All that Matters

Menoka covers her nose with the open end of her sador as she sponges the dirt off the recliner. Its discoloured fabric gathers fresh layers of dust every morning but Dr. Neog refuses to move it inside. So, the chair stays, perched at the centre of their veranda. Seeing her struggle with the dust pains him, but his countenance shows more annoyance than remorse. She smiles, momentarily, before a repressed cough weighs upon her lungs. In the last two years, her disease has acquired a traumatic frequency. The highway, a few yards away from their house is repaired every quarter of the year. Every time a new contractor takes up the project, he fell trees, widens the pavement and starts afresh. The money assigned dries up and another contractor takes over, repeating the whole process. Houses dotted on both sides of the road suffer the tomfoolery. Residents can barely open their windows, the colour of their houses dulled by accruing shades of sand. 

“This is why I tell you not to dust,” the doctor chides her. Menoka gulps a wad of spit. He drags his arthritic feet into the kitchen, and carefully prepares the thick concoction of tuloxi juice. Menoka accepts without protest. And thus, they forgive each other for the inconvenience they cause by being less mindful for their age.

After his superannuation six years ago, Dr. Neog has spent his mornings admiring the life he had built before his house. The few yards of his land are flanked by a garden that gloats with Neog’s veneration. The wall on the east side is ensconced by an undergrowth of pumpkin leaves ever skirmishing for space with the bottle gourds. The doctor has built a bamboo shed for the vines to crawl. Towards the west are rows of papayas, two different varieties of mangoes and tamarind- Menoka’s favourites. Smaller plants, pruned once in a while include peas, okra and beans. Herbs, including fish mint and pennywort sparsely pockmark the ground. From the ceiling of the veranda hang a few plastic pots of varying colours, holding Menoka’s houseplants. Another set of concrete pots embellish the lane between the gate and the porch. There she grows purple and white chrysanthemums, pink cosmos and the yellow narjee. 

The doctor totters into the garden, submitting himself to his plants.  He picks the broom balanced against the shed and sweeps the ground, thrusting the fallen leaves into the corner of the wall. With unsteady hands, he straightens bent stems and affixes them to tiny logs of wood. 

People notice him. No one in their right minds would dare to spend entire mornings in their front yards, inhaling dust. They ponder about his deteriorating health and show concern about his longevity. For the doctor, however, it is no affectation. All his life was spent in the upkeep of others. He has been his family’s debtor and he knows no other way to pay off his debts. Each tree on his garden marks his love for the family Menoka gave him. In a way, he has implanted them, tender yet salient, in the roots of these plants that he tended to. He has done everything to ensure that the garden thrived, attended seminars conducted by the town’s agriculture department, bought seeds from the farmer’s market, and even reached out to soil scientists querying about the pros of organic fertilisers. 

The gate screeches behind, startling Dr Neog. He turns to find Rimli on her scooter, slowly sliding into the driveway. Without saying anything, she takes off her helmet and walks inside. 

“This early?” Menoka shouts from the kitchen. Rimli does not reply. She washes her face and settles at the dining table. 

“Tea?” Menoka asks again. 

“No,” she is curt. “Maa, come here, please.” 

Menoka lowers the gas flame and walks into the dining room. 

“Dropped Niyor at school,” Rimli says, struggling to reach for the jar that sits on the table. Menoka passes it to her. 

“Maa, did Baba receive any notice recently?” she asks. Menoka shakes her head. 

“It will come,” she pours water into her mouth.

“About what?” 

“They are expanding the highway again,” she pauses, presses onto her temples and continues, “apparently, they will make four lanes over it. Sonjoy showed me the manual that has come to their office. Part of the garden here will go, I believe”, she explains. Menoka stays quiet. 

“There will be compensation,” she adds gingerly. Menoka nods, still unable to register most of it. 

The notice comes later that afternoon. Dr. Neog receives it himself. The sealed packet has come from the District Commissioner’s office. He calls out to Menoka, asking her to bring his glasses. Standing next to the heap of dried leaves, he reads it. It contains a pre-printed estimate of his immovable assets, accounting for more than a quarter of his land. The solemn contents are jarring and the doctor reads them twice, just to be sure.  

“The government wants our land”, he speaks, his eyes knitted into an anxious furrow. Menoka looks at his wrinkles, they appear denser than usual. She takes the paper from his hand. The measurements entail that the garden and one-third of the veranda would be snatched.  

“But Rimli said that it would not be much…” the words fall from her mouth. Menoka wants to ask if there would really be any compensation but she does not. Dr Neog draws into the house without replying. In reeling from the shock so fresh, he does not know what to do or look for. An unsettling conscience hits him. He should have known better when he bought this piece of land. He should have known that his life- much like his past- was disposable. He should have understood how governments work, how easy it was to be uprooted and thrown away when all one cared about was the ‘larger good.’ 

Was it not for the larger good that he ignored minor health hazards when pharmaceutical units erupted on residential locations? Did he not help the municipality demolish makeshift stalls on the medical college road because the crowd disgusted him? During his tenure as a medical officer, he helped this town’s decadent bourgeois in resurrecting the place with his certain advises, slighting all sense of causalities that felt like stuck fishbone. Why does he find it so difficult to contribute once again to the larger good of this place? 

Dr. Neog came to this town as a medical student with a scholarship few managed to secure. Befriending a group of boys whose fathers ran the town’s administration discreetly, he too enlisted for himself a calcified status. To fit in, the doctor took great pains. He became a member at the Gymkhana Club and learnt horse riding. On weekends, he attended parties in Bungalow 15, drank imported alcohol and with his first salary, bought an ambassador that he still drives. Slowly, he removed himself from the remains of his home, miles away, entrusting it to memory alone. That changed after retirement. The centre of privilege that looked enticing in the prime of his life acquired rust. The rapid changes the town fancied snuffed the last remaining embers of a dream he could only halfway materialise, a dream Dr. Neog was glad to outgrow. And so, he erased himself off the canvas that held them together. 

The doctor emerges out of his room. He suddenly looks older. He asks Menoka to bring him the car keys. Menoka hesitates but the lines of rage shimmering on her husband’s forehead makes her walk into their bedroom where the keys are kept. Soon, Dr. Neog finds himself driving down the scrawny, sandy road that leads up to the dockyard. 

When the ghat materialises before his eyes, the new settlement of immigrants bordering the upper end of the area is the first thing he sees. People gawk at his ancient vehicle, and children holler after it, trying to race along. A huge field separates the hamlet from the bank. He parks his car next to a line of Tata Sumos. The doctor takes his time to walk down the slope. Below, he sees college students strolling along the sandbars, couples sitting on tree skeletons, and parents clicking pictures of their toddlers in flamboyant dresses against the river’s serene backdrop.   

The doctor finds an empty bench and sits, facing the Brahmaputra.  The last fleet of ferries for the day have set sail with the mellowing late afternoon sun ahead. By the time they reach Majuli, it would be sundown. On the bank, a ferry has dropped anchor. The disembarking takes time. Workers gather around, placing huge planks of wood between the ship and the bank, creating a bridge for the motor vehicles inside the ships to crawl down. The crew help the other passengers, unloading their luggage after them.  

The doctor intently listens to their chatter. Despite the years, the complaints have not changed. Time rolls indefinitely before him, uplifting a thin sheet of fog that had kept a past concealed. Suddenly, he is a boy of fifteen and his arms are wrapped around his sister’s unconscious body. They are on a mar boat that wobbles violently. An overcast monsoon sky dims the surroundings. The temporary light house on this side of the river stands guard, warning boats about rising water levels. The helmsman prays. “What is it? Move fast,” the boy shouts. The helmsman turns the boat instead. “We cannot proceed further. You see the red light? That means it is dangerous. We won’t make it.” A fork of lightning hits the shore. A hailstorm is on the loose. The helmsman clicks his tongue. The boy screams. When they reach home, his sister is gone.  

With a sudden jolt, Neog snaps out of his trance. He fumbles for his keys and leaves the place immediately. 

At home, Neog takes out the notice again. He reads the clauses over and over, trying to find a loophole. There is none. The diction leaves no room for escape from the labyrinth. 

Menoka brings him a cup of black tea, peppered with a pinch of salt.  She places it on the desk and turns to leave. Neog grabs her wrist. 

“Sit,” he orders, directing her to the adjoining chair. She abides.

“Do you remember, Menoka, when I first brought you into this house?” 

Menoka holds his hands in a tight clasp. 

The doctor was fifteen when his father’s house was washed away by the hungry river. The unsatiated ebbs destroyed everything else. Their paddy fields rotted under inundated pools and their poultry drowned. Neog’s sister, who died in his arms, suffered excruciatingly from typhoid because this town did not extend its godly arms to the river island to cure their diseases. After her death, the three members of his family began living at his mama’s home when the flood next year swept away that house too. Neog’s mother survived to see him become a man of dignity. It was as if the penury, the tragedy and the remedy were all parts of his mother’s trousseau. Dr. Neog became a reputed surgeon. This old town became his new address. And he frantically sought to root himself in it. His mother did not live long enough to see him build a life away from the epicentre of loss. But she died in the care of nurses and after receiving the best treatment available. The doctor could give her a proper funeral. He could mourn her in peace. 

Menoka came into his life when he was treating the District Magistrate’s wife. He was their physician. The first time he entered the magistrate’s house, he was besotted with Menoka’s candour.  Desire raised its reckless head.  He craved for a home and a family. For the next five years, he worked tirelessly to buy this piece of land. He built the house with great foresight. The garden began as a diminished replica of the one he had seen at the magistrate’s house, the one Menoka was fond of, and later acquired a character of its own. And finally, he gathered the courage to ask for her hand. The magistrate gave her away happily.  

They sit, silently holding hands, well into an hour when Menoka suddenly looks at the clock and rises from her seat. “Time for medicine,” she excuses herself.  A thick bout of cough forces its way out of her as she walks out. Neog takes a sidelong glance at her silhouette disappearing around the corridor. Without ever complaining, she gave him a chance at having a complete life. 

The next day, Rimli comes home to help Menoka pack her bags. It is decided that Menoka would directly move into Rimli’s house and stay there until they find a new place. The doctor would join soon, but before that, he would clear all pending bills, and donate some books from his library. Except the recliner, a divan and a table, all other furniture goes with Menoka. 

“But who will cook for you?” Menoka asks, worried. 

“Hah, as if I cannot manage. Leave the stove too”, the doctor smiles. 

A week passes by and he neither clears the bills nor donates his books. Whenever Rimli comes, asking for an update, he gives her the same assurance, “I will come soon. Just a few formalities are left.”

Weeks become a month. One Tuesday morning, the doctor hears the bulldozer rumbling through the dust tracks of the neighbourhood that was there no more. He saunters into his veranda. The vehicle stops before the gate. The contractor in charge of the operation walks up to him. “Sir, we will begin demolishing now, please cooperate,” he makes a polite command. Neog does not respond. Moments later, he hears the first uproar. 

The bricks tumble from the west. Unruffled by the noise, the doctor drags his recliner to his yard and sits in it. His eyes fall on the broken wall. The serrated iron claws of the beast guillotine his mango trees, ready for the next strike. The doctor shuts his eyes and crosses his legs.