santwana

When I entered the room every thing seemed so dark I could not make out the figure lying on the bed. . The wooden doors and windowpanes were shut tight excepting the door by which I entered. Gradually things started taking shape. The room was reeking with the smell of stale vomiting and then I saw her lying on a single bed that stood by the wall in the western side of the room. A human skeleton. Nothing in that figure could relate to the image I held of Pishi-moni. Only the head and a bent knee were exposed to an otherwise covered figure. A horribly shrunken, discoloured and rickety frame of the once beautiful person that I was so fond of was lying listless, almost like a body without the trace of life in it. She was covered with a dark coloured printed blanket. A matching pillow case framed her small head. The bedspread , pillow cover and the blanket were proof of being costly once upon a time. Just below her bed was an open bucket and from this the foul stench of retching hit me like a bullet. During my brief stay pishi-moni threw up on the bucket three times.

Pinky was jumping around the room almost like a baby monkey without a tail. Whoop, whoop, Whoop and thud, thud, thud, jumping from the divan on the floor and again on the chair. Bhulo , sitting on the floor and about to follow suit when "Oh stop it, Pinky; you are getting on my nerves. This is not a jungle but my study and you are disturbing my concentration- grumbled Mama.