma slouched on the couch staring at the pile of clothes in front of her. It was one more moment in a string of inconspicuous moments that she lived each day. An erstwhile banker, her life was now filled with household chores which she carried on dutifully, devoid of any emotion whatsoever. Many mornings wasted looking at the TV screen as the middle-aged British newsreader spoke in a monotone about events in the neighborhood...someone who disposed. their junk mail in the public waste bin was not caught on camera and fined. Such inconsequential news gave her an appropriate canvas every morning to paint her picture of imagined reality. And so she did !
She thought about Arvind's growing weight, his increasing carelessness with his diet, of his returning home one day complaining of chest pain, of not knowing how to drive him to get medical help on time, of the undependable national health system, of the perils of living in a foreign land, of having to call his brother in the US to convey the news that he is no more, of his parents and family visiting on hearing the news and complaining as usual of how she was not vigilant of his health and diet, of why she was adamant about not learning how to drive, of the way she kept the house !
She got up and started to fold the clothes...
She thought about Arvind's growing weight, his increasing carelessness with his diet, of his returning home one day complaining of chest pain, of not knowing how to drive him to get medical help on time, of the undependable national health system, of the perils of living in a foreign land, of having to call his brother in the US to convey the news that he is no more, of his parents and family visiting on hearing the news and complaining as usual of how she was not vigilant of his health and diet, of why she was adamant about not learning how to drive, of the way she kept the house !
She got up and started to fold the clothes...
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