The Story Teller

Everything started with the persistent cough. Each time I called about the progress of the land deal he would tell me that he was too sick and cough into the phone. I used to get irritated assuming that he was refusing to get treatment to get out of the responsibility of clearing the mess he had created in the bank loan and land deal. Really it was a big mess. And he was cool about it, willing to let it fester and do nothing till the land got attached. We did not care about the land, as it was something he had made and he could do what he wanted with it but creating more liabilities without any source of income to get out of it was what really bothered us.

Anyway that was how it was and each time he spoke of illness I dismissed it. Even when sis wrote to me saying he was really sick I told her he was acting. When I returned home he had come to pick me up at the airport and he looked weak but I was angry and did not care. But at home I realized that maybe he needed to see a doctor. The cough was too persistent loaded with phlegm and looked like pneumonia. I was really scared he might become too ill by the time of wedding leading to more complications. An X-ray and MRI scan later, things were totally different. We were no more looking at a lazy man pretending to be sick, but a man with just a couple more months to live. The cancer had spread and was in the secondary stage. Both lungs were affected as well as his spine and lot of other parts.

Looking at him now brought back memories of what a great father he had been. At a time when other fathers tended to be aloof and distant he had been there for us all the time. Told us stories of kings and queens, and turned us into voracious readers. I remember him telling us “The adventures of Tom Sawyer”. I read the book much later but he had told the story so well without leaving out anything that even now when I think Tom Sawyer it is my father’s voice telling the story that I remember.