Bygone Rockstar

"Hey, Dad! It's raining really hard, and the school's closed today! Can you take the day off too?"

And somehow, that simple little question from his son answered it too. He made a few calls, while the rain drummed away rhythmically on the window pane. He could feel his fingers drumming on the phone as well, along with the rain. He could feel a song coming to him, he could feel his heart forming the words, as the phone rang in his ears and the raindrops drummed on the windowpane. The first rain of the season, it had a special innocence about it – as though, the only thing it wanted to do was to freshen up the world. The dry parched earth had seemed to be looking longingly at the dormant skies till the previous day, missing the rain more than anyone else. Finally, the clouds broke with a shower, and the earth was happy once more that the raindrops were awake again. The ballad kept coming to him, when suddenly the ringing on the other side of the telephone stopped and a male voice answered. He recognized the voice, spoke for a while, laughed for a little while, and hung up quite quickly, and suddenly the day was all his – for him, and his son, and the raindrops pattering on the earth, which danced back in muddy delight.

“Yay! My Dad’s the best! He took the day off, and now we’re gonna have so much fun! Aren’t we, Dad?”

He barely caught a glimpse of a red t-shirt running out of the room in excitement, and he was left behind with a smile on his face and memories in his mind. He remembered the innocent smile of that girl, and how he had fallen in love with her. He remembered the song the smile inspired him to write, and how she had fallen in love with him. Now, as he saw the rain outside, he felt the need to write another song about it all – sweet innocence. As he went about his life, growing up at every step, his trysts with innocence kept reducing. Now, again, he was face to face with the thing that inspired him to write that ballad so many years ago – sweet innocence.

The black box that had been collecting dust for so long stared back at him, and he knew he had to open it and take out the guitar within. It had been a long, long time since he had given that black box a thought; he was a changed man now, so many years later. So many first showers had passed away, without him even noticing them. He remembered how he used to sit beside the window every season, the guitar in his arms, his lady’s arms thrown around his neck. For so many seasons, he wrote a song for every single one of those first showers.

So many years had passed, and he never even realized it. So many first showers had gone by, and he had just let them pass him by. He wondered if he could pick up a tune again, and weave that wonderful song out of it one more time. He wiped the dust from the leather case, and gently opened the velvet lined box. The old guitar looked even more aged after so many years, the strings red from the dust and the rust it had been catching over so many years – and yet, he was sure she remembered every tune, every chord, every note that had ever been played on it. The guitar still seemed to reverberate slightly with the echoes of the songs that had been played so long ago. He gently picked the guitar out of the case. The ebony fret board still seemed warm, even after so many years, and he cradled the guitar in his lap, poised to play it. He gently touched the rusted strings, but the notes didn’t come. He tried again, his fingers dancing on the fret board, but the music didn’t play like before. He could feel his fingers cutting on the rusted strings; barely a minute later, he stopped. The music as he knew it had left him over the years. Suddenly, he felt hollow and alone, devoid of something that he couldn’t define, which made him feel emptier still. The rain still drummed on the window pane outside, urging him to join into the rhythm. He sighed, knowing that he could never join in with the rain the way he used to before. There would be no more ballads written on that guitar, he thought sadly as he gently put the guitar back into the velvet lined case.

“C’mon, Dad! Let’s go outside in the rain. I’m wearing my raincoat, and I got yours too. We can sing songs in the rain, Dad!”

The thunder boomed outside, like the crash of the cymbals right on cue, and his son laughed gleefully and rhythmically to the sounds of the rain. The drumroll on the windowpane continued, and he could feel the laughter building up inside of him too. His son was laughing and jumping as they made their way out into the drenched world outside, singing the new secret song – a song filled with Rhythmic Laughter, and Drumrolls on Windowpanes, and Thundering Cymbals. Many years later, he discovered that honest, innocent ballad, once more.

Raw Coffee

“I’m telling you, this is the best cafe in the whole of Mumbai,” he exclaimed proudly as he entered the quaint little cafe, the wafting smell of refreshingly fresh roasted coffee rolling over him like gentle waves. “More than the coffee here, it’s the amazing ambience of this place that draws me here, every time.”

The waiter hurried over to take his order, delivered in that impeccable English the patrons were so proud of. The regular order of a double shot espresso followed, and the proud waiter walked back into the kitchen behind him.

The delicious coffee was brewed, the aroma spilling over the cup and filling the air with the luscious tempting taste of coffee, and amidst it all, a crude voice issued, “Do number table ka Dubble Shot Asspresso le ja re!”

The Ocean is a beautiful thing...

The ocean is a beautiful thing. Last night, we spoke for a long time. She’s beautiful, in a delicate yet strong way. She’s vast, and she doesn’t discriminate. She takes everyone in, just the same. Last night, I had a long talk with her. I spoke, while she listened. The ebb and flow of the water like the rhythmic breaths of a slumbering gentle giant deep within. She listened, with a rapt attention, and every breath of her, every sigh under the moonlight; it all gave me immeasurable amounts of peace in my heart. The water is the same, anywhere I go, right? The Ganga flowing from Haridwar meets the Yamuna that flows through Delhi; they flow together beyond Allahabad, into the Bay of Bengal, and the Bay of Bengal flows into the Indian Ocean, where the Arabian Sea meets her too. So, maybe, that sighing breathing gentle giant from last night recognized from that time that I spent beside the Ganga at Haridwar, the time I spent with that warm stream in Garampaani, the many times I’ve crossed the Yamuna over the span of two years. I know she knew me well; she recognized me.

She told me some stories, in a different language. The words were alien to me, but the story was not. I understood the story, and could see the part that I was playing in it too; amongst the many others out here, living, just like me. She wants me to stay, the thought made a smile play at her lips. I like her a lot, but even then, I somehow couldn’t stop thinking about the other familiar body of water for me; the one who flows through my home, the one who I saw so regularly for the last two years – The Yamuna. I like the ocean a lot, but I know that one day, I will return home. I will return to The Yamuna, someday.

Someday.

Had written this a long time ago, but the absence of the internet at that point of time had this slip out of my mind. Found it again while I was browsing through some old things I had written, and thought it would make a bit of sense if I wrote this out here as well.

The Homesick Driver

“It’s 7:30 already,” said the driver, looking around at the still blue sky; the brilliant lights around the city mirrored on the shiny asphalt. “You really can’t understand how fast time flies away in Mumbai. It’s still almost daytime here, and it’s just half an hour to 8:00 PM.”

As he was reciting this, the eyes grew somewhat wistful, and he looked into the mirror for a brief moment. He saw something very familiar in the face that was staring back at him. He smiled sadly, and the face in the mirror complied as well.

“Back in the village, at this point of  time, the whole village would be drowned in a beautiful velvety darkness; a jet black silk blanket that gently lulls the whole village to sleep. You can’t find that in a place like this. It’s hard to get a wink of peaceful sleep anyway in this place.”

The eyes shifted away from the mirror, drifting into the memory lane, and finally settling upon a happy past. “I was better off driving the tractor on the fields, than driving an auto-rickshaw in this insane city!” The eyes were back on the mirror, and the homesick face looked back at him.

“I’m telling you, it wasn’t that different!” he said with a laugh, and the mirror burst out laughing as well. Still laughing, I paid the fare and stepped out of the auto-rickshaw, and the mirror went blank as the face followed me out.

55 Fiction: Blind Eyes

Tap! Tap! Tap! The white stick danced rhythmically on the pavement. The boy stared, mesmerized, at the hand holding the stick; the blind eyes saw nothing. A hand directed the man along the right way. Tap! Tap! Tap! Danced the stick as the boy stared, and in his mind, the blind eyes saw it all.

The Lady and The Rain

Mumbai is a place of great diversity. Diversity; the word sounds so beautiful when you hear it. Here, however, when you see it, the word gets a new raw meaning. It has been quite a while since I've picked up the pen to write a story, and so, I ventured out so I could get a few ideas that I could work upon. I walked around, and looked around, the way I usually do, and got a few ideas to write about as well. I was happy; I thought that maybe, tonight, after a long time, I'd be able to write something, something that's similar to the lines of what I've been writing out for a while now. Three fictional tales chased each other around my head, and with those safely locked up in my brain for the future, I headed back home. The stories, however never came. The raw diversity of the city hit me hard, and I couldn't help but ensure that the story I told was just as raw as what I saw.

The lady on the sidewalk doesn't need a fabricated story. Her tale has to be as honest and brutal as the very truth that she's living. I hadn't looked into her eyes for more than a second, but in that brief moment her sadness and pain and shame touched me. I shivered, as I stopped, looking at her. It was a wet night, what with the incessant rain that had been showering the city since morning, and because of that I had no idea of knowing if her face was wet from the drops of rain, or droplets of her tears. She knew, however, and in that brief moment she looked into my eyes, she told me about it as well.

The warmth from the halogen bulb shining over her head was all the warmth she got that night. Half a moon shone above her, and the yellow light and white light mixed up together somewhere as they fell over her. In that light, the droplets falling from the skies shone like glittering diamonds, and just like jagged diamonds, the cold water from above seemed to pierce through her dark skin. The warm blanket lay soaked and cold, and she was left with nothing but a pillow squelching in the light layer of soft mud to lay her head on. The tree nearby provided a little dry spot, with the occasional fat raindrop making its way through the leaves and down to the earth. The dry spot was where she had tucked in her little son, the one small comfort for her under the cold halogen bulb. Now, there was no place for her, and the long wet night waited for her. Many feet hurried past her, some of them holding umbrellas over their heads to avoid the water from above, the very same water that would get them, one way or another. No one spared a thought or a glance for the lady in the rain, sitting there cold and wet, the shadow of her past still strong in her eyes. The water flowed on steadily past her, rising slowly but surely; the pattering feet jogged past her, and the rain fell softly overhead, and she sat there, silently waiting for the night to get over, so both her son and she could be blessed with another miracle, another day in this city of dreams, Mumbai.

Like everyone else on that road, I tried to focus on getting back home as well. I tried to shake off the thoughts of her, the memory of that look in her dark eyes, but unlike everyone else, I couldn’t do a good job of it. A good few steps later, I turned back, my eyes searching for the lady in the rain. I was some distance away from her, and I could just make out a human figure in a soaked saree sitting near a big tree. I wanted to stop, for another moment, but the jostles from the people pushed me on, and being caught up in the wave of walking men, I kept going. A little ahead, the road bent to the right, and I couldn’t see her anymore.