fallen fingers

After the emergency call, we both were on a plane in a few hours. Me and my mother. Father had some sort of accident. No danger to his life they said, however he had suffered some grievous injury. It was a hot summer day and the air was still.

With a simple middle-class person's salary, we were happy as majority of Indians are to this day. There were no smart-phones, no social media. No major service providers to be glued to the television. Money was always enough to meet ends need and there would be no month-end savings. Few years later to the accident, whatever the family had, they would give away, my mom and dad, so that I could pursue my medical career in the US.

I saw him in the hospital after traveling for a day and a half. Never seen him like that before. Two of his fingers on the right hand had to be amputated the surgeon said. They had to fall as ischemia had set in by the time they could get him to the hospital.

I knew what that meant. He was not going to get them back. I knew that my parents knew. They were still managing a smile. They knew there is no getting it back, the savings they had and the fallen fingers.