The Bench...

I, Stephen Gomes, stand here today in front of the mirror, reflecting at my whole life like a time-line we see on social media these days.

At the age of 65, moving to a new house felt like a huge step to me. It was my son, Jonathan & his wife Serena's decision to move into a bigger house. Jonathan & Serena are at peak of their careers today. My little Johny had grown into a fine gentleman now. Thanks to his hard work & sheer dedication, today he is an AVP( Assistant Vice President) at a globalised IT firm. Serena, on the other hand, is a Chief Accountant at a corporate office of a Multi National Company (MNC). Their dreams, their desires, their wants, who am I to interfere? My time has gone by. I served for more than 40 years as a Personal Assistant(P.A.)to a mill owner in Lower Parel. I was his father's P.A. first & then once he decided to retire, I gave my services to the new boss, his son.

I was in my mid-twenties when I came to Mumbai. It was Bombay back then. This city gave me everything, food, shelter & above all... The love of my life, Agatha.

She worked as a sales person at a popular watch showroom in Colaba. The day we met is the day I would never forget. I had been to that showroom with my friend as he wanted to buy a watch for his girlfriend. I, instantly felt a magical connection with this pretty girl across the counter. I could easily tell...she was the one. While she was taking us through different types of wrist watches, I was mesmerized by the way she spoke, the way she moved, the way she smiled. After deciding on a particular watch, my friend went to the counter to make the payment & I stood right there staring at this angel eyed girl. At first, she smiled & ignored but after a few seconds of this uncomfortable stare from a guy like me, she politely smiled and pointed me towards my friend who was waiting for me at the payment counter. Since that day, I kept on visiting that watch showroom over & over just to get a glimpse of her. Her co-workers had started teasing her as I had made it very obvious that I was interested more in her then anything else. 

One fine day, she decided to confront me. Just as any other day, I entered the showroom & started looking at some clocks hanging over on the display wall. Before I could turn around & find her, she came walking towards me. She looked in to my eyes & told me with a straight face & a firm voice, "Step outside with me for a minute please." That's all she said & started walking towards the door. I must say, I was not prepared for this. My palms got sweaty. While I was walking behind her, I was struggling badly to find my handkerchief to wipe off the dripping sweat on my forehead but it was of no use. Agatha went ahead & stood near a closed shop next to the showroom & was waiting for me. I had no clue what was going to happen next. Like a dumb mannequin, I just stood there in front of her. "You come to the shop very often & keep looking at me.." she began, "this has been going on for some days now. what's on your mind?" She said all that with a straight face & her eyes fixed at mine. For a moment, I felt as if I have no life left in my body. My mind froze for a couple of seconds. Before I could say anything, I felt a soft tap on my left arm, "Hello..." she said, "I'm talking to you, don't you have anything to say now?" This time I could see a flare in her eyes.
I, somehow gathered all my thoughts which were all over the place right now & could manage to say only this, " I...I love you..." Her red angry face now started to turn pink. Her eyes still fixed on me though, now went from a flare to a blush.
Trust me, I have never seen someone so beautiful in my whole life. She looked down for a moment & started to walk back to the showroom. I just stood there  looking at her. She stopped at the entrance of the showroom, turned and looked at me for a tiny inch of a second & ran inside. It felt like a scene from a romantic Bollywood movie.
That day will remain fresh in my memory forever.

We started meeting more often. Spent some lovely time with each other & then our friendship turned into love. Thirty years of our married life felt like a span of few days. We were happy in our lives, our son Johnny was everything for us. Then one day, Cancer got her. Fifteen months of treatment gave her pain that I pray no one should see ever in their lives. I was with her the whole time. Johnny was in college that time but he did his best too to stay with her mother. It has been two years now that she's gone but these two years without her felt longer than those 30 years of togetherness.

We stayed in a 1 Bedroom Hall Kitchen(BHK) flat in Vasai. It was a flat which Agatha & I we both had bought with our own sweat n' blood. It's the house where Johnny grew up. After Agatha passed away, it became tough for Johny & I to stay home. She was the reason we came back to the house every evening. She used to keep my favourite coconut biscuits & tea ready for me. I used to wait for her calls on days when I got late at work. She had spoiled me & Johnny so much that none of us could even think of moving an inch in our lives without her.

After she passed, Johnny & I started finding reasons to stay away from home.  To come late at night had become a ritual for both of us. TV was our only escape from our pain & suffering. Johnny used to go inside & do stuff on his laptop & I used to keep watching news or sometimes those baseless, pointless TV shows to kill time.

Last year in May, Johnny told me about Serena. He was more comfortable with his mom about all this, but I guess now he had no choice. I know I should have tried to maintain a bond with him while he was growing up but now it's too late. Anyway; so, Serena was his classmate & they both were part of a same circle of friends. After college they kept in touch. Now they were in a relationship for about 8 months. I was happy for him. I used to always think that when the time would come, Agatha will take the lead in getting our son married. But, destiny had other plans. With some help from my brother in law & some guidance from Johnny's Grand mother(Agatha's mom), my son had a great wedding.

After Serena came to our house, she took care of us just like Agatha. She is a good girl. Along with her dreams and career, she also knew how to take care of her family. The resemblance in her nature with Agatha was unbelievable. However, the new problem...Well not a problem really but I think we will use that word here to explain the situation. So the new problem we faced now was my son and his wife's privacy. Like I mentioned earlier, we were living in a 1 BHK flat so when they got married, I permanently moved out of the bedroom & started sleeping in the hall. However, things were not as smooth as we had expected them to be. The problem was that our sofa-cum bed in the hall on which I sleep every night was right in front of the bedroom. Post retirement, I was more lathargic and thanks to my 1 to 2 hour long afternoon sleep, I could barely sleep at night. Now, the bathroom in our house was in the corridor between the bedroom and the hall. So everytime someone uses the bathroom, I would know. The fact that I'm awake most of the time and unfortunately I know when someone goes to the bathroom, made Serena a bit uncomfortable. No, she didn't had any wrong apprehensions about me, but I think she just felt shy is all. This was one of the problems.

The other thing is that they were young. They don't need to go to sleep at 10. At Least not during the weekends. It's their time to enjoy & spend some quality time. One night, I was just lying in my bed. I was not feeling sleepy at all. Didn't feel like watching TV either. Suddenly, I heard a soft metal clicking sound. It was the bedroom door. I saw the door knob rotate anti clockwise, so I understood that the door is going to open. To make things easier, I just pretended as if I'm asleep. I kept my eyes closed. I can tell from what I hear that Serena slowly came towards the hall, checked on me & once she confident that I'm asleep , slowly went into the kitchen. After that I heard the sound of vessels as she was cooking something. A while later, Johnny came out of the room in the same discreet manner & sneaked in to the kitchen. After some more metal clanking & suppressed giggling, I could smell noodles being cooked, Maggi, I think. Midnight snack, it's not a big deal. Everyone does that. They went back to the room and I could hear a muffled voice of some hindi movie played on a laptop.

Lying on the bed, I kept thinking about it. In my head, I thought that I had become an obstacle for them. They had to be so careful about doing regular things in their lives. They can't even move around freely in their own house just 'coz I am around all the time. Even during day time, I stayed home either writing endlessly in my diary or watching TV. I had no friends or friendly neighbors that I could go talk to neither we had any such gardens or a public place near our house where I could go take a walk. Upon that our house was on fourth floor. Being an old construction building, we had no elevator either. Hence, I hardly ever got out of the house coz otherwise I had to sit with ointments all night to apply on my knees to soothe the pain.

Last month, one evening, while we were having dinner, Johnny mentioned that Serena and him are thinking of buying a new house in Borivali. A two BHK with luscious gardens, elevator and all this in a very friendly neighborhood. They both had already planned it ahead of time and insisted that I come along this weekend to have a look at the place. To be honest, I had mixed feelings about all this.

To be continued. . .