June 24, 2021
It’s 10:52 pm. I am shaky today.
The day began with a sense of openness. I went to the clinic for my six monthly blood test. The sweet senior nurse attended to me saying that she had checked my history and was concerned that the last few times that I had been pricked, I had bruised badly. She’s always so nice to me and I told her that. It’s my job, she beamed.
It was over quickly and I took the MRT to Au Croissant at Stadium to break the overnight fast. I always treated myself to a chocolate danish after my blood test. In fact the entire week between the test and till I got the dreaded result I indulged all my food desires. Cakes, burgers, fries—stuff I avoided the rest of the year—were on the daily menu. I crunched into a flaky almond croissant with a custard cream centre and stared at the world. I felt content. I had the entire day to dream, write, draw. A couple of women sat at a corner table and I began imagining what their story was — friends from school or college, one married the other not, and what lay beneath their smiles. A child swinging her legs and colouring while her mum blissfully sipped a coffee. A couple of men staring at a laptop screen and chatting. A bunch of teenage boys in shorts rushed past.
After I decided to walk home. The sun was overhead and scorching but like a lizard or a cat I worshipped it. I climbed the bridge over the Kallang river and as I always did, stopped at the mid-point and stared down at the water. Today the ripples formed curvy diamond shapes and moved quickly from right to left. I lingered. By the time I got home my sister had tried calling me twice but my phone had been on silent.
‘I have covid,’ she said when I called her back.
‘WHAT! How!’
She had flu symptoms for two days and when she couldn’t smell anymore she decided to get herself tested.
Since last year when India’s lockdown began this had been my biggest fear. That she would get covid and I would not be able to get home to help take care of our mum. It was happening now.
My sister’s had a really tough year taking care of mum alone. After the call I felt breathless. I needed to be there. I couldn’t bear it that she was ill and tired and had nobody to take care of her. My anger about the increased weeks between doses that the Govt of India had mandated rose up again. She had only had one dose of AstraZeneca. Not effective protection against the delta variant. After a bit I messaged her and she called me. We laughed when I said she was now a statistic on the Maharashtra Covid count charts. Then we got down to practical matters. She slept in the afternoon and I ate bowls of Garrett’s Chicago-Mix.
Later while my spouse cooked I watched a misty rain drift from right to left across my balcony. The sky seemed to have descended to earth today and yesterday’s golden landscape was covered in a soft grey veil. I began to cry. All year I had felt so much guilt and today the last proverbial straw had fallen on my back. I felt slightly broke.
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