A Walk To Remember

We use to walk down Juhu beach each evening, chatting away for hours about the daily mundane things, college fun, latest movies, fashion and crushes. We could talk on almost anything under the sun. It is said that all good things come to an end; our friendship too saw a similar fate. From a time when we would meet each other every day we began meeting lesser; small unresolved arguments kept piling up, we reduced talking on the phone and immersed ourselves in our own lives.

It was on my birthday that she called and said, “Hi, let’s meet. It’s been a long time and I guess this is the best time to catch up on our lives.” After about two weeks I finally met her. She greeted me with that same welcoming smile that she was used to when we had become friends. I had missed that smile for days now. As our meeting approached an end my friend gifted me a letter and a watch and said “This is a memento for our good times. I have missed you and our friendship. How I wish time could revert! This watch is symbolic of our moments of friendship and each time you look at it remember our friendship even if it means for that little moment”.

I didn’t know how to react and I could feel a tear trickling down my cheek. I wanted to tell her that I missed her too, let’s be the way we were before, but I didn’t say a word and we parted. She was crossing the road and suddenly I heard a loud crashing sound. I turned around and was shocked to see that my friend had met with an accident. A speeding motorcycle had knocked her down. I ran to her and as I held her in my lap, she mumbled, “I miss our friendship” and lost consciousness.

With the help of a few people I rushed her to the hospital and called her parents. A major six-hour surgery was performed; she had a serious head injury. While the surgery was going on the only thing on my mind were her words “I miss our friendship.”

I opened the letter to read it. She had written a lot of things, she also pointed out the reason for our distance, she said we should have trusted each other and resolved our issues before they could become barriers between us. She said that for once if only we hadn’t cared about our ego and instead cared more for each other, our friendship might have been intact.

Ego. It was ego that had created the rift between us; it began with small things and went on piling up till our friendship finally became overshadowed by it. Ego does nothing more than isolating us from our dear ones, and on any day relations are more important than ego. We kept our self esteem above our friendship and unlike before we stopped making the little efforts to sustain our friendship. Petty issues such as: “Let her call, why should I?” instead of saying, “Why shouldn’t I call her up? Maybe she is busy.” made us ruin our friendship.

As I remembered the times we had spent together tears kept rolling down my face. Even then I didn’t tell her, “I missed you too”. The doctor came and told us that due to severe internal brain injury my friend had slipped into a coma. He said the time of her recovery couldn’t be predicted. I broke down on hearing that. It’s been two months now since that accident; I visit my friend each day in the hospital. Her external injuries have healed, she is still in a coma. Each day I go and tell her what happens throughout the day, and now I tell her each day before leaving “I miss you. Get up, let’s walk down Juhu beach again”. I know she is listening, how I wish I could have told her that before.

I know you are listening to this article as I read it to you. Don’t worry my friend, very soon we will walk down Juhu beach and this time we will immerse our ego forever in the sea….

MEGHASHREE BAHETI (BE-INFT)