INHERITANCE

I was ten and by all standards too young to be among the bidi ( local handcraft cigarettes) smoking men of my family. Everyday evening after my dad came back home from his hospital shift just like any proper Hindu ritual my grandfather and my father would sit next to the common balcony shared by 10 more households to share their day over a pack of bidis. Although I was never invited to be a part of their conversation our house was too small to be exclusive.

The year was 1983 and India just defeated Zimbabwe in the semi-finals the feat was celebrated in our home by introducing cigarettes. My dad opened the golden wrapper of a fresh yellow pack of Charminar Cigarettes the likes of which antecedently was unknown to my grandfather and me. As my grandfather smoked his first Charminar the love was quite instant. The smoke, the smell, and the aftertaste you could feel from his eyes were treasured quite extensively. From that day Charminar completely eclipsed the value of bidi in my grandfather’s life. To fall in love at the age of 61 is tough but his affair with Charminar made me believe that even if my grandmother was alive she would have little value in his life compared to Charminar.

My grandfather died three years later at age 64. Most of his last days were divided into smoking Charminar, coughing blood goos from his lung, and visiting the local hakim. When my grandfather died father lost his most treasured friend and I got a whole room to myself and no more had to sleep with my mother. The hakim said that the cause of his death was old age and loneliness. As a 13 year kid and having therequired common sense I knew for a fact that coughing blood goos every 10 mins was not a symptom of loneliness.

My father started smoking when he was in high school. He stole bidis from my grandfather’s pocket and would leave enough clues to get caught later. My grandfather used to hit my father with a thin bamboo stick for stealing his bidis. I believe the beating was more for the stingy reason that his calculation of bidis he bought for the day were set off and less for the well-being of my father’s lungs. When my father turned 18 my grandfather called my father and gave him his first packet of bidis. The problem of bidi calculations finally met its solution. See my grandfather was not a wealthy man but the bond he shared with my father was of contemporary standards, the kind of bond I often was envious about. He treated my father more like his beer buddy who he had beating privileges and less like his only son. My father finally got the green signal to smoke, not like he needed any but the blessing of your parents is always a nice thing to have and more than that was coveted by his friends.

When my grandfather died my father was 43 years old and worked as a peon in a state government hospital. I was the only child and my grandfather died without a single penny spent on hospitalization or expensive allopathic pills. Talk about the silver lining and there is the other one. Finally, I have the required space in my house and my family had adequate money-saving to spend on my education. So from my 8th standard, I was sent to private tutors who taught in batches of 50 to 100. The only thing private about those classes was the identity of the man behind spreading all the scuttlebutts about affairs going on in that room.

I went to school at 7:00 AM came back at 3:00 PM and then went to my tuition at 5:00 PM and finally came back home at 9:00 PM. I saw my father tear a fresh pack of 20 in the morning and by the time I get back home, he would be left with only 3 to last that day before sleeping. On Sundays however, one pack would last him only till the afternoon and for the evening a fresh pack was opened.

You see the common logical implication about smoking thrown by non-smokers before cancer cells got famous was the idea that a smoker can save millions in his lifetime by merely not spending his hard-earned money on smoking. To all the subsequent non-smoker millionaires out there, this financial freedom 101 plan is a complete batshit. Cigarettes do not cost money to smokers just like the air you breathe or the dump you took this morning. A smoker will always find the money for a new pack, there is always enough money left to burn the next light.

I was 18 when my father was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and the treatment of that however cost money. My father had insurance in the hospital he worked in and they prescribed him 8 chemo sessions for 3 months and then again 8 more after 2 months gap. After taking 2 chemo sessions my father realized that the pain was too much for him to handle. He called me and my mom next to his hospital bed and told us that he wanted to go home. We requested and pleaded for him to stay my mother even shed all the tears she can hold in her body to convince him to stay but he made up his mind. So we took him back, where he had everything he loved. His family and Charminar. He lived for another four months before leaving us and 3 unsmoked cigarettes to determine their future.

We lived on his pension until I got a job as the office superintendent in the Watershed Department. That salary was good and the bribes I took were enough to elevate us from the chawl to a two-bedroom apartment in the city with a new second-hand Maruti car.

I met Ayushi at a friend’s bon voyage party. She was the girl with the darkest hair and the fairest complexion. She was a bonny gal with a symmetrical face and a small nose piercing. I collected all my courage and went to the balcony where she was leaning into staring at the Orion sky. As I approached her I saw her taking a puff from what I could make was a half-burnt gold flake. I introduce myself to her and hoped it not be too embarrassing for me. She gazed at me as if I have done something unexpected and then after a few seconds which felt like years she introduced herself to me. We talked for a while that day and smoked about 10 cigarettes each.

After that night we dated for a while and eventually got married at ages 27 and 25. Through all our ups and downs in marriage what kept our relationship strong and lasting was the smoke we could share at the end of a busy day, after every useless quarrels and misunderstandings, after having a great meal and on load shedding. More than anything we looked forward to just sharing a Gold Flake Lite at the end of the day.

Our relationship however took a turn when Ayushi got pregnant with our daughter. The doctor strictly advised her not to smoke and she didn’t but adding pregnancy hormones with nicotine withdrawal is a deadly combination. We had fights and no cigarettes to share to solve them later; there was no relaxing puff after a busy day or at tough times. We thought that after Faya our daughter is born we will be fine but we were not. Ayushi quit smoking for good after Faya was born and after 3 years, we filed for divorce.

I moved back with my mother and stayed with her till she died due to a simple brain stroke. I met Faya on weekends and took her to school on days I could afford to go late to the office. When Faya turned Sixteen we sent her to the Doon School. I saw her after two years when she was 18 and was preparing for her medical entrance.

As fate would have it that year tumor was detected in my lungs and Ayushi and Faya came to visit me in my apartment. We talked for a while and I told them about the procedure and treatment the radiologist prescribed. Faya left for a while to attend to a phone call. I and Ayushi went to the balcony to talk about life. She asked me what if we were never that addicted to cigarettes and I reply gently moving my hand behind her back “ we would have never fallen in love my Love” to that both of us laughed and Ayushi went back inside to make tea. As I was about to open a fresh pack of gold flakes I saw Faya standing at a distance near the local pan shop smoking a freshly light cigarette.