Roots

By Kavita Chavda

“Yes, I do”, whispered the man in hard voice, with a heart as soft as wax. Everybody’s eyes fixed on bride, after the father completed his lines for the bride. Flood of thoughts across her mind, pain on her face, with heart in despair, a low voice whispered, “yes, I do”. Her eyes fixed on her mother in the wheelchair beside the pillar smiling brightly with smize, her sparkling eyes filled with tears. Tears, the language that expressed the old lady’s joy who lost her speech years ago. Her eyes were the only voice, the way of expressing herself.

Angela knew she had made her mother happy at the last stage of her life. Her heart that had pain of loosing something she longed for, struggled for since times, her dream, her own clinic at the place she took birth, the place where she spent her gay childhood, pink teenage and struggling adolescence. At the age of 31 she had to leave it all behind for her mother’s last wish, that can heal her, to marry David, the only son of Angela’s father’s friend who helped them in their bad times, being the covers of their feet on the rough path.

Angela did it for her mother’s happiness as she was living her last breaths, she wanted to see her happiness sacrificing her own. She was happy because her mother was, though she had to leave everything behind and shift to a new country, new world, with the memories of the old world. The next morning, the first official day of her marriage, Angela woke up with red puffy eyes, her soft cheeks still soaked with tears, with the thought of leaving her world and mother behind the very day. She didn’t find David in the house but her eyes found a note on the desk that went as:

“Darling, we are settling at your own place, your own world with our mother and your dreams. I just took off for abroad to shift my world into yours. I will be back in four days. I love you”.

By Kavita Chavda