It will be three years next month since she left us. And about the same time since I last wrote about her too. In the three intervening years, hardly have I talked about her to anyone or shared pictures or anything at all about her online or offline. I know one day I might want to. But that day is not here. Not yet.

Others who knew her sometimes talk to me of her. I want to tell them, ‘Please don’t!’ But I am too polite. So I merely smile and nod, trying hard not to really listen, letting the words roll off me like water off a duck’s back, or a lotus leaf, so they don’t enter my mind and disrupt and/or colour my own memories of her.

I don’t visit her page on Facebook. I don’t acknowledge the wishes she gets on her birthday from those who remember her. I don’t reshare her posts or photos. All I do is scroll through the abundant photos and videos in the albums on my phone at times, but that too not for long because the heart grows heavy with the knowledge that she is not here.

‘Yes, I had a dog, Luci,’ I might tell new people I meet if they show an interest, or ask about the Dog in the Photo they see when they enter my home. But that’s all. Nothing about her as such. Not the funny faces she makes, or the way she barks at the lizard on the roof just because they scare her mom. Not about how she ran after the rat snake only to be outwitted. Not about her drooly kisses, her unconditional love. No, nothing at all about her.

Sometimes she does come up in conversations with the L&M or the children. With them, I laugh while recalling something or other she did. That brief laughter though hides the pain, dulled now by the time that has elapsed, but somehow still as painful. I don’t want them to know though and then have them tip-toe around the topic of Luci in my presence.

In short, I hoard her memories inside me, zealously, and jealously guarding them from everyone and everything. Sigh. I have realised one thing from it all: I am not there yet. That place where you forget the absence and remember only the good things that were and smile. One day, perhaps. But right now I don’t know when the day will come.

Maybe, just maybe, today is that first step in the journey. She would have been thirteen today.

©️ Shail Mohan 2024