Someone I can Call

When I call Gavin, there’s a good chance he will be sitting at a juice shop, with a cigarette in his hand. I don’t know why this is the image that comes to mind whenever I think of him, but it is. Maybe because he is almost always there when I call. Maybe because I have called him enough times for the image to become familiar.

He usually answers with “sollu maaa.” (Tell me, ma). It’s an invitation to say anything I want to. Was something wrong? Did I have something I needed to say? Did I just want to chat? It’s such an ordinary thing to say, but I don’t think he realises how much comfort I have found in hearing it.

Gavin is a friend’s older brother. I’ve known him for about a year, perhaps a little less, but I don’t remember a time when I had to work particularly hard to become comfortable around him. I was shy at first, as I usually am with people I don’t know well, but he was familiar in a way I hadn’t expected. He was nice to me; he spoke to me, and somewhere along the way, he became anna to me.

I’ve never had to second-guess the way I refer to him and think of him. It’s simply who he is to me.

I’ve always been a little childish about the whole brother-sister thing. I love it more than I can explain. I like having someone I can call just because I want to, someone I can be silly around, and someone who will listen when I have something to say. Anna has never made me feel like I need a reason to call him. I don’t have to be upset, or have a problem that needs solving. Sometimes, he tells me random stories. Sometimes, he sends me reels. But I know that whenever I call him, he will be at that juice shop.

And he answers. I know that sounds like a small thing. It probably is, to someone who has never had to wonder whether they could reach a particular person when they needed them. But I have come to love the certainty of it. When I call anna, I don’t have to prepare myself for the possibility that I am being a burden.

There have been times when I have needed more than a conversation.

Once, I was at his house when my eye started bothering me because of a cat in the house. It wasn’t something I thought required a hospital visit, but anna disagreed. He insisted that it needed to be checked, and he came along when we went. I remember thinking it was overkill for him to come with me for something this petty. I could have managed just fine. But he came anyway.

He sometimes seems to take responsibility for making sure I am okay even when I don’t think there is anything to worry about. He listens to me first. If I am upset, his voice changes, and he asks if everything is alright. If someone has hurt me, he gets angry on my behalf. He gives advice without making me feel stupid for needing it. He doesn’t have to make a grand speech about caring. Sometimes, he just decides that I am going to get my eye checked.

There was another time when I needed him in a way that was much harder to explain.

I was assaulted, and when he found out, he was furious. He gathered his friends and they were ready to confront the boy who hurt me. Later, I had another encounter with the same person. I was on the phone with him, trying to tell him what happened, when I got into an accident. I could barely breathe. The air was knocked out of my lungs. I was on the road, heaving and clutching my stomach and chest. I remember my anna was on the phone. I begged him to come. He asked me where I was.

“Iru maa. Anna varen,” was all he said. He was coming.

He sped over to get to me. He demanded to know what had happened when he found me. He got the story, then made sure I was calm. He sent me home after asking for that boy’s number. Anna took care of it, making sure he wouldn’t come near me again. If he did, he would have to face anna.

I remember being scared, shaken, and unable to think clearly. I remember asking him to come and then watching him actually arrive. I don’t know if I can properly explain what it means to ask someone for help when you are frightened and to have them show up, no questions about whether you deserve it, no hesitation about whether you are worth the trouble.

After that, I trusted him more. I called him more freely. Something settled in me: this was a person who would answer. This was someone I could reach.

I think about that sometimes, especially because I don’t know if Gavin understands how much those moments have meant to me. I don’t know if he knows that the way he says “sollu maa” has become a kind of reassurance. Or that when he tells me a random story or sends me another reel, those little things become part of what makes me feel close to him. He might see them as ordinary. I don’t think he knows that I keep them.

There was one conversation that made me realise I wasn’t the only one who saw our relationship that way.

I was having a difficult day and crying because I felt like nobody liked me. My friend told me that Gavin liked me, but I didn’t believe him. I thought Gavin was nice to me because I was his friend, because being kind to me came with the relationship. I thought there was an obligation attached to it, and that perhaps I was mistaking that obligation for affection.

So my friend called him and asked.

Gavin’s answer was simple. “Ava en thangachi da.” I was his sister.

I cried when I heard that. I don’t think I had realised how badly I wanted to know that I mattered to him in my own right. I wasn’t asking him to prove anything, and I wasn’t expecting him to say something that would change my life. I just wanted to know that what I felt wasn’t something I had invented on my own.

And there he was, calling me his little sister as though it were the most natural thing in the world. I don’t think Gavin knows how much I love having him as my anna. I don’t think I tell him enough. Maybe I assume that because he is always there, he already knows. But being grateful to someone and actually telling them what they mean to you are two very different things.

So, here is me trying to tell him.

Anna… I appreciate that I can call you when something goes wrong, but also that I can call you over nothing at all. I love that you listen and give me advice without making me feel small, that you send me reels and tell me stories, and that you call me maa.

And I am grateful that when I have been frightened, you have made sure I wasn’t facing it alone.

You may think you are just answering a phone call. You may think you are just telling me to speak, or asking where I am, or insisting that I go to the hospital when I think I’m fine. You may not think any of it is particularly extraordinary.

But I notice. I notice that you answer. I notice that you come. I notice that you care.

And I hope you know that somewhere, in the middle of all your stories and reels and juice-shop phone calls, you have become someone I cannot imagine not having in my life.

I don’t know if I will ever find the perfect way to explain what it means to have you as my anna. But if you ever wonder whether you matter to me, I hope you remember this: you do. More than I probably say, and more than you probably realise.

So the next time I call and you answer with “sollu maa,” know that I have a hundred things I could say.

And sometimes, the one I mean most is simply: I’m glad you’re there.