Sauria

Sauria are the true lizards of the lizard family. Geckos, which are the most common form of these lizards, frequently hang out in my room. They hang upside down from the ceiling, always keeping a wary eye out for me. Were they here during the time that I had been away as well? I remember hanging like they do, precariously from tall trees made slippery by the constant rain. Scared, silent and still, we stayed there clutching our guns as if they were life jackets. Two days it took for the rest of the platoon to clear the route for us, before we could climb down from our ‘strategic positions.’ We could be people once more, instead of lizards. Maybe that’s why I feel closer to the geckos now that I’m back – I’ve somewhat seen the world from their vantage point.

Or, maybe they’re like the surrogate pets that I’ve never had the courage to keep. I hope they don’t let go and disappear after hearing about them being the surrogate pets. The truth is, to put it rather bluntly, I’m scared. I’m too scared to live; too scared to breathe; too scared to exist. War changes you; it distorts reality.

For instance, I still have trouble walking down the alleyway. Even in broad daylight, I am skittish. It has nothing to do with darkness. In fact, it is the light of day that scares me. I am too well lit, too exposed. There are far too many windows all around me to keep track of. Looking up, I am scared of clear blue skies and the dangers of the drones that may be lurking, invisible. I am scared of construction noises, the grenade like booms of the sledgehammers and the machine gun rat-a-tat of the drills. I fear the day for making me a sitting duck in the spotlight, and I fear the night for the unknown that presses in from all sides.

But most of all, I fear that which never leaves me – loneliness. It is the only thing that stays faithful when everything else has left. It is the one thing that never deserts, but snuggles up close to your heart, cold and menacing, hissing threateningly like a wiry felid. It followed me all the way back from the trenches, and chased away all that was dear to me.

Alcohol used to help, but now my body craves too much for it. Just as the tides, it has eroded away the remnants of my life that I came back to. My wife – my beautiful, loving, generous, forgiving wife – could not bear to look at me while I stared back at her through an ethanol haze. My feline companion hissed and growled from my chest, and I craved to destroy that which I cared for too much. It was the fear of losing her that made me want to hurt. When she inevitably did leave, the cat shook himself gently, yawned wide, and curled up against the crook of my neck, and slept. Once, he purred too – a cold, sinister purr that no living being should make.

My sleep has become fitful. While she was here, my cat used to sleep between us, and every night would take me back to the battlefield; the cold, the damp, the mud; the constant hum of mosquitoes around us and drones and jets above us. And as I slept, he would claw his way into my dreams and grow bigger and bigger, stretching out in front of me, his hiss becoming a roar, his purr a snarl. He could swallow me whole if he wanted to, but he didn’t. Like a cat, he toyed with his prey, played the deadly game, and just before I would be devoured, he would shake me violently. I still wake up in a cold sweat, shivering, reaching out to where my wife slept. But, of course, she isn’t there anymore.

Before the war, I used to write. I wrote about soldiers too, sometimes – the romantic tales of valour and dignity, of courage and brotherhood. All that died with my friends on the field. And amongst that carnage, out of the smoking craters of mortar shells and walls ridden with bullet holes, slinked out my feline friend. Before the war, these stories used to fill me with pride. Now, there’s no one to listen to my stories anymore. They don’t come as easily to me anymore either.

So, I read what I wanted to read to her to the sparrows. The ones that heard me flew away, but there were always more. And then there were the pigeons, the parrots, the mynahs. When she left, she took a lot of the stories with her. She took the sparrows and the pigeons and the parrots and the mynahs too. Both of us had been scared that I would hurt them all.

The felid remained.

There were big rats that looked like hand grenades that lived in the alleyway, but my scrawny feline friend never chased them. The owls swooped in and picked them off one by one, while on some nights the two of us would stand still and watch. We imagined the crunching of the rat’s bones between the jaws of the owl that swooped low, and the cat purred with joy.

But he is too scared to do the deed. A coward at heart, he is. That’s why he doesn’t touch the geckos living in my backyard, the ones that visit me sometimes at night. He doesn’t dare go after any of the rats that find their way indoors. He is content to snuggle in the protection of my chest, hissing menacingly from time to time, reminding me that he is always there, always present.

Would my wife come back had it not been for this stringy cat that sits heavy upon me? Some days, I find myself asking myself that question over and over, while other days I do not dare to. My days are empty, my nights hollow, save for the horrible company of my loneliness and the weight on my chest. Memories should never weigh so much, but more often than not, they do.

Today, I found a broken compass lying forgotten beneath my bed, its needle stuck permanently south. I don’t remember breaking the compass, and found myself wishing that it worked again. Maybe it was the cat. It could have been the rats. The owls might be guilty. But the geckos? They wouldn’t. They understand. They would not leave. They wouldn’t take what points me the right way away from me.

In light of this, I think it’s reassuring to have something stable in life – even if it’s the familiar sight of Sauria hanging upside down from the ceiling.

~

Image Credits: Yintan / Wikimedia

Snow White

The first rays of the sun fell on the new lanes of the old city. It was a new day, but the old man's life was still the same. The sunlight inched forwards, while the old man raised his sleepy eyes towards them and waited for that warm touch. The white cat purred softly beside him, while the old man looked down at the white cat, waiting for something magical to happen, just like every day. He sat up, and saw the shadows receding; he knew it wouldn't be long before the light would reach them, and the thought gave life to a mad euphoria in his eyes.

Then, the bright shiny light touched the white fur. The sunlight reached into the snow white strands, making the cat glow in the light early morning mist. Even the cat felt something, and mewed softly – but she dared not move, for she wasn't quite sure how to react to this beauty that was both inside and outside her. The old man's smile turned into a jovial laugh, as he stretched his wrinkled, bony fingers and stroked the cat's head softly.

"My dear Phanush, what would the day be without you," said the old man to the cat, while she purred lovingly in answer.

The old man stood up, and thus began his day. The footpath was waiting, as was his tattered rug where his days were spent. The loose change spared by the generous souls of the harsh city was his way to a semi filling breakfast. His stomach rumbling, he hastened to get started with his work day, and took his spot like every day. The tree overhead provided him with a little shade from the sun during the hot days, and a little cover from the water on rainy days.

It was a bright sunny day, and somehow the white cat didn't care too much to stay under the shade of the tree all day long. The day was calling out to him, and her stomach was rumbling too. She needed a bit of food, and so she left her old man behind and ventured across the street. She turned back once, and saw her old man wearing a sad face that seemed to work very effectively on the steady flow of feet, and the change flowed steadily into the little aluminium bowl in his hand. Reassured that the old man was fine for now, she moved further along.

Still early in the morning, the world around her had already begun in full swing. The shops along the street were thrown open, and the people bustling around everywhere would stop at one or the other shop for a quick bite. The myriad of smells that surrounded her made her stop a few times to investigate, but nothing seemed to appeal to the manic hunger of a restrained predator early in the morning. She looked back again, and saw her old man looking at her for a while with a happy gleam in his eyes, before going back to his aluminium bowl. 'A beggar has no business looking happy,' he used to say, and so she turned away from him knowing that it was bad for his business.

She turned back to the street and to the task at hand; finding breakfast. The street was full of the smells of food, but there was something there that she couldn't find. Her nose twitched slightly and led her on, in search of something so wonderful that she didn't even bother to look around at anything else. The smell of that special something had gotten hold of her so completely, so wholly, that nothing else seemed to exist at that point of time for her. She was carried forward by the scent that had caught her nose, and she glided forward effortlessly, dodging deftly between the many feet that pattered away on the busy footpath. She could feel her quarry getting nearer with every step, and the many generations of instinct that flowed through her veins told her to slow down. Her gait became slower, as she cautiously headed forward still. One quick glance behind, and she could see her old man looking at her with half a bewildered look on his face; but the overpowering scent of her prey drove all other thoughts out of his mind in a flash.

The butcher's shop was just a few steps ahead of her, and she had reached the butcher's block. Her senses tingling, she slowed down to a stop just in front of the block. Her muscles were ready to leap and catch the little, bloody sinew dangling near the edge of the beaten and cracked block. Her paws were hanging in mid air, ready to make the swipe if needed. Adrenaline and instincts pumped her heart, coursing through her blood. She stood there, frozen in time, waiting for the perfect moment to snatch that little piece of meat that had been calling out to her for so long. So still was she that nobody noticed her, and the butcher continued to cut up the meat on the block. She took a moment more, and then leaped towards her target.

Just as she was about to snap and free that little piece, the butcher's hand came out of nowhere and swatted at her face. She tried to dodge the hand, but in that midair change of direction, she fell a few feet short of the block. Landing on her feet as lightly as a feather, she could see the butcher raise his knife. Defeated, she streaked away, leaving that little piece of meat with the selfish butcher, while he hurled abuses that she never heard. Still hungry and humiliated, she looked around to see if her old man was still watching her.

She crossed the street and slowly walked back to the old man, who was still wearing a sorry face. He glanced quickly at her as she reached him, and sat down on his old ragged coat. From the look on his face, she could see that he hadn't seen her defeat; the ragged old coat was just as warm as before, and nothing seemed to have changed – but she kept wondering, if the one man who had always been so proud of her, the one man who had so unconditionally loved her through and through, thought lesser of her having seen that humiliating defeat back at the butcher's block.