Bottle Green Daffodil

Life After Death

An unmistakable smell of garlic wafted in the air when Israel entered the flat. The odour became strong as she headed towards the kitchen. Her stomach protested to it, threatened to spill its contents. Sweaty palm wrinkled the faces and words printed on the newspaper as her grip on it tightened. She started breathing through her mouth.

"Is something wrong?" Sheba looked up from the hollowed out capsicum she was chopping and descended straight to the point. There was no prodding questions about how her day went or where had she been.

Not that Israel's answer would be without a trace of lie but asking just for the sake of it would have been welcoming. She gauzed her sister's question. Gauzed her sister, the counter foil to her character. An achiever, the one who always had a way out, knew what she wanted. Like this evening, for example. She knew her black trusses should be swept in a neat French braid, flowery  dress thrown upon her toned figure, a heroine of a some romance novel.

Did Bathsheba really wanted to know what was wrong or was the inquiry born out of curiosity? Sheba was waiting for a response, one hand limply holding the knife and other a pared capsicum.

"No."

The former equation was stored. Sheba resumed preparing the dinner- mechanically chopping vegetables, heading back to the stove to check on the chicken, adding thyme, chopping again- not once looking at the person standing on the doorframe sans the door.

"I'll go take a shower," Israel said, a feeble effort of hers to start a conversation but what could she do? The silence was pressing against her eardrums, seeping inside her and it  was getting unbearable.

"Want me to fix you a mug of hot cocoa?"

A skip in heartbeat followed a formation of lump in Israel's throat. Both made it difficult for her to speak. Those words did not belong to Sheba. She could not say it. It was never hers to begin with. Cocoa was not going to fill up the cracks reappearing in their relation. It wasn't simple as the art of ceramics.

"Don't bother. I'll do it. I mean... your hands are tied."

Israel traced her step backwards. The smell had become overwhelming. Her head started throbbing; she felt nauseated. Unless a portal in time and space dimension could ferry her to a parallel universe, Israel desired to be nowhere else.

The newspaper was flung on the couch enroute her way to bathroom. There it sat, a timebomb with the farce of a good news, printed metaphor of Pandora's box.

By this time things were supposed to be running smoothly, her life was to be running at an annoying pace of normality; that's what the morning had promised. The guy opening the door for her at the store today was a part of that promise. Shepley loving her breakfast of eggs and bacon, and cracking over her jokes had been a sturdy proof of her vibrant personality bouncing back.  

An optimistic attitude, feeling of carpe diem had evolved somehow. Tom was the root of it. She had carried this giddy feeling while embracing Shepley over the threshold of "bye"s and "visit me anytime." Fetnock's art museum and old bookstore absolutely delighted her. She ate her doughnuts and drank her coffee with the strengthening resolute of going Sheba's campus and taking her for lunch. Then she would talk to her. She would talk to her about everything two sisters were supposed to talk about.

Few minutes down the line and her plans were put on an infinite pause. The newspapers heralded it. She herself heralded it by passing the newspaper stands. Coveting the front page of dailies were the bold proclamation which interrupted the trajectory Israel's life had taken since the daybreak.

JAMES CLIVE DONS THE VICE CAPTIAN'S CAP

A blown up photograph of an earnest faced batsman,  shoulders hunched, bat poised beside his right leg, eyes concentrating on the bowler who did not appear at the frame, stared at Israel. She froze. Nothing had changed about James. He still looked like the person who wore his heart on his sleeve, that innocent looking face; now the rising star in cricketing arena whose performance better with every game. Yet he was the same person who involuntarily uprooted her life, snatched the happiness from Wolowitz household and shoved in beneath the earth.