Aakaash Ganga

"I am trying to lactate," she stated in a simple straightforward tone.

I shook my head in disbelief.

I saw anger in her eyes. "I am the biologist in the family. Do you know that lactation is not connected to the reproductive system, but to the endocrine system and is controlled by the brain?"

I kept looking at her, in awe and admiration.

"I have discussed this with Jamuna's doctor and the paediatrician at the hospital. Since the milk glands are not formed yet, simulation can bring this about, in 1 to 4 weeks. Some drugs induce lactation, but that is my last resort."

"You don't have to do this, Ganga."

"I have made my decision. While there are enough people to do what needs to be done for the dead, I choose to do what I have to do for the living. I bid goodbye to Jamuna at the hospital..." She was crying now. Then slowly her sobs subsided. By this time, both sets of parents had come into our room and were watching and listening silently.

"I have arranged for a regular supply of breast milk from the Human Milk Bank at the hospital. I have also organised the formula feed as a backup. I have been bottle feeding Manjula for the last two days, and she is doing well."

She got up, picked up Manjula from her crib and brought her to me and placed her in my arms. Manjula was asleep, unaware that she had no mother. Her skin had a rosy healthy colour, and I could make out Jamuna's lips and my forehead and eyes in her facial features.

"I will use the breast pump and encourage Manjula to suckle me every day as prescribed by the doctors. I promise you Aakaash, Manjula will not miss her mother's love in any way."

I held my baby close to me but I could not tell her how fortunate she really was.

"There are enough people to look after Manju, Aakaash, please come back to the land of the living, there are lots of things that still need to be done."

"I know what to do now," I said with steely determination.

"You are not quitting your job, Aakash."

"I am not quitting anything, Ganga. Jamuna and I were working on a lot of things together. I have to complete those. That is what she would have wanted. I will update all of you once I have spoken to my boss."

When I got back from my workplace the next afternoon, I went straight to Ganga.

"You are a brave woman, Ganga and I will never be able to thank you for what you have done and what you continue to do. I have discussed the plan with my boss and this what I am doing.

I will be working from home for the next 6 months, except for weekly meetings at my office and visiting office or clients for any exigencies. This means I will be here to help you with the baby, you can leave the bottle feeding, burping, diapering, sponging and bathing the baby to me.

You are right, I hope you can breastfeed her soon. But I want you to take care of your health, Ganga."

"I am dropping this semester, Aakaash, I can resume and complete my Masters from the next one. By that time, we will be able to leave Manju with the grandparents, they can manage her while we are away."

We hugged for a very long time, confident that we will overcome all our difficulties together.

Our company had employee insurance, so the next time I went to my workplace, the HR guys asked me to sign some papers. Soon the reimbursements for the hospital expenses and the payments for Jamuna's life insurance, salary, gratuity and provident fund came though.

I banked a substantial portion for Manjula's future and used her life insurance amount to institute two awards in Jamuna's name at my workplace. One was for the most promising Software Engineer to be awarded to a high performing person who was less than two years old in the organisation and another for the best HR person of the year.

I had to admire and salute the grit and determination displayed by Ganga. I slept on the divan in my bedroom, Ganga used the bed, with Manjula either sleeping next to her or in the crib beside her.

I woke up one morning to a sight that will forever remain etched in my memory. Ganga was sitting on the bed, her back against the headboard. There was a huge smile on her lips, tears streaming down her eyes and little Manjula with her tiny hands clasping Ganga's rather large left breast as she greedily suckled away at her engorged nipple. Ganga saw me and she flashed a victory sign. I jumped out of bed, ran across and gave both of them a hug. Then I bent down, kissed Ganga, and then Manjula on their cheeks.

It is time now to come back to the present. I feel Ganga's steady breathing as she sleeps with her head on my chest, lulling me to sleep.

"You are mine, Ganga, I whisper." She hears me in her stupor, for I feel her hand tighten across my waist.

Ganga: The Rivers Merge and Touch the Sky

I wake up first and slowly wriggle out of Aakaash's grasp. He is still asleep. In about half an hour I am showered and my hair is combed and left loose, just as he loves it. I tiptoe naked to my wardrobe, pull on my panties and then a pair of jeans. I take out my bra, then chuck it back in my drawer and just wear a long loose kurta. Then I stand before the dressing mirror and stick on a huge flaming vermillion 'Bindi.'

I sit next to him on the bed and gently shake him awake. He opens his eyes, his palms grip my upper arms tightly as he looks at me.

"A veritable goddess, no doubt," he says, as pulls me to him and kisses me. He has morning breath, but I kiss him back, then push him away. "Go brush your teeth, shave, shower and all that. Coffee together at the kitchen counter in 40 minutes or less," I tell him.

I smell his aftershave before I sense his presence behind me and feel his palms on my breasts before I see him. I push him playfully away, and then place two mugs of coffee on the counter. He sips appreciatively. "Hmmm, piping hot," he mumbles.

"I know how you like your coffee," I tell him.

"I didn't mean the coffee, I am referring to my wife." I know I am blushing, but what the hell, he is a romantic mate.

He takes 15 minutes to finish his coffee. He moves both our empty mugs to one side of the counter, then takes 40 minutes to finish with me. As I lie panting, sprawled at an awkward angle across the counter, my jeans around my ankles, my panties around my knees, my kurta pulled up to my throat, and all those funny feelings between my legs, he bares his teeth in a wolfish manner and growls,

"What did you put in my coffee?"

When I release him after 5 minutes, he has my incisors and canines imprinted around his right nipple.

"Ganga, for breakfast, I'll scramble the eggs, you toast the bread and then we will go out for lunch."

"What do we do between breakfast and lunch, Aakaash?"

"Let me read your mind." He closes his eyes and put his palm over my forehead.

"A long cuddle in the living room couch." He exclaims.

"Bingo," I reply.

He is so nice to cuddle up to. Once my head rests on his right shoulder and his hand goes around me, I put my mine on his left shoulder and a movie starts playing in my head. It is always scenes from a beautiful love story, our beautiful love story.

My love story began with a great tragedy. Two days after Manjula was born, Jamuna, my younger twin was gone. A brain haemorrhage they said. She was so brainy, a software wiz, a girl who always had her way, and who loved my Aakaash. No, he was her Aakash then, he would become mine much later.

It was heart-rending to watch Aakash, as he knelt next to a beautiful, serene, but dead Jamuna, pleading with her to return from where she had gone.

"Please, Jamuna, if not for me, come back for Manju, she needs you more than all of us." I resolved that moment, that whatever my niece will lack in her life, it certainly will not be a mother.

Aakash does not remember those moments anymore. His brain has blanked out much of that trauma and I have no intentions of taking him back there either.

But one day, he opened his heart out to me. "I wish we had not been so careless that day Ganga, if Jamuna had not got pregnant, maybe she would be alive."

"You are wrong, Aakaash, Jamuna did not die in childbirth, she died because of a different ailment, something for which she showed no symptoms ever. I am glad you guys were careless, for before leaving us, she gave us the best gift that anyone possibly could."

Aakash turned out to be a great dad. He worked from home, for those first six months, and magically turned up beside me whenever Manjula or I needed him. Diaper changes, vaccinations, doctor's visits, check-ups, teething troubles, staying up late so that I could sleep, he was there.

He loved his daughter, he played and cooed with her and she had a special smile and giggle for him. There was no dearth of toys and clothes and most other things that were needed.

Suddenly I was the de-facto daughter-in-law of the family, the mother of Manjula. Jamuna used to rave about her in-laws, and she was right. I could not imagine a set of parents who could be so supportive. They ensured I had the best possible diet as a nursing mother and that I exercised regularly. They encouraged me to keep up with my studies so that I could rejoin college the following semester. Add to this my parents, who would visit often and be there for us, the sorrow of losing Jamuna became bearable.

Manjula turned out to be a wonder kid. She would laugh her heart out at 4 months, by 6 she was crawling, and by the time she was 8 months old, she would wave to Aakaash as he left for work, and then moments later, miss him and turn cranky. I used to bathe her after he left, that distracted her, she would enjoy her bath after which she would feed and go off to sleep. She was sleeping through the night now, and though I did plug in solid foods, she loved to be breast-fed. I had no intentions of weaning her till she was at least 2 years old.

Aakash would sleep on the divan, I on the bed, with Manju beside me, or sometimes in her crib. Our lives were returning to normal. By the time she was 11 months old, Manjula was trying to stand. I remember the evening, Aakash had returned from work, showered and was holding her in his arms as he sat on the divan. As always, he would point to me and ask Manjula,

"Manjula, who is this?" Manjula would giggle and laugh. But that evening, Manjula did something different.

She stared hard at me, with a frown. "Manjula, who is this?" Aakash prompted again.

Manjula looked serious, then her lips came together.

"Ammmmmaa, she said.

"Good, Manjula," Aakaash prompted again, "tell me once more, who is this?"

"Amma," Manjula squealed and then she laughed as she jumped into my arms. Aakash gathered both of us in his.

"Your daughter recognises you, Ganga," he whispered, "and this is the first meaningful word she has uttered. There is no one more wonderful than you in her universe, Ganga." Aakaash's voice trailed off....

'Amma' is the word for 'mother' in almost all Indian languages, and though Aakaash would become 'Daddy' to her,I would remain her 'Amma.'

"Aakash, she turns one next month," I ventured hesitatingly. It was a touchy issue, for Jamuna had died three days after Manjula was born.

"I am taking both of you shopping tomorrow afternoon, we will have a blast," he grinned.

"Oh Aakaash," I said to myself, "at last, I got to see you smile without the melancholy that clouds your face."

"Where are we going?" I asked him, as I got into the car with my little one in my arms. Aakash placed the bag with the diapers, baby food and other baby stuff in the back seat of the car. I knew he had planned a long shopping trip.

"Lots of places," he said, "just hang on."

The first stop was the car accessories dealer. He asked for a baby car seat. I checked out a few and chose one that would be most comfortable for Manjula. I strapped her in, she promptly went off to sleep.

Next, we went to the mall. "Ganga, first we get a stroller, then you pick out the pinkest, frilliest, puffiest birthday dress for our daughter," he said. We did that too. Now Manjula went from his arms to the stroller. I put the soother between her lips and she started to enjoy the ride.

"Now what?"

"I thought I will get you a beautiful saree, but if you prefer something else, we can do that too."

"That is not necessary, Aakaash."

"I thought both Amma and her daughter would look beautiful together in matching outfits when the cake is cut," he said with this entreating look in his eyes.

"I cannot say, 'no' when you look at me like this," I said, punching his arm playfully. "Let's go to the saree shop. Do you have a budget?"

"Ganga, I swear, if you select your saree by looking at the price tags, then I will decide what you wear."

"What if it costs the moon?"

"I can swipe my card and pay in instalments for the rest of my life. Now lead the way," and he took charge of the stroller.

I took a long time selecting my saree. Manjula was hungry, he took her in his arms, sat down on a sofa in the showroom and gave her the bottle.

"I have shortlisted 3, which one do you like?"

"Buy all 3 of them."

"Be serious, Aakaash."

He laid them, one by one across my bosom, looking at me, making me face the mirror every time, then he tapped the pink one. It was just the one I was hoping he would choose.

"You think we can buy the other ones for the moms?"

"No Aakaash, they don't wear this kind of stuff, but give me a few minutes and I will select a couple for them."

It took me another hour, then we had our stuff billed.

"Now that the ladies stuff has been sorted out, what do we get the menfolk?" I asked.

"Kurta's with embroidered fronts for the dads."

"And for you?"

"I thought I qualified as a dad too."

I hugged him. "You are Super-Dad, Aakash, I am getting you some super stuff."

By the time we were done, almost 4 hours had passed. I was juggling 5 shopping bags, with Aakaash managing the baby in the stroller and the bag with the baby things on his shoulder.

"There is a food court on the top floor of this mall, let us get something to eat and drink."

I still like to think that was our first date.

The parents were quite awed by the stuff we had bought. I explained to them.

"Much as we all miss Jamuna, I have resolved that we will not mourn her passing but celebrate her life, the happy life that Jamuna lived and the beautiful life she gifted us before she left. And please remember, this is your first grandchild's first birthday." There was no way they could refute this logic.

Manjula's birthday celebration was a close-knit affair. We had the family, some extended family members, a few of my classmates, Aakash's boss and other colleagues. Manjula, stole the show with her smiles and gurgles, as person after person held her in their arms for a while.By the middle of it all, she was tired and went off to sleep.

Three days later, we had a small meeting at home to celebrate Jamuna's life. Some of her colleagues spoke about her vivaciousness and her knowledge, her naughty sense of humour and her professionalism. I recited a poem on what she meant to me as a sister, and Aakash spoke on how she had courted and wooed him, with words that were tinged with sadness, yet seasoned with subtle humour.

Jamuna always used to say that Aakaash's mother had a sixth sense, she could gauge other people's feelings very precisely by processing their words and body language. I realised Jamuna had been very accurate in her observations.

It was about three months after Manjula's birthday. My parents had come over, possibly they were a party to what followed. We were all at the dining table when she looked directly at Aakaash and me.

"Both of you are great friends, and wonderful parents to Manju, we have been living as a close-knit and loving family for over a year now. Yet I feel that both of you have set invisible boundaries that probably exist only in your imagination, and you are afraid to cross them. You know very well what I mean. I think both of you need to talk and resolve these barriers one way or the other."

It sounded somewhere between a loving wish and a stunning rebuke. I knew she was right and so did Aakaash. We nodded dumbly.

After my parents left and just after I had fed Manjula, she came to our room.

"Place the baby food, bottle and diapers in our room tonight," she said looking at me.

Then she looked at Aakash. "Move the crib to our room. I know Manjula rarely wakes up at night, and tonight she is going to be with her grandparents. You guys start talking."

Boy, the old lady also knew how to hustle, but secretly, I was glad.

Aakaash came out of the bathroom, and then I went in. On an impulse, I dabbed on some cologne, and when I came out, Aakaash was sitting on the divan. He patted the place next to him and I sat down. I smelt his aftershave and though I had some apprehensions, I think I knew where this conversation was headed.

"I am sorry Mom was so pushy," he started.

"I think she is right, we do need to talk."

"Let me say what I have to say first, Ganga, and though I know I am going to sound confused and stupid and incoherent, just listen and don't stop me till I finish."

I nodded.

"I am not even going to try thanking you for all that you have done and continue to do for Manjula, because it just not possible. If I do make such an attempt, I will end up hurting you, it will be putting a measure on your capability to love, and I know that capability is infinite.

You and I have lived together in this home, and more so in this room, bound together by a tragedy and yet drawn together by the love that we have for Manjula.

Mom was right. I had this invisible boundary, yet she was wrong for it was not an imagined boundary. You are a wonderful person Ganga, but you are not Jamuna."

My heart started to sink. I was not expecting this.

"What made things difficult was that Jamuna was my first and true love, and you are her twin. I did not want to see Jamuna in you, Ganga, I did not want to come home from work every day, look at you and imagine you were my Jamuna. I wanted to know Ganga as she is, not as I thought she should be. But as the months went past, a simple geography lesson I learnt in my primary school days resolved the issue."

Jamuna, the river, is a tributary of the larger and deeper flowing Ganga, and as it joins the Ganga, it is the Ganga that flows on. Jamuna ceases to exist, yet it exists in Ganga. And we, in this country, always refer to the Ganga as a mother, and that is what you are for Manjula.

I wanted to love you for what you are, Ganga, and that day, when we went shopping for Manju's birthday, I realised that I do love you. You have made many sacrifices for our family, yet I do not know if you also sacrificed your love for someone else while donning this mantle of motherhood. If you have, I will do anything in my power to unite you with the one you love. But if there is none other, please stay on in my life in whichever way you think appropriate."