One gives what one has

There are countries where politics is essentially left to experienced and middle aged population. It takes a lot of time and effort to grab an office so youth generally loses interest. However majority of countries are still sitting on verge of revolution and youth is expected to play a significant role in bringing this revolution.

Our protagonist is a firebrand student leader. He entered into the college with his entourage, most of his followers eager to hear from him, his ideas for strengthening the college union, national politics, poverty eradication and other social activities. He looked inspiring, sincere, took every question seriously and tried his best to come up with a suitable reply. His speech was as moving as his looks.

He addresses them “I firmly believe that strong primary education will produce great leaders for the country. We will have to fortify our children so tomorrow they grow to be leaders who lead this nation to greatness. But who have we trusted with for this enormous responsibility, useless and incompetent school teachers. Can we trust our government with lives of innocent kids? No! We will have to take this responsibility in our own hands. We have to adopt as many public schools as we can. We will start evening classes for educating both children and adults. Most of these children do not come to school since they are earning members in their families. We will have to simultaneously raise funds to ensure that these children do not have to go to work. I know that this task is difficult but if we actually wish to change our nation, we will have to start at the grassroots.”

Such was his charisma that people got mesmerised and motivated at the same time. For a moment, they started thinking that they can also bring about a change. Every single one of them took a resolution to adopt schools and teach kids. This was a typical day for him. He spoke, people got motivated and together they changed some part of the world for good. They believed in him and that he will become a great national leader one day.

If there is one thing, political parties are afraid of is, growing popularity of someone other than their candidate. First natural choice for them is to make the newbie one of their own. He was summoned to the party’s office and was explained in detail, the party’s agenda, its principles, standing and ambitions. He was clear that his agenda is primary education and if they want him to join the party, they will have to spare funds to renovate schools and procure supplies. Party gladly accepted the offer.

It was the final year of college. He spent more and more time in schools. There was no dearth of funds or schools, but now he faced scarcity of one thing he had never faced earlier, his followers. It takes some time for youth to realise realities of life, importance of money and that dreams are only affordable till you get pocket money. Most of his followers were either preparing for professional courses or were trying for getting a job. If he was not so deeply involved in school activities, he would have noticed that the fund stream has slowed down. One day it stopped altogether. Without his followers, the party had no need for him.

After four years of pushing him to take a job, his father had finally disowned him. He spent some days with couple of friends he still had. He knew that he will have to take up a job. All the big companies talk about how they nurture leadership but are afraid when a real life leader comes asking for a job. The social service NGOs wanted people who could raise funds well and not who can spend well.

One day his evening class with kids got disturbed by a commotion. A mid aged woman was distributing sweets and the whole school gathered around her. He was irritated and kept looking at her with disapproval. She was a celebrity in yesteryears and thus being aware of her surroundings came naturally to her. She distributed the sweets and sat in the car. He was about to go back to the class when her driver came and told him that she has requested to meet him. He walked towards the car. Her driver opened the door and he sat beside her, wondering what she wanted to talk about.

“You know that they need all the happiness, no matter how small or insignificant the reason is. Is it not unfair that you want them to be deprived of one such moment.” She said. He paused for a moment. He wanted to read her. A lady, sitting in backseat of a BMW, clad in white from head to toe, speaking with such ownership, as if she was one of them. She looked at him with no judgement in her eyes, even when she had already judged him. He said “I looked at you with contempt for one moment and you felt the need to clarify. These kids will face scorning eyes every minute of their life, and they will never understand why. You come here to get rid of your guilt and ride away and come back when the guilt is again too much to bear. I come here because I cannot live with even one minute of guilt. They need all the happiness, but as you said, all the happiness.” She smiled. She said “Oh! A righteous man! Hard to find these days. You have your compassion, I have my money. One gives what one has.”

Days passed. He was now living in a hostel. Whatever he earned out of private tuitions, he spent on buying books for kids. He had no regrets, except for the efforts he put in for finding a meaningless job. He had never expected that this was going to end one day, but it did. He received a call from the party. They informed him that the funds were discontinued due to some communication gap and they would be willing to support him again. It is not hard to find followers and friends when one has money. He did not repeat the mistake of spending entire money on kids. He knew better now. He knew that everything has a price, even the principles and the values, so he paid it.

He was surrounded by his followers with garlands in their hands. He was running for elections. While he was standing on the stage delivering one of his fiery speeches, he noticed a BMW and recognised it. After the speech, he quietly slipped away. He was now sitting in the backseat of the car with the lady clad in white. “Why did you do it?” he asked. “This is not the right question. I had told you, one gives what one has. I see that you have realised that everything comes for a price. The right question is whether you are willing to pay it?” she said.

He knew, he cannot refuse.

Mystery of the Bandage - Stories in the Chai Shop

Some people are born storytellers. Thanks to our schools and offices, imagination of people like us has run dry, but fortunately our elders in villages are still adept in the art of story-telling. Exchanging stories from an imaginary world over a card game or a puff of chillum¹ is still the best recreation they have.  Not all the characters in these stories are imaginary, many of them are real life characters within the village, nearby villages; boys who ran away with a girl of another caste, girls who meet their boyfriends in fields, priest who drinks liquor secretly, families heading for partition and so on.

The main character of our story had recently settled in the village. He took a room on rent in the home of village’s sarpanch². Nobody knew what his occupation was, though many people had seen him spending long hours in chai³ shops with a pen and notebook. Some said he was a government inspector, others said he was a criminal in hiding. Given the lack of unanimity, nobody approached him for the fear of getting associated with him.

One day protagonist of our story entered the chai shop with a bandage over one of his eyes. He ordered for the tea and started reading the newspaper. Incidentally a group of our storytellers was also sitting in the shop at the same time. The person who first noticed him and the bandage around his eyes poked his neighbour who in turn poked his neighbour, so on and so forth. After some pokes, there was no one remained who was not poked and was not looking his direction. The last person looked pretty confused as he did not have anyone to poke, so he just looked at the other members of the group. One of the experienced story tellers declared that he knew what has happened and all others gathered around him. The experience story teller once again looked at the bandage and having assured himself that they were standing on the blind side, started his story.

“All you fools are blind. Don’t you recognise who this guy is? You all have fish’s memory power. This is Madho. I knew you nincompoops will not be able to recognise him, but I knew when I saw him first. Don’t you remember the potter who lived near the neem⁴ tree? This is his son who ran away ten years back. He was good for nothing; used to roam around with sarpanch’s daughter all day long. One day the sarpanch caught them coming out of village’s film theatre and ran after him with a lathi⁵ in his hand. Madho was young and ran very fast while sarpanch got caught up in his own dhoti. Madho looked back and let out a laughter and then he ran away. That was the last anybody ever saw him. The same Madho has come back and was roaming around sarpanch’s daughter. I noticed this and told the sarpanch and the result is in front of you all.”

The last person to be poked was even more confused now. He got up and approached the story teller. Then he took out his slippers and started beating our darling story teller. Others were still upset with his abusive language so they deemed it fit to let him have some beating. After a minute, others jumped in and stopped the person with the slipper and asked him why he was beating the old man. “This donkey has told this same story to entire village and ruined my name” he said. Somebody asked him “How has he ruined your name?”. “My name is Madho, son of the potter.” He said. Everybody looked at each other for a moment and then laughed like there is no tomorrow.

The hero of our story was still sitting there, undisturbed by the fight and the laughter. Others came and went, till another group of gossipers assembled in the shop. There was no poking since everybody had seen him sitting with a bandage. One of the group members gathered courage and asked “What happened to this city dweller?” Another one, as if waiting for this opportunity, jumped in and said “Yesterday I was walking towards my fields when I saw that he was doing exercise in front of sarpanch’s house. I tell you, he may look lean and thin, but he has muscles rippling out of his arms as if he has glued some fishes to them. So I paid him a compliment and said why you don’t participate in village’s wrestling competition. He ridiculed me, saying that “I am national champion. I don’t waste time with these novices.” You know our village wrestler, Bheema, happened to pass from there that very moment and heard him saying so. Only a few know that Bheema himself entered into a national championship but could not compete because he had, by mistake, got himself enrolled in ladies wrestling contest. Some of you may consider him as stupid but I tell you he is very sharp. So instead of challenging him for a fight, Bheema requested him to teach some tricks. As expected, this single bone structure did not know any tricks and while jumping on Bheema, got himself hurt in the eye.” Others were very amused with the story and complimented Bheema on his cleverness. Two of them even got up and enacted the whole incident again.

Village doctor entered the shop and being considered a very respectable man; others touched his feet and welcomed him to sit with them. He seemed very disturbed so they offered him tea and asked what the matter was. He sighed and said that for the first time he is not able to cure someone. The patient was in bed for last one week and no medicine was working on him. They asked who he was. The doctor said “Bheema, and the worst part is that he was supposed to compete in the national championship this week.”  People waited till the doctor left from shop and then enacted the whole trick teaching scene again, only that they jumped on the story teller this time.  

It was a winter evening and nothing like a hot cup of tea when one, after toiling for the whole day, wishes to take a break and share one’s troubles with his brethren.  But not today; today they had a new topic to discuss. They stared at the bandage for so long that the tea got cold and they had a fight with the shop owner to get it heated again. Sipping the reheated tea, one of them declared that he knows what has happened and narrated like this “Last night I got late from work and to reach home quickly, decided to take the shortcut from graveyard. Normally I would not have taken that route but yesterday, this shifty eyed was walking in front of me so I got courage and followed him. We must be halfway when suddenly the wind grew cooler and dogs started howling. I was so afraid that I wanted to take a leak but for the fear of losing his sight, I kept walking. I almost froze when I saw, a ghost appeared out of nowhere in front of him. I jumped in a nearby bush and peeped from there. I tell you, this person is some kind of wizard or something, he was not afraid a bit. He caught the ghost by his tail and threw him in my direction, but the tail struck his eye and thus this bandage. When the ghost was passing by me, I saw his face. He was that boy, Madho, son of potter who ran away in the graveyard and got killed by witches. His ghost still roams remembering his love with sarpanch’s daughter.” He had just finished the story when a slipper came down hard on his head and then another and yet another. The slipper holder yelled “For the last time I am telling you dogs. I am Madho, the son of potter, and I am not a ghost.”  

And that was the last group of the day. Our hero with the bandage on his eyes, having drunk twenty cups of tea, undisturbed by the on-going events around him, took the last sip of the day. Then he opened the bandage, put in on the table and rubbed his eyes. He took out a pen and a notebook and wrote “Madho - son of the potter, Bheema – wrestler who enrolled in ladies’ national championship, sarpanch who got caught in his own dhoti, Madho’s ghost with a tail.” Then he kept the pen and notebook in his pocket and said to himself “Interesting characters for my next story.”

¹ A chillum, or chilam, is a straight conical pipe with end-to-end channel, traditionally made of clay and used since at least the 18th century for smoking tobacco

² Head of the village

³ Tea

⁴ Azadirachta indica

⁵ Stick

So who are you more afraid of- Ghosts or Humans?

It is a terrible feeling to be in a horrifying situation, to see something which chokes your throat and increase your heart beat enough to be heard without a device. It is equally terrible to suggest someone that they imagine themselves in such a situation. Nevertheless I have imagined some situations in which I would surely get a heart attack, and I am sure you would too.

 

a)     You woke up in middle of the night. This is nothing new for you. Generally you roll over and go to sleep, but not today. A dog is crying in front of your house. It is a strange thing since you have not seen a dog in the vicinity for a long time. You had an eerie feeling but closed your eyes and tried to sleep. You felt hand of your spouse on your shoulder. When you turned towards your spouse, he/she was not sleeping. Instead he/she was sitting on bed looking at you. And believe me it is not love in his/her eyes. There is a demonic look on his/her face and then he/she speaks out your name slowly but it’s not his/her voice.

 

b)    They were in your building. It has been ten days since the riots started. There was a curfew so you sat in your home entire day watching new channels to see how many died and where. Your home is in one of the most posh colonies so you believed that you will be safe. But you were wrong. You heard screams of men, women and children. There was nowhere to hide and only a kitchen knife to defend yourself and your family with. With each new scream you wanted to run away; you wanted to stab yourself with that knife but did not enough courage. Your wife and kids start crying and held you tightly. And then all fears came true. There was a loud knock on your door and then more knocks. They were kicking on the door trying to break the same open. And you sat in a corner with your wife and kids, with a knife in your hands. 

 

c)     You walk your way from office to home. You worked till late in the office and are very tired. There is no hurry since you stay alone and thus no one is waiting for you to come home. But still you are walking fast since you have never liked this dark gully. It always gives you creeps. There is no reason to be afraid as you have not countered anyone suspicious till date. But today you saw a man walking towards you. You hope that he is another one like you and yes he was. He stopped and asked for a lighter. You handed him one. You saw his face for the first time when he lit the cigar. There was nothing on his face. Absolutely nothing, no eyes, no ears, no nose, no hair. You started running like crazy. You don’t even stop to look back and see if he is following you. Somehow you reach home and quickly open the door. You wanted to take a long shower to calm yourself down. So you stood under the shower and let the water run in your hair and your face. You rubbed your eyes. But there were no eyes. You ran towards the mirror. There was absolutely nothing on your face. 

 

d)  You and your husband love to take adventure trips. You keep searching for places far away from population; remote villages, camping on hills, tree house in forests, sailing far into the sea and so on. You heard about this location from one of your old friends from college. He said nobody crosses that road for months. You were very excited. You packed the backpack, picked your husband from office and started driving. It was a long drive. You camped in middle of nowhere just before sunset, pour two glasses of Champaign and kept staring as the sun went down the horizon. It was absolutely dark, except for the lantern. You two listened to classic love songs and danced till long into the night. While you were sleeping you heard a sound. You woke up to see blood on chest of your husband and then you saw the knife deeply stabbed. He trembled and then became silent for ever. And then you saw five men with lust in their eyes; one of them your college friend. 

 

e)   You drive towards your office and stop at a traffic signal sharp at nine every morning. Every day without fail, a man turns up on window of your car and stands there. He has a round box in his hands. He does not say anything to you, just stands there looking at you. No matter how much you ignore him, he does not go away. He does not make any effort to approach anybody else till the time you are standing there. You mention about him to your office colleagues but even though everybody passes through the same traffic signal, no one recalls seeing him. So one morning out of curiosity you look into his eyes. You roll down the windows and ask him “What is the matter with you?” He does not say anything. He just opens the round box. It is full of currency notes. You tell yourself in your mind that always you knew that this was about the money. So you drop a dollar in the box and as you were dropping the dollar, the man holds your hand. You shout and try to free your hand. Next moment, you are no longer sitting in the car. You are standing on the road. You are holding the round box in your hands and you see yourself driving away. The next car comes and you are staring into its window.

So who are you more afraid of, ghosts or humans? I guess I know the answer.

The dark will come

“Bindiya….Bindiya…wake up my child” a voice said; her mother’s voice. It had been years since she last met her mother. “You have ruined her with all your senseless affection” her father said; a father who always considered her as a burden. The voices seemed to be coming from far away. “Bindiya..Bindiya” it echoed. “You have ruined her…you have ruined her” sometimes loud, sometimes distant; sometimes real, sometimes hallucination. She had fever for entire night. Sometimes she felt as if her mother is caressing her head and then opened her eyes searching for her mother.

She woke up with sweat on her forehead. She was not sure if she was actually awake this time. She looked around to see if the room was still swinging, then slowly got up. Her throat was parched. She walked up to the pitcher only to find out that there wasn’t a drop of water left. Her husband knew about her fever however did not consider it important to leave water for her, let alone bring some from the well. She knew that in this neighbourhood nobody would give her water. Water was the most precious possession and lead to arguments, spats and murders. You would not be able to buy a glass of water with a kilo of gold around here. After all, you cannot drink gold.

She looked again in the pitcher. There was some water left. She dipped a cup and had a gulp. She looked again. There was still some water left. She again dipped the cup and had another gulp. The water was still left so she picked up the pitcher and drank to her content. The water flow did not stop. She found it difficult to breathe under such heavy water flow. She gasped for air. She woke up again. “Bindiya….Bindiya” her mother’s voice echoed. She had not slept. She could not tell whether she was sleeping or not. Why was she feeling so thirsty even after drinking so much water? She looked into the pitcher. It was as dry as a bone. She once again looked around to make sure the room was not spinning around her.

She picked up the pitcher and started walking towards the well. In normal days she took around twenty minutes to reach the well. The sun was at its best. It seemed that it had descended on earth itself. There was not a single tree or bush on the way, but yes you could make friends with some snakes and scorpions. “We should send Bindiya to stay with my sister in town. She can go to school and study” her mother said. “You crazy old witch! I have called people to see her next week. I am getting her married. Don’t fill her head with crazy ideas.” Her father shouted. She sat down after walking twenty steps. There was a woman coming with a pitcher of water. She poured water in her hands. She tried to drink water but her hands could not hold it. Her hands started melting and so did the pitcher and the woman with the pitcher. “Take this money and run away. This is the address of my sister in town. Run away my child. This life is not for you” her mother’s hand trembled. Her face melted with tears. She always wondered how tears always manage to roll even with so less water to drink. Why was everything melting around her? A bee sat on her eyes. “Run away…run away…run away” kept echoing in her ears. She opened her eyes.

She walked like a ghost, unaware of the direction and unsure of whether she was actually walking or not. She reached the well and drank water many times. She would have imagined rain also but unfortunately she had never seen actual rain. She had only heard about it. Her mother had told her to run. Her mother gave her some money and a bag. She started running. She fell and broke the pitcher. Where were the money and the bag that her mother had given? She had to run.  

She had reached the well. “This life is not for you” her mother had said. She had never seen a pond. She wanted to sit in water for so long that her soul got wet. There is only one way. She jumped.

That night she came back home. “It is too dark. I cannot run away” She had told her mother. Her mother froze and could only mutter “This is not dark. The dark will come.”

My last water bottle

My school was not too bad. The time was different, so if you compare it with today’s schools with air-conditioned buses and classrooms, then it does not fare well. However I did not know what air-condition was, so I could not complain. Of course, a fan in the classroom would have been highly appreciated. Imagine sitting in a class of fifty odd snotty, smelly kids with sun at forty eight degree Celsius; and me more often than not standing in a corner facing the wall or standing on the bench, or holding my ears and doing sit-ups. It wasn’t my fault; I just could not stand the heat.

The only saving grace was the cold water in my water bottle that I used to carry from home. I used to wait till the last drop of moisture in my throat oozed from my body in form of sweat. Then I opened my bottle and watched the water flowing from the bottle directly to my throat and in every pour of my body. I have never known a greater satisfaction to this date. But like all good things, this must also come to an end.

I lost my first water bottle when I was in second standard. Then I lost my second and third water bottle in third and fourth standard respectively. I have always believed myself to be a thinker with massive attention deficit. Earlier nobody noticed it including me, but now I know it for sure, with constant thrashing from my wife each time I am so focused on television and not listen to her. Several times I nod and later cannot even recall that the conversation ever happened. Since I did not know any such thing to exist, I could never give any valid excuse for such negligence.

The forth bottle I was given was not insulated so I lost the luxury of having cold water. I tried to drink all the water as soon with the fear that if I kept it any longer it would evaporate and rain somewhere else on planet. That time it was a real fear in my mind since I had recently learnt about clouds and rain. As the luck would have it, I forgot the bottle in class and when I went back it wasn’t there. I controlled my tears since I still have to spend half an hour with my classmates on bus to home.

I was sure that this time I am going to get a sound thrashing. So I decided to run away. When the bus dropped me outside the building, I started walking along the road. In next five minutes I contemplated on various things I can do to earn a livelihood. It included delivering newspapers, working at roadside eateries and working in television serials in that order. Also I had to run away till a point where it was easy for my family to find me and take me back to home; something to do with an advertisement I had seen in childhood wherein nobody says anything bad to a kid who had run away from home and later found at the railway station. After almost five minutes of walking, I realised that I was too hungry and thirsty to walk. I decided to be practical, I started walking back.

As soon as I reached my apartment, the fear sneaked in once again. So rather than going in, I went to the roof with a resolution to jump from there and end this agony. I walked to the edge and looked down. It was very high. I had fallen from bed last week and it still hurt. Recently I had seen the superman movie where he catches a girl falling from a building mid-air. The only problem was that my building was not high enough; he will be late for sure. Maybe he is catching some girls in some other parts of the world and what If he only catches girls?

My stomach growled once again. I decide to take a chance. I sneaked into my apartment. My mother told me to wash my face and change clothes. I quickly did that. I decided to have last meal and last glass of cold water of my life after which I will have to think of another way to die before my father comes home. After crossing a particular barrier on hunger and thirst, it is difficult for mind to tell when to stop, especially when I was also watching my life’s last cartoon film. The problem with summer afternoons is that after having a sumptuous meal all you can do is sleep. So I quickly fell asleep. When I woke up, my father was about to reach home. I pretended to sleep till long after he came home.

My father was watching television. I gathered my courage which was boosted by the fact that my mother had not noticed that I had lost the bottle. I got up and stood behind my father. My mother had finished her work in the kitchen and joined us. For some time no one spoke. My father was very engrossed watching news and my mother was knitting a sweater for me. I always thought it was weird that she knitted sweater in summers and I always outgrew it till winters came.

Then all my fears came alive when my mother complaint to my father that I had lost the water bottle again. Next I expected was a slap or at least a sound scolding. But to my surprise, no reaction came. Now I understand where I acquired my attention deficit from. My father only nodded and continued watching news.

That may have been the last water bottle I ever had, but I was perfectly fine with it. 

The Lodge: Night and the Nightmares

It was Christmas Eve and we decided to visit my parent’s house. It was half a day drive so we started around noon so that we reach before dinner. My wife, as usual, kept her frown and my five year old son, as usual, was excited. Everything was going well and we must have covered half the distance, when we got a flat tyre. No problem, I had a spare. Or, I thought so. It turned out that even the spare was flat. I told my wife and son to wait in car while I go get help. I waited near the road to get a lift. Lucky for me, I got a ride which dropped me to a gas station in about an hour. I got the tyre fixed. It was getting dark when I reached back. So finally we started moving. I must have driven for two hours, when the fog got very dense. I was also very tired due to extra travel and needed a rest. But there wasn’t a place to stop by. After driving for another half an hour, I saw a man walking down the road. It was weird since I had not seen any place to stay. I stopped and asked for a lodge. The man had a deep voice. He said something that I could not understand. It was very cold outside and he wasn’t able to articulate properly. He gestured asking whether he could come in. I reluctantly let him in. For the first time I noticed him. He had a scar across the face. He said that he is also heading towards a lodge, which is only place to stay nearby.

As soon as I laid my eyes on the lodge, I knew it was a bad idea. There was nowhere else to go, so we entered the lodge, three of us. I did not notice when the man disappeared, not that he mattered now. While I casually looked around for the man, my son screamed. My wife and I ran inside the lodge. My son saw the lodge owner and got startled. The lodge owner was a living impression of the witches you hear about in fairy tales. She chuckled seeing my son frightened. She opened a room for us and fixed some dinner for us. My wife and I had not spoken a single word till now. This was obviously worse for her than going to my parent’s house. My son had not recovered from his fear yet. I tried to soothe him but he was not able to sleep. I gave him my camera so that he could look at the photographs from our earlier trips. I was very tired and fell asleep quickly.

I heard a sound of a woman crying; not crying, sobbing probably. Then some screams, more like suppressed screams. I opened my eyes; there was nothing so I slept again. I heard a deep voice, like that of the man on the road. “Where did he go?” I thought in my sleep. I saw him near the door. I opened my eyes, but he wasn’t there. This has happened with me before, when I was a kid. In dark, the mind makes the images that you are afraid of. I slept again. I felt stabbing pain in the chest and woke up. I was sweating. I drank some water and felt normal. When I was about to sleep, I saw that my wife was sitting near my son’s bed. I asked her if there was anything wrong. She did not reply. I thought she had fallen asleep while sitting there, so I got up and touched her shoulder. She was not sleeping, but she did not look back either.

I called out her name; it was as if she was in some kind of trance. I was already trembling having seen the images earlier. My tongue twisted when I called out her name again. She did not respond. I could hear her breath getting heavier. From where I was standing, I could not see her face and I did not have courage to take a step further. There was a mirror on my side. I looked into it and was able to see half her face. My knees lost their strength and I dropped on the floor. That scar. The scream; so loud that I had to put my hands on my ears. She held my son in the air. Blood was dripping from her face. It was like her face was eaten. Her body was fighting with itself. The old woman chuckled. She wasn’t there. My son had woken and was chuckling like the old woman. I had lost all control over my legs. The stabbing pain was increasing every second. In this entire struggle I could reach a knife. Amidst all that fear, I thought it was very convenient that I could reach for a knife in this situation. I threw myself at her and with all my strength stabbed the knife in her back. She let out a scream in a manly voice. At the same time, I saw a scar building up on my son’s face. He was chuckling. He jumped on me and i raised my hand with the knife. This was probably the longest nightmare I had that night. My heart was pounding heavily when I got up. My wife and son were sleeping peacefully. A little too peacefully I thought. I decided to give it one more chance.

My head was swinging. Sunlight was burning my eyes. I took half a minute to be able to see. The old woman was standing on the door screaming at top of her voice. The man with the scar came running. The next thing I saw was blood on my bed. It was my wife’s blood. She was stabbed to death and so was my son. I kept shouting to police that the Scarface and the old witch had killed them, but they did not listen. I came to know the reason why they were not taken in custody later at the court hearing. The judge directed people to go out of the court. A video submitted by the police was to be played in the court and apparently it was so gore that it was prudent to not let people see it. Apparently my son was playing with buttons and left the camera on recording mode. Again very convenient, I thought. The video started playing. We three were sleeping when I got up, picked a knife and first stabbed my wife and then my son. I shouted that I did not do it. They were convinced that I was lying and by now I was convinced that I was mentally disturbed.

I requested the judge to allow me to attend the funeral, before going to the prison. I was handcuffed and was taken to the cemetery. I wanted to see the faces once before burial. They opened the coffins for me. My eyes got wide as I saw the faces. I started screaming “The scar, the scar”. But ofcourse no one else could not see it.

She was with him and then she wasn’t!!!

He opened his wallet and looked at the picture. Whenever he got time, he used to sit with a beer in one hand and his wallet in the other one. It was his wife’s picture. They were in love. After three years of relationship, they had finally decided to get married. She was the most cheerful girl he had ever met. He was in love with her since they first met. He remembered how her face gleamed when he asked her out. They did not know what to talk about, but then they did not need to. They were young and youth possess ability to talk through eyes; eyes which are not convoluted by ego, self-awareness and morals.

His chain of thoughts was broken by the firing which kept on starting every few minutes. He quickly kept the wallet in his pocket, picked up the rifle and started shooting. It had been two years, since his battalion was fighting the enemy; so far from his home, so far from his country and so far from his life. She could not believe when he told her that he had to leave for the war. She argued and shouted at him, then tried to persuade him not to go. He knew that she was doing this out of love. She knew that he will not stay.

During all these two years, her picture was the only thing which assured him that he has a heart with feelings, that he was still a human, that he has someone to go back to. He had spoken with her only thrice in last two years, last call was four months back. She spoke less cried more. Her tears worked as a reassurance for him that she still loved him. Sometimes he dreamt that he went back and it did not matter to her anymore. He had written her letters, but had not received any replies, but then no mail was delivered for a long time now.

Like all horrible dreams, the war also ended. He was tired and broken. He hallucinated that he was already at home in her arms. It was like starting a new relationship altogether, as if he did not know her from before. His heart pounded when he was finally standing in front of the door. What if his dreams (more like nightmares) came true? He knocked. There was no answer. She was not home. He had no idea how she spent her time, so he decided to wait on the bench outside. He must have waited half an hour when a woman from the neighbourhood approached. He recognised her and greeted. She did not say anything and started sobbing. He knew something had gone wrong. With great pain in her eyes, she told him that his wife was no more. His wife was suffering from acute depression after he was gone and one night she killed herself.

Moments like these are when there are no thoughts, but it is only silence before storm. Only if he had the rifle in his hands right now, he could have joined his wife at this moment. She told him that his wife was buried in Highgate Cemetery. He went there and looked for her wife’s grave. It said “Ashley Hudson – May her soul rest in peace.” He kept his head on the grave. He kept crying. After a point he could not cry. He had no awareness of the fact that he was sitting in a graveyard for entire night. He did not know when he fell asleep. He had nowhere to go. The home was no longer home to him. He spent almost entire day sitting beside the grave. He knew that her soul was not at peace. He kept telling her stories from the war, how he survived by just looking at her picture, how it was not easy for him too, that she should have waited for him and that he still loved her a lot. He knew that she was listening to him. He felt that he had not lost her. He could feel her listening inside the grave. He could feel her sitting with him when he was narrating all those stories and feelings. He had decided to spend his life with her, sitting in this graveyard near his beloved.

It has been almost five years now. He did not miss her anymore. He kept talking to her. He no longer felt that she was not with him. Today morning he decided to pick up white lilies for her. He had carried white lilies for her when he first took her out. It was her birthday today, her thirtieth birthday. He dusted the grave and kept the lilies. Somebody touched his shoulder. He looked back.  A man in his late twenties was staring at him. “Thanks for taking care of her grave. I usually do not stay in the country so am not able to come very often. It’s very nice of you to buy her flowers. How do you know these were her favourite? Did you know her?” the other person said. He was puzzled. “Who are you?” he asked. “Oh. Excuse me. Where are my manners? I am Thomas Hudson. Her Son.”

The last list he made…Well! Not exactly…

It was not the first time he was making a list; except for this time it could very well be the last time. He was making a list of all possible ways to commit suicide. He loved to make lists to the extent that it seemed like a compulsive disorder. He had a list ready for everything - from routine lists like grocery shopping to names of people to greet on the way to work; from list of people to send cards on Christmas to list of movies he had watched during the year. It was going fine till he got into a relationship. I would not say that she was the most careless girl in the world, but she certainly belonged to group of people who made lists only when it was absolutely essential. At first she admired that he was a responsible person who planned everything, but her first shock was not too far.

It all started when he handed a list of names of babies, both for male and female, to her. It could have been considered a sweet gesture on his part, but considering that he had not even proposed to her yet, it led to cold war for a week. Before marriage, he made of list of topic her parents should not bring up while talking to his parents. The girl must have really loved him, because the marriage did happen. Today is their first marriage anniversary. Along with the anniversary gift, he deemed it appropriate to present to her a list of habits she must change for leading a harmonious married life. She could have lived with it, however could not since she had already been given a list of fasts she should keep, of days when she should visit his mother, of TV soaps she should not watch, of her friends she should get rid of and many more. So she just packed her bag and left.

After she left, he made a list of possible reasons on why his marriage was in trouble, list of food items he will have to buy to make his lunch the next day and the day after, list of steps he will have to take to bring her back home and a list of options available if she did not agree.  While he was making the last list, one of the options available was committing suicide. He knew right at that moment this was the option he would choose and here it was; a list of all possible ways to commit suicide. Once the list was ready, he started eliminating the difficult options. Jumping off the building – risky, eating rat poison – disgusting; stabbing himself with a knife – painful; cutting wrists – very long. So he zeroed in on the last option. He would hang himself from the ceiling fan.

So he tied the rope from the fan and stood on a stool. He kept his neck on the noose and tightened it. He considered making a list of eligible candidates for his wife to remarry once he is gone, but decided otherwise, treating it as a revenge for everything. He was ready to kick the stool. For the transition to be less painful, he started making a list in his mind of everything he did not do in his life. He kicked the stool. Next ten seconds were the longest ten seconds he ever spent. When he was convinced that it was long enough for him to be dead and wake up in heaven or hell, he opened his eyes. He was not dead. Neither was he hanging in the air. His toes were touching the ground. He did not know what to do now. He had kicked the stool very far. He tried loosening the noose but could not.

He stood there for next 30 minutes like that. He decided that he should shout for help. Just when he was about to shout, somebody knocked. He froze. There was a knock again and yet again. Then he heard a voice. She had come back. “Open the door you freak. If you promise not to make another list in your life, I can come back and stay with you” she yelled.

He was standing there, with noose around his neck and toes on the ground. Between him and the door were lying the four lists he made before getting on the stool.

The father and the Son

Varanasi, the oldest living city on earth, was his home. His mother told him that when he was born, she could hear the bells of aarti ¹   at Kashi Vishwanath Temple ². She never told him who his father was. When he pressed a lot, she told that she will once and only once tell the name and that he should not dispute or question the same. When he agreed, she told him that Kashi Vishwanath himself was his father. For that moment, he neither doubted his father’s identity nor felt his absence. He used to sit on the temple’s staircase everyday for a long time. He felt that the only way to communicate with his father was to immerse himself in the music created by ringing of bells and chanting of mantras. His devotion was more than meditation since he was not worshipping a God, he was just seeking refuge in his father. Years passed. Everybody knew him as son of the God.

Let’s skip to the day when his life was about to be changed. He followed his usual routine, took bath in Holy Ganges and started walking towards the temple. Generally he used to walk with his eyes fixed on the dome of the temple, but today he felt some uneasiness, as if he was being given some indication. He stopped for a moment. Just when he was about to start walking again, his eyes fell on an infant sleeping on a staircase. He looked around to ascertain if the parents are nearby, but could not find anyone. He kept standing beside the kid, not picking him up with the fear of being charged as a kidnapper. He sat near the kid for the whole night but nobody came to claim the kid. In the morning he decided to take the kid home.

It had been twenty five years from that incident now. His life in these twenty five years entirely changed. He had raised the kid as his own. He never married for the fear of division of his love. As it is he had to divide his devotion between his father and his son. He never let his son know that he was son of the God. He lived as a commoner, a daily wager and worked hard to meet their ends. He worked even harder for getting his son an education. The harder he worked, the more his health deteriorated. Not a single day went, when he did not long for meeting or speaking with his father like he used to do earlier. At the same time, not a moment passed which did not revolve around his son.

He was back to the stairs one day - The stairs where he found his son; the stairs from where he could directly look at the temple and speak with his father. He was wrapped in a blanket. He did not move. He could not move. After 2-3 days, people at the temple recognised him. They got very upset at his condition. They were angry at his son for whom he had done so much but was still left for dying on the stairs. Some of them reached his home to meet his son. After continued knocking and getting no response, they had to come back to the temple. While they were discussing the matter, one of them noticed that there was another figure wrapped in a blanket sitting in a dark corner. They went near him and recognised him as the son. They could not understand what was happening and asked the son why he left his father for dying the on stairs and while his father was at it, why was he sitting and watching him.

“He wanted to die in lap of his father, at a place where he himself was born as a father. As a son, I seek to ensure that my father’s death is peaceful. As a father, I seek to free him from the cycle of life and death” He said.

That very moment, a bell rang in the temple. They looked at the temple. It took them a moment to understand what the son had said.

A moment was all what was needed for the father and the son to be together for eternity.

1 Hindu religious ritual of worship

2 Hindu temples dedicated to Lord Shiva and is located in Varanasi

 

The pair of shoes

He left from office and started walking towards home. It was a long walk. He used to have a bicycle, but had to sell it two years back when his wife fell ill. She could not survive. Now sometimes he laughs at himself thinking “at least I could have saved the bicycle.” Now he avoids the road and takes a shortcut through fields. Apart from saving time, it also helped him avoid temptation of stopping at the tea shop on the road and save five rupees, four for a cup of tea and one for a beedi (tobacco rolled in tendu leaf). He has neither time nor means to get into such indulgence. He used to enjoy the walk when he started, looking at the fields, birds etc. But now he just walks mindlessly.

He had been saving for last two years to buy another bicycle. With one less mouth to feed, he had hoped to save the money faster, but he had underestimated the expenses, which were growing much faster in comparison to his growing children. He calculated in his mind, seven hundred rupees for school fees, eight hundred rupees for grocery and nine hundred for rent. That leaves around hundred rupees from his monthly salary.  He should have saved something for contingency also, but in his salary any expenses apart from above three is contingency.

Today he would not be able to take the shortcut. He has been thinking about this since morning. He will have to buy shoes for his son today. He kept staring at the shop for a long time before entering it. It has been a long time since he has entered any shop except for the grocery shop around the corner. The shopkeeper gave him suspecting looks. He wanted to ask for the cheapest shoes available, but decided against it. A salesman approached him. He asked for canvas shoes. The salesman looked at him head to toe before coming back with a pair of shoes. It has been sometime since he had held anything new in his hands. He mustered up his courage and asked for price. “Six hundred rupees” the salesman said.  His heart sank. This was way more than he had planned for. Against his self-respect, he requested for a cheaper pair. The salesman understood and came back with the cheapest pair. “Four hundred rupees” the salesman said and this time he did not offer him to hold the shoes. He wanted to ask for a discount but decided otherwise because he wanted this anguish to end. He quickly calculated. These shoes meant that he will have to walk through the fields for four more months. He paid, collected the shoes and hurried out of the shop.

Now that the bicycle was at least four months away, he stopped at the tea shop today. He relished the tea and the beedi while it lasted. He observed the passers-by. It was much like his life, which had stopped while everything else was moving fast. It was now getting dark. He slowly walked towards the house.

He smiled when he handed over the shoes to his son. His son looked at him, first without feelings and then with exasperation and repulsion. “How many times I have told you Dad?” his son said. It was as if somebody had jolted him out of a dream.  “It was twenty five years back. How many times will you buy these shoes for me? Did you forget to take your meds?” his son shouted. He did not say anything, just quietly walked out of the room. His son kept the shoes along with fifty odd other identical pairs.

 

A false promise of a better tomorrow.

She was staring at the lamp, unsure whether she should keep it lit or not. Tomorrow it may very well be a choice between warmth on face and food in stomach. So here is the main character of our story, let’s call her Radha, staring at the lamp hoping that the oil burns slow, so that she does not have to buy it again tomorrow. Staring at the lamp, Radha knew in her heart that it only offers a false promise of heat in a freezing night. The night was going to be long. She put out the light. Lying in the dark, shivering and hoping for sleep to finally takeover; at times like these, the most difficult part was not to fight the present, but to avoid thinking about happy moments of past, to avoid the thoughts of the man in her life. The man who wasn’t.

She had little ambitions in life. Majority of our population may not even understand the meaning of the word ambition. It is a luxury available to only who do not have to worry about making the ends meet. She could not fight the memories. The memory of the day she came to her new home, her warm welcome and memories of her first night. That day is probably the highest point in life of girls like Radha.

She could not sleep. She was feeling thirsty. ‘Not thirst’ she cursed herself for not going to well in the evening. There wasn’t a drop of water at home. She tried to fight with the dry throat and then after a point she could not win. She picked up a pot, covered herself with a tattered blanket. She hesitated for a moment but her throat did not. She got rid of her anklets. The quieter it is, the better it would be. It was pitch dark. She did not know whether to curse the fog or be grateful for it. She was not born in this village but after years of carrying water, she could reach the well blindfolded.

She quenched her thirst. She filled the pot and started back. She was near her hut when she heard the footsteps. At first she thought she was imagining things, but all the doubts cleared when two strong hands strangled her from behind, one holding knife on her neck and other holding her hands. He did not allow her to make any sound except for the sound of her pot dropping on the ground. The intentions were clear. He started dragging her most probably to a nearby hut or to fields. She could not help but recall when her husband used to drag her holding her hair. She had become habitual to the daily torture. Her fists clenched. With extreme pressure she bit on the hand and jumped on the knife. In a moment, she was sitting on the man and stabbed him in his chest and she kept stabbing.

Sometime back she could not stop shivering. Now she was sweating, but only till she came back in her senses. She wasn’t going to leave the body there. It belonged to her now. She dragged it to the backyard and started digging. She just dropped the body in the grave and covered it. Nothing what happened today had happened to her for the first time. She had lived the nightmare all over again. After all, the grave was adjacent to the place where she buried her husband.

If she could kill her husband a thousand times, she would. She was not shivering anymore. She slept like a child. The sleep offered a false promise much like the lamp and her wedding day. A false promise of a better tomorrow.

 

Things about her….Poetry in our life

Sometimes I get a little suspicious of my wife. No, No, don’t get the wrong idea! Not the kind of suspicion Mr. Smith and Mrs. Smith shared for each other. I have never been able to understand how she manages everything and I am not talking about household chores. For instance, I have never been able to remember any traffic routes but she seems to have a google map in her head. Is it possible that she may have been chasing criminals on these very roads earlier in the day? Whenever we are planning a vacation, she already seems to know a hell of a lot about various hotels, places to visit and places not to visit and so on. Is it possible that she might be on some international espionage assignment and is yet able to make it home to cook dinner? I guess I will never be able to figure things about her, so I will just restrict this article to our conversation the other day.

I was writing a poem. I am not a poet; I just try to rhyme things and at times use my poems in my stories. After thinking for a couple of hours, I came up with the following lines:

It wasn’t my place to be, for I am only a traveller,

an observer, an onlooker, at best a road dweller.

I once called things I owned, proudly as my own.

Now the world is mine to use, all things known.

 

She was standing over my shoulder. I expected her to say something good about the poem. She kept looking at the words for a minute and then moved away with indifference. I looked back and asked her, “Hey! What happened?””Nothing” she said. Now with my experience of the last five years, I knew that “Nothing” is never “Nothing”. So I decided to prod on.. “I mean, what you think about the poem?” “Ohh! It’s nice”, she said. Now “nice” is another word which I know is  not nice by any standards. While a man would mostly do the stuff himself to  impress a lady, a woman would only offer help when the man is ready to admit that he is stupid. So I said “I am not able to complete the poem, can you help me with this?”  “Oh you are a writer, you will figure it out” she said without looking at me. What did I do wrong? I had already admitted that I am not smart enough to do the job. Why wasn’t  she helping? Oh yes! Once you have admitted that you are stupid, you also have to make the lady feel her supremacy.  “You do these things so naturally!. In fact you do everything so beautifully! Just see what you feel about the poem.” Finally, she was interested!

 

“Hmm.. maybe we can change some words. For example “place to be” does not seem to fit in and neither  does  “all things known”. We may also have to change  “road dweller” and “use” she said. “So what do you have in mind?” I said hiding my annoyance over the fact that I had spent  almost four hours in finding these words.  She spent the  next ten minutes scribbling, striking words out, writing and then rewriting and mostly staring at the paper. After ten minutes, she came up with the following version:

 

I do not stop, for I am a traveller, an explorer,

My pilgrimage is long, for I am still a seeker,

I chose the world over the crossroads of “own” and “renounce,”

The world I own as an observer, an onlooker, at best a road dweller.

 

I kept looking at the poem, trying to find my words. Now I am beginning to think that they train their agents in all kinds of art including poetry as well!

A yellow house, a thing that dropped out of the sky and a thing of beauty...

‘How do you write a story? I mean how you come up with all these ideas?’ she asked me. This was something I had never asked myself. I never had to. Not trying to boast, but after writing the first line, the story just oozes out of me. It is the first line which is difficult to imagine. She did not believe me when I told her this.  So she offered to suggest the first line of the story. I was more than willing to oblige.
 

‘It was a cold dark night’ she said. ‘Really? You wish to make it that simple for me? C’mon try again.’ I suggested. She thought for a minute and came back with ‘The house was yellow’- nothing more. I had the first line. Now it was upto me. My story followed like this:

“The house was yellow. Or it must have been yellow at some point in time. Now there is only a hint of bright yellow hues it once may have sported. She had said that it was the most beautiful house on the street. I jokingly said that she must also be the most beautiful girl on that street. She blushed. We had met at a marriage. I roamed around her for three days before she agreed to meet me alone. We talked about ourselves and each another. We laughed at silly jokes and shared our idea of  the future. Suddenly we could see a future together. I promised to come to her home soon and ask for her hand in marriage. She said I should not make promises which I may not be able to keep. I could not understand her doubt. Men have a tendency of having very high confidence on their abilities for as long as they live off their parents. She had to leave. She dropped a chit with  her address  and I picked it up”

‘This is not a very good story. I can already guess the ending. The guy will not be able to marry the girl and will visit her house after 20-30 years in the hope of  meeting her.  Let me give you another line’ She interrupted. ‘Try me’ I said. She wanted to give a really weird one this time and she did. ‘It just dropped out of sky’. I could not lose face after having made such tall claims. Here was the story I knitted :

“It just dropped out of sky. The question. They were shocked. How can I even think about getting married before I got a job? Men at this age do not think very far in future. I had received a letter from a girl I met in a marriage and who I loved like crazy now. We had been exchanging letters since then. She could not wait any longer. I was to visit her home and ask for her hand in marriage. I had to decide quickly. There was no other way. That night I stole cash from my father’s safe. I had sent her a letter mentioning that she should meet me at  the railway station from where we will run away into a world far from here. For opening one’s eyes fully, one must first take a punch on one’s nose. And I took a couple. She was watching from a distance while her goons beat the hell out of me and snatched the cash. All this while, I did not blink even once. I kept looking into her eyes - those deceiving, devious eyes. I wanted to remember those eyes for my life.

 

My brothers had lodged a complaint against me with police. I spent next two years in jail, never forgetting her eyes for a single moment. It gave me strength to go on.”

 

‘Okay I am impressed. But for my satisfaction, complete the story with this first line – ‘a thing of beauty is a joy forever’. She was getting adventurous with her lines. To write a standalone story with a single line is one thing, but to join two completely different things and come up with one outcome is another. Well, I could only try!

“A thing of beauty is a joy forever. Apparently the sentence was only half true as far as I was concerned. No matter how much I tried, I could not recall those beautiful eyes I fell in love with, only the deceitful version of them. After coming out of jail I had nowhere to go to. No future to look forward to. There was only a resolution – revenge. Life took dramatic turns and I took all kind of ways to earn money and I did.  It was my chance to take revenge. So here I was looking at the yellow house. The house which was yellow once. I kept waiting till she came out in her balcony. She looked at me. I tried to summon my anger, my reflection of her deceptive, devious and deceitful eyes. Then I turned back and started walking, with a new image, a memory which I had cherished for long ever since I met her. Those beautiful black eyes - a thing of beauty is a joy forever”

My story was finished. She could not speak for a minute - maybe a little too spellbound. She was mesmerised with the narration. While she closed her eyes to think of another line, my hand reached into my pockets and produced a chit with an address. It was time to let go of it.