Pavittra Kalyaan
Some responsibilities come with the blueprint of life, whether you like it or not. Like being the firstborn. Whenever his parents were away, Atul was expected to watch his siblings. It was a once-a-week thing. Every odd Sunday. Until the dhaba they opened three years ago began draining money. Now, they’re meeting with investors, pulling all-nighters at the restaurant, turning every stone for new funds. For Atul, that means more time stopping his manipulative eight-year-old sister from wrestling their spindly younger brother.
With shrieks of laughter emerging from the living room, Atul groans, falling back on his bed. He loathes what his life has come to. The only places he visits anymore are the school or the dhaba. His friends don’t call him for things, and he’s stopped pretending to laugh at their inside jokes. Riddhi is the only one in the group who bothers texting him. Sits with him at lunch. Remembers his birthday—
Atul jolts. The gift! His brother cackles manically, chasing his sister past the door. Throwing himself out of bed, Atul scrambles to his cupboard. The rusted hinges squeak as he jerks the door open, retrieving the box. The picture at the top reveals the beast of a car, glimmering in all its glory. The Ferrari SF90 Stradale. The model kit was gifted to him by Riddhi on his last birthday. This came days after he thought he had bored her to death with his lengthy monologue comparing the ways McLaren and Ferrari manage downforce on the Formula 1 track.
He had been waiting to assemble it ever since. However, with commitments compounding at school and home, the sixteen-year-old had completely forgotten about it. Given that this is his only relatively free weekend until exams start, he makes a decision. Today, the SF90 is coming out of the cardboard. He lifts the box over his head dramatically, when light from the window illuminates the small white price tag underneath. Two-zero-zero euros.
Atul’s jaw drops. How had he missed this? If he had known how expensive it was, he would never have accepted it. Although Riddhi isn’t a show-off, it is obvious she is rich. All her vacations abroad—from island hopping in Greece to touring chocolate museums in Belgium—say that much. Still, gifting a friend this sort of money—he would never do that for anyone. Hypothetically speaking. Not that he had any money to spare.
Still, the SF90 beckons, and it is too late to scold her for it. Perhaps in the future, he can figure out a way to pay her back. Assuming the car has many parts meant to come together in a puzzle, he carries it to the living room, carefully sidestepping between his squealing siblings having their fifteenth argument of the day. Atul’s brother pauses to express an interest in his activity, but he brushes him off and sets the box atop the only table in the house.
One after another, Atul removes sprues containing the chassis, body, engine parts, interiors, and custom accessories. The parts are unlike any he has seen; they don’t have grooves or holes where pieces interlock. They are to be glued together. Slipping into his room to grab a tube of glue and scissors, he returns to see his brother standing on tiptoe, peeping into the box. He wants to help. Atul shakes his head despite his brother’s protests. Some of these parts are smaller than the six-year-old’s thumb. His clumsy brother is bound to lose one or two, and Atul doesn’t want to be the one crying over spilled milk. He points to their sister, who is stretching her elbows, ready to practise her chokehold.
With a humph, the brother goes back under his sister’s wings. He yells for Atul to see him expertly turning in her arms, but the eldest sibling is unbothered. Pressing his glasses further up his nose, Atul retrieves the manual and studies the lists of parts and symbols. The sounds from their tussle distract him now and then, but for the most part, the assembly instructions have put the rest of his world on hold.
Thud. A resounding hit forces Atul’s chin up. Neither of his siblings is in sight, and the height of the table doesn’t let him see below. His sister lets out a low whimper. Dropping his manual on the chair, he rushes to the entangled pair on the kitchen floor. She is on her stomach, with both legs and a hand wedged underneath the younger one’s back. Her yelps get louder as she tries to wiggle out; his hold is surprisingly heavy. At Atul’s touch, the brother stirs, and his sister jumps out. A scolding ready at the tip of his tongue, he waits for his brother to rise, too. But the boy, pushed on his side, doesn’t move.
Atul calls his name. There is no response, only a slight jerk of the head. Concerned, he cautiously sets his brother back on his back and observes the small pupils unstable inside partly closed lids. Breath catches at his throat. Atul quietly turns to his sister. How hard did he fall? She babbles. She didn’t have anything to do with it. Hers was barely a touch. He didn’t see the way he pushed her!
Atul huffs. She isn’t going to tell him the truth. Not when she is scared of being yelled at by parents who dote on the little one. Hoping they will be more helpful, he searches for his phone. Worry fogs his mind as he wastes seconds pushing cushions, clothes, and cartons of cookbooks out of the way. Where is it? His hands freeze at his sister’s shriek. She is pointing to his brother’s lips. Saliva drips from its corners. Particles of food spout out when he coughs.
Stories of drunk boys choking on their vomit swarm his mind. Atul violently gestures for his sister to get to the boy’s back. He pulls. She pushes. Fluid sputters from his brother’s mouth just as he is made to sit up. First a spittle, then a shower. With his sister determined to stay as far away as possible from the retching, she pushes further and further, directing all the sickly contents towards Atul.
With vomit-soaked clothes, Atul realises. His brother doesn’t need his parents. Right now, he needs a doctor.
Feet firm on the floor and hands under the unconscious boy’s shoulders, he lifts. When the soles of his brother’s feet find the floor, he steps forward. Regrets it immediately. The boy’s legs flop on the vomit, and the unsteady weight causes the pair of them to tumble, Atul cushioning his brother’s head only moments before he hits the floor for the second time. Cursing at his inability to lift a boy whose appetite is only large enough for two biscuits, he groans aloud, wondering if he will ever make it out the door.
Thankfully, his sister isn’t as useless as he thought. Running out, she brings along the first stranger she sees, an auto-rickshaw driver smelling heavily of cheap smoke. Swooping the boy off the floor, the driver leads the children into the cement-dusted street. With nothing to do as they blaze their way to the nearest hospital, the true intensity of the moment descends on Atul.
He may be too late.
The disinfectant in the waiting room does little to help with the chunks of sick drying on his clothes. Guilt arrives in ripples. Could have. Should have. He could have let his brother play with him. He should have been watching them. Hiding behind her knees on the chair next to him, his sister asks if their brother is going to be okay. When he doesn’t answer, she rushes to ask one of the nurses going in and out of the ICU. The agitated nurse rebukes her for causing a disturbance. Atul embraces his bawling sister until his parents arrive. He rang them an hour ago from the hospital reception, catching them just when their meeting ended. His mother hugs him tight, thanking him for being brave and doing the best he could. She says other things too, but her words are muffled as his eyes lock on the frame on the opposite wall. A photo of a sculpture titled Atlas shows a bearded, muscular man holding a sphere upon his shoulders. The strokes on the enchanting blue sphere replicate the Earth. Atlas, bent double from the weight, looks exhausted.
Hours pass until a doctor meets them. Disapproval teems in her face. She grabs a wide envelope from the nurse’s station. I warned you this could happen, she tells Atul’s parents. His mother gasps in shock. His father asks the obvious: Is he alive?
Yes, the doctor responds, and Atul feels his own heart lift a little. Although her expression as she retrieves the CT scan from the envelope says there is little to rejoice. With the bottom of her pen, she circles a white crescent-shaped area along the curve at the right side of the brain. Subdural hematoma, she says. He was bleeding inside his skull.
The next day, Atul learns more about his brother’s chronic condition. He pours over article after article on the internet. Haemophilia. Children with haemophilia. Clotting factors. Haemorrhages. He discovers that his brother was diagnosed at three, after his first accident at the park. He needs injections to help his blood clot. When the money from the dhaba started to dry up, so did the treatments. A fit of rage blows through him. He wants to scream at his father for caring more about his business than his youngest. At his mother for enabling his father and not telling him to find a normal job. At both, for leaving Atul in the dark about his brother’s condition. But he doesn’t speak. He swallows his rage, thoughts travelling to the man in the painting at the hospital. His sight away from the globe, unavailable to admire the beauty of what he carries. Forever condemned to be so.
When he arrives at Riddhi’s house the following morning, she is pleased to hear that he’s been wanting to talk to her about something. Me too, she says. Her smile fades when he seeks her permission to sell the model kit. He needs the money for his brother’s treatment. Given the thought she put into the gift, it didn’t feel right to do so without asking first. Unable to see Atul devastated and alone, she weeps for her friend. Her parents like Atul; they always have. When they hear of his grief, they call his mother, sending them home with a cheque, the model car kit still in hand.
Atul’s anger now boils over. He confronts his mother over accepting the money from his friend. She cries. Says she has nowhere else to go. They lost their insurance, and his father used all of their savings to renovate the dhaba. She promises to repay it as soon as she is able. Because Atul is sure she won’t, he pledges to repay Riddhi’s parents in six years, when his engineering degree lands him in a decent-paying job. For now, there is little he can do except trust in his parents. Even when every bone in his body is telling him not to.
The rest of the week, he stays home with his sister as his parents spend days at the hospital. He learns to keep rice. Boil chicken and eggs. They always eat in silence. Sleep with the TV blasting in the living room. When his brother’s alertness improves and he can receive guests, Atul takes his sister to the hospital. Seeing them makes the little one smile. His sister jumps on the bed, hugging, wailing, and apologising. Atul stands at the bedside, brushing a hand through his brother’s hair. There is a lot he wants to tell him, but a quiver is controlling his throat. He doesn’t want to cry.
His brother points to the box in his hand and asks if he has assembled it yet. He shakes his head. Tiredness comes calling for the affected. Atul stays for a bit longer, watching him sleep. Follows the IV fluid dripping into his thin veins. Listens to the soft beeping of the heart monitor. When they’re about to leave, he leaves the gift.
Inside the Ferrari SF90 Stradale model kit is a promise.
I will always protect you.
— A Atul
Pavittra is a writer from Bangalore, India. Her YA mystery novella, The Broken Shadow, was a finalist in the Amazon KDP Pen to Publish Season 5 contest. She enjoys writing across genres, particularly about self-aware characters and finding unique ways to break them. She is currently exploring the dynamics of irreversible choices in relationships in her work-in-progress romance novel. When she finds herself staring at the same line for hours on end, she steps away to dance or play tennis. Instagram: @kindly.writing; X: @PavittraK
