Page 240 - Till the Last Breath . . .

and her and she could see Dushyant’s horror-struck face hidden behind the

curtain.
‘Do we really have to do it now? You said seven, not five,’ her father
begged.

Arman’s head hung low. He said in a soft yet assertive voice, ‘I know,
Uncle, but the surgery room will be inspected later, early tomorrow

morning. We have to schedule the surgery right now or we won’t be able to.
Please try to understand.’

‘But … but …’ Her mother wailed and threw herself at Pihu, who felt
helpless and a little scared. ‘Don’t take her, she is fine!’ she shrieked.

‘I will be okay,’ Pihu whispered, with tears in her eyes.
Her father, too, joined Pihu in her bed and both of them hugged her.
There was no stopping the tears now. Arman cowered in a corner and he

looked scared, too. She waited for Arman to look at her and when he did,
she smiled meekly at him as if to say, I am ready.

The ward boys shifted her to the stretcher and slowly started to roll her
away, her parents still clutching both of her hands and walking beside her.

She took a deep breath and braced herself for what was going to follow. She
had led a good life. She had no regrets. As she passed Dushyant, she

noticed the shock on his face, too. She smiled at him and moved her lips to
say, ‘I will be back. Don’t worry.’
Dushyant smiled at her and the stretcher was out of the room. Her parents

said a million things to her about how much they loved her. She closed her
eyes and thought how superfluous and unnecessary those words were. She

knew. If she died, their loss would be far greater than hers. She knew they
knew she loved them.

As Arman bent over, pretending to help the ward boys roll the stretcher
into the lift, he whispered in her ears, ‘I love you, my beautiful wife.’