This is about this gorgeous, young, smart girl with a beautiful mind. This 22 years old young woman, graduated from a reputed college, in her prime reached the end of her rope and was about to put an end to it. What was it that pushed her to the cliff edge at this age while she is yet to see the world! None other than her own father! His day-in, day-out snarky remarks, taunts, and jibes tore at her heart and mind and that drove her to take to drugs. She did drugs for years to live through the terrible torment at her own home (hell) until one day in downbeat mood she let it on her mother that she could no longer carry on the crushing burden of her own life.

My cell phone rang at an unusual or rather at distressing hours to jolt me awake and out of bed. The woman at the other end (I had helped her through her psychological problems) sometime back, spoke on the phone brokenly, her voice panicky. In a wail of despair, she said that she had sinking feeling that something sinister about her daughter is going to happen. She begged me for help in rescuing her.  She said her daughter was feeling really low and expressing death wish and could take any untoward step.

I pleaded her to observe restraint, not to lose her calm, gave soothing words of assurance, and asked her to bring her daughter along with her to breakfast at a restaurant. I then and there reserved a table in a separate cabin in the restaurant, at a stone throw from my residence, quickly washed and changed, and got off to see the anguished mother and her daughter with a tortured mind. We made it to the entry of the restaurant just about the same time, exchanged greetings, climbed the spiral staircase up and the boy at the restaurant ushered us into a clean, quiet cabin. I put the girl next to me and her mother took seat across me. I ordered a packet of cigarette and couple of bottles of beer along with breakfast. My order of beer and cigarettes at breakfast raised eyebrows of her mother (socio-cultural context). She gaped at me with a disapproving look.  Her consternation about it was writ large on her face. Her daughter in jeans and an anorak sat glumly staring emptily through the glass window.  No words were spoken. I beamed smile at the girl, looked into her glassy pair of eyes. They were empty like a dark sky bereft of twinkling stars. Occasional twitches and knitting of brow said it all that her mind was uncontrollably noisy.

‘Lost in thoughts!’, I said grinning amiably at her. She forced a smile tinged with pain.

‘As long as we are in the table everyone goanna abide by my rules’, I announced in a no-nonsense way. The girl flicked me a nervous glance. Her mother gave a bemused smile. ‘Here, in this cabin, body rules over belief. You are not allowed to bring in your faith, belief, and values to the eating table. No food code, no drink ethics! Everyone is totally free to eat and drink what they feel like taking as long as the stuffs are served. No the done and the undone thing! Is that clear!’ I said. This put the girl off her thoughts. She stared at me from the corner of her eyes in an attempt to figure me out. Her mother opened her mouth to say something. I gestured her to keep quiet.

The breakfast was served with two bottles of chilled beer and a packet of cigarettes. I took out my cellphone and put a music on, picked a cigarette off pack, holding it between lips, said, ‘if you wouldn’t mind, can I smoke?’ The girl flicked an uncertain or rather confused glance at her mother in anticipation of her reaction before shrugging her shoulder and shaking head to suggest it was okay by her.

I held out the cigarette pack to the girl. She hesitated, acted or play-acted reluctance, threw timid look at her mother. Her mother came in on it. ‘She doesn’t smoke’, she said. ‘I know she does’, I said in an authoritative tone of voice. ‘You have no right to run her life. She’s perfectly capable to run it all by herself. I have a daughter too. She drinks and smokes. I know these young people. I know their taste. My like and dislike doesn’t hold any relevance. I repeat, everyone in the table is free to enjoy the way they want without exception. She’s every right to choose what she takes or doesn’t take. Nothing can stop her. Not even you’, I kind of admonished her. She acquiesced. The girl now accepted the cigarette without demur. I lit it up while she took a pull at it. I gave her a delighted smile. She reciprocated. We ate breakfast, drank beers, and filled cabin with swirling clouds of smoke.

‘We’re not gonna think and talk about anything that spoil fun. We put all talks on ice and let ourselves loose and enjoy today. Talks can wait. Is that clear!’, I said. ‘Yes! The girl cheered and clapped, just like that. Her mother looked at her as if she didn’t know what hit her. I could see her happiness was bursting at seams to see her daughter getting in on it.

‘Don’t bother your head about money! It’s on me’, I said to relieve her anxiety. A bottle and half of beer down the throat and the girl had come out of herself. She hummed tunes, sang song along with me. We danced together in the cabin, cracked jokes, talked about shoes, jeans, perfumes, beautiful places around the country, and planned to go for hiking over the country. She laughed her head off, laughed until she cried over some of my jokes.

She expressed need to go out for pee. No sooner she went out than the mother spoke, ‘Thank you so much. I feel greatly relieved.  I was so terrified. I dreaded I’d lose her. You’ve taken the fear out of me. Now, I am confident you’d pull her off the dark abyss of her mind, giving her depressing thoughts. I knew it that you are the one who can do it.

‘The root of problem is not in her. It is elsewhere. She’s a victim. And you know who is the villain!’, I said. ‘This beautiful girl with a brilliant mind wants to breathe freely under the sky and see the world. She’d make something of herself. I have absolutely no doubt about it. She’s blessed with everything it takes to live a great life. You’ve to act as a shield against her father at home. You’ve stoically endured unbearable pains. Show a bit of more fortitude! I promise, I fortify her mind in such a way that it’d become immune to all jibes, jeers, and taunts in a matter of weeks’, I promised. ‘I’d do as told’, she promised.

Let me paint a picture of her father. I have met him couple of times. It is beyond my ability to put a word of wisdom in his head nor any power in me to knock an ounce of sense into him. He’s dyed-in-the-wool traditionalist. He’s made of stuff that takes nothing regardless of who is saying it. He lives off her wife, for his poor health has almost crippled him. A chronic asthma patient with a debilitating health, he’d been jeered at by his peers for not having a son. That’s been his raw nerve. He’s even called impotent. They have two daughters. The one I am dealing with is the eldest. Over the last 25 years, hardly a day passed without him inflicting torture on his wife both physically and mentally for failing to bring forth a son. That drove her to insanity and she developed mental or psychiatric problems. She suffered anxiety, paranoia, and recurring hallucinations. The people around called her witch, possessed, and evil spirit. I helped her throughout in whatever way I best could. With the aid of medicine coupled with my constant support she pulled it off. She endured every bit of pain and torture that her husband gave her only for the sake of her daughters. But for her daughters, she’d have ended her life longtime back. This woman made a resolve that she’d make her daughters something of a women who she’d swell with pride on. And prove that girls are equally if not better at doing things that humans do. When her husband started to take it out on girls, hated the very sight of them, and her beautiful and brilliant daughter took refuge in drugs and slipping into depression, this broke her. She broke down inconsolably with me. This woman, I know, is the paragon of patience and tolerance. I’d be surprised to find a woman in parallel with her with the degree of stoicism and fortitude she demonstrated this far.

Sweta returned to the cabin. We ate, drank, smoked, joked and danced for hours until late afternoon. We spent the whole day with lot of fun, danced with joy, laughed bucket full of laughs at jokes. ‘Mummy, he’s great zest for life. He’s absolutely wonderful. He knows how to live with joy. I must learn it from him. You knew him. And yet, you never made a mention of him. If only I had known him, I’d have been a different person altogether’, Sweta said to her mother.

It was time to part. I footed the bill, turned to the girl, said, ‘You and me make a deal before we part. We talk to each other twice a day over phone. I give you a call and you give me a call. We see each other twice a week at any place of mutual convenience.’ I said. ‘Great! I’m thrilled. I’d give my eye and teeth to be with you’, she said.

‘But, you got to meet my one demand. You’ve to stay away from drugs. Promise you never ever touch it from now on! Take the anti-depressant given to you by your doctor! You got to choose between me and drugs. You can’t have both. Choice is yours!’, I said in a warning tone of voice.

‘I get these dark thoughts. They are so overwhelming. Please, help me fight them’, she implored me.

‘You don’t need to fight them. They come and go. They don’t stay. Why do you care?’, I said. ‘But, they are so tormenting!’, she said.

Now, I asked her, ‘Tell me, are you your thoughts or beyond thoughts! Are you your fear or above fear! Are you your worry or something else than your worry!’ ‘From now on, when dark thoughts run through your mind, think that you are not thoughts. You are more than that. Remember me! Bring me back to your mind! If that doesn’t help, give me a call!’, I said.

‘Great!’, she endorsed clapping her hands.

I talk to her over phone every day and we meet at some places once or twice a week.  She works in a private company as part timer for pocket money. She hasn’t been able to pursue her Master’s degree for lack of fund.

I’ve couple of challenges before me as regards this girl.

1. To find resource to fund her higher studies coz her parents can’t afford it and she doesn’t have steady fulltime job,
2. To find a job that pays her enough to fend for herself and to fund for her studies,
3. To enroll her in some skill-based training schemes to give her some selling points,
4. To explore skill-based employment overseas,
5. And, to engage with her until she is stable,

I’ve been working on it. I don’t know where it all lead to nor am I interested in knowing it. I only can act. Hopefully, I achieve a breakthrough soon. You never know what is in store. Good intentions are seldom wasted. I’ve control over my actions and not over results.

 

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