Frozen !

Frozen !

Sophia was quite disturbed by the phone call she got one day. It was from her son Roy. 

Roy, Sophia's only son had gone to Europe, with some of his friends. He was a young man in his late thirties. He called up his mother that day and spoke for a while and then quite suddenly asked, "Mom, if it's fine for you would you mind coming here ? I shall make the travel arrangements soon". She didn't quite well understand why he wanted her to go there that too all of a sudden. 

She was quite confused, and responded in a bit concerned tone, "Why should I come ? Are you okay ? Is everything fine there?" Roy replied everything was fine and soon hung up.

 Her son had told he was in Switzerland in Europe as he was out there with his friends.

 

Sophia had been to Europe once during her youthful days with her husband, and ever since then, she had never been there or ever wanted to go there. That trip had left her with some haunting and nightmarish memories which she had been trying to erase from her mind.

 Sophia had been staying with his son's family in Calcutta for many years now. Roy's wife Monica was a cardiologist and they have two small kids, both twins, and Sophia spends her time looking after the kids. She is a very affectionate and caring grandmother and takes care of the kids very well. She spends more time with the kids than even Roy and his wife does, as very often both of them won't get enough time to spare amidst their busy work schedule.

 Roy works in a private company in Calcutta, and post his marriage and right after the twins were born, his mother Sophia moved to their family and has been with them since then. She is now an integral part of their family. Roy is also quite an affectionate and considerate son.

 Sophia during her earlier days had to go through a lot of hardships and sufferings to raise her son, that too all alone. Sophia is a widow and lost her husband just few years after her marriage, and had to go through lot of struggles in life.

 

Well, during her college days (that is during the 1970s), Sophia was in love with a young man named Sabarjith Chatterjee and finally married him against the wishes of both their families. 

In the orthodox society prevalent in those days, where religion and caste were given more priority than human sentiments, no support from both families were there for their inter-caste relationship, and they began their life together on their own.

 Later Sophia got a job as a school teacher after completing her studies, while at that time Sabarjith worked in the accountants office. Though they had to go through lot of hardships during their initial days, with their little earnings they pulled on together and settled in Calcutta itself. After few years of their marriage, their son Roy was born.

 They were living their happy life together in their rented out apartment in the city. 

It was during that time Sabarjith came across a plan for an overseas trip. 

Some friends of Sabarjith suggested a plan for a trip abroad to Europe and he was really excited. Sophia too who loved traveling and had never been abroad or even on a plane was also too much interested with the idea. Their son Roy was around three years of age then. Some of their common friends and their families too were joining for the trip and hence they were really excited.

 After their marriage due to the difficulties, they had to go through they never got a chance for a trip together and now after couple of years through their marriage, they thought this was a golden opportunity. Money was a concern, but still from their earnings they were able to spare the necessary expense for the trip and decided to go ahead with the plan.

 So finally, after much planning, the dates and schedule of the trip was finalized. Finally, the much-anticipated day arrived, and they set out for the trip. It was a two-week long vacation plan in Europe, and besides Sabarjith, Sophia and their three year old son, there were two other families with their small children. They set out from Calcutta, landed in London and then visited several places in UK, and then headed to Paris, and then to Germany and to Switzerland. While spending time in Switzerland tragedy struck !

 While they were in Switzerland, one morning Sabarjith and friends along with some other local men of the town set out for hiking to the snow-capped Alps mountains, leaving behind the ladies and kids back in their rooms. It was in the Jungfrau region towards the famous Matterhorn.

During the hiking, the group of young men climbed uphill enjoying the pristine landscape all around covered in snow which looked as if it had rained vanilla ice cream from the heavens. As they climbed enjoying the pleasant weather and serene landscape, all of a sudden disaster struck. Initially they felt some rumbling sound and felt as if the ground where they stood was shaking, and then followed by a roaring sound from above. The next instant, the entire mountain slope came down on them. It was a terrible avalanche, with a deluge of snow and rocks and fallen trees which swept everyone down the very same instant, and all of them were buried in a huge pile of snow.

 The shocking news of this tragedy spread all over the town and Sophia was shattered and was inconsolable, and so were the other women. All the families lost their dear ones, and were shocked and devastated. They couldn't even unearth the bodies of the men as the avalanche was terrible and snow had piled up over a large area and no one had any clue where their bodies lay. It was those days where GPS or smartphones didn’t exist and for locating something underneath the snow there weren't advanced technology like sonar. Though police force and the locals did extend their maximum support, all their frantic efforts bore no fruit. The three families finally returned to India bearing the loss of their loved ones, and without even being able to find their bodies or perform the last rites. 

 Sophia was too much devastated and shattered after this horrific incident. She found life miserable without her husband, and that she even thought of committing suicide several times. As she was aware that her sole existence was essential to raise her son, she pulled on with her life.

 Her family did share with her their grievance and condolences when she lost her husband, but no one came forward for further help or support and she was left alone. She put in all her efforts she could, and took lot of pains to look after her son Roy and to raise him up.

 Years went by.

 Her son completed his graduation, got job in the same city, later got married and settled down in his life.

 Sophia finally retired from her job as a headmistress in the school where she joined, and post her retirement and after her son's marriage she moved to live with her son.

 

Now she was in her late sixties and it has been around forty years since the horrific tragedy which left her life in shambles. She had been living with the memories of her husband all these years. As it's often said "time heals everything", so in the course of time she could recover and pull on with life somehow, though literally time hasn't healed everything for her. Still that day remain afresh in her mind, the morning when she waved goodbye to her husband as he left out smilingly leaving her behind, and never returned. 

 Each and every day in her life she had lived so far didn't have a single hour when she hadn't reminisced that day she lost her beloved.

 

So today, when her son called her from Switzerland, suddenly these memories flashed through her mind. She was very perplexed on why he wanted her to go over to Switzerland - a place whose memories were haunting her all through her life. 

Even from a very young age Roy was aware of the mishap, and she had narrated the details of the tragic day to Roy and explained on how he had lost his father. Also, Roy was now pretty aware that the place won't bring her any happy memories other than adds on to her pain and grief. Yet he wanted her to go there. This really disturbed her.

 After the call that day, Roy tried calling his wife. She was in the hospital when Roy called and hence later in the evening after she returned home, they both had another conversation. He explained to her at length the reason why he had called and why he wanted his mother to travel to Switzerland, and told her to explain this to his mother and convince her. 

 That night after their dinner and after the kids were off to bed, Monica and Sophia sat down in the living room as usual. Sophia was engrossed with some knitting work, while Monica had a magazine in her hand and was pretending to be reading it. Monica didn't know how to put it across to Sophia. After a brief silence she spoke up.

 "Mom, well as you know, Roy is now in Europe with some of his friends" she began and Sophia lifted up her head and looked at her. 

 She continued, "It wasn't just a casual trip.... I mean, he has some contacts in Switzerland and few years back while having a conversation with one of his friends there, Roy did mention the fateful incident which took the life of his father, and that even his body couldn't be recovered then. There was no trace of his father or his friends who had set out for hiking that day. Roy also mentioned the location where they had stayed in Jungfrau, and went for hiking and the specific year of the incident."

 Sophia's eyes widened on hearing this and she looked at her intently, trying to grasp what she was trying to convey. This was something she had least expected to hear from Monica.

 Monica paused for a moment and then continued, "That was years ago but recently that friend did contact Roy. He said that a news was reported on the local newspapers of some findings of some remains of travellers. It seems, a group of youngsters were doing some excavations and could unearth some remains. The current climate change, global warming and melting of snow from mountain tops must have also led to this finding..."

 Sophia listened intently, with abated breath.

 "A small pocket calendar was found from one of the travellers and it mentioned the year 1977 and an Indian passport was also found and few other belongings and some unidentified bodies. The friend thought of informing Roy as they found Indian passport and the year from the calendar, as it bore resemblance to Roy's narration of that accident."

 "Oh", remarked Sophia. Suddenly she seemed to turn very gloomy and sat as if struck by a lightning bolt.

She was very much disturbed earlier that day even when she spoke to her son, and when he mentioned the name of the place and asked her if she would like to go there. But now she felt really shaken and upset. She felt as if those memories which were haunting her so often, were raining down on her.

 Monica continued without giving much heed to Sophia's change in demeanour, and gathering all the courage she could get.

 "So Roy had gone to Switzerland with few of his friends and have identified some remains of articles that were unearthed, and some dead bodies were also recovered. He wants you to travel there to identify one of the bodies and if so, we could ..."

 Before she could complete further Sophia raised her hand as a gesture of objection. With eyes filled with tears, she waved her hand in dismay with a gesture to stop. She didn't want to hear this any further and she tried to utter few words, but her lips wavered and she somehow expressed her resentment for this.

 Monica had to spend some more time trying to convince her. If she didn't want to travel it's fine, but if she could and if one of the bodies they found, happened to be that of her husband's then that would make a big difference. She was the only living person who can identify him, and Roy hardly has any vague memories of his father whom he lost when he was just three years old. Roy is familiar about his father's appearance mostly from old photographs. 

 Sophia was still adamant. They continued sitting in their living room and Monica didn't speak anything further. They sat in silence and continued with their own work and after some time Sophia got up to go to bed. Monica said "Good Night". Later she too got up and went to her bedroom.

 

Next morning, Monica was busy in her kitchen making coffee. The children were still in bed cuddled together on that cold morning.  Sophia had got up and she came down to the kitchen and came up behind Monica and suddenly in hushed tone remarked, "Well I can travel if the arrangements can be made soon!"

 Monica was quite startled to hear her and turned around in surprise at the unexpected change of mind, and the courage which her mother in-law seems to have quite suddenly. She smiled at her and said "Wow. That's great. I shall tell Roy now itself".

 Quickly she tried to call up Roy but soon realized that it was still night time in Europe and hence left him a text message. 

 

Well, later during the day Roy who had seen her message, spoke to Monica and then also had a word with his mother Sophia. He went head to make the travel arrangements so that Sophia could travel to Switzerland at the earliest. Roy had to get in touch with Indian embassy to get her visa, and the formalities went quite smoothly unlike how Roy had thought. Finally, the arrangements were done and Sophia was to travel to Switzerland the next Monday. 

 

Days went by quite soon, and finally it was the day of her travel. Sophia set out for her travel to Europe. Monica dropped her at the Calcutta airport to see her off. 

She boarded the aircraft. After travelling through the skies for many hours to another part of the world, she finally landed in Zurich. Roy was there to meet her at the airport. She met him waiting for her. Amidst the crowd, she could somehow identify him as he was waving his hands. Everything around looked very unfamiliar to her.

 He greeted her and ushered her outside, and they both got into a taxi and drove to the hotel where he stayed. It was a pleasant day except for the cold weather.

 They spent the day together and talked a lot, tried western cuisines, and went for a walk later that evening. Sophia felt the weather to be colder than she though and might be because of her age she was finding it hard to cope. The places looked much different and though few places she did realize to be the ones she had visited decades ago, even those appeared much different from what she could recall in her mind.

 Roy didn't talk anything about the subject and only mentioned that the next day they would be going over to a hospital for identification. Sophia too didn't enquire anything neither did she express any interest for that topic.

 

The next morning, Sophia and Roy set out to the hospital quite early. Roy met few friends there at the hospital and had a brief conversation, while Sophia stood beside him. After a while a lady staff came and she ushered them to the morgue.

 Recently after the news was reported, many bodies were unearthed from the site and some belongings too were found. One of the body Roy had identified to be that of his father from his vague recollection and the familiarity of his father's face from the old photographs.

 The lady ushered them to the section where the specific body which Roy had identified was kept. Sophia followed Roy silently through the grey corridor and dark room. She was quite emotional but tried to maintain her composure.

They reached the vault where the body was kept and the lady turned and glanced at Roy and his mother. She didn’t utter anything. Roy nodded his head.

 Then before they opened the chamber he gently turned to his mother and whispered in a low tone, "Mom, as you know I am almost sure this is dad, but we would need you to recognise and confirm. Please have the courage."

She nodded faintly. Her heart almost sank when she heard this, and tears swelled up in her eyes. Roy held her hand firmly.

 It's been almost forty years, and many decades have passed since she last saw her husband. She was in her early twenties when she lost him and now she was in her late sixties. She had been living so far with her memories and the recollections of that dreadful day haunting her every single day. Now after forty years when she had almost lived through her entire life with the memories of her husband now at this stage if she's going to have a look at her husband's corpse, how would that be ? Would his body be in a good shape to recognise? These thoughts were bothering her. She herself wasn’t sure how she would take it and how she may react.

 The lady finally opened the vault, and pulled a bed outward. Wrapped in white clothing lay a frozen body. Sophia stared at the face for a quick second and stood there frozen. Just a brief glance and Sophia was sure. She grasped Roy hands firmly. 

 He only had a brief glance at the body then, but continued staring at his mother's face to see her reaction and she nodded her head, as tears filled up her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. Sophia was still firmly holding his hand, and slowly bend over towards Roy’s shoulder. She put his arms around his mother.

 Roy turned to the lady and in a firm tone and replied, “Yes, it is confirmed now”. He turned and then stared at the frozen corpse and asked his mother to take a good look at him.

 So, she gathered all her courage and stared at his body. It was buried in deep snow all these years, and was frozen in time, well preserved and looked almost exactly as how he was forty years ago. She has aged so much but Sabarjith's frozen body looked young and fresh and almost exactly as how he looked on that fateful day with no trace of any decay at all. It suddenly took her back in time, and the memories of that day flashed through her mind again. That day looked so fresh in her mind and it was as if it was yesterday. And now the lifeless frozen body of her husband is right in front of her still intact defying the course of time. 

She felt as if she had gone through a time loop and was living her past life again. She felt as if it was still that day on which she parted with her husband and the unfortunate mishap happened, and she was now seeing his body that very same day, though around four decades have passed by.

 Roy observed that his father's face looked much younger than even his face. Roy too had seen his father only when he was a toddler, had only some faint memories, but now he was seeing him after many decades. He grew up without his father and well aware that he was dead long ago. But never realized that one day he would be able to see him, and touch his face. He stared at his father for quite some time.

 Then after spending some time there, they left the morgue and came to the reception area of the hospital. Roy made his mother sit on a chair and then went over to talk to someone. Then they both returned to the hotel.

 Roy made the necessary arrangement to take the body back to India, got the required approval and sanction from the authorities, and also from Indian embassy. He conveyed the news to his family and relatives. There were not many relatives or friends of their generation still alive.

 After few days Roy and his mother were on the flight travelling back to India. After reaching Calcutta, they received the body from the airport took it home and made arrangements for the funeral.

 It was a shocking news for many friends and relatives back in India and many flocked at Roy's house to get a last glimpse of a person who had died forty years ago. Besides Sophia, Roy, Monica and the children, many dear and near ones had turned up to share their grief. Mostly it was people who didn't even know Sabarjith but had come out of curiosity and also lot many news channels and media persons had turned up for their coverage. Some of Sabarjith’s friends and relatives too paid their visit still unable to digest the news and came up to see with their own eyes to be convinced.

Few friends from college and work and some relatives of Sabarjith were emotional when they saw him. All who knew him were really shocked and astonished to find him appear exactly how he was forty years ago and were quite glad to be part of his last rites after these many years. 

 Sophia never expected even in her wildest dreams to find the lost body of her dead husband one day. She had believed that he was lost forever, but now atleast they could recover it and perform the last rites and a funeral according to the religious laws. After his last rites she somehow felt a great solace to her disturbed mind. The haunting memories which used to lash her mind like raging sea waves seems to have subsided and now her mind was at calm.  

 Sophia was very much thankful to the Almighty GOD. Time is a great story teller, and for the Almighty nothing is ever lost in time, but only frozen !

 Roy too was quite happy to have found his father's body even though it was after these many years. He could atleast see him and touch his face. It felt to him as if he was seeing him for the first time.

 The last rites were performed and this incident was the talk of the town and made headlines in all newspapers.

 Life came back to normalcy quite soon for Sophia and Roy and the chapter which had ended years ago, could again get a suitable logical end.

 

 

- Suveen Jacob Abraham.

 

 

 

 

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