DAYS OF SUNLIGHT

by NANDA NAIR

I remember I was just seven then. My father used to work as the general manager of a beautiful resort located in the eye of Munnar.

Every summer and winter holidays he used to take my mom and me to stay in that beautiful resort. My mum used to stay in our room most of the day until evening when we used to take a stroll on the hill. But me being an extrovert, solitude was at bay. I was always in the garden having fun with the gardeners. They were so good. They babysat me throughout the day though I wasn't a baby. Poor flowers, the gardeners owe them a lot for those flowers must envy me of my privileges. They taught me Tamil and they played tennis ball cricket with me. I was always the bowler since I sucked at batting. Gardner Geetha didi was my peer in the merry-go-round and in almost anything I did from the garden.

And best of all, they gifted me with chocolates at the end of the day.

But what added spice to the fun was when the kids of guests who came to enjoy their holidays in the resort came to the garden. I used to entertain them, much to the glory of their romantic couple parents. I even taught a few words in Malayalam to a few diligent ones. I warned them not to pick any flowers from the garden, simultaneously winking at the gardeners as I plucked a few of them and shoved them into my pockets.

Out of the few kids I had fun with, I adored one dearly. She was Priyanka. Priyanka came from an inter-state family. Her mother was Hyderabadi and her dad was from Karnataka. I remember them to be a really sweet couple. But Priyanka was sweeter. She was just a year or two younger than me and her hair locks always fell onto her cute puppy-like face. Now I stopped pestering the gardeners for my entertainment because I had Priyanka. She was to stay in the resort for three days and for those three mornings she came and knocked on my door for me to wake early and play with her.

Throughout the day we played so much that my mom feared I would exhaust her. She even asked me not to get into their room without knocking and taught me manners whose existence I was oblivious about until then.

On the day of their departure, her dad handed me his business card. He asked me to keep in touch with them whenever possible and I was overwhelmed by their gesture. And like that, they bid goodbye…. Forever.

I remember handing over that card to my mom after they left. But forgot to remind her of its importance. Only after our holidays ended and we got back home did my brain cells remind me of the card. I pondered about it to my mom and she started rummaging in our luggage. She couldn’t find it, unfortunately.

As time transcended, I forgot Tamil, my dad resigned from his position in that resort, one of those gardeners(Geeta didi’s husband) succumbed to cardiac arrest, the resort was sold to some political party and I grew up to be a teenager, just like many other girls of my age. 12 years passed, seemingly quicker than it takes to flip the pages of a book.

Priyanka might not remember me as I might be just one of her ‘didis’ that she befriended in the course of her life, but she was a wonderful girl. A girl with whom I spent only three days. A girl with whom I shared a little of my beautiful memories.