My breathing is ragged and strained. Every breath I take and release hurts a little more. I feel choked and my throat burns. My head hurts. I try to open my eyes but a bandage wrapped around my head obstructs them. I adjust the bandage to open my eyes. My whole body is broken and it pains as if it has been put into a blender and ground.
I take some time to gather where I am. Why does everything hurt so much? Is this a bad dream? I slowly open my eyes partially and look at the ceiling above. It's not familiar. Then it strikes me. The Chandni Chowk blast.
It all comes back to me. The noise, the people, the blood, the severed limbs, the mangled remains of people, cars and buildings. It is a lot harder this time. I can think more clearly. I could've been among the dead.
'Deb?' a female voice says. 'Are you okay?'
I look at her and my eyes light up. She is like a shot of morphine that takes every bit of pain away. I feel alive.
'Yes,' I say feebly.
I look at her and I am mortified. She has tears in her eyes and it looks like she has been crying for a long time. Did something happen to me? I force my aching neck to move a little and look at the bed I lie on. I try to move my hands and legs. I am not maimed or paralysed. I have just a few cuts and burns here and there. I have been lucky.
'What happened?' I ask.
"There was a terrible blast in Chandni Chowk,' she says. 'Eighty-nine people are dead so far.'
She sits on the bed, hugs me, and starts crying. I feel a few? teardrops percolate through my hospital robe and wet my skin. A few tears find their way into my eyes too. I don't know if it's because she's crying or because of what I saw this morning. People had died, lost their arms, their legs and their loved ones right in front of my eyes. It was like a nightmare. Only, a lot worse. It happened for real. The animal cries of people, the blood and the limbs that had gone flying all around me it had all happened. All those people are actually dead. Eighty-nine of them. I am not. I am still in one piece and have my girlfriend hugging me.
Why? I ask myself as I see her cry with her head on my chest. I think about all the people who lost their lives this morning or have been crippled. What would their loved ones be doing? If I were dead, what would Avantika be doing? I shudder to think about it. I was almost dead. Or maimed. I feel grateful.
'Do Mom and Dad know?" I ask her. She shakes her head. "They called you?'
'Yes,' she says, still crying. 'I told them you were in office.' I smile at her. She knows me and my parents so well. My parents live
in Muscat, Oman, and they find it very uneasy to live away from me. They miss me a lot, but Dad has work there. Even though I am a big guy now, they are as protective about me as they were when I was a school- going kid. I still remember the fifteen-minute sermon I used to get from Mom and Dad whenever I would go out. 'Look at both sides when you cross the road,' 'Don't talk to anyone,' 'Don't eat anything that anyone offers.' You get the drift. It continued way into my late teens.
