Mami. That's how we knew her, Nim and I. For ma and pa, and maybe the rest of the world, she was Mini. Our rock. Always there, soft when she needed to be, tough when you needed her to be.
I loved her. As all of us did in our own quiet way. I just wish I hadn't waited for the cancer diagnosis to tell her that. And even then, on text.
Looking back on my childhood, I feel like she was my third mum. First was ma, then Nim, and then her. She was the one who got me hooked on to books. She gifted me my first Harry Potter, my CD of Simon & Garfunkel the year I told her I was bored of getting books as gifts. She shaped how I viewed my role in this world. A lot. She was the person who got my hair cut really, really short the first time. Dad stopped trusting her with my haircuts after that. She made the best mac 'n' cheese in the world, and the most comforting tomato & cheese sandwiches I've had. I re-discovered those too late last year, when I was missing her. I wish I had asked her to make them again for me. Or that I had seen her more often and I could have.
As things stood, we found out about the cancer right about the time the pandemic started. None of us could go near her, hold her, kiss her or hug her, in case we unwittingly passed on a virus to her already frail body. I couldn't hug her throughout her sickness. I remember going to meet her the night before I was to fly out to Bangalore late last year. I wanted so much to hold her hand and squeeze it. All I could manage was a kiss on the hem of her kurta. Her kurtas. She made Fabindia cooler than it was. For real. Nobody else could have carried those cottons better than her.
Mami was the coolest. She got me my first pairs of hot pants. If she said a book was good, you read it and told the world it was the best thing you have read. Because mami had said so. My awkward social self could only bring up book conversations with her. I loved my visits with her to bookstores. She introduced me to Pico Iyer. Who later introduced me to Rumi. Who then introduced me to Shams. I knew Rumi before it was cool to quote Rumi. Rumi knew a thing or two about loss.
When news of her passing came out, lots of writers wrote in. Talking about Nandita the Editor. I felt I had barely known her. She left a big piece of herself behind, with different people, who knew her different than how I knew her. But she was just our Mami - Nim and mine. Nobody else knew her the way we did.
Mami was smart, she was funny. Even hilarious. She corrected your grammar without batting an eyelid. She loved selflessly. Nim and I were just a couple of kids she happened to be related to. But she checked in, she looked out. Growing up, she shared her mom-love with Nim and me. We always felt like we belonged with her when we were together.
My favourite memory of her is from the time she spent a day with me in Bangalore. She kept refusing a meal. I finally convinced her it's no bother, and that she should eat some lunch. She sat near me in the kitchen while I made some dosas for her. I think I saw a glimmer of pride in her eyes. She did say, in her typical mami-way - 'Wah!' I think she meant it. We had a moment there. I don't know what it was. But it was special. I wish I'd taken some pictures of that day.
I will always carry a part of her in me. I will have my mami-lens on when I am doing up my house, or walking into a Fabindia, or interacting with my own nieces. I will always think of her when I pick up an author she spoke to me about, or a song she recommended, or have somebody else's shitty mac 'n' cheese. Time will heal, and with time, I hope my memories of her grow stronger.