A thousand years of repentance
My lover cannot sleep so he asks me to tell him a story. My mind, muddled by antidepressants, whiskey and an insomnia-induced migraine, races to try and come up with something more engaging than Goldilocks and the Three Bears. He still sees me through rose tinted glasses and I’m still trying to live up to this image of me that he’s become so captivated by.
What else should come to me, in the form of inspiration at 2am on a Sunday morning, than the stories I grew up with? Stories from the thin, colourful comic books my dad would treat me to from the Popat store on Ealing Road, with its overly stacked shelves of Hindu paraphernalia. The calming waft of incense sticks and sandalwood would follow me through the store. I tell him about King Bhagiratha, who observed penance for a thousand years so he could release his ancestors from a curse and thus save their souls. His actions brought the mighty river Ganga down to Earth. Such was the power of his atonement. “A thousand years? That’s a bloody long time” he murmurs as he nuzzles his head into the crevice between my neck and my shoulder and falls into a deep slumber, whilst holding me tight in his embrace.
My last phone call to you accidentally got recorded and saved onto my phone. I inwardly thank the “persistent” ex, whose constant harassment and threats led me to install that call recorder app a few years ago. The conversation took place five days before you left us and neither of us could have known it would be the last time we were going to speak to each other. I’ve listened to it so many times, I’ve memorised the dialogue word for word. Also the pauses. The part where I can hear you smile as you answer, when you realise it’s me you’re talking to. You told me you prayed for me every day. I asked you why and you said it was because I was far away from you. I knew the actual answer though. You prayed for me daily because your eldest grandchild is the rolling stone of the family and you wanted me to stop straying and start putting down some roots. You wanted me back. But you weren’t going to admit that, were you? You asked me if I had eaten. You always ask me if I’ve eaten, no matter what time I call. You also told me to be careful whilst walking down the cobbled, slippery streets of Lisbon as I have always had a history of tripping and falling, even in the unlikeliest of places. Literally and figuratively a rolling stone.
Now you are my ancestor, I hope you have found your place amongst your own. Maybe you’ve gone home to your appa. He was a deadbeat dad and an alcoholic who kept a mistress but you were his youngest child. His favourite. I knew you loved him regardless of his faults because your face would light up whenever you spoke about him. He would bring you sweets and art supplies whenever he came to visit you. Apparently he was as fair skinned as a white man. Apparently you got your looks from him. Or maybe…maybe you finally got a chance to make peace with your amma.
Ponnamma lived with you when you got married and stayed whilst you started a family. One day, she felt insulted by an offhand comment from yourself and she left. Just like that. She would regularly come by to see her grandchildren at the gates but would never set foot in your house again. She would never speak to you again. Because pride. Then she disappeared and didn’t come back. You and Pappa reported her missing at Jaffna Police Station. You searched for her. But nothing. No body. No Ponamma. You would blame yourself for her disappearance for the rest of your life.
The same day you spoke so lovingly to me was the same day you hung the phone up on my mother. Your second child and your eldest daughter. The child who swept the floors for you, who cooked and cleaned for you. Who was more of a servant than a daughter. She took over the household for you at a young age so you could live like a queen. You hung up on her and refused to speak to her again because she said something you didn’t want to hear. Because pride. A few days later, you left us. At peace, but without a word of warning. And now she will live with unmerited guilt for the rest of her life.
Mother and I. We have never seen eye to eye. When I was in her womb, she prayed every day that her firstborn would not turn out to be a pushover like her. When I became a teenager she told me her prayers backfired. That I was too much to handle. She said other, unrepeatable things that she later regretted. I’ve done things that I regret to this very day and our relationship still remains unpatched and unworkable. Sometimes I call her and we have civil conversations which end in pleasantries. However some of our interactions end up with us yelling down the phone to each other, or in me ending the call. Talking to her is like playing Russian roulette. It’s like I’m sitting on a time bomb that is about to explode every day she gets older and her aches and pains get worse.
I have generational curses to deal with from my dad’s side too. However, throat cancer doesn’t scare me half as much as the thought of my mother passing away after another one of our screaming matches.
This ends with me and that is one thing I am certain of. The chain of remorse and anguish that has been handed down from mother to daughter, cannot thrive. I promise my future daughter and her descendants a better fate. Because a thousand years is a bloody long time.
