Theandric Thursday : Post-cards to Achen

It was sixteen months ago that the letters started coming in . They were old post cards with no proper address and postage stamp. Since post cards were long now a passe, even for a small town like ours, we didn't receive many such letters. So we used to hold them back, in case someone came looking for them and cleared them out only every three months.

When I first came around her postcard more than a year ago, I was intrigued by the big clumsy handwriting and couldn't help myself not reading. It was addressed to;

Achen 
Cloth Fac toree 
Big City

The post card had following lines written in dark, big letters,

Hello Acha*

When you come back. I miss you Amma also miss you. amma is sad Achen she also cry today. pleese come home. I wait for you. 

Madhu

She had written so much in so less words that I couldn't help but wonder about what was it, that made her write that letter. Her innocence and honest belief had me thinking about the girl and her father for long that day. But I forgot about it soon enough because after that day, either I never got the chance or for some other reason, I never got around any more of her letters, until yesterday. Then, I had found them lying on my table with other letters. There were arranged to date and it could only be a chance that most of them were much older than three months. But when I recalled her first letter, I skipped the other ones and began with her post-cards. They were all addressed same, to; Achen, Cloth Factoree, Big City. This is what I read.

Letter 2:

Dear Achen

How are you. I am happy amma is happy also. Acha you buy my frend show me her doll today I also want a doll. You buy doll for me achen. okay. Come soon achen.

Your Madhu

Letter 3:

Dear Achen

Today Amma and Me go to fair. We sit on rides we also eat sweets and achen amma buy doll for me. I am very happy very happy. when you are come back we me and amma and you will go to fair

Bi achen, I love you

Letter 4:

Achen, when you come back, please come back. amma is no talking with me Amma is ill achen she is in hospital I am scared Acha. pleese come

Letter 5:

Dear achen

Why you no reply acha why you no come back. I am waiting for you i no like here. Where Amma go I want amma. acha pleese come back and bring amma also.. pleese achen. I miss you

madhu

The last two letters really moved me. I became worried. I kept thinking about her the whole day and until sleep came late at night. I saw Lalitha in my dream after a long time. It was that same scene I almost always see now, whenever I see her. 

I am sitting at the head of the table, on the wall side, eating. She's sitting on my left, forking her food and thinking. There's a hazy yellow light coming from the bulb in the corner behind me.

'I have to talk you about..' she starts to say

'Please, can I at least eat my food in peace. Will you let me', I cut her. She pauses, then says 'You are not changing your decision then?'

'Yes Lalitha, I am not changing my stand. I don't want a kid okay.. and that's that.' Then she leaves the table.

The dream ends. 

***

This morning, when I was going to office, I saw an overturned truck by the road. It then struck me, I had actually read about an accident involving a woman in the paper two months ago. It said that the badly injured woman had just a 7 year old daughter for kin. Maybe that woman was Madhu's mother, maybe not. Still, to be sure I called Parindra, a friend in local police station, and asked if he could tell me where the kids normally go if a guardian dies such as that in the reported accident. He told me that the minors in such cases are usually sent to the orphanage, and that there was a small one in town. I took the orphanage's number off the net when I reached the post office and dialed in to inquire about a 7 year old named Madhu. I found her. 

The caretaker at the Kutumb orphanage, Ms Sumana told me that the girl's mother died three days after the accident. Police had found from the neighbors that she had no relatives around and her husband had left her 5 years ago. And nobody knew his address exactly, but that he went to Calicut for work, apparently married some other girl and never returned. While on our way to see her in the garden, Ms Sumana asked

'So, you are the head postmaster at the Kettangal post office?'

'Yes'

'You're married I suppose'

'Separated actually, two years before'

'Oh, okay' she said, following it with a pause. Then 'So, how come you know about Madhu, I mean did somebody tell you about her..'

'Oh no. Let's say she sent me a letter herself', I said with a smile. She looked confused.

'Ah, we're here. Madhu, look ... someone has come to meet you.'

The girl with two ponytails sitting under a tree looked up. She had big round eyes and a rounder wheatish face. She looked every bit her name. She first looked confused, then said, 

'Who Achen?' I smiled at her.

'Is it really you, achen?' she said, eyes already welling up. I just smiled more and stretched out my hands. She ran into a hug and starting sobbing, clutching me tight, afraid maybe that I might leave her.

'You've come at last, Achen. You've come. I thought you'd never come. I thought you hated me and that you would never see me. I thought Amma also hated me and that's why she left and I would write you letters but you never replied, I waited for them and you never replied and I thought I would never see any of you again. But now you have come Achen and I am so happy. I am so happy Achen. Please never ever go away from me again. I love you so much. Please never go.'

'I would never my darling, I would never', I said wiping the tears that had come out and thinking that perhaps this was my chance of repentance. Of doing the things I did wrong, right.      

***

The last week, with Madhu, has been one of the best days of my life. I can't remember when I was this happy last. I got to know so many things from her, about her, about her school. She also told me that she got the post-cards as a gift from her class teacher, for her handwriting. 

I got to know that she loves reading poems, drawing and singing. She loves dogs. She hates bad dogs. She can't sit in one place for more than five minutes, unless she's drawing. And she talks. Nonstop. 

Today when I went to office, I found a post card lying on my table. Sathish must have left it there. It was addressed to,

God

7 Floor

Heaven

Dear God

Thank you very very much. You give my achen back thank you God. I love you you are best.

- - - - - - - - - - 

* Achen, Acha is Father in Malayalam.

This post very loosely fits Ashna's Theandric Thursday posts description. And since I wanted to write something for a TT post anyway, I am clubbing it under it. 

The dictionary definition of 'Theandric' is 'Relating to the joint agency of divine and human nature'.