Wooden witness
Dec 14, 2021
The Witness
A story from a wooden heart
Squirming, from the vantage point from where I could see everything, I wanted to stop her.
Using one of the hand-carved rails of my canopy, I wanted to throw the whole thing down before she could say, ‘yes’; but I couldn’t, as it was no guarantee that the canopy would fall on him, the man trying to persuade her, and not at her, my frail Babli. I could never ever hurt her. Looking at her with all my love and annoyance at the same time, I was thinking,
“Why oh why doesn’t she see, what he is doing, what he is getting her to do?”
Out of frustration, I almost groaned.
She had always been delicate, not that she didn’t have enough flesh on her bones, but it was her bones, that were the ones so light, paper-like, making her a paper mache doll. With her delicate body and her fine features, and her dark eyes, surrounded by the most astoundingly long lashes, always shining with love and kindness, she was a darling, my darling!
The very first night, when she had come in the room, in her bridal attire, I had fallen head over heels in love.
It didn’t matter who she had been waiting for, and who was going to be sharing the saffron laced milk in the silver glass with her that night, I was just thrilled that she would be mine from now on, to see, to feel, to touch, and to take in my arms when she slept.
My Babli!!
And afterwards, she had talked to me, whispering into the pillow, telling me, how happy she was.
And sighing with relief, I had taken her frail body in my arms, and she had slept in peace.
And next few years had passed blissfully. She had a happy life, as she enjoyed taking care of the needs of her husband and her household, doing chores that needed to be done each day, keeping the family comfortable, cooking, cleaning, supervising those who came to help her with these. She was a great housemaker, who made everything comfortable with all her love, and care, and beautifully.
She was very neat, almost religiously clean, and loved to change the sheets and pillow covers almost every day.
And I loved that.
Then her first child, her son was born, and then her daughter, and then her youngest child, another son, they were all born right there in front of my eyes, and each time, I had helped to heal her, get better, get stronger.
Day by day, my love for her had grown, reaching that extreme, where I could read her, feeling from the way she touched me if she was happy or unhappy, angry, or miserable. And, no matter what mood she would be in, I soothed her and was always able to make her sleep.
That time, when the oldest was sick, really sick, I had watched her, praying for his recovery. She had not eaten anything till the little boy had opened his eyes and taken his bottle.
I had sighed with relief when she had finally left the boy in his crib to come to me.
And today, the same boy was forcing her to do what she didn’t want to, I could feel her unhappiness, and helplessness in my limbs, my bones.
But it was she, who had to refuse, if she didn’t want to sign the paper, she had to say that. Signing that paper would mean the end of an era, her ownership of this house, her house, and with it her independence, her relationship with me!
As, three years ago, at the death of Babli’s husband, I had thought that now it was just us, and we could … but it doesn’t matter now.
I couldn’t do anything. I was just the witness, that had come with her, 40 years ago in this house, in dowry!! Yes, her companion of 40 years, her walnut wood hand carved Kashmiri bed!
Inspired by
’s prompt: “your narrator a nonliving object? … Write a scene about something it observes”.
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