Pangs of Separation - Part 3

He stepped outside the door and looked on either side of the corridor, half expecting to see her, maybe in conversation with a neighbor or maybe coming back from some errand that she had suddenly remembered. The corridor was deserted, children having gone to school by now and the adults getting ready to start their treks to their workplace. There was a sound of someone sliding the latch on a door and his heart leapt up as if this were the door from which she would emerge. A door opened half way down the corridor and an old lady with her walker and the girl attendant walked out, most likely on her daily walking routine. They passed him on their way to elevator, the lady staring at him openly and not bothering to look away when he stared back.

He came back into the house, closing the door behind him. And then, as he sat down, he was struck by a thought that the locked door might make her think that he had left. So he went back and opened the door, leaving it ajar. He sat down on the sofa, his thoughts wandering to the conversation that they had been having the previous night, her sitting on his lap and brushing away his hair from his forehead as she had grown used to doing. They had talked about what she would do over the next few days, setting up the place, how she would like to do it and how she wanted him to help. He had offered to take the next few days off when he realized that she had been pulling his leg, her whole body shaking with suppressed laughter at his gullibility. He had decided to take revenge then and …

The door bell rang loudly, breaking his reverie. He almost jumped out of the sofa and ran to the door, not realizing in his haste that she wouldn't be ringing the bell on an open door. The old lady in her walker stood outside, the girl attendant in tow. She looked impatient, as if he was somehow late in coming to the door, even though he had run to open it. He said, “Hello, can I help you?” and the lady replied, “Tell your wife that I have got her the Tulsi plant.” It was then that he noticed that the girl was holding a small pot containing a Tulsi sapling. A wave of relief washed over him. Finally, someone had met her and would now know where she was! He just stood there letting his relief wash over him when the old lady dashed his hopes to the ground by saying, “So, call her out, will you? I haven’t got all day.” He automatically muttered something about giving it to her and took the pot from the girl. The old lady turned to go and he suddenly asked her, “Where did you meet my wife?” She turned back and stated as if it was the most obvious thing, “Why, on the roof terrace of course!”

He ran back into the house, leaving the old lady standing there, her jaw dropping at his reaction. He ran outside to the terrace and then realizing that he was carrying the pot, he kept it at the bottom of the stairs that led up to the roof. He clambered up the iron ladder, taking two rungs at a time, his eagerness almost giving him wings. As he raced up the stairs, he realized that he had missed her so much the past couple of hours, he didn't actually want to go to office or anywhere else that day. He made up his mind to call in sick and spend the day with her. As his head cleared the roof, he saw a couple of ladies standing some distance off, talking. He could instinctively see that she was not among them. He almost ran towards them and then realized that he would look foolish running up to them to ask about his wife. So, he slowed down to a walk and tried to appear as cautious as he could, his heart racing inside at a pace that he was sure would show on his face. Taking a couple of deep breaths, he approached them, forcing a smile on his face that completely belied his anxiety.

One of the ladies saw him coming and muttered something to the other, both ladies now snickering, an obvious reference to him in some way. His resolve almost quaked away into nothingness, the only thing still seeming to make him walk towards them was his desire to know if they had met his wife. He stopped short some distance away from the ladies who were openly enjoying his discomfiture and asked them if they had met his wife. First he drew a teasing response about having brought in a new wife and then when the ladies realized that he wasn't biting, they responded that they had bumped into his wife in the morning, drinking her coffee on the roof. She had struck up a conversation with them about the place and nearby shopping haunts, the vegetable seller. Then, the old lady from the same floor had come out onto her terrace and had called out to her. They had been talking for a while and then his wife had gone back down to the house. All this seemed to have happened about an hour ago.

Muttering a hurried thank you, he went back down the ladder. He was none the wiser for this episode but he at least knew that she had met three people all in the space of the last hour or hour and a half. Where could she have gone, the question resounded in his head and he almost missed his footing on the ladder. Luckily he was on the last but one rung and he landed sharply on one foot, twisting it a little and falling awkwardly down. Cursing, he picked himself up and tried to walk, feeling a sharp twinge when his foot landed. He hop-walked it back indoors and fell heavily on the sofa. Pulling up his pajama bottoms, he saw that the ladder had torn a strip of skin from his ankle and it had now started to bleed. He got up to wash the wound and disinfect it. In the bathroom, he found the Dettol in the cabinet but nothing he could actually use to swab the wound. His eyes fell on his favorite green and white checked shirt that he had been wearing yesterday, the one that she hated and kept telling him to throw away. She said it made him look older and a little outdated. With a wry smile, he picked it up and blotted the antiseptic with it and proceeded to clean up the scrape.

The job done, he dumped the shirt back into the wash tub and then shaking his head, finally decided to consign it to the dustbin. But that couldn't happen without a celebration now could it? So he picked it up and carried it through to the living room where he draped it like a flag of surrender on one arm of the sofa. He sank back onto the sofa, laying his head back and closing his eyes, wishing that this was just a bad dream and that he would wake up from it any moment now. Unwittingly, his mind flowed back to the previous evening and how they spent it. Lying next to her, watching her eyes look back at him from behind the curtain of her hair, mischievously darting about, crinkling with laughter that she was trying to suppress, the dimples in her cheeks deepening and inviting. The whispered words, disappearing into long stretches of silence and then resurfacing as if they did not want to lose the night to Morpheus. Her fingers intertwined in his, never for a moment letting go, cherishing their togetherness. The thoughts and words said aloud again and again, marking the start of their life together, alone by themselves.

At that thought, he woke, alone by himself, in the harsh light of reality. A sudden feeling of loss swept through him inexplicably. He almost groaned out aloud at the coldness of it. Feeling a shiver like someone had just walked over his grave, he hugged himself, wishing she was there to envelope him in her warmth. He remembered feeling like this when she had left for a week on a trip abroad to visit one of her cousins. She had not activated the international roaming on her phone and so could not call or message. Three days into her visit, he was badly sick, a case of shivers and fever that foxed the doctor at the nearby clinic. The next day an email came from her and immediately he recovered. He mailed back asking her for a number at which he could call her. And the very next night, spent three hours nearly on the phone with her. He was right as rain the next morning, even though he hadn't slept. And when the telephone bill for that month came, he fell off his chair on seeing an amount that was ten times his normal bill. But then, that conversation had been worth it. Talking to her had brought his temporarily lopsided life upright again.

After that, he would call, no matter how much money it cost and they spent hours talking, telling each other about the things that happened around them, to them, their dreams, their disappointments. Each day had been incomplete without them first talking their hearts out. They could talk for hours or so it seemed. He remembered watching her speak about the police atrocities in the aftermath of the Delhi rape incident, her eyes flashing and voice quivering with indignation. He also remembered her eyes, soft and moist when she recounted the incident of her school friend who had suffered an accident. She always did get caught up in her emotions. Suddenly she would stop, to find him watching her intently, drinking in her expressions, her words and would smile sheepishly and say, “I've been going on and on about it, haven’t I?” And he would always deny it, the sheer pleasure of listening to her and watching her, sometimes overwhelming him with the sheer intensity of it.

Suddenly, the thought struck him that his entire life in the past few months had been defined by her. Each moment, each memory, framed with her in it. In fact, he realized that he could not recall any specific thing that she wasn't a part of. Even the office party that had happened had been made more special by her calling him in the middle of it and him screaming responses to her to be heard over the noise. It seemed like his life had now become a series of memories that had been stitched together by her, each one sharply etched in his brain. The coldness that surrounded him seemed to get worse. He shivered, despite the sunny morning all around him. How he wished he could hold her in his arms again, letting her warmth drive away his chill, tell her how much he had missed her and that she should never ever go away like this again without telling him where she was going.  His longing was like a physical pain, a blow to the gut that made him double up as he sat, hugging himself.

Suddenly, out of the blue, like the child that can hear his mother’s voice amongst a babble and turn unerringly, he heard her laugh, that lilting, floating laugh that always brought a smile to his face. It seemed to be coming from somewhere down below, the sound floating in through the balcony door. He stood up, almost thinking it was his imagination playing tricks on him. But no, her voice followed next, laughingly asking a question or so it seemed. His feet moved towards the balcony, his mind barely registering the action. He quickened his pace and reached the balcony, stopping at the railing. He could see her, or someone that looked incredibly like her and also sounded amazingly like her. She was talking to a heavy set old man who was sitting on a scooter and she was holding a bag of what appeared to be groceries. She looked up suddenly, as if sensing his eyes on him and smiled. That smile was enough to drive away all his worries and anxiety. She shouted up, as usual, uncaring about protocol and public posturing, “Mamaji” And he recalled that she had mentioned something about a mama in this town who had been estranged from the family. And the pieces of the puzzle fell into place and the clouds finally cleared up, the worms went into their wormholes and the sun came out again. He raised his hand and waved, his heart drumming a crazy three step tango, which he was sure, could be heard all the way down. Mamaji waved back and then waved goodbye as he started off on his scooter. She turned back, her step quickening at the thought of being with him again. The grocery bag that was precariously loaded to the brim suddenly seemed to give up on itself and decided to split open. And she reached out for the falling groceries mid step.

From his balcony high up, he saw her missing her step and going down on her knees. He reached out involuntarily, as if to support her and stop her fall. And suddenly found his feet slipping out from underneath him. He had leaned out too far across the railing and now he found himself tipping over. It seemed an eternity while he slowly toppled over the railing, screaming out her name and hearing her screaming out his. It seemed a long way down and he could see the sun shining out brightly from behind one of the buildings. He turned to look down at her and saw her stricken face, blanched white and wanted to tell her not to worry. It would be alright now that he had found her, they would be together and he would tell her how she had become the seamstress of his memories.

He was rushed to the hospital, bleeding profusely. The doctors took him into the OT immediately and came out seven hours later declaring that he seemed to be OK except for the multiple fractures of his hands, legs and shoulder. There was only a small note about his possible concussion and the fact that they had to keep him under observation. She was completely distraught and in the arms of her parents and his, not willing to listen to anyone or anything. The doctors’ words gave her the first signs of hope.

It was thus that he woke up, bandaged hand and foot, his body a mass of bruises and one continuous channel of pain that seemed to build up and run down in cycles. He saw all the equipment around and the place and realized he was in a hospital. He saw his parents there at the bedside, their faces tear lined and weary, as if life had shaken the will out of them. He wanted to raise his hand to wipe their tears away, to tell them that he was OK or will be OK soon. His mother held his hand, a fierce grip that seemed to give strength to him and solace to her, her fingers almost crushing his in relief. His father seemed to have grown a lot older than he had last seen him, head bent as if with the load of the burden that life had placed on him. He wanted to hug both of them, telling them it was alright, he was there and that everything would be OK now.

Then another set of old people came into view, their kindly faces as tear lined as his parents. They were younger than his parents but had the same time worn quality about them. He couldn't quite place them. His parents seemed to be telling something to them and they seemed to be telling his parents that he would be OK. He guessed that they must be parents of someone else like him.

His parents then left his bedside and a young lady came in. At first he thought she was the doctor. But then, her face and her voice betrayed her. She seemed somehow related to him though he could not place his finger on how. She was really pretty even in her distraught condition. He noticed her eyes, large and expressive and the dimple spots that creased her cheeks. He had a feeling that this was a woman who could light up with her laughter. Her voice sounded husky, a strange quality about it, like something he could keep listening to. He racked his brains for some idea of who she was and why she was sobbing uncontrollably at his bedside. She lay her head down on the bed beside his hand and he almost reached out to lay his hand on her head, the crow black hair hiding her face completely from view. And then, not realizing why he felt that way, he dropped his hand back, choosing to remain silent.

After a length of time, the nurse came in announcing that visiting hours were over and she stood up and walked away, dropping a kiss on his forehead, her lips warm and moist, wetted with tears. As she walked away, he lifted his hand up, wincing at the sudden intense wave of pain at that and touched the spot where her lips had been. The warmth was familiar and yet distant. As she had leaned over him, he had smelt a curiously musky smell that he was sure had come out of a high priced bottle off a department store shelf. And yet in spite of this, he could not place her. It was almost as if he were throwing each of these hints at a blank white wall that was absorbing them and giving nothing in return. That curious sense of knowing and yet not knowing, something at the edge of his memory, almost peeking from around the edge of that white blank wall but quickly retreating as soon as he turned to catch sight of it.

At the door, she turned back and smiled at him, a smile that lit up her eyes and creased her dimples just as he had somehow known it would. And her lips curved up in a smile as she mouthed “I love you” and then the door slid closed behind her. Seeing her go, he felt a pang, a sense of loss that he simply could not explain. The pang seemed to break open something in his head, almost like a crack in the cover of ice that seemed to hide a whole lot of secrets in the lake underneath it. He wished for someone who could help him completely break down this layer of ice and uncover the secrets that lay beneath. It was only a momentary lapse, for, seconds later, the ice had completely closed up and the lake lay silent and dark beneath. 

Pangs of Separation - Part 2

While the worm of unease made its way through the dark caverns of his brain, his strong rational impulse strove to assert itself, like a sapling that rights itself after being bent. He shook his head trying to rid himself of the senseless thoughts that threatened to pull him into a panic. Of course, nothing could go wrong. They were there in his apartment, the new one that he had moved into a month ago, coming up in a newly developing suburb of the city which was yet to become a landscape dotted with concrete monuments dedicated to progress, standing in worship of the city’s growing need of space. He had come to the city a month ago when he had got the new job that seemed to be the answer to everything that he had been searching for. And it had happened just two months after he had met her and he had joked saying that finding her was the key that had unlocked this door as well. And he remembered the doubt in her voice even as it had reassured; the flicker in her eyes as she had showed her support of his decision.

That had been a stormy evening indeed as he had planned it as a surprise announcement and was surprised by the second thoughts she had. And while he sought to convince her about the decision and that it was exactly what he had been looking for, that little bird at the back of his mind tweeted that her instinct for these things was very strong and that he should listen to it. He brushed off the thought and went ahead cheerfully to make her feel alright with the decision. They had then fought about it as well, their first fight of that intensity. Previously, they had only had minor arguments and then she would use her special magic on him to make him understand, capitulating to conquer, until he actually thought he had made the decision in favor of her suggestion.

But this time, the fight had erupted over his wanting to take her out for a drive and her refusing saying that she had to go early for work the next day. It had escalated into something that was bordering on vicious for some stupid reason that neither of them could remember. He remembered almost walking away and then cursing himself and turning back, only to find her in tears. He had run back, hugged her in desperation murmuring apologies that neither of them understood and making promises of never hurting her, clinging to her for life itself. Neither of them referred back to that evening anytime thereafter, choosing to simply shut it off from memory. The fact that he remembered the incident at this instance was itself disturbing, making the worm in his mind larger and stronger as it whispered its way through the caverns, rustling as it snaked through.

He walked out into the hall, turning slightly sharply at the door to avoid the extended nail that for some reason had been left jutting out of the door frame. It had already left an imprint on him when he had first moved in, deeply scratching him just above the ankle. He had been resolving to get that nail removed from the frame for some time now except that he had not yet got around to it. It was one of the things that he had shown her yesterday as soon as she had come in, cursing himself for forgetting to repair it and hoping she wouldn't get hurt while promising himself that he would get it pulled out the very next morning. He suddenly stopped and looked back at the nail, afraid of what he would find. The sight of a dark piece of cloth snagged in it alarmed him and he bent quickly to look at it closely. He pulled the cloth from the nail and brought it close. It was a strip from her pajamas, the favorite that she had insisted on unpacking and changing into even though it had been quite late. The dark grey one with the puppy embroidered down the leg. The one that he had just stopped short of laughing at, the first time he had seen it, luckily guessing that it would have been a gross over stepping on his part. He had then realized that this was her treasured possession, something that she had grown to see as a lucky charm, along with her dark pink top. It was what made her sleep well, she said.

He stood there with the strip of fabric in his hand trying to figure out if it had any blood on it or on the nail. Luckily, it appeared that only the fabric had snagged and torn and no injury of any sort had happened. He was sure he would have to pay dearly for even the tear. She would have been so upset. Somehow, thinking of her upset made his stomach flop, almost as if someone had upended it and all the contents had rushed down leaving a completely empty air space on top that threatened to stop his breathing. He had to find her and get to her quickly. Only he knew how to make it alright again. He turned around with a quick step, looking around the living room. The two chairs and bean bag that he had brought in were still there but nothing else. He glanced across at the dining area where he had a couple of chairs and a small table. He half expected to see nothing there as well. But his heart quickened a beat when he saw a cup standing on the table. His stomach flipped back into place again and he nearly ran towards the table.

Reaching it, he stopped short again, for the cup was still half full. In all the time he had known her, nearly six months now, she had never left a drop in her first cup of coffee in the morning. It was very unlike her to simply leave half the cup. A thought struck him and he quickly dipped his forefinger in the coffee, expecting to find it at least slightly hot. It was tepid, down to room temperature, the skin on top having clearly formed across the surface of the coffee. He stood there for a moment wondering what could have happened that would have dragged her away from her dear coffee. It had to be something very important indeed. Then something caught his eye. Something black and shiny was lying on the ground next to the chair where she had sat down to drink her coffee.  He bent down and realized that it was the bead bracelet that she normally wore. She must have worn it after getting out of bed. She alternately used it as a bracelet or a hair band, looping it around her hair when she wanted it tied up.

As he picked it up, the beads slid from his hand in a rush, falling onto the floor and bouncing off in all directions, skittering away from him. Startled at first, he realized that what he held was only a small piece of the band that held the beads. It must have broken and one part had fallen off and was lying there. He knelt down on the floor, down on his hands and knees, picking up the beads one by one, as if this activity would give him something to do rather than think of what had happened, as if these beads were the most important thing in the world at the moment. He finished picking up all that he could find and started to get up, when he banged his head on the dining table under which he had been reaching. His head swum with the impact, his eyes tearing, and he fell down on the floor. He lay there for a few seconds getting his wind back. Finally, he made as if to sit up when he saw a few more beads lying on the floor off near the chairs in the hall. How the hell did they get there, so far away?

He stood up and walked to the spot, expecting to find the other part of the band. However, he saw that the beads were all lying scattered around, as if they had been broken in some force and had gone flying. There was also an impression on the cushion of someone heavy having sat down, or was he seeing things now? It sure did not seem like the kind of impression that he made when he sat down. Or did it? He went and sat down on the other chair and then got up to examine the dent on the cushion. He could not clearly say whether there was a difference. He tried to think of when he had last sat on the cushion. And then remembered that it had been the previous evening when they had come home. After showing her around the house, they had come back to the living room. They each sat on a chair and then finding it too distant and remote, she had simply come over and sat down on his lap. He had held her and then they had talked about the apartment and what she wanted to do in it. He had listened to her, a slight smile on his face, imagining the way she painted the picture, her hands darting all the while, shaping this, pointing to that or describing something else. That must have been the reason for the deep imprint on the cushion! He almost sighed in comic relief, his mind giving up the ghost that he had almost started chasing.

But he still could not explain the broken bead bracelet and how it came to be lying there. He walked across the window sill from where the road outside could be seen. He stood there for a few moments, looking down at the street. People were already up and about now, school children waiting for their bus, the newspaper van dropping off bundles at each apartment and the maids and drivers making their way to their jobs. A few early job goers stood waiting for the bus to come. There was no sign of anything amiss. The world had started its routine that day just like any other. He came away from the window still clutching the beads like he had grabbed onto a lifeline that he would not let go.

He walked toward the kitchen then, some degree of desperation now casting strong ripples across the pool of his rationality. Some part of his mind was hoping she would be there, bent over the kitchen counter, her hair hanging down and covering her face from both sides. It was only after he stepped into the kitchen and found it empty that he realized that he had been holding his breath in anticipation. The cooking range had a bowl of milk that she had boiled. The counter had the cutting board out and a knife there but nothing had been taken out to cut. There was a pan with water in it that had been kept ready for something. It appeared that she had been about to do something when she had simply stopped and walked away. He stood there in thought when a sudden loud thump from the hallway brought him back to earth in a hurry. He turned around and almost ran into the hall, hoping it was her.

He heard a couple of more thumps from outside and realized that it had been the newspaper being dropped off at his door step. He walked towards the door to open it and was shocked to find it open and slightly ajar. The newspaper boy had thrown the sheaf of newspapers and they had hit the door opening it even further. His alarm bells went off now in full force and his face furrowed into a frown as he furiously thought back to the previous night. Had they left the door open after leaving the basket out for the milk? They had spent about half an hour searching for the basket which he had placed somewhere in the kitchen and then for the milk coupons which he had kept so safely that they could not lay their hands on them. Finally, after having located both of them, they had argued about how much milk they needed. His justifications that a half liter would be sufficient since there were only two of them; were met with mischievous denial. Finally, they had put the basket with the one and a half liters of coupons out and he now remembered distinctly that he had locked the door, an elaborate procedure made more so by her holding him from behind as he locked it.

Would she have brought the milk in and left the door unlocked? Though it was highly unlikely, it was the only possibility he could think of at that moment. Or alternatively, she had stepped out of the house and left the door open. This possibility was even more unlikely given the half drunk coffee and the cutting board and knife in the kitchen. And then there was the broken bracelet with the beads lying scattered on the floor. His brain was on fire now, the worms having lit the whole place up. 

Pangs of Separation - Part 1

The sun came up, lazily rising, reluctant to resume normal duty as if after a holiday break. The streaks of sunshine spread tentative fingers across the clear blue sky, lighting up the wisps of clouds like a bulb switched on inside. As the sun slowly but surely walked across the streets of the city, it passed one other reluctant window where the day was not yet welcome. The window was not particularly different from any other, housed as it was in a structure seemingly entirely of glass just as many others that were housed in that part of the city. The window itself allowed a peek into an apartment, very similar to many others in shape and size except that this one looked as if it was in a state of flux, caught between a major turbulence, a sea of change. A set of suitcases lay, some partially opened and some still to be explored, a new set of curtains lay unopened in their covers, closets looked as if they were either being filled or being taken down entirely. It looked like an apartment where people were moving into or was it moving out? And in a corner was the bed on which the man lay. He was still asleep, his deep breathing filling the room, arms akimbo and face turned sideways into the pillow. He was dreaming …

Something about the dream made him frown in his sleep, heavy eyebrows bridging that short gap between them. And then the frown dissolved, just the way the breezy sunshine clears the clouds, and a smile stole across his face. Starting from his lips, the smile spread across his whole face like someone had just taken a spoon and spread it out across his face. His face creased up entirely and made him look years younger than he actually was. Just then a noise from somewhere around intruded into his dream and threatened to wake him up. He resisted, turning his face almost entirely into the pillow, lest his beautiful dream be lost. But the noise was as persistent, forcing its way into his thoughts and blasting out the cobwebs of sleep one by one. Finally, he reluctantly gave up. The eyelids opened once and then shut again, almost as if the reality they saw was no comparison to the dream they had come from and they wished to go back. Another thought then stole into his mind, this thief being the most daring of all, for what it made him do.

The thought stayed as he reached out to the other side of the bed. His arm flailed for the warmth that he knew would be there, seeking and searching. Not finding it, he turned his head and opened his eyes, a quizzical look on his face. The depression in the bed told him that she had been there, the pillow and the mattress shaped with her form. He lifted the pillow that she had lain on and brought it to his face. He could smell her on the pillow now, that unique smell that was only hers, like bright sun shine in the garden on a spring day.  That smell was always hers, a smell that he had first thought came from a bottle but soon grew to realize was her. He could remember her lying facing him, her hair falling across her face, dark as a crow’s wing, partly hiding her eyes, making him want to brush the strands up and away and yet holding back, somehow hesitant to even touch the image for fear that it would disappear. He remembered the way her hair felt, softly tickling his cheek, the errant strands caressing his face as he held her close, enveloped in a cloud of her. And the way it felt as he ran his fingers through it, soft and yet gently gripping, not letting go.

He felt a sudden pang at her not being there then, a murmur that was completely out of place, a blot of black on a snow covered mountain top. Where could she have gone this early? She must have woken up early to make some coffee, he thought. He half sat up in bed, thinking he would sneak up and surprise her. She didn’t like him doing that, he remembered. The last time he had done it, she had gone crazy in fright and almost started trembling. Okay, so he wouldn't creep up on her. He sat up on the bed trying to think of how he would surprise her. Suddenly, he realized that he couldn't hear any noises at all from around the apartment. He stopped and listened carefully, trying to pinpoint where she was and what she was doing, smiling slightly at the thought. After a couple of minutes, he gave up, the silence around strangely unnerving.

A weird feeling descended on him, like a cloud that had suddenly blotted out the sun. He called out her name, once, twice and then with increasing sound until he realized that he was almost screaming for her. And yet, there was no answer. No sign of that familiar face that had grown so quickly dear to him, no sound of that voice that suddenly switched things on for him when he heard it. His eyes grew wide with the realization that she might actually not be there in the apartment at all. For some strange reason, he didn't react well to the thought. Of course, she was a literate and well traveled woman who would be able to find her way around a place. So why was he reacting so strangely, an inner voice asked, in a mocking tone. His practicality seemed to have deserted him as well as all reason that he normally took pride in.

Another inner voice, starting out feeble but growing stronger with his acceptance said that she had only arrived here yesterday and would not know of any places or people around. He thought back to the conversation of the previous night, where they had stayed up most of the night talking about what they would do the next few days and how they would do up the house. In between all that, he could not remember talking about the apartment or surroundings or any details that she would have been able to work with to go anywhere. With that thought, he got out of bed, struggling to figure out what to do, but goaded into some sort of action.

As he stepped forward, he felt a sudden sharp sting on his foot, as if something had pricked him. He looked down and saw that it was the ear ring of hers that they had spent over an hour searching for immediately after they had reached. It had fallen out of her hand as he had grabbed her and held tight as soon as they were home, within the walls that they henceforth would call their own. After her loving hug back, the missing ear ring had resulted in a veritable hunt. It was a sentimental piece of hers gifted by her mother. They had both searched around the room but were not able to locate it even after shaking out the bedspread, stomping around on the carpet and looking on the floor. They had missed the spot on the carpet right next to the inside of the leg of the bed, where it had somehow rolled. He remembered her sadness then and then the child like attempt at smiling as she tried to make him feel better that she would anyway be able to find it with the maid the next morning.

He wanted to call out to her to tell her that he had found it. And wanted to put it on her that very moment and see the joy back in her eyes. The way they would light up when she had got a thing she wanted, and this ear ring was something that she cherished and so the lights would on in full force. He wanted to see the child like joy that surged behind the practical smile that would make her lips curve upwards, stretching till they ended in the dimples that so endearingly adorned her cheeks. On those rare occasions that she would actually succumb completely to his wit, the way her face itself brightened and brightened and the dimples on her cheeks danced in tune with the sparkle in her eyes, her laugh like the peal of bells that rung in the spring merrily.  The very same dimples that he teased her about mercilessly and she turned away in mock irritation, trying to hide the fact that her eyes were dancing still.

He wanted to hear her voice, that husky tone given to high pitched laughter, a combination so incongruous that it would have been funny if it weren't for her. It made her what she was. He could go on for hours listening to her voice, the inflections in it. She was given to not revealing herself too much but he could now read that tinge of disappointment in her voice when he had to go off the phone to a meeting and the reluctant goodbye which made him want to stay on for a few minutes more just to try and bring the joy back into it. He could read that hidden excitement when she had done something and she called him in the middle of everything just to tell him first, and then she actually wanted him to find out without her telling, leading to a series of questions and guesses. He read the joy in her voice when he called her every morning and evening, just to hear his hello. The wistfulness when they talked about the future, like last night. That note brought reality crashing back in, a realization that she was not home.

He kept the ear ring on the side table next to his clock and then changed his mind to keep it in between the pages of the book that she was reading. He wanted her to find it as a surprise, wanted to see her reaction. The book had been something that she had picked up at the airport before she had boarded the flight and when he asked her about it as he met her at the arrivals gate, she had launched into an animated explanation of how it was a wonderful combination of mythology and science and romance. She went on and on until she suddenly realized that he was barely able to contain his laughter and then sheepishly admitted that she had got carried away, the blush sweetly darkening her cheek. And he, the occasional reader of the current affairs and business section, who preferred to get his news on the television and entertainment on screen, finally burst out laughing at how she had been trying to convince him to read a thousand page book on the intricacies of the evolution of science. And then, in her unique way, she told him that she would explain it to him and he knew that she would – in her earnest way, hands moving with and describing every word, punctuating every sentence. He had teased her about her talking with her hands, about how, if he were to hold them still, she would not be able to speak.

The thought made him want to hear her voice. And he turned away from the bedside table to go to the hall. As he was stepping out of the room, he saw that her suitcases had been opened and some things were missing. It seemed like someone had hurriedly opened the suitcases and taken some things out and left the rest. A couple of her dresses lay partially open on the floor next to the suitcase as if whoever had been searching the luggage had pulled out things and dropped them in their haste. He saw her favorite peach dress lying rumpled on the floor and a sudden stab of worry went through him. It was completely unlike her to simply leave things on the floor and in disarray and go away to something else. For the first time that morning, he felt a vague sense of fear creep into his thoughts.

Yesterday's Newspaper Club

Welcome all you brothers and sisters, to our clan of Yesterday’s Newspapers. It is a rare honor bestowed on us, for we carry the tradition of creating history in the name of news. It is our sacred oath to record and carry the tidings of the days gone by. Of course, there are those cousins of ours who are part of this sacred blood oath, that carry tidings of Page 3 and the advertisements for massage parlors. However, we do not discriminate. The bond between us is strong and we will not let the newspaper barons segment and subdivide us. We will stand strong and united, my friends, and we will fill the archives that the generations to come will pore through to learn about history as it was reported.

Why, it was only yesterday as I had stopped to exercise my elbow at the Typesetting Pool, when one of the tabloid cousins was talking about their circulation going down with the increasing prevalence of the internet and television. As if that monstrosity will ever replace the dignified and time honored habit of news reading. What would ever replace the joy of waking up to find the newspaper on the doorstep and opening it to read about the world? And even if there were 24 hour news channels as one of the new fangled magazine cousins was rudely pointing out, I am certain that nothing will ever replace the experience of reading the morning newspaper with one’s cup of tea or coffee.

The magazine cousin was also pointing to the dwindling addition to our numbers, now that digital newspapers and archives have started taking over. I mean, how rude and ignorant can one get? But what would you expect from a magazine or a tabloid anyway. Where is the pedigree, the breeding and the social grace? They are uncouth, that is what they are. A couple of us were so put off that our noses went up in the air and we would have cut them down with a fine choice of scathing criticism. But, better sense prevailed and we let them be, drawing into our own corner, with the high brow of publications. Who wants to really mingle with these yellow types anyway? Would be getting down and dirty now wouldn’t it?

There in our corner, we discussed the history that we had helped create. We remembered the time when newsprint was so expensive and rarely available. That was the time when it used to take more than a day to reach newspapers to various parts of the country; the time when the people could only read news of the day before, at best. That was the time when only one copy of the newspaper would reach a town and the arrival of the newspaper was such a momentous occasion that all of the men folk would gather around the town chowk to hear the most learned of them read the paper out aloud and explain it.  And then the debates that used to ensue from this, they were so splendid that those of us that belonged to that era felt proud of the views and movements that they helped propagate and fuel.

That was the day and age when yesterday’s newspaper was veritably the hero of the times. That was our heyday. The age which we heralded in, where we shaped the future, the way things happened and how people understood what was happening all around them. We raised many a toast to that particular memory and many of us got goose bumps recounting incidents that they had helped spread word off or movements that they had helped spark off. And then someone had one too many and spilt their drink, all over the first page of the August 15^th edition of the nation’s pride, can you imagine!! The top right column was washed away before we could get some blotting paper and stop further damage. What a disaster! That incident kind of sobered us up.

We hung around there for a while, remembering how archives of us were created in local libraries and we were indexed and stacked up, neat as the day we were printed. And the locals and the school teachers who came to refer to us, searching by the date of events for the exact details of what we had reported and kept alive, making copious notes and taking this back for their work. The environment wasn’t always friendly, stored as we were in dank and recessed shelves where the older publications soon succumbed to the termites sating their hunger and seeking to build new nests while the more recent ones developed terminal allergies of mould and fungus. Those were trying times indeed, where one had to really fight to survive. And those of us who actually made us out of these times were considered the survivors and we proudly recounted our tales like we were doing at the Pool.

That was also the time when newspaper cuttings were a way of keeping records of things that happened. People took the pages out of the newspaper and carefully cut out the sections that they wanted using a pair of paper scissors and then stuck them onto the pages of their diaries or memoirs with gum. Oh, what joy it was for them to read and re-read these columns and relive the memories and the moments. And though it was painful for us to give up a part of ourselves, it was always a proud sacrifice that one made, in the larger interests of society’s need for keepsakes. After all, how many people have gone under the scissor willingly and smiled through the operation, living to show a gaping hole in the middle of oneself? The worst of them were those who, after cutting what they wanted, simply discarded the balance sheet. How rude of them, how uncouth? Don’t they even care for the sacrifice that the poor brother made? But these uncivilized kinds did not society make and the larger population valued our contribution surely.

Then came the really trying times when distribution of newspapers became more efficient. And the cost of newsprint went down and the people could afford a newspaper each. Then the people could read yesterday’s news that day and everyone had a newspaper at home each morning. And our place in the sun was taken over by the latest print. Though, there was still that Sunday tradition when the men folk would take out the week’s newspapers and pore through them, reading and re-reading them until they were more dog-eared than could possibly be imagined. It was a way of keeping track of the changes that were happening around the people said one of the distinguished lots. One of the back benchers unwisely chose that moment to retaliate and yelled back that there was little that passed for entertainment on weekends in those days. After all, the magazines had not yet started making a popular entrance. We chose not to respond, simply holding our peace until the raucous laughter had died down.

One of the barkeeps joined in the fun and mentioned how the only use for us yesterday’s newspapers in those days was the weight in paper that they would fetch by the kilo. The newspaperwallas that used to come by once a month and weigh the newspapers with their crooked scales and the horrid negotiations that would ensue and finally the money that would change hands and off we went into the garbage where we would be put into multiple other uses. Imagine, the newspaper that proclaimed India’s independence, being used as a wrap for a measly 100 grams of peanuts off a side street thela or even more horrid, the same paper being used to hold the hot oily bhajias served down to the eager grasping hands. The very hands that would scoop out the nuts or the bhajias and then uncaringly, unseeingly, drop the prestigious purveyor of news down on the ground where it would be trodden upon by so many feet.

Though this comment drew a snicker from the back benchers, it hushed up almost all of us. This was not the elite vs. commoner’s battle; this was an issue that affected all of our existence. Ah, the ignominy of it. Gone were the days when paper used to be considered holy, never to be touched by foot and revered. Those days, we were only worth our weight – literally. And we were considered junk that needed a place to be kept in, and when the newspaperwalla would get late, we were cursed and complained about until he finally blessedly came and took us away. And then the whole resale bit where all sorts of shop keepers and sellers would come to buy us in bulk. Again weighed and doled out like scrap, like we weren’t worth anything but the paper that we were printed on.

And then, we were kept in a dark storage room in stacks that were of no significance, rubbing shoulders with all sorts of dates and types, waiting for the next step in the journey to oblivion. Till the man came and took out bunches of us and tore us up into bits of the size that he wanted, with no care for the section margins or the news items which were torn up in the process. And then off we went to the street side shops where we would await our fate in silence – to hold the nuts or fried stuff for human consumption. And when the purpose for which we had been bought had been completed, we would just be crumpled and thrown, often wiped hands on. Lying on top of a garbage heap, soiled and oil stained, the only thing that could have been worse was to have garbage dumped on oneself. And that happened too, with unfailing regularity, adding insult to injury. Lying there, with all that much, one had to be really strong to carry forward the tradition.

But there were exceptions. Limited they were but they did exist. Like the odd boy who would try and practice reading under the street light with the pieces that he found thrown about. Opening up the crumpled balls of paper and smoothening out the creases to make it more legible, he would peer down at it and try to read past the stains and dirt. Haltingly, he would piece the letters together and get each word out, the reading a labor that he would persist in. It made us proud to think of how we helped that boy and any others who would still read us and learn from us. We swelled our chests at that thought and the barkeep proclaimed one on the house for the noble task that we had performed even as we perished. Some of us were far too gone to continue and those of us that did, willingly made up for their share of the free round. The mood was distinctly somber, Times typeface distinctly prevailing. No italics and no exclamation marks around.

That comment somehow seemed to set off a distinct downturn in the conversation at the watering hole. Some of the oldies left the bar and wandered down to their respective slot shelves. Some of the more recent editions left along with their groupies, those plagiarizing tabloids that hung onto their every word and mimicked their actions perfectly, fawning over them and almost falling over themselves in the haste to keep up. The attendance really thinned down by then. Only some of us old timers, dated sheets, yellow with age and type fading, were left around. Even though we were still going strong, we found the mood completely downhill after that episode. And the drink continued to fuel it all, the liquor fumes swirling around the bold headlines, almost making them bleary and fuzzy in the smoky bar lights.

Talk revolved around the modern times and the move towards news and information on the tap. How it had gone to a point where there was breaking news every minute. Whatever happened to the headlines and the privilege of waiting for the news? How could anyone want news on the tap and even if they did, how did they have the time to even read it as soon as it was broadcast? Besides, how could you even bear to listen to someone else reading the news? For the moment, let us ignore the wisecrack from the back about the old practice of the learned man reading at the village chowk. Just imagine tuning into the television any time of the day and finding out what happened! What would people do while they drank their morning cup of coffee then? Watch TV? Impossible!!!! The current day and age sure gave people a lot of time besides their work and personal lives. While the wise men among us shook our heads knowingly at this, even the back benchers were in agreement on this change in trends that was affecting our very livelihood.

One of the financial publications remarked that space being such a premium in this day and age, everything had become digitized. Even newspapers had become digitized, the “e-paper” taking over those people who actually wanted the pleasure of reading a newspaper but without the paper edition. How could anyone actually open their tablet or laptop and flip through to the sports section along with their morning coffee? Or read the editorial, with its mocking wit and keenly discerning perception at the breakfast table, hanging on just that little bit longer after the coffee? Or split the sections among the family and trade the sections over the long drawn out breakfast, arguments erupting in which member would get which section next. Those were the traditions that made newspapers what they were. All of them simply thrown away with the e-paper? How tradition itself could have such little relevance now-a-days, one wondered.

Added to this, the digital archives and e-papers took away the need for the newspaper cuttings and stacking of old. Anyone who wanted a particular section only needed to use a few key words to “search” and then could copy the article or section that they wanted. Why was the world in such a hurry, we wondered. How could you ever replace the joy of looking at the yellowed, faded newspaper cutting in your diary with the experience of looking it up on your tablet or PC? Would the digital copy be yellow and as authentic? Though one of the smart alecks did mention that with modern day science, even this was possible. But then, would they be able to give the same smell as old newsprint, I ask you. Or even the same crispy crackly feel as old newsprint?

One of the back benchers quipped that the value of the newspaper itself was almost the same that it was at twenty years ago and even dropping below. He said that the newspapers were getting advertising revenues that had helped bring down the costs. But then the newspapers of today had become almost full blown novels, with two or maybe three supplements each day and pages after pages of advertisements that most of the people barely saw. One cynic who had been down in his pegs, remarked that if the people did not pay a price for the newspaper, they would not value it at all and that the only way to make them value old newspapers also was by charging more for the paper in the first place. A host of encouraging “Hear Hear” shouts egged the speaker on and he continued denouncing the degradation of quality of the newspapers. The content had gone to bits he said, with the air of an expert. Most people today did not read the full newspaper, he said. They only read the bits that they wanted to. One would actually need a full day to read the newspaper from end to end.

With all this happening, how would anyone place value on the newspaper itself, leave alone on yesterday’s newspaper, asked the barkeep. It was true enough; most houses did not get newspapers and even those that did, barely read them fully. In the brief fifteen minutes that they had, they barely glanced through the paper while gobbling up what passed for breakfast these days. And they barely had time for the important headlines before they realized that it was time else they would get caught in the traffic and get late. Some of them bravely took the newspaper along and tried to read this in between hours of waiting or breaks at work.

If this was the treatment that was meted out to that day’s edition, what could you expect to happen to the previous day’s paper? And then they were in a hurry to get rid of the old newspapers. There was no space to keep the old newspapers. Where before, there had been a shelf dedicated for this storage, today, there was hardly some space on one shelf where the newspapers could be placed and which soon overflowed if not cleared. Which is why, people considered old newspapers a nuisance, being of little value in the first place and then occupying precious space next. So, they couldn’t wait to get rid of them, giving them off at the first chance, not even bothering with the money that came from this disposal, most of which was done and pocketed by the maid anyway.

And in the meantime, look at what yesterday’s newspapers were used for in the house. Lining the shelves was an age old tradition, choosing the glossiest paper to put on the shelf and regularly replacing it. Today, the shelves were not lined at all and things were kept as it is on them. Most of the times, the newspapers were used for odds and ends. Why, the disgust of it! The latest was that used baby nappies were being wrapped in yesterday’s newspaper to throw. How demeaning it would have been for that cousin to be treated this way? These and other horror stories were traded around the bar. One heard episodes of the newspaper being used as blotting paper to mop up a spill (shudder!), to mop up the waste from the floor, to prevent the floor from being stained when the walls were being painted or when nuts needed to be mashed up. What value for the newsprint within, what respect for the service to society that we perform? A collective nod of disapproval went around the bar at the treatment meted out to our society at large.

One of the latest trends was recycling, something that held promise for all of us. A noble end, giving birth to the next generation of newsprint, this was something that all of us felt was the way to go. No more peanuts or baby diapers. No more cursing for occupying space. No more callous disregard or ill treatment. We all resolved to die for the cause of the next generation, as martyrs that would proudly go to the crushers, giving up our identities to become a collective defaced mass, our typeface obliterated and our total selves mashed to pulp. And this would then go to the making of the next generation. Let us forget for the moment, the glorified paper bags and even tissues that are now being made out of the regenerated paper. Why dwell on exceptions when the cause is so noble and pursuit worthy? It was closing time then and we all shuffled out, careful not to get our page bottoms wet in the puddles of rain on the road. Some of us teetered and tottered on our heels down the road to our shelf spots, the bar keep reminding some of the regulars to pay up before the week was over, who knew what would happen to them the next week?

However, this is not all, my brothers and sisters. The society of Yesterday’s Newspapers rules large. We are still a dominant force in the society and our numbers swell in ranks in spite of all the threats. We come in many shapes and sizes, but one single thread binds us all - the honor and the pride of being the carriers of information and ready to serve up so many alternative purposes to the human population. We have our annual convention coming up the next month on the eve of the New Year, at the place where it all began. Come one and come all of you, let us make this an occasion to be remembered for all of us Yesterday’s Newspapers.

The Train Journey

His eyes grabbed your attention first. Wide and framed with a degree of fear that you know comes out of the multiple stones that life has thrown at him. And a fixed stare, like a deer caught in the headlights, crazed into inaction, until the next sound or sight jerked him around like a puppet on a string. Any sound around would produce a jerk of the head in the direction and a temporary suspension of breathing, like he was expecting the next big rock to be hurtling down at him. A vision of a scared, timid little mouse he should have been. Only he was very far from it.

Crow feet deeply creased the corners of his eyes until they seem to be webbed at the ends. Along with the furrows between his eyebrows that came from constant frowning and squinting, they gave you an impression of a man who had to concentrate intensely on his work. His dark brown face from which his wide open white eyes stared made you believe that he worked in the sun. And then you looked at his hands. The skin was tough and cracked like old leather which someone had neglected to wax and polish. Calluses formed and reformed until the ridges on his palm were a dirty blackish brown. The veins lining the back of his hand stood out like taut wires. He worked with his hands alright, hard physical work that came nowhere near a pen or paper or a keyboard. These were the hands of a man used to hard labor and endless hours under the sun. Usually, with this profession, there comes a sense of equanimity and patience, the hours they keep and the kind of back breaking work they do make these men stoic in their outlook. And this was all at odds with the deer in the headlights that one first saw.

The monkey cap that he wore did little to keep back the confused mess of hair that crowded his head and peeked out from underneath the cap. Drops of sweat kept running down his face but he seemed oblivious to the sweat or the cap that was causing it, so much that the discomfort causing cap was completely forgotten. And the cap was even more out of place considering that he wore only a faded khaki that had certainly seen much better days. Frayed at the ends from too much washing with the brush, it now bore sweat imprints all over as the Chennai heat took over. Buttons mismatched spoke of many a darning and sewing to keep the shirt going and a closer look revealed a darned patch near the shoulder as well. This must have been a proud possession or probably the only possession of the man that he wore it so often and so well. The dhoti that he wore added to the darned faded look while it revealed its age with the yellow brown color acquired over time.

Eyes went to the bag that he held with a death’s hand grip – almost afraid to even set it on the floor. The bag itself seemed to have been stitched out of assorted bits of cloth that had been gathered over time with no thought to patterns being matched or any other aesthetic sensibilities that one often sees around. A functional handle made of the same cloth and a button down top gave away its home made nature. The possessiveness that was being exhibited towards this tattered, worn out specimen of a bag gave away the fact that the man held some prized possession – probably his life’s cash - in it. As the crowd built up in the train, he seemed to shrink into himself until the bag was almost inside him, secure from the prying eyes of his co-passengers and protected from wandering hands.

Every once in a while, he would turn around and look at something behind him and to his right. With the growing crowd, whatever he was looking for was quite hidden from view and this made him agitated, as if he had lost his touch with a reality that he was tied to. At one instant, his agitation grew to a point that he dared to take one hand off his bag and tried to push aside some of the bodies that pressed up against him to create a passageway for his eyes but to no avail. As time passed, his agitation grew and he started fidgeting with the bag, looking for an escape back to his tether or whatever it was that bound him to the spot on the floor. His breath rasped from an open mouth as he mouthed words of protest and discomfort and yet no sound was heard. There was a mighty struggle going on within this shell of a man, one that the crowd around him either saw and ignored or completely missed. Either ways, his struggle grew more intense and pitiful as time passed.

At one point in the journey, the train halted at a major local station and the press of bodies evacuated the compartment in seconds. The man nearly jumped up in his attempt to check whether whatever he had been searching for was still there. As one followed his desperate eyes, one caught sight of a woman and a child and the whole story then fell into place. The woman smiled at him and the man smiled back, almost instantly calmed into a peaceful state, and gone was the frenzy, the panic and the anxiety. The man visibly relaxed in his seat and sank back into it, almost as if he had been holding himself up in his anxiety attack. The furrows in his brow smoothed like someone had smoothed over an uneven surface of sand with a flat palm. The eyes creased up and the crow feet gathered up as if the bird were ready to fly, the lips which had gone parched in the heat drew upwards in what seemed to be the start of a smile. The hollowed out cheeks creased and a deep line formed as the smile widened, starting from his lips and his eyes and then spreading to his face and then his whole body.

The woman was a picture of calm, a perfect foil to the nervy man. A gamin face framed by her saree drawn across her head in a traditional fashion, wide forehead that was accentuated by her hair drawn back tight with a large red bindi, large eyes outlined by kohl and a pixie nose that pulled up while she smiled. A long neck and a slender frame completed the picture but with a toughness that comes from having worked her way through life daily and without asking why. Her saree too had seen better days but was obviously a special one that she had saved for the times she went out with her husband. One hand held another bag which must have carried most of their clothes and other belongings, a tattered specimen that fought for antiquity with the bag that the man held. And her other hand cradled her child that was busy drawing imaginary castles in the air with saliva from a finger that returned unfailingly for a refill into his mouth every few seconds. The child was dressed in his Sunday best, new clothes that the parents had spent on while skimping on themselves. The woman’s hands were full of glass bangles of varying hues, green, red, yellow and violet, from wrist to elbow. The bangles clinked and clanked every time she moved her hands. She was squatting on the floor of the compartment with her back to the wall, obviously used to sitting that way for hours and seemed perfectly at ease. Her feet peeped out from beneath her, bare and dusty with a silver toe ring on the second toe that was surprisingly clean and sparkling.

It was obvious that she was the man’s sheet anchor, the calm placid lake soothed and comforted the nervy jumpy fish that leapt out of the water every now and then but returned to its comforting depths soon after. For every tough hand that life had dealt him, she had been there, resolute and enduring in her calmness. Her smile was sufficient to bring the sun out from behind the clouds. The day began and ended with her smile and in her ever giving warmth, he slaked his thirst. The hard day out in the sun was forgotten and so was the measly money that the contractor never paid on time, all because of her smile. It made him run back home every day, only to see her smile. It was his one special treat that life had bestowed, as if to make up for all the other things that it had thrown at him.

She smiled that same reassuring smile at the man and went back to feeding the child a soggy biscuit. The child only interrupted his masterpiece to take a small bite of the biscuit and then returned to his art. After a few minutes, the child tired of his castle and decided he wanted to take a walk. The woman tried to restrain him but to no avail. The child tried to march on his wobbly, stubby feet, both hands now firmly stuck into his mouth, not in the least fazed by the motion of the train as it sped along. Two steps later, he had found himself close to the open door of the compartment which would normally have been choked with people but now was completely empty. He took one look at the road side rushing past and swerved and made straight for the door. The woman screamed his name and reached out but the child was just outside her reach. He ignored her calls like he usually did and wobbled his unsteady way to the door. The man heard his wife scream and took all that happened in one look. He dumped the bag that he had been holding for dear life onto the floor, uncaring of what happened to it and jumped to reach the child who was barely a couple of steps away from the door now. Flailing hands managed to catch the child’s legs and the man hauled the child in unceremoniously by the hand and leg.

Relief at the disaster being averted was soon overcome by anger and the man set the child down and raised his hand to strike the child. The child, blissfully unaware of the drama that had been enacted, took one wet dripping hand out of his mouth and pulled on his father’s unruly hair. The action broke the tension and the man shook with laughter, the release triggered by his son’s one act, and gathered him in a hug. The woman who had moved close and was standing by ready to stop the man’s hand if he were to strike, took in the scene and simply gathered her two men close. They stood that way for moments, completely isolated from the world around them. And then reality closed in. The man looked for his bag which he had dumped onto the floor in his haste. It was no longer there. He broke away from his wife and child and went to the place he had been sitting and searched around there. Not finding the bag, he then tried to ask the people sitting nearby in his own language. No one understood him and even if they did, they did not bother to reply. Unnoticed by the man, his neighbor had picked up the bag and had moved to the forward door of the compartment. As the man frantically tried to communicate his question to people around, the train pulled into the next station and the thief stepped out with his prize and escaped into the crowd unnoticed.

Completely unnerved at losing what must have been his life’s savings, the man finally gave up in defeat and tears ran down his eyes. Sobs choked his breath and shook his thin frame with their intensity. Life seemed to have dealt its most cruel blow yet and that too at the most opportune time. The last straw seemed to have been reached and the man sank down onto the floor in abject despair. The woman, his wife, who had been silently staring at the goings on, now moved close to him, gathered him close and held him to her chest, rocking him and murmuring soothing words of relief while tears found their way down her cheeks. The child continued its play with a string from the bag that had caught his attention and at the sounds his parents made, he raised his face up and pulled on his mother’s saree. The woman, torn between her sorrow and her need to comfort the man, mustered up her smile, a beaming beauty that satisfied the child. And he went back to his thread while his parents struggled to find the next step in this morass of life that they had stepped into.

 The train blew its horn and sped through to the next station while time and maybe life itself had stopped for a couple of its passengers ….

Unspoken

Thoughts flew around like cannonballs in the empty spaces within his head,

thudding into the walls that created the order; brick by brick that he had built,

tearing out chunks of stone in some and leaving gaping cracks in others instead,

threatening the precarious balance of sanity that seemed to be held up on stilts.

The only outlet, the words he would have spoken; the feelings they expressed,

but there was none around; no warm inviting, open glances he could even trust,

for miles around all was desolate and barren; a silent graveyard that stretched,

where every word spoken disappeared into the mist of silence and turned to dust.

And so the demons that he had hid away carefully behind the walls broke through,

and roamed unchained through the alleys of his mind leaving darkness in their wake,

forcing their way to his conscious like bubbles rising on the surface of the swamp do,

their pungent and cloying odor similar to the swamp gas; a thirst no drink could slake.

His eyes the only sign of the raging battle inside; dark tunnels that led deep down,

to the fiery volcano that burned within; fueled by the thousands of words unspoken,

riveted and tacked down under layers of concrete constraints laid over time unknown,

that were now steadily giving way; breaking loose and letting the lava flow unbidden.

Oh for that luxury of the words that could be spoken; willingly sent into the open,

the satisfaction of a thought expressed; an impulse given into whenever it occurred,

and the joy of someone to share with; that could listen and maybe understand even,

the one that could cast away his inner demons and maybe even heal his soul battered.

The Tail Tales - Chapter 6 - The Guardian

Through the rest of the night, Andy sat, holding Ael in his lap. At occasions during the night, he would put his ear next to her nose to check if she was still breathing. Her deep sleep showed no signs of breaking as the night wore on. Pitch black darkness was both an ally and an enemy. Strange noises and sounds of breathing carried through to Andy, noises of creatures shuffling about and then stopping perhaps when another predator came close by. He felt that he was going crazy with the riot of activity happening in an otherwise empty night. He had had enough excitement to last him for a lifetime and longed for the comfort of his mother’s hug and the warmth of the kitchen back at home.

But, this was not to be and he continued to sit there staring into the black inky pool around them, peering desperately for some sign of help. At long last, his frayed nerves gave him away and he slumped in a deep doze. Around him, the inky blackness began to slowly withdraw as if the night were slowly and stealthily withdrawing her blanket. An ashen gray sky lay underneath, sickly in hue and weepy in its outlook. The orange yellow sun was late in coming up and hid shyly behind the thick tapestry of clouds that framed the horizon. The leaden yellow day watched Andy doze with Ael in his lap, the little boy in a world that he did not at all understand and was not prepared for.  The clouds sighed in regret as their hearts were heavy with all the rain they were carrying. They drifted in low as the weight dragged them down and as they drifted lower and lower, they started crying their regret for the events that had passed before. The drops were just a few stray ones and fell at random.

One such droplet fell down below into the clearing where Ael lay on Andy’s lap. The drop spiraled down, grape sized and clear, seemingly headed straight for the two of them. A drift of breeze caught it and tried to swing it away but the drop was resolute and held steady to its course. It fell straight and true to catch onto Ael’s right eye lashes. The drop tangled for a moment in the lashes and then seeped through to form a pool in the corner of her eye. Suddenly, the pool was shaken violently as her eyes opened and her clear green pupils stared up at the sky. Her eyes looked confused and disoriented as she struggled to figure out where she was and what had happened. And then she happened to look to her left and saw Andy’s slumped form and the confusion gave way to concern. She rose; half sat up and tried to shake Andy awake. The first couple of times gave no result as Andy seemed to be completely dead to the world. Finally, the third time, she shook him a little hard and he woke up with a start, a violent look in his eyes as if he was expecting the worst. He looked around a little wildly and then at her, his eyes softening at seeing her awake. He did not say anything and just leaned forward and hugged her in relief.

He got to his feet, a little uncomfortable about the show of emotion and as she tried to follow, she found that her feet were still a little unsteady. She almost fell and then finally, balanced herself with a lot of effort, still very wobbly on her feet. Andy asked her to lean on his shoulder and they set off up the mound, away from the field of the deadly flowers. The drizzle continued, feeling strangely refreshing as the water washed them down. As Ael struggled forward and covered some distance, her legs became better until after about a kilometer, she was able to walk on her own. By then the drizzle had slowed down to just a few droplets and the sky had cleared up. The weak yellow sun now surveyed the land as if deciding what to do next. They had almost reached the pool where Andy had drunk the water the previous evening. Both of them were thirsty and drank and washed their faces in the clear cool water.  Andy realized that he was very hungry and thought of going to hunt for the berries again. He asked Ael to sit there by the pool and went deeper into the shrubs searching for the berries. With the sun behind his back, he still stepped cautiously forward, half expecting some large creature or beast to make an appearance from behind a shrub. His breath coming quickly, Andy found no signs of the shrubs that he had seen yesterday. He decided he must have taken the wrong direction and tried to retrace his path back to the pool, looking for signs of his passing and heading back using the sun as a guide.

Suddenly, a huge cloud seemed to come up over him and the sky darkened almost instantly. Andy thought there was going to be further rain and started running back towards the pool so that Ael and he could find shelter. There was a complete silence around for some reason, like the calm before a storm. An uneasy tingle started in his spine and Andy quickened his pace. As he did, a sudden whoosh sounded some distance above him. Andy immediately remembered the happenings of the previous night and almost froze in panic. It took him an enormous effort to lift his head to look up and then his worst nightmare came true. Yellow Eyes was peering down at him like he was a morsel that needed nibbling and was starting to swoop down to get a taste. Andy then did the only thing that came to him in his panic, he hid. He ducked behind a rather large shrub and curled himself into a tight little ball underneath it. He could still see Yellow Eyes through a few gaps in the leaves. Yellow Eyes had stopped mid air at his sudden disappearance and was now turning and dropping down to where he had last been. In a couple of seconds, the beast was on the ground, its massive legs settled down among the shrubs, trampling a few of them like grass under its feet. One of its feet landed close to Andy and its talon came to rest right at the shrub under which Andy hid.

The claw, though small in comparison with the rest of the creature’s body, was about half of Andy’s size. It was dirty brown in color and looked sharp enough to tear him into two with a flick. Andy was mesmerized by it and watched it intently as the claw tapped the ground and then dug grooves into it as the creature shifted its weight and stepped around, searching for him. He glanced up to see that the creature was now bending down, sniffing as if searching for a scent of him. He held his breath, sure now that it was only moments before he got a very close look at those curved teeth. Suddenly, he heard a high pitched girlish voice screaming “Heeeyyyyyy”. Not once but several times, as if calling the attention of the creature. The creature must have heard it too, because, it immediately swung its head up and looked for the source of the sound. Andy realized that Ael must have come out into the open and screamed to draw the creature away, thinking that he was in danger. He cursed her stupidity while his brain explained that she had obviously done it for him. The creature must have seen her for it began to move away, each step of its massive feet causing the ground to tremble and shake and its wings flapping and raising a large cloud of dust.

The dust was everywhere and Andy started choking in it, unable to even see anything. He could only hear the creature moving away, gather pace now. Ael must have still been some distance away but not too far as the creature chose to run on the ground and not take flight. Andy stepped out from the under the shrub and started running in the direction of the sounds knowing full well that he could never outrun the creature and that it would get to Ael far before he could. Somewhere in the middle of all of this, Ael had stopped screaming. Andy prayed that she had the good sense to hide herself, knowing that neither of them had a chance of any kind against this creature.

All of a sudden, Andy heard a different kind of noise, a curious buzz, almost as if it was a high pitched scream. The air seemed to vibrate with the sound which seemed very powerful though obviously not so loud. It almost seemed like the warning growl that a very large dog gives before it attacks. Andy glanced over his shoulder as he continued to run behind Yellow Eyes. And he caught sight of the creature that looked like the one that had saved them the previous night. Only, this one was much larger, almost as if it had grown to about two times its size in the night. Powerful wings pushed it forward as it was swooping down, aiming at a little distance ahead of Andy, roughly the spot where Yellow Eyes was. Andy could see now that Yellow Eyes had sensed the presence of the second creature and had stopped and turned around as if preparing for a fight, raising itself on its hind legs, forelegs pulled up for attack and tail on the ground, steadying itself. Whatever it had been preparing itself for, Yellow Eyes did not expect what happened next.

The black creature simply launched itself like a missile streaking towards Yellow Eyes, not trying to stop or descend to the ground. Yellow Eyes must have realized this late as it started to turn and run away. But by then, it was too late. The black creature had slammed into Yellow Eyes, the impact causing a shock wave that threw Andy back clear off the ground.  He fell and lay there in a daze, shaking his head. Sounds of the two creatures still rolling came to him and he got to his feet, taking cover behind a shrub, hardly realizing that it was of no use at all. He saw that the two creatures were locked in a fierce embrace, forelegs gripping the torso of the other, hind legs kicking and tearing at the other’s belly while the jaws snapped in attempts to bite off portions of the other’s body. Yellow Eyes was clearly the bigger of the two and was heavier as a result. But the black creature was definitely more powerful, its legs easily deflecting away the other’s attacks and then tearing away. Its jaws too began to find weak spots on Yellow Eyes.  As the two massive creatures rolled around on the ground, they flattened everything around like a bunch of twigs in a carpet of grass that they trod on. Suddenly, Yellow Eyes let out what sounded like a scream. Andy could see that the black creature had buried its fangs deep in Yellow Eyes neck and was now pulling and tearing away. Yellow Eyes now struggled grimly to dislodge the hold and threw itself around on the ground. Finally, the both of them landed on a set of trees and the impact loosened the black creature’s hold. At once, Yellow Eyes took flight, flapping its wings a little weakly and desperately pushing away from its attacker.

Andy expected the black creature to take flight and follow Yellow Eyes, to go and finish what had started. But the creature simply got up and shook itself off. It then sat there, like a massive statue carved out of some ancient black rock, except for the rise and fall of its chest as it breathed. Andy suddenly thought that it had sighted Ael and was now shifting its focus to the girl. He broke into a run, desperately thinking of any way in which he could fight the creature. As he got closer, he realized that the creature was simply looking at something close to its feet and not even glancing up at him. He stopped and yelled at it, waving his arms about, trying to attract its attention. He did manage to briefly distract it, for it looked up at him and then quickly looked back down at its feet. Andy was now sure that it had found Ael. He suddenly came into the clearing where the creature sat, all bushes and shrubs around flattened into a green carpet by the mammoths struggling. And he saw Ael lying down at the creature’s feet. He ran to her and tried to lift her and speak to her, only to realize that she was unconscious. There was no visible sign of any injury and Andy thought that she must have been hit by a branch or a shrub during the tussle.

Andy looked up and saw the creature simply looking down, its red black eyes not showing any signs of attack. He tried to pull Ael away from there but he was too weak after the entire struggle and could not move more than a few feet. He finally sank down to the ground, holding Ael and almost sobbed in frustration. At that instant, the creature moved forward and grabbed hold of them. Andy screamed as he felt the powerful claws go around him and Ael, thinking that this was it and that they were going to be crushed. But the claws simply held them like a cage, not squeezing but holding. The creature then simply pushed itself off into the air with its powerful hind legs. One flap of its mighty wings and it was airborne, high above the ground. Andy felt the wind rushing past him as the creature simply glided through the air, only flapping its wings occasionally. A few seconds later, he realized that they were descending. And could see a pool of water far below on the ground. It looked like the pool where they had drunk earlier. The creature descended swiftly and once on the ground, simply set Andy and Ael down on a patch of grass. It then sat back and once again watched them motionlessly.

Andy realized that the creature had brought them to water thinking they would need some. It seemed to be helping them in some way though Andy could not think of any reasons why.  A flood of thoughts ran through his head, starting from the earlier episodes of the stone and how it had always shielded them or protected them. How he had imagined seeing a tail inside it. And how, during the previous night and just then, the creature had fought off Yellow Eyes. As he struggled to understand what had happened, he realized that in this hostile and unknown land they were in, they now seemed to have a guardian of sorts though by the looks of it, the guardian could well change its mind and snack on them in a minute. The sheer relief of having someone on his side was too much for Andy and he just sank his head to the ground weakly. An instant later, he felt a warm moist breeze pass over him and looked up to see the creature breathing down on him, close above, as if enquiring whether he was OK. The rows of sharp curving fangs stretched backwards just a few feet away from his face. But they oddly did not seem threatening or scary any more.

Andy stood up and walked down to the pool of water, gathered some in his cupped hands and walked back to Ael. He splashed some on her face and as she sputtered awake, her eyes filled with alarm at the sight of the creature that loomed over them. Andy then reassured her of the creature’s intentions and proceeded to brief her on the sequence of events thus far and more importantly, share with her the fact that they now had a guardian. The creature was certainly no angel but for now, that seemed far less important. As Ael stared at the creature, still not believing anything that Andy had said, the creature simply extended its fore leg with its claws. The claws now stood inches away from them. Andy grabbed hold of a claw and on seeing him; Ael reluctantly took hold of one too. The creature then simply folded its claws, back to the cage hold that had brought them there. It then simply pushed up in the air again and in seconds, they were soaring high up in the air, the ground rushing past them. The creature continued to soar and Andy saw that it was heading for a mountain like land formation up ahead. For a moment, he felt uneasy at the memory of having escaped from one such mountain with a cave where he had nearly been cooked to death. Then, shrugging the memory off, he simply closed his eyes, letting the wind brush off all his unpleasant memories and clear up his brain.