Of Silent Chairs and Mute Memories

Her name was Chameli. Once the jasmine flower she was named after, she had folded back into the bud that she had been a long time ago. Against the misty morning, in her delicate white dress, she looked radiant. She had been beautiful, and there were those who remembered that. Time had flown, though, and she had been trapped in her memories, and become that delicate flower bud once more. She had laid out the chairs in the field just the way she remembered it. Li’l Jo Singh, Mr Bakra, Mowgli Man, Alice Kumar Chautala, Maikalal Jaikishan, all members of the short-lived A-Team. She had long forgotten their real names, but their strange faces were still as vivid as the quirky names she remembered. That’s what they remembered her for, coming up with strange names. So lost was she in her memories, that she had forgotten her own name as well. She was Champa Chameli, presiding over this morning’s meeting on the dreary, bleak, misty morning.

I had hoped to catch her off her guard, so I moved through the empty chairs as silently as I could. Past experience had shown me that the trick worked – take her a bit by surprise, maybe startle her just a little bit, and she’ll suddenly become a lot more relaxed. Give her the illusion of being in control of me too, at just the right moment, and suddenly I would find myself a part of her little game, her periodic dance with the past that haunted her so much.

I crept closer and closer, and just when she was standing up after straightening an imaginary chair cushion, I leapt forward and whispered ‘Boo’ right into her ears. It didn’t have quite the effect that I had hoped. Instead of being startled, she turned around with a smile and said in her cute, little-girl manner, ‘I knew you were right behind me. You’re not good at trying to be a ninja, Makdee. You’re late for the meeting.’

‘I’m sorry, Chameli,’ I said with a smile. ‘I got caught up…’

‘In a web?’ asked Chameli, but I knew it was a rhetorical question. It was a joke at my expense, something that she found incredibly funny. I had no idea why she came up with the name Makdee, a spider, for me. I wasn’t a member of the imaginary A-Team, so Chameli didn’t really need to give me a name. I could have been me; but I knew she was scared of reality now. She preferred this dream world of nonsensical names and silly, childish games now. Somehow, I had become a part of that as well.

The chairs were laid out in the same way as they had been since I had known her. It had been so long ago that I don’t even recollect how and when I met her for the first time. Maybe it was at one of these meetings. Maybe we saw each other from a distance at a café. Maybe we met over lunch, and shared a meal a long time ago. I didn’t know anymore, and she was too lost in her delusions to care too much about those trivial things.

I had a job to do, though. I had to shake her up a little bit, give it another try. Maybe the infinity-plus-one-eth time would do the trick. I wanted to be tactful about it, I wanted to stall for a while, and I wanted to not tell her the things I knew she didn’t want to hear; but these were things that weren’t in my hands anymore. I existed only for Chameli now, and she had made me up for a reason.

‘Who’s the guest of honour today?’ I asked her as I took my seat next to her.

She giggled shyly, and said, ‘It’s Jaikishan; he finally told me that he loves me. Alice was wrong; didn’t I always tell you that?’

‘Why do you call him Alice? I mean, he’s a guy after all!’

‘You look at him! I’m sure he’s gay; he’s so effeminate after all. Besides, he likes it if I call him Alice,’ she said matter-of-factly, running a hand down her beautiful white dress.

‘Chameli, there’s something you should know,’ I began again, knowing well that it would be a fruitless endeavour. I had done this enough times to know it, but it was my job. It was precisely why Chameli had conjured me in her mind – so I could try, time after time, to snap her out of her hallucinations and back into the real world. ‘Chameli, are you listening?’

‘Yes, yes. I’m listening to you, Makdee,’ said Chameli absently.

‘You’re dreaming again, Chameli. It’s time you woke up and went back to your world. The people in the meeting, they’ve all gone, they’ve left. Don’t you want to know what happened to all those people? Wouldn’t that be good, to know them in real life, instead of inside here, only inside your mind?’

‘Oh, Makdee,’ she said exasperatedly. ‘Why do you come up with the same story every time? Look, Jaikishan will be coming soon; it’s going to be our first date. And Alice told me it would never work out!’

‘Chameli, Alice isn’t real,’ I said, taking another shot at it. ‘Alice lives inside your mind. Jaikishan exists only in your head. They’re not real, not here at least.’

‘Shush, Makdee!’ said Chameli, standing up suddenly. ‘Jaikishan’s here! You stay here, Alice will keep you company. I’ll see you later, ok?’ Another sudden smile and she ran off a little way off the cluster of chairs. I was sitting alone again, surrounded by phantoms just like me. They couldn’t see me, and I couldn’t see them – it was an arrangement that seemed to work just fine. My job, my purpose, my destiny, that wasn’t coming along so well, though. I could see Chameli animatedly holding a conversation with the thin air in front of her, no doubt speaking to Jaikishan. Things were going exactly as I had always known them to be. In a bit, Chameli would be lost, and there wouldn’t be any purpose for me to stay for the day. Would I leave then, though? Would I be able to walk away?

Chameli was taking Jaikishan’s invisible hand now. I knew I shouldn’t be watching this, but I couldn’t help it. She was putting his imaginary arm around herself, and getting lost in his warm embrace. I wondered, as always, if I should stop her or not. I knew I wouldn’t in the end – I never did. That wasn’t a part of my reason for existence.

She melted in his arms, invisible as they were. She crumpled to the floor, and lay down still. It would be over soon, I told myself. This day would end soon, I told myself. Beyond the circle of chairs, I could see Chameli kissing a phantom lover, a ghost-boyfriend from the past. I could see the beads of sweat glowing on her skin, could see her writhing with pleasure in the soft grass underneath her. It would be over soon, I told myself yet again.

But it wasn’t Chameli who had complete control. I knew it would last yet another lifetime; I knew Chameli was lost just a little more, yet again. While I could do nothing but sit and wait, and watch her falling in love yet again with Jaikishan – the imaginary, invisible man Alice had been wrong about.

~

Inspired by Magpie Tales. I looked for the source of the image, and found that it's by Rosie Hardy.

The painter at the Kulkarni Household

When he was a child, Mohandas Kulkarni was expelled from art class.  When his son died unexpectedly, for reasons unknown, he picked up the brush again. It had been a strange choice for him, one that didn’t seem to make much sense to anyone apart from him. His son had played the guitar almost all through his life; there were people who had expected Mohandas to maybe pick up that instrument, as a fitting way to remember his son.

Instead, he got lost behind his canvas, buried beneath layers of paint and dust. The words stopped flowing out of him over time, and he stayed mute for days, eyes glazed over, and thinking about whatever it was that he was painting. It’s easy to let grief out by crying, but Mohandas saved up every last teardrop he had. His wife cried, while Mohandas stayed stoic and silent. When the fire swallowed their son, Reena had been inconsolable. A day later, Reena stood strong, and in spite of it all, her life went on.

A week later, the first easel appeared, followed by the palette. Reena lost her husband to the easel that day. Mohandas lost the words shortly thereafter. The paint settled on the canvas overtime, and the dust settled on Mohandas; and unseen to his eyes, Reena aged long before her time. Two years passed like this, in a flash.

In Mohandas’ little art room, there was a pile of discarded paintings. They were all the same, but he hadn’t been satisfied. He had spent most of his time locked away in this room, looking for something in what he created so carefully, only to strip them down and begin anew. He wasn’t sure what it was that he was looking for all this while, but he was sure he would know when he saw it.

For two years, Reena and Mohandas hadn’t spoken to each other, or seen each other much. Weary and tired, Reena had wanted things to end quietly instead of going on like this. She had considered running away – but how can you run away from someone who isn’t even sure about your presence? She had thought about leaving him, but there was something about Mohandas that stopped her every time. In the way that Mohandas could never identify what he was looking for in the paintings, Reena failed to identify the reason that made her stop in her footsteps and bound her to the man she had lost the day her son died.

On an unremarkable Sunday morning, while the neighbours slept till late, catching up on their lost hours of sleep over the weekend, Mohandas emerged with the canvas and headed straight to the room that he once shared with his beloved wife. She was still in bed, but her eyes were open – almost as if she had been expecting him. He settled it down in front of her, and took his wife’s hands in his own. That morning, on an unremarkable, lazy Sunday, Mohandas broke his silence.

His voice, raspy from lack of use over many years, seemed sudden and cracked, but Reena heard him well; “I love you.”

“It’s beautiful, Mohan,” she said.

“It’s not original. I copied the idea from another painter. I forgot her name a long time ago,” he said.

“It looks just like him, but. How did she do that? Did she know him?”

“No, she didn’t. That’s what I was looking for, all this while. I was searching for him, searching for his face in that painting, hidden beneath the many layers of colour. I’ve found him now.”

Reena looked at the tears that streamed down Mohandas’ face, delayed by over two years while he had been looking for his lost son in another woman’s painting.

She gently put his arms around him, while he rested his wet cheeks on her shoulder. And they lived happily ever after…

~

Inspired by In Tandem.

‘An Eulogy’ or ‘Laughing in the face of Death’

Geoffrey wasn’t a deep guy. Not by a long shot. Maybe it was this that made Brad chuckle when he wondered if it would be better to have buried him in a shallow grave. He stopped himself from chuckling though – he was, after all, at a funeral. ‘I’d probably been hanging out too much with you, Geoff,’ thought Brad to himself, while Geoff’s smiling face twinkled behind the glass of the picture frame. The candles reflected on the glass gave him a holy look, which was ironic when Brad thought about the situation in which the picture had been taken. It had been anything but holy; the thought of it made Brad chuckle again.

‘Stop it, Geoff! You’re killing me – which is weird, considering that you’re dead now! I won’t be able to read out your eulogy if I go on like this,’ thought Brad, as the priest finished with the prayers. It was time for Brad’s last words for his best friend.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for coming here. Geoff was my best friend, we grew up together, and we knew each other like brothers. There’s a part of me that still has to come to terms with the fact that he’s gone, but right now his memories are still alive and kicking.”

Brad took his eyes away from the piece of paper in front of him, and looked at the crowd sitting in front of him. There was a hint of a smile even now on his face as he said, “It’s probably because of that, because of the fact that I still haven’t come to terms with the fact that he’s gone, really, that I was chuckling sitting back there. Call me crazy, but it still seems that he’s around me somewhere, whispering his endless line of silly jokes in my ears even now!”

The crowd laughed softly, nervously, and Brad went on reading from the little piece of paper.

“Geoff was a clown. He had a slightly sick, and a very weird sense of humour. Unfortunately, I was one of the few who got that sense of humour, which meant that while others were getting revolted or getting offended or getting ready to bash Geoff’s head in, I would be rolling somewhere, clutching my stomach in pain. He got beaten up a lot because of that as well, because I was too busy laughing at his jokes than standing next to him to save his ass.

“I’ve borne the brunt of his sense of humour at a number of places as well. I know neither of us can visit the local sandwich place anymore,” said Brad, and was smothered by a fresh bout of giggles. “That day was funny on so many levels! I don’t want to get into the details of it, and I don’t think any of you would want me to, either. Let’s just say that it had something to do with a BMT Sub, shall we? It was on that day this particular picture was taken, in fact – moments before we were thrown out of the establishment, and asked never to return…”

An uncomfortable silence filled the space while Brad stifled his laughter once more. The people sitting shared disapproving glances with each other. Most of the people knew Geoff as a young man full of potential, on the brink of his bright future. His sudden and unexpected death had reminded them of the fragility of life, and the overpowering stillness and finality of death. And yet, here was a boy, Geoff’s best friend, talking about his memories in such petty terms.

Brad didn’t care, though. He composed himself as best as he could, and went on reading from the little white, slightly crumpled sheet in his hand. “Geoff, you were a swell guy. You knew just how to cheer your friends when they were feeling low. You always knew just what to say in every situation. You always had a witty retort up your sleeve, and tried as we might, we never could figure out how you came up with those. You might have seemed to be a smart-ass, Geoff, but you cared about us. You cared about your friends. You cared enough to make us laugh, and you did that so well! I’ll miss you, my friend, for the rest of my life. I know this is farewell, but it doesn’t feel that way. Maybe that’s because we’ve never had a goodbye. We’ve always shared jokes instead, something that made us laugh through even the toughest days – when I left town, when you went to college, when our little group of friends was scattered all over the country. Those silly, shallow, and sometimes rude jokes were our way to say goodbye, Geoff. I’ve tried to do that here, but I wonder if it’ll work or not. Here goes…”

Brad’s voice choked up as he reached here, and he sniffled loudly. A fat, potent teardrop rolled heavily down his cheeks, followed quickly by another.

“A man walked into a bar…” he began, but the teardrops fell on to the nearly white, slightly crumpled piece of paper, washing away the rest of the joke with it.

~

Inspired by Magpie Tales

The Typewriter

As you can see, I’m a typewriter. As you can see, I’m not as inanimate as you thought I was. As you can see, I do remember a lot of things – the stories that have been written through me, channelized on to paper by my mechanics. You know how they say that a guitar remembers every song, every note that’s ever been played on it? And how they say that a book remembers every emotion, every bit of imagination that flashed through the reader’s mind? Well, we typewriters – not all of them, but just some of the more gifted ones amongst us – have the same ability; especially the ones that have been used to tell their stories to the world. I am lucky to be one such typewriter.

I’ve been handed around a lot, passed on from one hand to the next for the initial few years of my life. During that time, I was nothing more than a clerk’s tool – writing memos, printing an address – that was supposed to be my forte. Nobody wondered if the mechanical piece of equipment wanted to tell stories. Rather, if this particular piece of equipment wanted to learn about the art of telling stories. Things seemed hopeless (in hindsight, of course, because I never knew how fulfilling telling stories could be back then), until I was bought and paid for by her.

She was a romantic; an adventuress. She loved making mistakes, and she loved breaking the rules – not because she was a rebel or an anarchist, but just to test the waters. When people around her had started using a trusty computer, she stuck by faithfully with our kind. She picked me up at a flea market, lovingly cradled me in her arms, and carried me home like I was her first born child. It was love at first touch.

I never knew what she looked like, but I knew her better than anyone else can claim. We stood by each other, faithfully, for many years. I had never seen her face, but I knew her fingertips well. I knew her thoughts, and her dreams, like they were my own. In a way, they were my own. After all, it was only through her that I lived – really lived – my life the way I did.

She loved telling stories, but there weren’t many who were keen to hear them. She wasn’t beautiful in the conventional way (in fact, she used to call herself hideous!) and so never seemed to have many friends around her. She wanted to study. She wanted to write. She wanted to tell her stories. She wanted to build something, even if it was nothing more than an imagined, fantasy world. The world around her, however, wasn’t so keen to let her do that. The world around her wanted her to live a quiet life, have a family, make babies, raise them, and slip away once she was done in the silent arms of death. But she wouldn’t have it that way.

Having never seen her face, I never had the chance to make such judgements. I loved her for the way she told her stories, and the way she spoke them out to me. I revelled in the fact that I used to be the first one to hear those stories, and I nurtured them as if they were all mine. Now, I know I have a few of my own to tell, but they’ll never be as good as hers. But, I digress.

For fifty years or so, we made and broke people. We conjured up worlds together. We gave our characters strange names, people who came from strange places. We built those men, those women, and those children carefully, and breathed life into them. We felt the sting of the arrows, or the blow of a mighty punch. We felt the power of death, wielded by our hands. We made our heroes bleed, and we made our villains cry. We rejoiced in victory, we lamented for the dead. We fell in love, and we had many a lovers’ spat. You see, we built worlds together – intangible though they might be. And when the story was done, we stepped back to look at it for a while, before diving right into the next story.

It was only through her that I created something new, and I loved her for it.

It’s been many years since she passed away, but she lives on in my memories. And the stories she crafted so carefully; they still burn strong inside me, and I do churn one of them out from time to time – there are, after all, so many to choose from. But then, I’ve become old. I’ve become redundant now. I’ve been locked up inside a storage box and left alone for many years. The world has moved on, but I can’t.

I won’t have to. I still have her memories with me. I still have her stories with me. It doesn’t matter what her name was. It doesn’t matter what she looked like. I’ve never seen her face, and I’ve never known her name – but when those fingertips touched me, and when a new story poured forth from her mind into me, and on to the paper that was being hammered, I knew that none of that mattered.

Because I knew then, just how beautiful she really was.

~

Inspired from Magpie Tales.

Ladies & Gentlemen, Mr. Brad Ramanujam...

This post was loosely inspired from a prompt at dVerse, which asked for poems on taboo subjects. I’m not a good poet, so this is what I ended up writing instead. This is entirely a work of fiction. It contains a lot of profanity (intended in a humorous way only) and talks about taboo subjects like drugs, sex and prostitution. Please do not read this if you are in any way offended by any of the topics that have been mentioned above.

The name Brad Ramanujam is an anagram of my own name, Arnab Majumdar. No offence intended for any Brad Ramanujams or Dan Fedoseevs out there.

~

(audience applauds)

My name is Brad Ramanujam. I know it’s a weird name…

(audience laughs),

but wait a while before you start laughing. It’s about to get better.

My name’s Brad Ramanujam, and I was a lonely child. I had friends, but at home I was alone. I envied my friends who had siblings. Then, I’d go back home to my bland room and try to sleep, wishing that I’d have a little sister or a little brother someday.

Thing is, my dad left when I was a little kid. So, having a little sister or a brother became a bit difficult. At least, that’s how it seemed at that time to my innocent little mind – no dad, no brothers or sisters. Simple childish logic.

(Brad laughs)

(audience laughs)

For a long time, I used to keep wondering why my dad left. My mother never gave me the answers. Of course, she wasn’t around much for me to ask the questions, but that’s ok. I was fine, really. Except a few unanswered questions. But hey, who doesn’t have unanswered questions as children, right?

Now, the name, Brad Ramanujam

(audience laughs)

Yeah I know, I find the damned name funny too. Now, this name, Brad Ramanujam. Brad was the name my mother chose. Ramanujam was my dad, and for some reason she chose that name as well. Why, Mom? You’d think a name like Ramanujam, combined with the name Brad, would give me some leverage in high-school?

So, I got bullied a lot. A lot! For the first few years, I never got home when my hair wasn’t soppy – that’s how much I got bullied. It kinda grows on you, over time, though.

I got bullied because of my name a lot, and every time my head would be dunked into a toilet – that’s how I used to get the soppy hair every day, if you guys are keeping up –

(audience laughs)

I used to curse that sonofabitch whose name I had to keep. Ramanujam! Try cursing with your head bobbing inside the toilet. It’s fucking hard!

(audience laughs)

Hell, the guy wasn’t even around, fuck him! I wanted to drop the name, but high-school names stick on with you for a long time. A really long time. I was Ramanujam till the end of my school days. Thankfully, I grew up a bit, and the bullies couldn’t pick me up that easily, so the head-down-the-toilet thing stopped.

My mom used to do a lot of drugs. Marijuana, cocaine, heroin, shit like that. You know the drugs I’m talking about, oh you know I’m sure – even the smarmy bastards in their business suits. You’re looking at me right now as though you’re sorry, but I know what you’re thinking – if I have any with me right now or not!

(audience laughs)

Or, maybe if I’m still in touch with my mom anymore.

(audience laughs)

Or if I have my mom’s dealer’s contact number!

(audience laughs)

If you have any such questions… meet me after the show and we’ll talk! Now…

(audience laughs)

Now, moving on. So, my name’s Brad Ramanujam. I used to get bullied in high school. My mom did a lot of drugs. And I was a bastard son. Oh shit… wait, I didn’t tell you that one till now, did I?

(audience laughs nervously)

Damn, I’m sorry… I’m all nervous, man, standing out here on the stage. Bright fucking lights in my face, my hands are shaking like crazy. Anyway, so I was a bastard son. Took me a few years to figure that one out. No wonder my dad didn’t stick around, eh? He just probably took one look at my mom and went, “Hey, my stuff isn’t inside me anymore. It’s your stuff now, you deal with it!”

(audience laughs)

So, yeah, he left. As if there was any chance of him sticking around. And then, mom couldn’t go around doing her job anymore – I mean, who’d want to fuck a pregnant whore now, right? Oh shit… I did it again!

(titters from the audience)

Damn, I’m so nervous. (pointing to the lights) could you turn down the lights a bit, man? Or a little bit away from me? It’s freaking the fuck out me right now! (the lights dim just a little bit) Yeah, that’ll do. Thanks.

So yeah, my mom’s a whore. Well, was, actually. I mean, she’s not a whore still. I mean, she could be, I just don’t know about it. I mean… I really shouldn’t be thinking along those lines!

My dad probably was a shitty customer that she had, but apparently she knew who he was and everything. Anyway, so there I was, swimming around in my mom’s belly waiting to be born…

(Brad smiles) (audience laughs softly)

Aah, I grew up in a shitty environment. You guys know that by now, right? Yeah…

(audience laughs a little louder)

And I was quite a shitty kid too, once I’d grown up a bit. I mean, I’d ride a bike all day long, and I kept long hair and everything, and I’d fuck a whore myself. That’s how I fell in love for the first time. I was 16, she was 18. I loved her tits, she loved my allowance. It was perfect!

(audience laughs)

Yeah. I’ve been in love a few times after that too – wait a minute, you thought I was still with the hooker, didn’t you?

(audience laughs)

You sick fucks… I’m not that messed up anymore, man! Talk about being judgmental… geez!

(audience laughs)

(speaking emphatically) I’ve fallen in love a few times after that little adventure of mine! At least wait till you know the whole story before you start judging me!

(audience laughs)

I’ve been in love with two more girls. The second girl I loved was Maria. I got her pregnant, and I ran away. I think I get that from my dad…

(audience laughs)

… the Ramanujam side of me!

(audience laughs)

My next girlfriend was called – oh geez, I keep forgetting her name.

(audience laughs)

Sarah! No, wait… Linda. No, Sarah. Who the fuck is Linda, then?

(audience laughs)

Sarah, yeah. Sarah was the next love of my life. She was a lesbian.

(audience is quiet)

I will repeat that.

(audience laughs)

I was in love with Sarah, who was a lesbian. The most fucked up part is that we both knew it. We dated for a month or so. Still confused?

(audience laughs)

Don’t worry, so am I. It’s been a few years, but I’m confused even now.

Here’s what happened. Sarah was a lesbian, but she liked fucking guys when she was high.

(audience laughs)

The funny bit is, we both knew about that fact!

(audience laughs)

And we dated!

(audience laughs)

For a fucking month!

(audience laughs)

And we fucked every night!

(audience laughs)

Well, you know… not every night, I mean… there were a few days in the middle, when things were a little messy, down there, you know.

(audience laughs)

And, I mean, I couldn’t get myself to do it for those few days… blood everywhere… gah!

(audience laughs)

But the other nights, man… we banged like bunnies! We fucked every chance we got! And I didn’t even think about it at that time.

(audience laughs)

Was she high during the whole time? The entire fucking month?

(audience laughs)

That’s some extra potent shit she must have been taking! I gotta get the name of that…

(audience laughs)

By the way, if anyone sitting here finds the effect anywhere familiar, talk to me after the show… I’d like to…

(audience laughs)

I’d like to meet you. And know you. Maybe become friends in future…?

(audience laughs)

So, yeah. I’ve had a pretty shitty life, growing up in a shitty environment and everything. But the thing that gets to me is that even now, everyone – everyone – judges me before they know me. You’re doing that as well, right now… probably.

(audience laughs)

Nod, you motherfuckers! Even if you don’t mean it, just say yes! Fucking humour me, will you?

(audience laughs, and then nods)

Thank you! So, you see. Everyone judges me…

(audience laughs)

… when they hear about my childhood, and my dad, and my mom, and the whore and the lesbian girlfriend. But I’m not entirely like that. And it hurts that people judge me like this. Like, the other day, my friend Dan Fedoseev…

(a few titters from the audience)

Hey, that’s not a funny name! His dad’s still around, you fuckers! Don’t laugh at my best friend!

(audience laughs)

My friend Dan Fff – nevermind, you’ll just laugh again! Dan…!

(audience laughs)

Dan came over to my place. We grew up in the same neighbourhood but he’d moved a while back. Now, he was my best friend, and he knew about my fucked up life. He knew everything! We were meeting after some five years or so – give or take a few… shit, I’m bad at math!

(audience laughs)

And Dan came over to my place with a bag full of doobies, all rolled out and everything.

And he offered me one, just assuming that I like smoking up! (Brad shuts up)

(expectant audience begins to laugh)

I know! That fucker just assumed that I was a pothead!

(audience laughs)

This motherfucker grew up with me, knew me inside out. And, he thought I was a fucking pothead! So…

(audience laughs)

So, I sat him down, and I helped him fire up the joint. And then, I told him, as nicely as I could… ‘Fuck you, Dan! Just ‘coz I had a nasty childhood and a shitty life, doesn’t mean I’m a pothead! I don’t do drugs, man. I just sell them!’

(audience laughs)

Thank you, all. You’ve been great tonight…

(curtains)

~

Duck-Duck-Treasure

It had been years since I had seen my sister. It had been years since I had played ‘Treasure Hunt’ with her. So, her excitement, as we chased the ‘treasure that she had stumbled upon in the old market’ was quite understandable. To be honest, it was endearing – I had missed my little sister a lot, and I hadn’t even realised it all this while.

“Mother used to bring me here when I was a little girl; I had forgotten all about it,” she said as she led me down the narrow pathways. “It’s funny how you forget a lot about the things that used to be your whole world once upon a time – our village, our home, our family. As kids, that was our whole universe. Now that we’ve grown up, we hardly even think about it anymore.”

A strangely familiar smell was present all around us, right from the time that we had entered the narrow alleys of the market. I couldn’t quite place what it reminded me of, but I vaguely remembered it to be about something from our childhood. All around us, there were small shops frying things or baking things or grinding spices to be used in the tiny kitchens. The smoke from the many cooking stoves hung around heavily above us, mixed with the wondrous aromas of the dishes being prepared to cater to the hungry mouths that would come to the market soon.

“I would surely come here often, now that I know about this place – rather, now that I remember this place once more. After all, this place is just a stone’s throw away from where I live. Look, there,” she cried suddenly, grasping my arm. “You can see our balcony from here. You see?”

I nodded, and we shuffled along once more. There were kids playing amidst the tomatoes being sliced and the potatoes being fried. We pushed past them, resisting the urge to stop and join in their games. An old lady kept looking fondly at the children as they chased each other around a pile of shelled pea pods. She reminded me of someone, but I had trouble placing who she looked like.

“Mother used to get all her spices, vegetables and fish from this market,” said my sister as she led me down past the children. “And the ducks for special occasions.” There was a smile on her face, one that had been triggered by the fond memories of duck cuisine at home, only on days that were deemed fit to be called ‘special occasions.’ I had never been that close with our mother – the only person I felt attached to in the family was my little sister. The thing I missed the most about my family was my mother’s cooking. It was the only thing I remembered now, and as the days went by, I forgot to remember that about home as well.

As the evening crept on, we could feel the crowds swelling. Small plastic tables and chairs were set hastily in shops all around us, and people would sit at one of the shops to snack on the many delicacies that surrounded us on all sides. We didn’t stop, however, in spite of the many mouth-watering treats that were being laid out in front of us on the many tables. My sister kept going forward, tugging me along, with the ever-present promise that the ‘treasure’ we were ‘hunting’ for was “just ahead of us.” We passed stalls with fried chicken and prawns, past shops selling spicy noodles, past woks of steaming soup of different varieties, but we stopped to sample none of these. She led me on and on, till we almost reached the end of the market, and a small establishment with fried ducks hanging outside. This is where she stopped and sat down, the smile still firm and strong on her face.

“Why are we here?” I asked her softly, trying to stay out of earshot from the cooks who were working nearby. I didn’t want to sound rude, but I found that I was even more confused now than I had been while walking down to this restaurant.

“You’ll know in a little while. I’ve ordered the duck noodle soup, I think you’ll like it when you have it. Mother used to get me here when I was little, but we never had a chance to stop. It was always too expensive for us, and that’s why she made the ducks for us on special occasions – so that we, too, could taste the expensive taste of this place.”

There wasn’t anything particularly expensive about the setting – it was quite a dingy shop, and it was hard to figure out the true colours of the plastic seats on which we were sitting, so covered with grime they were. But I could understand what my sister meant when she said it. I had lived through the same tough times that my sister had seen.

All the walking had made me hungry, so when the soup finally came out, I couldn’t wait for common courtesies. The moment the bowl was set in front of us, I made a lunge for it, but my sister stopped me before I could taste any.

“Not like this! You’ll ruin the effect,” she said. “Here, take this spoon and taste it. Taste, don’t gulp it down!” I took the loaded spoon from her and sipped the piping hot soup from it. “Don’t swallow it yet. Close your eyes, and let the soup stay in your mouth for a while. Taste it. Really taste it. Feel the butter and the salt and the pepper, the noodles and the tender duck. Taste the spices, feel it sting your tongue. Chew the meat, feel its texture between your teeth. Savour it, and you’ll know why it’s a treasure worth trudging all this way down here. You feel it?”

My eyes were watering, from the heat and the spices and the pepper. But there was something else as well. Something which made it special, and suddenly it all made sense – my sister’s excitement, the reason why she dragged me down the market where she used to come many years ago, the familiar smell of the market, the kids playing along on the street while the old lady looked on affectionately, and the soup – it all reminded me of home. It reminded me of my childhood. It reminded me of our mother.

“It tastes just like the way she used to cook it, doesn’t it?” asked my sister; but I was too choked up to answer her.

~

Inspired from Magpie Tales.

Mr. Ragpicker

His day had begun quite a while back, so that when his body started to feel the need for a little bit of rest, the early morning October mist still hung in the air. The aroma of the typical spiced tea – rich and creamy and strong, with the hint of ginger and cardamom infused in it – buzzed around the roadside tea stall. Judging by his composure, I figured that this was all part of his regular routine. Picking up crumpled bottled cola bottles thrown carelessly from the flashy cars, early in the morning, and when the time came, a nice steaming miniature cup of tea from the tea-stall. Life, even at its harshest of times, seemed to have acquired a sense of rhythm to it; especially for him.

It was at the tea stall that I met him, and when I looked into his face, found that there was something amiss. The eyes didn’t seem to fit those of a rag-picker. The eyes were intelligent, and looked like they were still looking for a way to fulfil some half-forgotten dream from a long time ago. Or, maybe I was looking too much into them – maybe he was just yearning for his morning cup of tea. Still, there was only one way to find out; by talking to him. I didn’t know how to start a conversation with him, but there was no other choice. So I started talking to him in the lamest way possible.

“Nice weather, isn’t it?” I said to him when he sat down with the tiny cup next to me.

Now, the weather might have been cool, and it might have been nice, but it was nowhere near worthy of a comment – especially between two strangers. The look on his face clearly suggested that he was torn between being amused and confused, and so he made a compromise and gave me a confused smile before putting the cup of tea back to his lips. I was embarrassed myself, so gave him a sheepish smile too before sipping on my tea.

“Yes, it is nice,” he said a moment later. “It always is around this time of the year. October mornings are wonderful in Delhi.”

“You’re from Delhi?” I asked.

“No, but I’ve lived here for a long time. I’m originally from UP, near Meerut. Not far from here, but it’s not Delhi is it?” he asked. I grinned, and he continued, “I grew up there, in Meerut. I came here in my youth, after I’d finished with my studies. I was an engineering student, not too bad with grades and all. Once that was done, I came to Delhi looking for a job.”

“Where did you work in Delhi?”

“I worked at a number of places – engineering companies, mostly. But none of those stints lasted long. I wasn’t really happy about life, not even content. Life was just – moving on.” He drained the last of his tea from the cup, and I expected that he would walk away right after that. But he stayed put, while I wondered a lot about him. At first glance, I might have dismissed this old, fragile man. Now, however, I found it hard to not be interested in him – and although a part of me hated it, I was downright curious to know more about him.

I didn’t want to sound rude, though, so I didn’t ask him anything outright. I just waited for him to feel comfortable and open up (I think I might be too much of an optimist sometimes), while he sat there with his black bag with the discarded trash of the day slung on his shoulders. Some of my curiosity must have been reflected on my face, however, because he asked in a little while, “Why should I tell you more?”

“Because you can trust me,” I said on impulse.

He looked slightly taken aback by my answer, but then asked me, a little more sternly this time, “Why should I trust you?”

“Because I’m a stranger,” I said.

He looked strangely at me, and suddenly the discomfort melted away from his face. He laughed – he had quite a heavy, booming laugh for a man of his stature – and for some reason (and even though I didn’t expect it at all), he bought what I said.

I bought another round of tea for the both of us, and sat down for his story.

“So, like I was telling you, I was working at various engineering companies in and around the city. I never really stuck to one job for long – it got monotonous for me. In fact, this was one of the main reasons why I joined up for the railways; so that I could travel. But what I really wanted to do, of course, was get into the air force or the navy. I know I didn’t qualify on medical grounds, but it’s a dream that I nurtured for a long time. Life does that to you sometimes. That’s why I always tell everyone I talk to (which isn’t much, mind you) to do whatever it is that they want to while they still can.

“But, I digress. Where was I? Oh, yes; the engineering companies. The work was tedious, repetitious and boring, and I quickly got bored from it. I moved from company to company in quick succession. Every move came with a hike, and a promotion, so before I knew it I was quite well off. I moved to a bigger house since I was able to afford one. I bought a car, and when I had acquired all these things, I found that I still wasn’t satisfied with life. My parents were trying hard to get me to settle down (a colloquial way of saying that it was time for me to get married), and that’s when I left the endless line of engineering companies and joined the railways. I got married, we were settled in Delhi, but the constant travelling kept me away from home when I really wanted to. I was content with life, but the monotony kept on; I still wasn’t happy. In addition, my wife constantly complained about our comparatively lower income than my friends and neighbours, most of who were still working at the places I had left – the big private firms. She pressurised me, finally, to give up the railway job and get back to my old job that paid much more. I tried to get away from that, but I couldn’t. I was back where I had started; to the same old hollow lifestyle, comparing sizes of houses and lengths of cars as if it all meant something. But now, at least my wife had stopped complaining so much, and even the new line of jobs kept me busy most of the time. I hardly stayed at home.”

“What about kids?” I asked.

“There was never time, to be honest. Like I said, I was hardly ever home, and I didn’t want to raise kids in that environment when I couldn’t be around to watch them grow up. Now, when I think about it, I feel it was selfish of me. Back then, though, not having children felt like the right thing to do.

“I started reading a lot more than I did previously, but there was something that was always nagging in the back of my head. In all aspects of life, I was content but never happy. I had a good family life – a good wife, great relations with all of my extended family. I had a decent job, one that paid all the bills for us. I tried a lot of ways to get back the happiness that I used to feel during my college days – books, music, films. I read more than ever during that time of my life, and watched more films than ever. I revived my interest in music once more; I used to play guitar in the college band, and although we knew we weren’t any good, we were passionate about music. I started frequenting small rock shows, and would be the only guy in formal attire – complete with tie – amidst the crowd of youngsters in their black t-shirts, head-banging with them while they looked a little alarmed with my exuberance. I stopped going soon after though – there are just so many strange stares that you can take. But books stayed on with me, and so did the music, confined in my own little room, my private little world.

“And in spite of it all, I still wasn’t happy the way others seemed to be. Life seemed so much simpler for them; my neighbours would get their happiness from buying a pair of ugly, branded shoes, while I felt nothing from the same experience. Even my wife seemed happy after buying things like that, something that I never understood. I envied her for it too – for having that simplistic bent of mind, to be happy with nothing more than a piece of leather shaped into a shoe.

“I started drinking the way my wife had started shopping. The louder she got, the more I had to drink to dull her voice in my head. Her friends, our neighbours, they became even louder, and for a while it seemed as though it was a contest of who was the loudest of them all. The glitterier my world became, the more I had to drown myself in alcohol to survive it. There had to come a time, however, when no amount of alcohol would have been sufficient, and when that time came, my wife filed for divorce. She hired a lawyer (with my own money) and proved that I was an alcoholic in court. The lawyer sucked out a major chunk of the money we had, and whatever was left, my wife took that. The house, the fancy cars (note that that’s plural; and I hadn’t even wanted one car to begin with!), and the money that was left after the lengthy divorce trial – it all went to her. I was left a tiny sliver to sustain myself, and the court justified it by saying that I had a job. What the court didn’t realise was that after I was proven to be an alcoholic, the company wasn’t too keen to see me around either. I was put on a sabbatical (without pay, of course), and eventually I was fired. By this time, I had moved twice to progressively smaller homes, and had rid myself of all the things that had tainted me since I had ‘settled down’. I was finally a free man.

“I travelled a lot, mostly on foot, since I couldn’t afford luxurious means of travel anymore. What I found, however, was that I was happier doing that than travelling in air-tight cars where you can’t even smell the air of a new village you pass through. I stopped often, and met a whole lot of people. I did small odd jobs – repairing phones, radios, TVs etc. at that time, to sustain myself, and every time I had enough money to get around again, I’d move on. I started writing as well, and carried at least one book with me at all times. It’s a good thing that you can still barter books, or buy them second hand for cheap, if you know how to find the right places. I was finally happy with my life.

“I don’t linger on anywhere for long – especially in the big cities. I’m not stopping here, I’m just passing through here. Truth is, nobody wants me to fix their radios or their phones in big cities like this; they would rather take them to the bigger shops and pay good money to get minor fixes to those things. Not that I mind though – it just gives me an excuse to get out of the bigger cities sooner.”

“So, you’re not a full time rag-picker?” I asked him before I could stop myself.

“No, no,” he said, laughing. “I’m not a full time rag picker. I don’t stay here often; I’m just passing through the city. The only reason I stopped was because October is my favourite time in Delhi, but that’s not reason enough to keep me here.”

“You said you write a lot now. What do you write about?”

“People I meet, mostly; their stories.”

“I do that too, from time to time. Do you mind if, someday, I write something about you?”

“Why should I mind? I don’t even know where I would be when you’ve written that. Chances are that I won’t even get to read it! Go ahead, write whatever you want about me,” he said, the smile still not leaving his face.

“How do you manage to write so much if you don’t stay put at one place for long?” I asked. I was wondering where he kept his written work, but he misunderstood the question.

“Pens and notebooks aren’t hard to come by these days. They’re not so expensive either – so I can afford to buy them when I have to.”

I tried to clarify the question. “And where do you keep the notebooks once they’re full? If you write a lot, you must have a whole lot of notebooks filled by now.”

“I generally barter them for books to read. I give them away to the small, second hand book-sellers, and they generally lower the book prices for that. The only thing I ask them, however, is that once they’re done with the stories, they pass them on as well – barter them again in exchange of books. That way, maybe, my stories keep going round and round. Who knows, if you haunt dusty book stores often, you might find one of my notebooks there as well!”

“Why don’t you get your stories published? You would find a much bigger audience that way, and more people would be able to read your stories.”

“I don’t think I would be able to handle the fame or success, if any of that comes my way. Also, I would have to use a pen-name for that purpose, and I’m bad at coming up with names of characters.” He finished the last gulp of his tea, crumpled up the plastic cup and threw it in the trash bin.

“I know what you mean,” I said. “I have trouble coming up with names for my characters as well.”

His story finished, he got up to leave and get back to his day of rag-picking. Break time was over, and like all of us, his face suggested that he wished it had lingered on for a little while longer as well. Just as he was leaving, I realised something and called him back.

“Wait, you didn’t tell me your name.”

He smiled his smile, the one that I had become so used to in that little span of time, and said, “If I told you that, we wouldn’t be strangers anymore.”

~