Page 132 - Till the Last Breath . . .

‘LET ME HAVE A LOOK,’ Arman said sternly, but Dushyant kept

rolling from side to side, frothing at the mouth.
Overhearing the commotion, Pihu got down from her bed. ‘Let him see
it,’ she implored and Dushyant let his hand free.

Arman took a cursory look and said, ‘I think it’s broken.’
‘But I didn’t FUCK FUCK FUCK fall that hard,’ Dushyant said, his face

wet with tears and sweat. ‘Arghhhhh. It’s hurting!’ he shouted.
‘Your bones seem to be a mush,’ Arman noticed.

‘I think I know what it is,’ Pihu reasoned and added, ‘It’s cadmium
poisoning which is killing his liver.’

Even as Dushyant watched Pihu in disgust, Arman’s brain cells tingled
and he was stunned. It made perfect sense. She was right. How could I not
see it? Dushyant whined in pain as Arman smiled at Pihu. YES! Pihu

seemed to say with her eyes.

Later that night, Dushyant was scheduled for surgery to get the bone in his

left hand fixed. Arman went over all his reports again. Cadmium poisoning
fitted and all the vital symptoms could be accounted for. His other problems
wouldn’t have been so hard on his liver, if acting alone. Finally, after days

of groping in the dark, they had an approach that could get Dushyant better.
It took Arman a long time to get Pihu to sleep. She had beeen smiling

from ear to ear ever since she got the diagnosis right. For the last three
hours, he had been making constant trips to her room to keep a check on

her. A strange feeling of being dependent—even if it was in a small way—
disgusted him a little. But the contentment of seeing her sleep calmly stirred

something much more human in him. With time, he had come to see only
patients, not people, not problems but diseases, not emotions but
weaknesses, and fallible human character. Something had changed in him;

something that reminded him of a life he had left behind.
The operation was to last two and a half hours and the treatment for

cadmium poisoning wouldn’t start until the next day. Arman felt like he had
just closed his eyes when someone knocked on his door. It was Zarah. Isn’t

she early? He looked at his watch and found that it was already eight. He