SITA’S SISTER Read Online Free PDF Page A

swiftly as the tears down her cheeks. ‘You have an answer for everything…’
    Sita could not go on as the enormity of the circumstances slowly dawned on her. For the first time, she was aware of a new harsh reality—that she would be separated from her younger sister and she would be leaving her soon for a different world. Urmila might have been the younger sister, younger just by a year, but for Sita, she was her anchor who secured her to a comforting veracity of her own existence. Urmila was her lifeline, she was her soulmate.
    As their adopted daughter, Janak and Sunaina had fawned on Sita to the point of being slavish. She had been embarrassed by it, squirming uneasily at the gratuitous affection lavished unduly upon her. Her upbringing had not been normal; she could not recall a single instance when she had been scolded or frowned upon. Urmila had suffered all of that and taken it with a brave smile on a trembling chin. Sita had been hailed as Janaki, Janak’s daughter, when it was Urmila who was his daughter and the sole proprietor of that name. Sita was Maithili, the princess of Mithila, when it was Urmila who should have been crowned with that title. But never had Sita seen Urmila resentful about all the favours showered upon her, when she was deprived of them. Sita had never dared to discuss this with Urmila as she might not have liked it. She had kept quiet and taken in all the outpouring of love and adoration without letting anyone know how she felt—that it still did not make her one of their own. It left her, instead, feeling like an outsider. She could never forget that she was a foundling; and that she was indebted to them forever. That feeling of obligation was enormous; a burden she silently carried and could never shrug off. However, Sita could not remember even one instance when either her parents or her sisters had ever made her feel unloved.
    Instead, by bestowing too much, they had made her feel too special. All of them but Urmila; she was the only one who treated Sita ‘normally’—like a sister would another. Urmila had screamed at her, pulled her hair, pinched her, argued bitterly and each time, it had been Urmila who had earned the ire of her parents. Praise was reserved for Sita, though it was invariably Urmila who picked up the Vedic verses more quickly than her sisters.
    Sita recalled each of these moments and they made her angry—all of them had been undeniably unfair on her younger sister. Her younger sister…Sita repeated the words in her mind with renewed fondness; Urmila had always been the veritable older sister all through their growing years—strong, fiercely protective like a tigress shielding her from everything, guiding her, helping her, consoling her. Her parents’ love had been smothering and the sweetest memories she carried was of her younger sister. Each tender gesture was like a picture painted lovingly in her mind—Urmila hugging her tightly each night before going to sleep to dispel her nightmares, kissing her tears away when she had fallen from a branch or like this moment, trying to show her a better world than she could ever imagine. Sita wondered in sudden despair how she would be able to disengage herself from her sister’s comforting existence, her rooted reality which she would have to extricate herself from.
    Urmila was close to tears herself, but she kept them in check, refusing to crumple. Sita suddenly seemed to have realized the enormity of the situation but for Urmila, her sister’s impending marriage had been a torturous thought, an unpleasant eventuality. Her sister was going to get married; she couldn’t find herself feeling gorgeously happy about it. That dull ache in her heart would not let go of her. The thought of parting was more excruciating than the happiness of the occasion. Was she being selfish? No, she was just so dejected, Urmila quickly self-analysed. She was having an agonizingly bittersweet time: excited yet secretly sorrowful