Little Piece of Heaven

(Trigger Warning: Death and Loss)

I just finished reading The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. This book is about, among many things, a story of childhood friendships. It felt deeply personal. About my childhood best friend. Let's call her H.

A long time ago, 29 years to be precise, H was born today. She was my next-door neighbour since we were two. I remember spending quiet afternoons in the corner of a chawl in Mumbai. It was our little piece of heaven where everything was possible. We spent time colouring, playing “ghar-ghar” and all the make-believe plays that we could cook up inside our heads. She was always there. We ate at each other’s places, slept at each other’s places. We used to finish our homework quickly so that we had enough time to play and laugh and talk.

For some reason, my mom and sister did not like her. They tried to colour my opinion of her. I was too young to create my own opinion. To be honest, I did not find anything wrong with her. She was always kind to me. She said nice things about me. She was always there to play with me. She did not stop talking to me ever. She made me feel special. For her, everything I did was amazing! But somehow, I started to take her for granted and tried to avoid her, because mom said.

I was fortunate to have parents who invested in travelling. I started travelling at the age of four. We visited at least one new place every year. But H’s parents did not have the money to indulge in travelling. It was our summer break after grade 3. H’s family was travelling to someplace I don’t remember. All I remember is she could not stop talking about it. It was for a wedding, I reckon. She used to talk about all the things she would do there, all the shopping she had done, and all the little updates regarding the travel. I did not care. In my head, I thought I do this LITERALLY every year. It’s no big deal. Why is she so excited?!

One afternoon, she came and stood at my door. I was sitting on one of the two sofas we had arranged in an L-shape. (No it wasn't an L-shaped sofa). It was my sofa. I had written my name on the inner part of it in grade one. That sofa still has 6-year-old Shraddha’s Marathi handwriting on it. :) H called me. I did not get up. She said, “I am leaving. I came to say bye.” I did not even get up to say bye. I only looked up and waved. She left. Excitement in her eyes with a hint of kindness as always.

The next morning, I woke up to Mom’s words, “H met with an accident.” Everything went blank. I was too young to process what my mom just said. I woke up. Asked too many questions that my mom did not have answers to. That day was the most difficult day of my life. I was just nine! I did not know what was going on. The entire day only went into getting different versions of the whereabouts. Almost twelve people from our building were travelling. H and her whole family. We did not know who sat in which car and which car had met with the accident. And how serious it was.

By night, everyone knew who was dead and who was injured. They said H was no more. I dismissed the idea immediately. I knew this was unreal. "She is a child. Children don’t die!”, I thought. Finally, around midnight, three ambulances arrived near our building. They removed five dead bodies wrapped in white cloth. They were symmetrically arranged in the same playground where we spent our summer holidays playing badminton. That ground was our other happy place. And now look what it had to go through! I was standing with Mom on the balcony of the fourth floor. I still remember everything about that night vividly. They kept all the bodies. and when they did, I could tell which one was H. My first ever friend. Maybe my best friend. Someone who was always there with me like a shadow. Her body was the tiniest. It was kept in the left-most corner. For the first time in my life, I was experiencing something so devastating. I cried my heart out. I don’t know for how many hours I kept crying. Mom held me tight. Even she did not know what to say to me. I only remember my tears were not ready to stop.

Since that day, something huge shifted inside me. It was like someone snatched a part of me, yanked it, and burned it. And I could do nothing. I could not tell her that she was my BEST friend. That she was my first-ever friend. That I owe my childhood to her. That I loved playing “ghar-ghar” with her. And that she could eat all the cool things that Mom got for me. That I would trade anything to get her and our little piece of heaven back.

We, me and my other friends, stopped going to the garden. We stopped playing on the floor. The noisy corner that spoiled old Aunty's sleep was deserted. So was my heart! The school reopened in June. I started acting normal. I made new friends. This time, I told them how special they were for me. I started being there for them and never took them for granted.

Today H would have been 29. Maybe married. But she would been the prettiest and kindest woman I know. She would have been an amazing dancer. Maybe she would have had her dancing studio. Most importantly, she would have never left my side and told me nice things about me and made me special.

She gave me a friendship of childhood sweet nothings. Of purity and love and mischief and laughter. A formative bond. A friendship that unfortunately never saw bloom or end or even get bitter. It just ceased to exist one fine day. Or it didn’t. I think, I still carry it within me. The loss. In this book’s language - an H-shaped hole in the universe. A hole so enormous and enduring that it can never be refilled with all the love in the world. A hole that I don’t want to fill. I want to keep it. Honour it. Like the Twin Towers in NYC. With the water fountains and names of people carved on it. A hole that I love in a weird way. A hole that reassures me that I still have something left in my hands after this unbearable loss. A loss that broke me. That MADE me.

I will carry her in my heart and my work. Always.