missed days

I was happy, excited, and impatient because my train would reach my home in another 3 hours. It has been seven years working far away from home. So far, that I could make my mother cry by just saying a ‘hello’ over the phone. I couldn’t make my father cry because he had promised that he wouldn’t. He couldn’t cry even when I had said him that it would take me another 3 years to be back.
My impatience was engulfing me. For the first time I was hearing the clicking of every second of my watch so clearly, it feels so bad, so long. I couldn’t think of how my father had felt 3 years back.
I reached the station finishing the longest journey of my life.
My father was waiting there for me. I saw his eyes behind his glasses; his glasses didn’t change but his eyes did, they were dustier. His eyes had the same fake strength as his voice had over the phone. Bending down, I reached for his feet to touch them but he held me by my arms and hugged me. He forced a smile on his face; I forced a tear back into my eyes.
We took a rickshaw back to home. My father unlike before didn’t have an argument over the fare the rickshaw wala asked.
My father said that I have grown young and healthy; I couldn’t say to him that he was looking fragile and old because it made me sad to see him the way he was looking. He was not looking dependable like he did when he came with me to see me off to the station where I had to catch the train to the place which never became my home. He had said then with a grin,” 4 years will run away like this”.
We reached home.
I got down from the rickshaw. My father pulled the luggage out, I bore the pain.
My mother, who sat in the doors, saw me and the first thing in her body to react were her tears and then followed her legs. She ran to me though not faster than her tears and hugged me. The air was filled mixed with sadness, happiness, and numbness.

We went inside. I saw nothing much changed, except the air. The air which bore pristine youngness 7 years back now was grappling on more agedness than it could hold. The rocking chair of my grandfather seemed waiting desperately for my father.
My mother made all the dishes, which she knew I liked, standing for a long time on a constantly paining leg. My father was attending to everything which was about to come on my mind, forgetting to even gulp a sip of water after taking his pills.

They were so happy to see me, but I was in pain to see them.