The OLD MAN’S Cell

Having retired from work and having lost his wife, Abdul Rehman was shattered emotionally. He developed so many complaints from life and suffered from inexplicable diseases that even his son Zahid could no longer clue out when it was something of significance and when it was merely a peevish whim. He sat idle on his string bed most of the day and developed an irksome habit of stretching out suddenly and lying absolutely still, allowing the whole family to fly around him in a flap, wailing and weeping, and then suddenly sitting up, stiff and lean, and spitting out a big gob of betel-juice as if to mock their behaviour.

Once there was a big party in the house and the celebrations were suddenly stopped when the grand-son discovered Abdul Rehman laid flat on his string bed without making any movement or responding to the repeated calls. When he woke up from the unconscious state, daughter-in-law accused him of creating a drama. She manipulated the situation in such a way that after that no one much cared if he sat up cross-legged on his bed, hawking and spitting, or lay down flat and turned grey as a corpse. Except, his son Zahid who was the sole caretaker.

It was Zahid who brought him his morning tea, not in one of the china cups from which the rest of the family drank, but in the old man’s favourite brass tumbler, and sat at the edge of his bed, comfortable and relaxed. It made no difference to him that his father made no response apart from spitting. It was Zahid too, who, on returning from the office in the evening, persuaded Abdul Rehman to come out of his room, as bare and desolate as a cell, and take the fresh air out in the garden, beautifully arranging the pillows and bolsters on the divan in the corner of the open veranda.

All this was very satisfying for Abdul Rehman. What was not so pleasing was that he even undertook to supervise his father’s diet chart. One day when the father was really sick, having told his daughter-in-law to make him a sweet dish, Zahid marched into the room, not with his usual respectful step but with a scornful stride, “No more sweet dish for you, Daddy. We must be reasonable, at your age.”

The old man who had been lying stretched out on his bed, weak and feeble after a day’s illness, looked frightened and numb. He opened his eyes—rather, they fell open with shock—and he stared at his son with an eye of scepticism. Rehana slipped silently out of the room with a little smirk that only the old man saw, and hated. Sweet Dish was only the first item to be crossed off the old man’s diet. One delicacy after the other went. The meals that arrived for him on the shining stainless steel tray twice a day were frugal to say the least—dry bread, boiled lentils, boiled vegetables .

If he called for another bread —in a cracked voice that quavered theatrically—Zahid himself would come to the door, gaze at him with a frowning face and shake his head, saying, “Now, Daddy, you must be careful, we can’t risk another illness, you know keeping in view financial constraints,” and although Rehana kept tactfully out of the way, the old man could just see her smirk sliding merrily through the air.

He often missed his late wife who was generous, tolerant, she served her husband selflessly for almost four decades without complaining. Once Abdul Rehman tried to bribe his grandson into buying him sweets, whispering, “Here are twenty rupees, run to the shop at the crossroads and buy me sweets for fifteen rupees and you can spend the remaining five rupees on yourself. He got away with it once or twice but then was found out, the son was scolded by his father Zahid and thrashed by his mother.

Zahid came storming into the room, almost tearing his hair as he shouted through compressed lips, “Now Daddy, are you trying to turn my little son into a liar? Quite apart from spoiling your own stomach, you are spoiling him as well—you are encouraging him to lie to his own parents. You should have heard the lies he told his mother when she saw him bringing back those sweets wrapped up in filthy newspapers. I don’t allow anyone in my house to buy sweets in the bazaar, Daddy, surely you know that.

The old man sighed and lay down in the corpse position. But that worried no one any longer. Outwardly all might be the same but the interpretation had altered: his masterly efficiency was nothing but cold heartlessness, his authority was only tyranny in disguise. There was cold comfort in complaining to neighbours and, on such a miserable diet, Abdul Rehman found himself slipping, weakening and soon becoming a genuinely sick man.

There were pills to regulate his bowel movements, pills to bring down his blood pressure, pills to deal with his arthritis and, eventually, pills to keep his heart beating. In between there were panicky rushes to the hospital, some experience with the stomach pump and enema, which left him frightened and helpless. He cried easily, shrivelling up on his bed, but if he complained of a pain or even a vague, grey fear in the night, Zahid would simply open another bottle of pills and force him to take one. “I have my duty to you Daddy” he said when his father begged to be let off.

“Deprived of food,” screamed the old man on the bed, “his wishes ignored, taunted by his daughter-in-law, laughed at by his grandchildren—that is how I live.” But he was very old and weak and all anyone heard was an incoherent croak, some expressive grunts and cries of genuine pain. One day he spat out some words, as sharp and bitter as poison, into his son’s face.

“Keep your tonic—I want none—I want none—I won’t take any more of—of your medicines. None. Never,” and he threw the bottle on the wall. Rehana added fuel to the fire by uttering uncomfortable words. All around the old man was hubbub once again, noise, attention. He gave one push to the pillows at his back and dislodged them so he could sink down on his back, quite flat again. He closed his eyes and pointed his chin at the ceiling, like some dire prophet, groaning, “God is calling me—now let me go.”

Authors: Dr Zubair Saleem/ Dr Showkat Rashid Wani