Half Girlfriend (1)

Bye, Madhav. Take care.
Riya
My eyes welled up. Tears rolled down my cheeks. My limbs felt
weak.
I struggled to stand.The letter fell from my hands. I picked it up
and read it again. Memories of me sitting in Riya’s car came to me.
Images flaihed in my head—her fancy wedding-card box, the glucose
biscuits and her driving off. She had disappeared to get married then.
She had disappeared to die now. In both cases, she had taken, to use a
tough English word, unilateral decisions.
I called her number again. This time it was switched off. Perhaps
she was driving back to Patna and passing through a no-network area.
Or maybe she had thrown away her SIM card.
I went numb, like someone had hit me on the head with a hammer.
Nothing mattered to me. The guests at home, the Gates Foundation
grant, nothing. Riya had lung cancer, and she hadn’t even mentioned
It, How could she do this to me?
‘Patna, go to Patna,’ I told myself. She would go home first,
obviously.
I ran downstairs to the living room. A crowd was gathered there.
‘Congratulations, Madhav bhai.What a speech you gave,’ said the
sarpanch. He spoke Hindi and possibly didn't know a word of English.
‘Hello, sir. I am from Dainik Bhaskar. We would like to profile you
for our Sunday magazine,’ a reporter said.
I found my mother.
‘Patna? Now?’ she said.
‘The Foundation people need me to sign some paperwork.’
‘I thought they went to Gaya for the other programme.’
‘Some of them did. Since they have announced the aid, I need to
sign documents.’
‘Go after lunch. Right now we have guests.’.
‘Ma, I need to go now,’ I said.
My mother sensed something amiss.