Everything that begins...

Three years ago, in Bombay. Café Ideal, five in the evening of a balmy day, sitting by the window listening to the waves and watching the traffic go by. Put ten bucks in the jukebox and then another ten and then another and then another till there is half an hour’s worth of Kishore-RD magic lined up. Order a beer. The place is still half empty and so you can play RD comfortably. In another hour or so, it will move to Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison, and in another hour, devolve to Kumar Sanu. Sit by the window, watch the waves splash, watch the easy traffic flow.

I was just out of college, a young English literature graduate head full to bursting with the Great Indian Novel I was destined to write in the coming years; meanwhile earning my beer by taking on freelance reporting jobs with whichever newspaper would commission one or whichever newspaper Professor Gupta could get to give me one. Jeans, khaadi kurtas, long hair parted in the center, beard. I was so entranced with myself that I was not merely creating characters, I was living one. As the great comedian once said, I did not just brood, I brooded at the world. The melancholy of Kishore and RD (aided a lot by Gulzar) was a perfect fit. And so I would come to Ideal around 5 in the evening, get a beer, play Kishore, read some and listen to the waves splash. And then I would just drink as the café slowly drifted into Morrison and then Sanu territory. Except, this evening it doesn’t. Not till six, not till seven, not till seven thirty. RD plays, Kishore sings, the jukebox keeps going. And so I call the waiter, and ask. And he says that she is the one playing. And as I turn to look at her, she stands up from her table and turns and all I see is a mop of shoulder-length, wavy black hair. She leaves.

How clichéd.

***

Sunday through Thursday I wait there everyday and listen to Dylan and Morrison and nothing happens. And then, Friday evening, just as I am about to take the first sip on my beer, she slips onto the bench in front of me.

‘Waiting for someone?’

I just stare. I don’t know that she is her at this point, but I am already captivated.

‘He told me’, she says, pointing to the waiter who has answered my question every evening with a polite ‘No, Sir’, ‘What are you drinking?’

‘Budweiser.’

‘That is donkey piss’, she says and orders a Kingfisher for me. She has taken charge of the evening.

She speaks to me, I imagine we speak of music and writing and our shared love of RD and Kishore and the Mangeshkar sisters. I say I imagine we spoke of them because she agreed to meet me again, and then again and again, and those things, I imagine, do not work out because you have stared at her for three and a half hours straight, evening after evening, too enthralled by her smile, her eyes, the curl of her lips as she twisted them ironically in response to some stupid comment I might or might not have made, her laughter…ohh her laughter! Her laughter, like they said in the clichés, like the gurgling of brooks, like the chimes of the wind chime you put in your doorway, like that magical, melodious sound you hear so often in literature but never in movies; because no human person in front of a camera can ever pretend to having that kind of laughter; she just laughed with me that night and a hundred more nights and we listened to Kishore and Lata and Asha and RD and Gulzar and we created a world in a place aptly called Café Ideal with the waves listening to us and us listening to the waves and we both believed the world was, and would be beautiful…

Infinite Guilt

Well, that’s it then. All that is left is to pay the rickshaw off, and then I have to go inside the house. Which I do, and I ring the bell and I walk in and she opens the door, and she knows that I would be coming sometime around now, something still makes her freeze in the doorframe, and then she clasps me to herself in that way I hate, that way which always makes me feel I am still thirteen and not thirty. I disengage myself and let the bags plunk to the floor.

In the middle distance beyond her, he stands watching both of us, a half-smile on his face that does not quite reach his eyes. He stands there watching half-mockingly as if this was a little comedy being played out for his benefit. I say nothing to him; nothing seems to be adequate, not sufficient.

 I change, and she leaves us to the TV and goes off to mind dinner. The evening news is moderated by the clinks and rattles of steel against steel, as we sit side by side and do not converse. 

Dinner is to be served; he and I sit on opposite sides of a small table, much like two gladiators sizing each other up: the table is the warzone, place mats defensive positions, and spoons are swords which will be waved during the conversation. She is the arbitrator neither side is willing to listen to. 

Predictably, she serves the chapattis, he serves the guilt.

‘I hear you have quit this job too.’

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘I did not like it.’

‘You did not like it? What is there to like about a job? You do it, you earn a salary and you live a life. Did not like it!’

That puts me on the defensive.

‘I cannot spend the rest of my life filling forms in triplicate and covering up other people’s errors in whitener.’

That stings. I can see it in his eyes, even though his face is neutral.

‘I did not spend my life just filling forms in triplicate. There was a purpose to whatever I did something larger than what you are ever going to understand.’

I do not reply to this obvious mistruth. She serves me another chapatti, and a conversation restarter.

‘But this time you will stay for a few days, no? Go to the village, spend some quiet time, and figure out what you want to do.’

‘Figure out what you want to do’, he mimics her, ‘what has not happened in thirty years will happen in three days. What do you want to do, after all?’

I am not hungry any longer.

‘I have told you a hundred times. I want to write. And I will make a living doing that. I will be going back tomorrow morning.’

And I leave them, him to his unfinished dinner, and her to a hungry night. In wars between two people who love each other, the one who arbitrates should be prepared for a lot of injury.

_____

It is morning, now. The not unpacked bags are slung on my shoulders again as she clasps me to herself as if she wants the very essence our beings to meld together. Her eyes are sad like dusk in the mountains, and tired like a long day’s end. I can tell she has not slept, her hair is tangled, and her face tells the story of all her years, all the battles she has been spectator to, the crow’s feet around her eyes the silent scars gifted her by our egos. I hold her tight, as if I am not going to see her again. There have been too few of these embraces, I realize, and now, there will never be enough.

He stands in the middle distance, watching us. The half-smile is nowhere in evidence. I notice for the first time that in the half-light he looks very, very frail; almost all his hair are silver now, and his eyes promise stories of valiant defeats that I will never share. As I release mother from my embrace and move towards him, I notice the peculiar way he is holding his left arm, the hurt from the accident must still be there. I stand before him, and we say nothing to each other. And then I turn and walk out of the door.

‘Goodbye mom. Goodbye dad.’

A nose out of joint

‘Ahhh’

With a sigh of satisfaction, I drained the last drop off my glass of excellent scotch, and waved to the steward for the check.

‘You take it, JD’, said RN.

I made a gesture of exaggerated surprise. This was the first time RN had not offered to take a check. Something must be terribly off.

‘What’s wrong, RN? The nose-hair-trimmer business is running down?’

‘Very droll, JD. But seriously, yes, considering I might be shutting up shop soon, you might want to take that check.’

That called for another drink. I did the needful.

Now just for background, RN is the scion of one the foremost of India’s business families in that his business caters to a unique need. Story goes, his father was one who loved to play with words, and one day, as he lowered his not inconsiderable bulk into a barber’s chair and asked to have his hair trimmed, his mind went off on a tangent with the word ‘trim’ and somehow, it arrived on the phrase ‘trim your nosehair, on the run’. The rest, as they say, is history, and today RN (nickname, which obvious acronym, of course, came from years spent with us in school, and sticks to this day, like, you know what), inherited a fortune in snot. 

‘Go on.’

‘It’s all over the papers.’

‘I am sorry; I am rather behind the news.’

‘Ahh well, the double murder in Mumbai.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Well…the murder weapon was one of my company’s nose-hair trimmers. And now people are calling for a ban on my ‘On-the-run’ nose hair trimmers.’

‘But that is stupid. People get their heads shoved in by bricks. No one demands we stop living in houses and start living in thatch huts.’

‘It is not that simple. It seems there is a culture based debate going on.’

‘Culture?’

‘Sort of. About the kind of people who trim their nose-hair. A big political party leader has claimed that if people did not trim nose hair, there would be no nose hair trimmers, and hence those murders would not have happened. And, it seems, we lost our culture when we began trimming our nose hair.’

‘Ha! So, it is less about culture, than agriculture. I like it…the agronomy of snot. Could make a fine play one day.’

‘The hell’

‘Ok, seriously. Ignore the guy. The media will find a new topic of outrage in a few days, and life will go on as normal.’

‘Oh, if only it were only as simple. Another political party took offense at his words. And *their* leader made another speech decrying nose hair, citing them as a sign of barbarism and uncouthness. It seems they conducted a survey on convicted felons, and found that most were not nose-hair trimmer users. And based on that, they are claiming that nose-hair trimming is what separates the civilized from the uncivilized. And they are exhorting me vigorously promote my product, for civilization.’

‘But that is wonderful news! Think of all the publicity you are getting!’

‘It would be. Except that the goons of the first party attacked one of my offices yesterday. Few employees were lucky enough to get away without hurt.’

‘Well…that is sad.’

And we buried our heads into our fresh drinks, trying to find a solution to RN’s problem. But if was unfindable…almost as if the bottom of the glass were an abyss we were bound to spend our lives trying to find the bottom of, while wearing lifejackets- there seemed to be only two choices- either drop the lifejacket and plummet to the bottom, or to float upwards. I made my choice.

‘RN, I think I have a solution.’

‘Yes?’

‘First thing you do tomorrow, arrange to provide hefty donations to both parties campaign funds. Just get them to keep this in the news for as long as possible. Cut all your advertising budgets. Send your staff on leave for a fortnight. Double the security on all your installations. I think that should crack it.’

RN blinked in confusion, and then, slowly, smiled.

‘Yes, JD, I do think that should crack it.’ He waved the steward over, ‘Why, I think I shall be taking the check, after all.’

Growing old. Together

‘I first  saw you in a painting- a profile, done with infinite delicacy, a light smile on your cheeks, your one visible eye coursing a thousand promises down the glow on your face. That was before I fell in love with you. And when, a thousand years later, you came into my life- I could give everything, then and now, books, music, the nights spent alone thinking, everything I cared for- to have you smile at me, once more. ‘

‘And we measured out life in tinkles of spoons on coffee cups, in early morning scrambles and exhausted kisses in the night. The sunlight passed us by, fluttering in other people’s hair, while our souls grew old. Tired embraces and late-night flights, snatches of conversation-poured into whiskey glasses, and toasted. Every year, same day, same time.’

‘How did this come to be? We did not fall behind, out of step. But did we lose each other somewhere? Do you remember the last time? When did we stop realizing? The touch of your hand, when did I stop feeling it?’

‘We remained in step with the world.’

‘We could have been the world.’

A Thousand Empty Roads

He spoke in beautiful sentences. She replied in non-committal monosyllables. His words had no coherence from one pause to another. Her silences told a thousand stories. They lived together, and they drifted apart. And then the silences brought them back. Again and again, he spoke in words which were like the refraction of white light; again and again, her silences the beauty of the infinite darkness.  

The world wore the white of a fogged out windscreen, the silence of a thousand nights populated by silent blinking traffic lights signalling no traffic whatsoever. Did you ever realize there are very few things as lonely as walking a brightly lit, empty road late in the night? Bright lights are not built for silences, when coupled with empty roads; they bring your worst monsters out and threaten to eat your soul. He walked those roads alone. 

And then one day, she asked to come with him. And all the squalid little affairs of the day- the brain freezes, the ego-fights, the petty squabbles- everything was forgotten. He was complete. The empty roads wore the brilliance of a satisfied soul.