Page 19 - You Only Live Once [BooksLD]

The shower is where I stand as myself—naked, vulnerable, and all on my
own.

You must feel that I am incomplete. But that’s not true. I feel complete.
But how can one be complete in solitude? Beneath this flowing shower, I
feel wholly myself. I feel that I no longer have to dress up like my family
wants me to, sing like they want me to, or attend customary weekend social
parties like they’d like me to.

I am myself sans all the responsibilities and the rituals they find
themselves entangled in. I don’t want to fit in. I want to be myself.

I walk out of the bathroom and move to the wardrobe to pick up the box
kept amidst my clothes. I pick up a pair of binoculars from the drawer, a
pair of slippers from another, and my diary from the bedside.
I had finished my packing long back. These are just some add-ons. But I
feel unsettled, anxious that I might still have left something. I scan the room

in haste but don’t find a thing that I would have missed. Have you ever
looked at a room as if it were your last time? Register every single detail of
it. I have spent five years in this room. I give a final look to the walls done
up by me, and I shut the door.

Before leaving the house I also glance upon my incomplete family photo.
Have you ever looked at someone’s face so closely as to register every
detail of it? As if you know that you are looking at it for the last time? I
could never get over the resentment that he never made a bigger effort to
seek out the truth. I had to remember my Dad’s passive eyes and, of course,
his mouth that kept at par with his eyes.

I had to remember every bit of his face.

They say, out of sight is out of mind. If you can forget that 10 Euro note
in the pocket of your jeans, you can forget anything until you chance upon
it again.
Is holding on difficult? Is letting go easy?

I reach the airport just in time. I could not afford to miss this flight. I am
flying out of Europe, all on my own, for the first time. As I make my way
towards the check-in baggage counter, I exchange smiles with another girl
who seems to be of Indian origin. She seems to be my age and is travelling

on her own too.