Splintered Lives (20 page)

A car pulls up and young woman bounces up the steps, without seeing the boys in the garden, as she is so anxious to see her mother and sister.

“Mum, Taz.” She calls as she hurries into the hall.

“Oh there you are, lovely to have you home for a few days.” Calls out Mrs. Menon as she rushes downstairs to meet her daughter. Taz appears and they share a hug, the three of them.

“Where’s dad?” Sahida asks.

“He should be on his way now.” Taz tells her sister.

“Come out and meet our guests.” Taz says.
 
“They have been trekking for the last two and half months, but Ben has had an accident up on the mountain and I brought them down to the hospital, here in Katmandu.
 
They are from Britain and they are two lovely lads.
 
They have tickets to return home on the 20
^th
but they cannot find a hostel that is not booked up for the Festival.” Sahida and her sister, along with their mother, go into the garden.

Chapter 29

Dr Menon is worrying about the situation at home and he hopes that his family will not be too upset when they meet Simon.
 
He hopes that when they question Simon, there will be an explanation for the looks he has.
 
His heart sings with hope that he is the grandson he has longed for, and that a part of his lost son will be amongst them.
 
He thinks that there may be a possibility that the English girl Taj loved may have gone home pregnant.
 
It is a possibility that he hopes is true.
 
He has never really got over the loss of his son, neither have the other members of the family, but he is afraid to get his hopes up too high because, he tells himself, it could be a coincidence and he may be disappointed.

He arrives home to find there is a party going on in the garden.
 
Ben has revived after some pain killers, and is gently smiling at all there present and telling his side of the story.
 

Simon is teasing a little about the time they saw the lodge in the distance and Ben was so excited he fell off the mountain.

The doctor has a precious look on his face as he looks at the two boys.
 
Ben has mended so quickly, his attitude to his injuries so positive and when he looks at Simon his heart lifts.
  

“Sahida, you‘ve got here in good time.
 
Did you have a good journey?” Dr Menon asks his eldest daughter as he gives her a hug.
 
It’s lovely to see you darling.”

Sahida tells them of her journey from the mountain school where she is now the headmistress.
 
The roads had been busy because of the Festival and she was late setting out as she had been arranging, along with her staff, the Festival in the villages from where her pupils came.

“The journey was better than I imagined, there was a steady flow of traffic, and I didn’t stop on the road as I had had a good breakfast before I set off.” She replies.

Taz turns to introduce the boys to her sister and Sahida’s eyebrows rise as she gets a better look at Simon.

“Oh my God.”
 
She cries as she takes Simon’s hand.
 
”You look just like my brother.”

 
“How can I?
 
I am so confused, I have seen a portrait in the hall that could be me when I’m dressed up, and the looks I have been getting from all the family makes me wonder what’s happening to me.”

Dr Menon steps in to say “Come on let’s put our cards on the table and say what we are thinking.
 
Sahida what do you think of Simon?”

“I think that he can be Taj’s son with Sarah, who left very soon after Taj’s death. I know that Sarah loved my brother very much and that she was devastated after the plane crash.
 
What’s your mother’s name Simon?”

Simon is so confused he doesn’t reply for a moment and then says. “My mother’s name is Sarah and my father’s name is David.
 
I have a sister called Anne and my cousin Mark is here in Nepal doing some civil engineering work.

“Oh my god.” Sahida cries.
 
“I know Mark, he came to see Sarah when she worked with me, and we had a party for him and his friends.
 
All the villagers were invited to come to the party, and Sarah and I prepared the food. Taj came to meet him.
 

Mark is trying to come to meet us in Katmandu on the 19
^th
to see us off on the 20
^th.”
Simon tells them.

Ben puts his hand on Simon’s shoulder and hugs him to him.
 
He knows his friend is confused, but feels it is a wonderful thing for him to have found this other family.

“Are you O.K.?” He asks Simon shaking his hand and saying.
 
“Congratulations on finding these lovely caring people.”

Dr Menon takes Simon to the bottom of the garden and gently tells him of his son and now it seems, Simon’s father.

“Taj was a doctor in the hospital where Taz and I work.
 
He was only thirty-two when he was killed in an airplane crash in Pokhara.
 
He was a good man and a good son, but I did not know how close he was to your mother.
 
She came to stay with us when we lived in Pokhara where I was G.P., a lovely girl who was a close friend of Sahida’s.
 
I think Sahida will be able to tell you more about the time they taught together, in the village school.
 
Taj had a lovely nature and all the family have missed him dreadfully since the accident.
 
I’m so happy to have found you and the family will adore you because Taj was adored by all of us.”

Simon looks at his grandfather and smiles his lovely smile but feels strange and confused. He wants to be on his own to digest what he has been told.
 
He remembers David and the love he has for his dad.
 
He asks himself all sorts of questions.
 
Why has no one at home told him?
 
Who is he now he has found another family, half way across the world?
 
Is it because of his genes that he wants to be a doctor?
 
Why did his mother not tell him about his father?
 
Is this why he has always felt a bit of an outsider at school?
 
He is longing to see Mark who seems to have known about all this from when he was eighteen and trekking in Nepal.
 
He keeps these questions to himself and tries to be pleasant and friendly but he can’t wait to be by himself and ponder on what he has been told by this new family of strangers.

Sahida comes towards them and she puts her arm around Simon’s shoulder and Dr Menon leaves them to talk.

“I was a great friend of your mother.”
 
She tells Simon.
 
“She left so quickly after Taj had died.
 
She came to the River for his funeral but became so ill she had to be taken away from the river, where Taj’s ashes were being scattered. Your grandparents came to take her back to England, shortly after that, and I have not heard from her or about her since.
 
Taj and Sarah were so in love and I’m sure they would have been together today, if he had lived and we would have had you in our lives from your birth.
 
Sarah loved her life at the school and in Pokhara and she came at my invitation to meet my family.
 
That is when she met Taj at our house by the lake and they hit it off immediately.
 
Taj adored her and she felt the same.
 
It was such a tragedy for all of us when Taj died and I’m afraid we were all bound up in our own grief to see how bad she felt.
 
I’m sure she did not know she was pregnant when she left or she would have told me.
 
Tell me about her and your life in England.”

“Why did she not tell me?” Simon cries. “I love my mother and my dad and all my family at home, but someone should have told me.”

“Why hasn’t Mark said anything, especially when he knew my friends and I were coming here to the mountains, and he was here to meet us when we arrived?”

 
“It isn’t his place to tell your mother’s secret and he was a very young man when he was here with us, just about the same age as you are now.” Sahida says with a sad look on her face.
 
To think that Taj’s son has lived for eighteen years without them having any idea of his birth.
 
A feeling of bitterness comes over Sahida to think that Sarah has kept her family in the dark for eighteen years and not to have shared the child that belonged to Taj, as well as, Sarah herself.
 
She shrugs this feeling away as Simon must be feeling a lot more confused than she is.

“Come on love.”
 
She tells Simon with a loving look on her face.
 
“We’ll find the others and they can all tell you what they remember of your mother and Taj.

I’m so glad that you have a father figure in your life to which you can give love and respect and what has happened here will not make any difference to your relationship with him.
 
How he has nurtured you and how he has made your family whole can only be because he is a good man.”

Simon nods as they wander back up the garden, to find the rest of the family.

Meanwhile Mrs. Menon sits quietly in the kitchen with her thoughts far away into the past.
 
She knew Taj was very taken with the English girl, Sarah, but she was sure that when Sarah went home that Taj would settle down and marry a local girl and have a life in
Katmandu
within the extended family.
 
When the airplane crashed and she lost her son all she could feel at the time was a grief so strong no one should have to suffer it.
 
She remembers the grief Sarah showed was as strong as her own, but she ignored it, and let the girl be taken by Sarah’s parents, home to England.
  
She should have known that Taj’s love for Sarah was very strong and have done more for the girl. “What had Sarah to do?” She asks herself when she found herself to be pregnant with the man she so obviously adored.
 
She had done the only thing she would do, and had the baby.
 
I must talk to Simon to tell him, how we are partly to blame for his not having been part of our family, from the start.
    

Taz has shown the boys their rooms. She has taken Ben to one on the ground floor that has an
ensuite
bathroom so that he can be independent.
 
He knows that Simon will help him in the bath when he is ready but for now he just needs to lie on the bed and rest.
Taz
renews his pain- killers and Ben soon sleeps peacefully.

Simon is now on his own and he curls up on his bed and feels like weeping.
 
Tears start to run down his face as he thinks about all that has happened to him since the accident to Ben on the mountain.

“He thinks of the kindness of the Menons, Taz who brought them to the hospital.

She must have been a teenager when his mother was here but she can see the resemblance of her brother in him and he must admit that the portrait in the hall looks a lot like him.
 
Dr Menon is so thrilled to have Simon staying, and he makes no reservations, of him being his grandson.
 
He treats him with a kindness that is like that of Joe and Charlie, his grandfathers at home.

Sahida shows him a glimpse of his mother that he has never thought about and he wonders if the love for his Hindu father takes something from David, who he is sure she loves.
 
The life of the parents, with Anne and me, has always felt right and has been, and is still, a very close unit.
 
He sometimes has a memory of first meeting with David, when he was a very small boy, claiming him for his dad but he has put the thought away from him because David has always been there for him.
 

Mrs. Menon, who has been very busy finding them rooms, making up beds and giving them tea, has not yet drawn close to Simon, but from the glances she has been giving him, he knows that he is her grandson and she accepts him as such.

I need to see Mark he thinks in his troubled mind.
 
Mark will help me to accept what is happening to me, but Mark is not here yet. I’ll go to Ben when he awakens and talk my feelings over with him.
 
I’m glad it’s Ben with me here because he is the most sensitive of my friends.

Simon pulls himself together, gets up off the bed and goes into the bathroom to have a shower.
 
When he is dressed he goes to see how Ben is doing.
 
Ben is awake and feeling refreshed after his fitful sleep.

“Can I help you to have a shower if you are feeling up to it?” Simon asks.

“Sure, but are you feeling O.K?” Ben replies.
 
“Why don’t we have a talk, I know how you must be feeling confused and happy eh?”

Simon goes and hugs Ben and sits on the bed.