Category: Stories

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Stories

Intersleep

By Nileena Sunil

The true woman who possesses exceeding wisdom, 
She consults a tablet of lapis lazuli  
She gives advice to all lands...  
She measures off the heavens,  
She places the measuring-cords on the earth.

Naina read those lines which she had written on the first page of her journal. They were lines from a hymn written by the ancient Sumerian priestess, En Hedu’anna, written in two-thousand three hundred BCE. Every time she read those lines, she felt a sense of awe, as well as of sadness. How grand, how inspiring those lines were, those lines written millennia ago, during the dawn of civilisation? She sighed. Once, she too had wanted to be like En Hedu’anna, an astronomer, or at least a poet. But that was not her destiny. She was stuck in her corporate job, one that seduced her with the prospects of a financially stable existence, and refused to let her escape from its web. She idly turned the pages of the journal with the intention of starting a new entry. Perhaps that would help her fall asleep.

She was not sure why she kept waking up in the middle of the night. It was not the first time, in fact she had been facing such interruptions for a while. She would go to bed at eleven, only to wake at around two, and she would then be unable to fall asleep again till around four. She had tried to force herself to sleep a few times, but she was unable to do so. I might as well embrace it and turn this into my new routine. She thought of the article she had read the other day about how medieval Europeans slept in two phases. They would go to bed in the evening, wake up s a little after midnight and wait for around an hour for their second sleep. In the interlude, they would pray or do chores or work or study. The article actually suggested the practice might not even be unique to medieval Europeans, rather it could be something found all over the world, for centuries, millenia even. If it was so common, then how harmful could it be? Only, she had nothing to do in the interlude. The idea of doing office work at that hour nauseated her, nor did she think she wanted to read or watch anything at that time. She thought she could write in her journal, but as she held the pen, she found out that no words flowed from it at that time.

Sighing, she decided to go to the terrace, to get some fresh air.

Naina looked at the stars. She had always thought there was something magical about them. She used her fingers to trace the tiny pinpricks of light, wishing she could identify constellations. There was a time when she knew how to, but she had forgotten. Orion was the only one whose location she could remember. The Hunter. There was a time she wanted to be an astronomer, but she eventually realised it wasn’t very realistic a dream for her. En Hedu’anna’s verse came back to her mind.

She measures off the heavens

Her mind turned to another female astronomer, from the pages of history. Maria Cunitz, from seventeenth Silesia, who authored a book that refined the works of Johannes Kepler. She imagined being an astronomer in those times, getting to look at a night sky sans light pollution, trying to calculate and make deductions without a calculator or the internet. Wasn’t it strange that it was that way for most of human history, yet such a life was unimaginable for those in the present? Naina’s mind went back to the Silesian astronomer and the life she had led. It must not have been easy to be a woman of science in those times.

Naina then thought again, of sleeping habits in the past. Biphasic sleep must have been the norm in Maria Cunitz’s time. Did she look at the stars between her sleep cycles as well? She hoped she did. It would be nice to have something like this in common with her, Naina thought as she descended the stairs.

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Nileena Sunil is a student and a writer from India. She has previously written short stories for The Collapsar Directive and Flash Fiction Addiction, anthologies by Zombie Pirate Publishing.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL. 

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Stories

Mausoleum

By Hridi

Twenty-one months later, Rai[1] arrives in Paris. It is spring and she is here on a pilgrimage of memory. It is not her first time in this city, she has visited it before through the eyes of another: a city bathed in the mellow yellow of an exceptional limestone, chestnut trees abloom beside the Seine, a river green as malachite, the white sleek pleasure boats and the chuffing barges passing under the grave arches of thirty-seven bridges, each distinct from the last, a differently shaped shadow rippling below, connecting over and again the opposites of what divides the city, a people who know the art of touch all too well. Yes, the sights, the smells, all familiar. The spring air smells of her beloved; an enormous peace descends upon her.

Ever since she stepped on the train from the suburbs where she has taken her rooms, she finds herself scanning every face in the metropolitan crowd, every face looking elsewhere, somewhere, lost outside the present of their almost mechanical movements, perhaps like her, seeking another face. Strangely, this feels like home, like the city she left behind many months ago, ostensibly to travel. For all it takes from its inhabitants, a great city gifts them an anonymity that is sacred to the human heart. Therein remains its primary seduction for diversity. Your face becomes a mask of itself. You live, unapologetic, learning to make room for yourself where none exists. Every great city has this air of elsewhere, she concludes. I can already see Rai could live here; it is reminiscent of where she grew up. Yet, today, more than ever before, she is homesick, for the soil, the faces, the lives she tore herself away from.

You wonder how I glance into her heart with such ease. Let me lead you to the answer.

She has your address, half-a name, a few photos. What does it matter? One cannot create what one did not destroy first. She is obeying the laws of physics you joked about nineteen months ago, the laws that would inevitably bring you nearer and nearer. Here she is, touching you almost, a ghost walking beside her, pointing out every other piece of beauty in this city which does not lack of them. You stood here once, your feet touched this pavement, oh god, you stood here! This is where you clicked the photograph you sent her saying, “Remember me.” But she isn’t speaking to you, not yet.

Insecure, naïve, scared, stuck she had been, but mostly scared…terrified… of losing you, the last thread of sanity in a world collapsing around her, screaming into her ears with a deathly consistency, inevitability. You had been her escape, god, how she had escaped… Looking back, she thinks… no, there is no looking back. I almost lost my mind when you left, she would like to say, but… almost, that word… I was living with monsters tearing each other apart. To you, I showed only what I hid from others, and hid from you all that offal the monsters would leave behind at the end of each meal. They knew how to devour a girl of nineteen. The result is her face, at twenty-one, that of an old woman.

But that is an advantage, especially in big cities.

when you left even the stones were buried:

the defenceless would have no weapons.[2]

Her poet knows she remembers every place you promised to show her. It is the city of forgotten promises. She has read every book you ever recommended, watched every movie you spoke of, revisited two languages for you, painted you, cursed you, pleaded with you, desired you, hated you, shattered the boundaries of her known world for you; for the rest of her life, she will celebrate the nineteenth of July as the birthday of her heart; and yet, you are only a ghost who she cannot talk to. But she will, now that she has reached your city. Tomorrow she will talk to you. Tonight, she will write for the first time in twenty-one months. Through the dim lights of the small window of the suburban apartment, you will see her typing away. She will write again.

The painting earlier this morning made her think of God. This is not unusual, merely the first impact of a Monet painting on one who has only seen photographs all her life. Remember the poems she would translate for you? She reads them sometimes now, searching for mistakes. Her innocence makes me laugh, her capacity for love is adorable. It is what she will write about.

Why did you introduce all those new words in her mind? That was a mistake. Didn’t you know words are a writer’s biggest fear? Well, you can see the result for yourself, aren’t you happy? That she forgot how to write, that she mixes up alphabets of three different scripts every time she picks up the pen, trying to find a language that will make you answer. But you tricksters play on…

This city is a mausoleum of your memory. This is the first line she writes. The rest of the night is spent weeping between fits of sleep. You watch on, right outside the window. I watch you watch.

It is still very dark when Rai finds herself irretrievably awake. A faint fragrance of some spring blossom is wafting in through the half-open window. It is light by the time she reaches the small station; the air is crisp as the ticket in her hand, the cold from the river making her button up her coat. Today she will walk beside the Seine.

Many have said that the soul of Paris flows in the green waters of the Seine. Obviously, those fools know nothing about souls. Souls do not flow away, they haunt.

The yellow aura of the buildings is enhanced in the pale morning light, the river dappled in the golden, the empty promenade inviting. Later in the day the tourists and hawkers will crowd this part of the city, but it is yet hers, all hers. A few joggers and some sleepless ones as her claim the early hours.

She starts walking from the tower towards Musée d’Orsay along the river. You walk behind her, slightly unsure. On this morning you realise this city entwined itself in her personal history long before you arrived. It wounds your pride, shakes your confidence in her fidelity. The artworks hanging in that building yonder have been the pursuit of her fascination for almost a decade now. You knew it, if fact, that is where you met, in a shared longing of elsewhere, of nostalgia for a world you were never a part of.

In senior school math, they taught that for an equation to have real solutions, one must apply constraints. But within the parentheses of those limits exist an infinity of choice. Remembrance is a choice. Her math tutor from school, the old man with the twinkling eyes, would insist mathematics is the purest form of poetry. How long has it been since she remembered him? What is the pollen in this air that brings back the past so lovingly?

The path Rai traces, to a viewer like me, appears most comical. But I’ve been around here long enough to know lunacy is the mother of imagination, it afflicts the seekers more often than you would think. Sometimes she walks beside the river, sometimes climb the stairs to cross a bridge that fancies her, then strolls again along the other bank, as if her wandering steps cannot have enough of the novelty of a river joined with such frequency, such care. In her culture, the poets have sung for centuries of the two banks of a river as lovers separated in togetherness, together in separation. This far from home, the metaphor revisits her.

My memory is again in the way of your history2. A city with a history of over two millennia, glorious in this spring, what does it care of your unrequited love, foolish girl? Yet she would repeat under her breath these lines from her favourite poet. He spoke of war, of a heritage blown to bits overnight, over years, preserved in the memory of its refugees; how interchangeable is it with the torn love she carries with such grace? Foolish as she is, I think I am getting quite fond of her stubbornness.

And you! I almost forgot your apparition there, caught in watching her too. What are you sulking about? Quick, she is walking towards the Pont des Arts. Wicked rogue, won’t you play her once on the love lock bridge of clichés? She is standing at the centre now, spread before her the split halves of tremendous urban life, speeding fast in the midday heat; on either side, decades of forgotten promises caught in iron, rusted, locked away. She bends to inspect the locks. Even as you rush ahead to play your game, you turn back and shout at me, “You are wrong, it is a cliché only if you win in love.” Through the strong breeze on the bridge, I try to make myself heard: “So much for your words, go close enough if you dare and she will speak to you.” I think you heard me. The plan works. On one of these locks, Rai discovers her own name, a single name, a word, perhaps echoed in rust from decades of a solitary namesake on the same bridge, but that staunch heart knows what it wants to believe. Who will save her? You are close enough to touch her now, and she senses you. When you have spied on people’s secret lives for as long as I have, you tend to expect melodrama. But Rai, travelled across twenty-one months of quiet longing, is not surprised. You have appeared before her on fretful nights, sweat-stained afternoons, rainy mornings, in songs, in tears, in sudden joy, in sunshine, in broken shadows of grief, in the citadel she has built for you, how can she not expect you? She is narrating a story now, the story of what her name, written on that lock, means.

It was the one of the first fables of love ever fabricated in her part of the world. Centuries old. The story of a woman who falls in love to the music of a cowboy she has never laid her eyes on. Their illicit love-making becomes the whisper of the land. With the passing years, the musician in the boy slowly succumbs to the warrior in the man, who eventually gets crowned in a country far away. Rai is left waiting; music is not so easily forgotten. Like all classics, this too is of unrequited love.

The lazy warmth of the afternoon has brought out many on the promenade. Sunning away, relaxing with beers, some sitting alone, some in picnics; in the little island of Île de la Cité, a band of young jazz enthusiasts blow into their trumpets; the flowers compliment the myriad soft colours on all dresses: the Seine is the frame of happiness. I watch the two of you stroll, a happy couple, woman and ghost, breathing in the Spring you promised her not so long ago. Grief is the kindest of opiates, it dissolves in its own fantasia. Tonight, with all the walking, she will need some wine. The cheap wine of this tired evening will put her to sleep. You do not have to sing lullabies, but pray, lie down beside her. Let her hold in her palm the ghost of your erect manhood, rest her head against the illusion of your chest. In you, she desires sleep so in her sleep she may desire you, consummate a mirage. Do not stay outside.

It is night yet when she leaves. “The Frog & British Library” glows in its ironic neon, the streetlights halo in the clear blue hour. The Pont de Tolbiac stoops groggily over the ultramarine blue of the water pregnant with shimmering reflections: the illumined buildings, the barges anchored at the edge, the symmetrical reflections from the arch of the next bridge, perhaps (she fancies), the last of the stars too. The beauty of this night stings her eyes with an almost physical pain. She is thinking of you, of what remains of what you were.

I’m everything you lost. You won’t forgive me.

My memory keeps getting in the way of your history.

There is nothing to forgive. You won’t forgive me.2

Her poet is speaking again. Yes, she is here to ask for your forgiveness. She has left everything behind, for nothing ahead, in this long, long solitary journey only to ask for your forgiveness. Forgiveness for naïveté, for insensitivity, for distance, for loving with more sincerity than a heart bears without protest. The little crystal she wears around her neck on a string, she believes it has a beauty she does not deserve, like you, who loved her more for the magnanimous reflection in your kindness than her own small artless self. Your absence fills the air above the deep blue Seine like a forgotten god of this city that is yours. The semi-circle of these lanterns shiver beneath her like a pantheon of answers. Hope costs nothing, you told her once, and that is how she dared. To cross an ocean for you. The boatmen of this world speak of riches on the opposite bank, her voyage was merely to free the emptiness of her claustrophobic heart, restless, restless, oh, ever so restless. Perhaps, and I speak only as the outsider who inhabits you both, you should forgive her now.

Years ago, on summer nights, her grandmother would tell her the story of the boy who dived into the bottomless pond in the middle of the desert to salvage the pink pearl. The next morning, the villagers found a banyan tree at the centre of the pond, its roots vanishing into the fathomless. Legend says every full moon night, the heart of the boy cries for the pearl, and in the morning, a new column is added to the mass of hanging roots, a stream of condensed tears feeding the pond. Thus grew the desert city of Ehsaan around an oasis of endless fertility.

The blue is beginning to fade, a turquoise haze envelopes the bridge, the barge, the lamps, her; from the horizon, a faint blush rises, spreading softly over the sky. It is still night, the crescent moon still in bloom, but the last scattered stars are evasive now.

If only somehow you could have been mine,

what would not have been possible in the world?2

Suddenly, the streetlights go off. In this instant, dawn has arrived. The sky transits less hastily. The city of her beloved is waking up. A bus awaits to take her where she came from, through fields of uniformly shaven colour- yellow, green, brown, waves of symmetry upon a calm earth. A piece of this calm resides in her now, the river has doused the fire scourging her insides. Something has healed.

She will return. I, the Seine, rushing past a million lives, over a hundred thousand springs heartbreakingly beautiful, have promised to save the pink pearl in my bosom until then.

[1] Another name of Radha, the beloved of the divine cowherd Krishna

[2] Excerpted from “Farewell” by Agha Shahid Ali (1949-2001)

Hridi is an Indian writer currently based in Belgium. Her works have previously appeared in Aainanagar, Contemporary Literary Review India, Modern Literature, The Piker Press and Across the Margin, among others.

 PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL. 

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Stories

Ants

By Paul Mirabile

Courtesy: Creative Commons

My flat is very small and unhealthy: a roach-infested kitchen and bath, a stuffy dining room and bedroom. And I must admit that I made no particular effort to remedy this unhealthiness. Because there is no heating system, in the winters I board up the tiny windows that are found above my bedroom and those in the dining room. This may appear primitive, but I do live on the fifth floor where cold winds blast frosty air through flimsy boards. It goes without saying that I freeze during the winter. With the arrival of spring, though, I remove the boards and replace them with wax curtains so as to keep the insects out. They build their nests on top of the roof. In the kitchen there is a skylight, square and tiny, the brittle glass of which I had the misfortune of breaking some time ago. I haven’t either the skill or the pecuniary means to repair it. This broken skylight had been constantly on my mind because of those huge nests atop the roof. I indeed could have mustered up the money, but … you know how people get when their existence is reduced to tiny cubicles and thoughts ?

Not long ago I left town for a short stay near the sea. The weather had been exceedingly hot, and my flat was like an oven. The square below was filled with sultry, polluted air, with noisy gypsies hawking and haggling. My pleasant little holiday terminated horribly as soon as I stepped into my flat : the kitchen, stifling, was crawling thick with black ants ! I was beside myself. There were streams of them forming enormous black, billowing pools on the unclean white-tiled walls. I puked on them for I have detested these ever since I had buried live ants as a child, relishing the sensation of their tomb in the midst of hard-packed humus, suffused with dampness and pervaded by silence. I often wondered whether this sentiment was mine or theirs ?

The mere sight, now, of one or two made me break into a cold sweat; and here, before me scampered millions, fat and juicy. I ran to the bath grabbing a mop and bucket. Pouring alcohol into the soapy water, I set to work crushing them on the white-tiled floor, knocking them off the white-tiled walls and ceiling. The toil seemed endless, yet, as time went by, the mass slaughter gave me a sort of perverted delight ; an abnormal sensation of power, divine and unholy at the same time. Toppling the darting beasts from the walls, I sent them hurtling to a watery death. The strong smelling alcohol caused them to shrivel up into tiny black balls. I finished off many by simply crushing them between my fingers or under my bloody heels. Two hours later there were none left on the wall to tell their disheartening tale …

Exhausted, I owed their hideous trespassing to the broken skylight, and vowed to replace it in the morning. And still I hadn’t unpacked … That would be left for the morning ; for now, I needed a good, sound sleep. Yet the heat that evening was unbearable. I threw myself onto the bed, trying to forget the images and those disgusting ants. No use, I couldn’t drive them out of my strung-up mind. The sheets were soaked in perspiration. I tossed them off, wiping the sweat from my face and arms with them. The bedroom stank of sweat so I got up and staggered into the kitchen to splash some water on my body. When I switched on the light a terrible sight made me fall back into the kitchen table : the walls heaved and throbbed with myriads of black and red ants which were making their way through the skylight. Many of them were huge. They swarmed round my feet, naked and exposed to their scrabbling, biting and scratching. Involuntarily I let out a scream and ran back to fetch my trusty mop. I would have to begin the whole gory operation again …

Returning to the amok beasts, I took up the mop, smashing the filthy creatures against the walls and floor, picking them out of the fissures and cracks, wrenching them out of corner and nook. It seemed as if I were fighting for my life ! Alas the battling brutes out-numbered me ; little by little my strength wanned as the colonies gained the cracks throughout the kitchen walls, filling them until the plaster broke and crumbled down. They dived into my hair, swiftly seeking the orbits of my eyes. Falling to my knees … I awoke …

It had been an evil nightmare ! Were the black beasts coming back to torment me after so many years of burials and extermination ? The wall-clock chimed three ; My mind raced and body ached. And the darkness of my chamber offered no consolation, nor the oppressiveness of the heat. I dared not walk into the kitchen although my throat, parched and swollen, yearned for a glass of cool water. The nightmare had turned the beads of sweat into icy droplets : would this bed-chamber be my tomb ? And yet … yet, the temptation gnawed at me. Yes, enter the kitchen, see whether it had all been a nasty nightmare, or reality, or something in between. Yes, my little coffin in which I had passed much of my existence. I laughed aloud, then louder. Speedy thoughts formed icicles in and round my soul. For I did believe in the soul : wasn’t that the very reason I had buried those ants alive ? 

However, the clammy heat kept me riveted to the bed. Laying back, I suddenly detected slight noises coming from the door which led into the narrow, yellowed peeling wall-papered hallway. I listened … and listened with greater intensity, steadily growing conscious that something was alive in the room. Frozen to the bed, I listened even more attentively, carefully, so as not to disturb this pulsating thing.

Finally, plucking up courage, I flung myself out of bed and darted to the door. I noted a foul smell reeking from the hallway ; the scent of the dead ? Flicking on the light a jolt threw me back in horror : millions … no billions of ants were smothering two half-dead mice, dragging the screeching rodents across the threshold of my room. And there inside it, I had nothing to kill them with ! The screeching of the half-gnawed mice drove me mad ; strange, too, were the indescribable crunching sounds that elicited from the open-mouthed rodents. I soon realised that this was no nightmare. However, I couldn’t be sure whether the mice were dead or still fighting off the floods of ants with the last flickers of their unfortunate lives.

I grabbed a chair and squashed them at my feet, attempting to clear a path to the kitchen. The mop was my only salvation, since that of the mice could no longer be redeemed. But what would the kitchen look like ? I was trapped. Nonetheless, I put on my shoes that were still stained with the blood of the black beasts, and made a bee-line towards the sacred door. Those ant nests must have been immense ; the walls, floor and ceiling had been blackened by them, caked, dense and throbbing …

The door loomed in sight, albeit it swelled in a tidal wave movement of heaving, pulsating ants : clinging, swirling, skirling, raging … They fell upon me like wrathful wasps whose nests had been discovered and disrupted.

They fell upon me I say, hordes of them racing up my naked legs. Yet, I couldn’t budge; I tried to inch forward but my feet wouldn’t move. They were attacking my face and hair now as I crawled closer and closer to the oscillating door. I started to scream for help; yet, who would have come to my succour ? Thoughts of the half-eaten mice suddenly flooded my mind ; they were probably dead by now, buried beneath a layer of ants, like the ants I had buried, beneath layers of dun soil ! I imagined an ant-hill at a time when pirates would bury their sad prisoners up to their necks in them, waiting until the disturbed red killers chewed through the eyes of their screaming interlopers. I reached for the door-knob ; something held me back, an evil, insalubrious odour that stealthily began to suffocate me. My breath became shorter and shorter, and when I managed to gasp for breath a billow of soft, mushy, black flooded into my open mouth … I sat up screaming in bed …

Like a lunatic I paced back and forth in that death chamber. All I asked for was to sleep. But the ants … I placed my ear to the moist floor boards … there was no sound. Cautiously I moved through the narrow hallway, my fingers touching ever so tenaciously the viscous, soiled paper, probing each and every crevice and crack. I couldn’t, however, bring myself to switch on the light, thus there I remained in the dark, a man afraid to exit from his own shelter. Would they bury me alive in this earthy niche ? Into the kitchen I ventured still in absolute darkness. I stooped down to touch the floor : nothing, absolutely nothing. I laughed a rather hysterical laugh. The floor was somewhat wet from my mopping. I did indeed mop then ! I slipped and slid about, so happy about this nothing … this absolutely nothing. So thrilled about this … that …

Suddenly the phone rang. At this hour of the night ? I sat up listening … listening … it suddenly stopped, as abruptly as that ! Then there was a knock at the door … I sat up listening … listening … It too stopped, as abruptly as that ! As I lay back, the flat echoed with various breathing sounds : they would come and go, like the ringing and the knocking. The phone rang … no one. A knock drilled … no one. Gradually an inky blackness crept over my still, stiffened body until the rim of a faint light allowed me to peer into the hallway where billions of soldier ants were busy bearing the burden of their dead …

Paul Mirabile is a retired professor of philology now living in France. He has published mostly academic works centred on philology, history, pedagogy and religion. He has also published stories of his travels throughout Asia, where he spent thirty years.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

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Stories

The Persistence of Memory

By Vedant Srinivas

Despite rolling the window firmly shut, Dhruv could still feel the dust swivel inside the car and settle on his skin. He could smell the combined whiff of fried pakodas mixed with rotting trash, as if the transparent glass pane was no barrier for the hazardous environment outside to which he had once belonged. Sweat rolled down in beads and collected at the nape of his neck, and he wiped it with a crumpled handkerchief. Small apartment blocks came into view on both sides, with cycle rickshaws parked on either side of the gate. Rusted clotheslines jutted out from the balcony on each floor. They were hung with clothes of varied shapes and colours. A car honked twice, and someone yelled in return.

He eyed the outside proceedings with a strange fervour, his eyes taking in the action that seemed already imprinted in the depths of his memory. It wasn’t so much perception as re-creation; he had, after all, spent his childhood roaming the same streets of north-west Delhi. Remembrances swept to the shore of his mind, summoning up something buried and forgotten inside him. He distracted himself with more practical concerns. What was he to say to Digant’s father? Would he recognise him?

The taxi took meandering turns down narrow lanes. “They all look the same,” the driver remarked, his tall figure bent as he struggled to look through the windshield. Indeed, the roads did look the same — row after row of vehicles were parked in every inch of space available. Yawning over them were emaciated trees providing respite from the excessively harsh sun. Two boys with long rakish hair zoomed past on a motorcycle, their sunburnt faces exuding joy.

The car took a right turn and came upon an apartment gate populated by people in white. Some were on the phone while others were standing together in groups, waiting for instructions to be given. Dhruv paid the taxi and stepped out, smoothening the creases on his white kurta. He felt a strange sensation in the pit of his stomach. He had, since he received the news, thrust it in the back of his mind, refusing to engage with it, and had himself been vaguely surprised by his stoic reaction. Now it was bubbling in his gut, threatening to spill over.

Dhruv exchanged handshakes and condolences with people he assumed were family, and was shown directions to the flat on the first floor. The door was open, and smoke billowed out from the narrow entrance, wafting in tune with the pandit’s recitations. Some of the furniture had been moved and replaced by threaded mats to accommodate the shraddh ceremony ( funeral rites). There was an air of forced busyness inside the flat; people scurried about carrying various things, whispering quietly to each other or into their phones, as if stillness would collapse the facade that had so painstakingly been constructed by everyone present. Without this structured pretence, reality itself would lose its consistency, and make them confront that which perhaps lacked definition.

In one corner of the room, some women sat huddled together, rocking to and fro. Dhruv recognised Digant’s mother amongst them. Her eyes were red and puffy, and her distant gaze seemed to pierce through the opposite wall. A ceiling fan turned lugubriously near to where she sat. Mr. Singh, Digant’s father, sat next to the officiating priest, his fingers locked tightly together as he tried to follow the priest’s sharp intonations. His eyes were glued to the body that lay in front. The flicker of recognition in his eyes upon seeing Dhruv soon transformed into a dull glaze.

 Dhruv moved closer, his hands folded in a namaste-like posture. It was wrapped in a white shroud, with cotton buds placed in the nose. There were dark pouches under the eyes. The skin too had aged; the glowing white of ten years ago had now turned into a sickly yellow. He peered hard at what had once been Digant. Try as he might, Dhruv ​​couldn’t muster anything as complete and engulfing as grief. The pinch of bereavement he felt was for a life snuffed out, a death that had taken place, utterly devoid of particularities.

Dhruv had received the news last night through the school group. More details had emerged, once the initial outpouring of shock and concern had subsided. The rope had been tied to the ceiling fan, and the door locked from inside. No note had been found and no foul play suspected, though he had been known to lead a rough life.

Dhruv glanced around the room and spotted a familiar face at the end of the passage. He walked towards Rohit and they hugged awkwardly, putting one arm sideways around the other’s shoulder. Rohit had been in Digant’s section, and had also been part of the football team with Dhruv. His hair had already started greying; a paunch of considerable size jutted out from his middle. Standing next to him were two other schoolmates whose faces he recognised but whose names he couldn’t recall. They politely nodded at each other. It felt odd to meet under such circumstances.

Leaning against a wall, Dhruv and Rohit observed the proceedings, with hands clasped respectfully at the front. The priest was pouring ghee into the crackling fire while chanting archaic mantras. Their eyes smarted from the smoke of fiery oblations; tears of grief freely mingled with those produced by the stinging fire. Dhruv found his mind wandering. He wondered what view tradition accorded to such an event, and whether the rites would be different in this case. There was an uneasiness in the room that belied even the genuine concern he could see entrenched on faces and eyes. Rohit turned to Dhruv, put a hand around his shoulder, and said in a caressing voice, “I can’t even begin to imagine what you are going through. After all, you guys were best friends.”

Dhruv started, his feet almost giving away under him. Suddenly thirsty, he stumbled towards the kitchen, wading through the ever-increasing number of people. More than concern, it felt like an unbidden accusation. Surely calling them as best friends would be going too far? Yes, they had spent some important years of their childhood together, but that was true for everyone who had lived in the locality and gone to their school. It felt intrusive to think that someone else had formed such an important opinion without bothering to consult him or the facts.

The water filter beeped a faint red as water began to drip out of the nozzle. Flashes of the distant past, sieved through his memory, came upon Dhruv — bunking school and spending the day playing pool at one of the shady centers in Pitampura, the regular fights they’d get into, alcohol, rustication… Image after image played successively in the recesses of his mind; he was unable to think of a single school memory that didn’t have Digant in it.

Dhruv suddenly felt swamped by unreality. His current existence — his job as an advertising filmmaker, his daughter and wife back in Bangalore — had nothing to do with the memories that now assuaged him from all sides. He had lost touch with everyone as soon as he entered college, and had somehow managed to do well for himself, despite the odds, proving everyone — including his parents — wrong. He was now fully wedded to a life of ‘upward mobility’ and the sophistication that came with it. Indeed, his entire childhood, including Rohit and the others lounging outside, seemed now like a mythology that had been invented from scratch. To think that he had grown up in this grimy locality of corruption and crime, sharing secrets and confessions, shouting songs of friendship and love, with the same people whom he could barely recognise seemed to him a fiction of the highest order. 

The kitchen window was blowing wind like a furnace, and he found it difficult to breathe. Stepping out, he made his way to the bathroom and locked the fledgling door. The drain cover had mounds of wet hair stuck to it. Sitting on the commode, another hazy image assuaged him, sending shudders through his body. A drunken reverie, teenage angst, him and Digant, valiant and masculine, proclaiming their allegiance to the famous 27 club as a revolt against life, their deaths too enshrined in history …

Later, at the crematorium, the men listlessly shifted their weight and scratched their faces as they stood huddled around the burning pyre. Dhruv had helped with the preparations and now, standing at a distance, watched plumes of smoke merge with the blinding sky. Bereft of its materiality, Digant again existed as he had before, as a submerged and fleeting reminiscence. Dhruv suddenly felt tired and nauseous. A vague feeling of inertia hit him. The present moment curdled in the heat of the afternoon, and he was confronted with lumps of empty time as it stretched across the burial ground, shimmering and undulating like the funeral fire. Unable to stand it, he nudged Rohit on the shoulder and whispered into his ear if he wanted to go have a beer afterwards.

 *

Years later, while directing some extras for an advertising shoot in Himachal, Dhruv would spot a local theatre performer — a dot on the camera monitor — struggling to master the sequence. In exasperation, he would yell out, “Digant, keep to your mark and don’t stray out of the circle.” Non-plussed faces would stare back at him, unsure of who he was talking to. The words that had come crashing out would be swallowed back just as soon, followed by a long period of silence. For the rest of the day, he would walk around in a reeling daze, and try not to stare at the young man who had unwittingly, instantaneously reminded him of what had once been.

Vedant Srinivas studied Philosophy and went on to do a diploma in Filmmaking. His interests fall in the interstices of literature, anthropology, cinema, and poetry.

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A Balochi Folktale: The Precious Pearl

Translated from the Balochi retelling* by Fazal Baloch

Courtesy: Creative Commons

Once there lived a poor man who made his living by selling firewood. One day he was chopping a tree in a forest when suddenly his axe got stuck in a log. Despite all his efforts, he could not pull out the axe.

A bird perching on the tree asked: “Who are you? Why are you chopping the tree?”

“I’m a poor man. I sell firewood to feed my family,” replied the man.

The bird gave him a pearl and said: “It’s the most precious pearl in the world. Sell it out and live the rest of your life in prosperity. And listen, never come to the forest to split trees again”.

The man took the pearl and strolled back home. When his wife saw him coming with empty hands, she shouted at him and said: “Where is the wood? What will our children eat today?”

The poor man held her the pearl and said: “Take this and sell it.”

The woman carried the pearl to a shop and said: “I’ve a pearl to sell.”

 The shopkeeper after examining the pearl and said: “It’s a very precious pearl. I’m afraid I can’t pay you its price even if I continue paying through my my lifetime.”

The woman said: “First give us some ration. I’ll leave the pearl with you. Sell it out in the market and pay us the reminder of the money.”

The shopkeeper agreed.

The woman returned home and asked her husband to go catch the bird and bring it home. She said: “When we have the bird in our possession we will soon run into enormous wealth. The money we are going to obtain from this one pearl is like stagnant water which will soon dry out and we will become poor again.”

But the husband replied: “How can I go to the jungle again? I made a promise to the bird that I would never turn up there again”.

“It doesn’t matter. Go and strike the tree with your axe. When the bird addresses you, pretend to be deaf. Eventually, it will alight on your shoulder and draw its beak close to your ear. That is the time to capture it.”

The husband did exactly what the wife had told him. When the bird perched on his shoulder, he caught hold of him and carried it home. They made a beautiful cage for it. It was a pretty bird. His both sons always played with it.

The shopkeeper, who actually was a wizard, assumed that it was perhaps the magical bird about whom he had heard many stories. Whoever should eat the bird’s meat would become a king. Whoever ate the liver, would find a pearl under his pillow every morning. He yearned to possess the bird.

The shopkeeper had also started seducing women. A woman fell in love with him inasmuch as that she killed her husband to marry her new lover.

A month after their marriage one day the shopkeeper asked his wife: “How much do you love me?”

“I love you more than my own life.”

“Can you kill the bird for me?” asked the husband.

“Of course.”

The wife stole the bird and killed it.

Then the husband advised the wife thus: “Cook its meat, liver and skull in three separate pots.”

The wife followed her husband’s instructions and cooked the bird in three different pots and retired to her room for a nap. When his wife’s sons from her first marriage returned home, their old maidservant who had heard the conversation of the couple, told them everything about their mother’s relationship with their stepfather and the secret about consuming the bird’s meat and liver. Then she asked the boys to eat the bird’s meat and liver and leave immediately. She feared their stepfather would kill them if he learnt that they had devoured the bird. The elder brother ate the meat while the younger one consumed the liver quickly and they left the house.

The maidservant buried the bird’s skull, tore her dress, smeared her hair with dust and began wailing. The woman came out to see what was going on. The maidservant said: “Your sons assaulted me. They consumed the bird and left. I called you out for help but you didn’t listen”.

When his husband came to know about this, he shouted in rage: “I’ll not leave the boys alive. I’ll find them wherever they have gone.”

After wandering for almost a whole day, the two brothers reached a jungle in the evening and decided to spend the night under a tree. Off in the distance, they noticed a spiralling dust approaching them. They knew it was the wizard following them.

The two brothers shot at the dust with their arrows. As a result, the wizard was wounded and could not proceed forth. Both brothers decided that when one brother slept, the other would stand guard there to keep a watch for wild animals. The elder brother slept first.

The younger brother noticed the presence of a bird on the tree. Since they were hungry, he shot the bird. It fell on the ground. He needed fire to roast the bird but he did not have any matchstick on him. Far in the distance he noticed the flames of a fire. So, he hurried towards it. But the more he went forward, the farther the fire moved. At last, he gave up and took returned to his brother.

Meanwhile, when the elder brother woke up and did not find his brother, he thought he might have been killed by a wild beast. Thus, with a heavy heart he resumed his journey. He reached a city and found a huge crowd had gathered. He enquired what was happening of one person. The man told him that their king had died and as per their custom the queen would release a bird, and whosoever the bird perched on, would be appointed the king. He stood at a corner to see how things would unfold. The queen released the bird, everyone held his breath, the bird soared high and then perched on the boy’s shoulder. Everybody was surprised!

As he was a stranger in the city, the elders decided to release the bird again. Not the second but the third trail also brought the same result. Hence, he was conducted to the palace, where he was crowned as the new king of the land. Since he was worried about his younger brother, he made a proclamation saying that whosoever saw a stranger in the city, should produce him before the king.

When the younger brother reached back to the tree, there was no trace of his elder brother. He assumed his elder brother had left and it was perhaps not destined they would cross paths again. Thus, with a heavy heart he resumed his journey.

At dawn he reached the frontiers of a city. Soldiers apprehended him and asked him who he was and where he was heading. He told them: “I’m a stranger and am looking for my lost brother.”

The soldiers started beating him till he became unconscious. All of a sudden, one of the soldiers remembered the proclamation of the king about a stranger. To avoid the king’s wrath, they secretly threw the boy into a well. In the morning, a washerman came to draw water.

He found the bucket unusually heavy. Thus he pleaded: “O, whether you are a human, a jinn or an angel, please leave my bucket. I have to wash huge piles of cloth to feed my family”.

The boy replied from beneath the well saying:

“I’m a human being. Pray draw me out. From today onward, I’ll be like your son and you will be like my father.”

The washerman at last drew him out of the well. When he was unconscious, water had coursed into his belly. He vomited out a huge sum of the pearls. The washerman was astonished. He gathered the pearls in the bucket and took the boy home. Now every morning, a pearl would show up under the boy’s pillow.

One day the boy, now known as the “washerman’s son” was walking outside, when vizier’s daughter saw him. She immediately fell for him and expressed her desire to marry him to her mother. The next day, her mother sent for the boy. When the boy came, she asked him to marry her daughter, but the boy refused. She offered him enormous wealth and riches, but he turned down her proposal. The woman decided to teach the boy a lesson for his ‘misdemeanour’.

One day, the king prepared a boat and dispatched it to the sea in search of pearls. When vizier’s wife got the news, she secretly summoned the captain and hatched with him a plot to murder the boy.

The captain secretly tied a rope to the boat and the other end of the rope he tied to a huge boulder buried beneath the boat. When they tried to drag forth the boat to the water, it would not move.

The captain said: “We must seek the help of the astrologer.”

The king summoned the astrologer. Since he was the part of the conspiracy, he said: “The boat needs the offerings of the blood of the washerman’s boy”.

The astrologer summoned the washerman and the boy. He told him that the boat needed the blood of his son. The boy had no choice but to give the offering of his blood. The astrologer said that he would give him enormous wealth which would never be exhausted for many generations in exchange of the boy’s blood. The poor washerman left the boy with the astrologer and walked back home with a grief-stricken heart.

The boy was taken to the shore. The boy turned to the astrologer and said: “Does the boat need me or my blood?”

“It’s your blood, “replied the astrologer.

The next moment, the boy cut his fingertips and smeared the boat with blood.

When the vizier’s wife got the news of the failure of her plot, she was disappointed. However, she racked her evil brain and asked the captain to take the boy along and throw him into the sea. The captain requested the king to accompany such a wise boy on the expedition. Thus, the boy was summoned and taken along.

One morning, one of the crew members found a pearl on the spot where the boy had slept during the night. He took the pearl to the captain. The captain asked him to be on guard to see where the pearl would come from. The crew member secretly kept an eye on the boy. He noticed that the pearl was produced by the sweat of the boy. He told the captain. Since they were in the quest for pearls, and the source of the pearl was with them on the boat, they exposed the boy to the fire, scratched his body and gathered a huge amount of the pearl from his body. This continued for many days until the boy turned pale and frail.

One day the boy noticed a tree in the middle of the sea. It was all green till midnight and turned yellow after midnight. The boy was curious to know the mystery behind it. At late hours of the night, the boy noticed a horse with forty foals nibbling its tender branches. He seized hold of the horse. The horse pleaded to let go of it. He gave a bit of its hair and said:

“Whenever you are in trouble and need my help, just show a fire to the hair I will arrive”. The boy took the hair and let the horse vanish.

After journeying for many days, they finally reached a city by the shore. The captain anchored the boat on the shore, and they strolled towards the city. They walked into a jeweller’s shop. The boy turned to the jeweller and said the gold he was selling was blended with impurities. The boy’s words did not sit well with the jeweller, and they started to argue.

The jeweller said: “If you prove the impurities in my gold, I will give my daughter to you as your wife”.

The boy said: “If I’m proved wrong, I’m ready to be beheaded”.

The boy continued: “Bring a hammer and let me strike on a piece of a gold. If it shatters apart, you will see the traces of impurities”.

The jeweller brought him the hammer. When he struck the gold, it shattered into many pieces.

The jeweller was embarrassed and admitted the error of his ways. He married off his daughter to the boy. After staying for a few days with his wife, the boy along with the other crew members proceeded ahead. Since they were to take the same route upon their return, he left his wife at home.

After sailing for a few more days, they reached a city which resembled Bombay. A huge crowd had gathered on the ground. The boy asked someone what was going on there.

“A horse race”, he replied. “The winner will be married to vizier’s daughter and the losers will lose their life as they will be beheaded”.

The boy approached the king and expressed his desire to take part in the race. Away from the sight of the crowd, he exposed the hair to the fire and the horse emerged before him. It was a very frail and weak horse, and everybody sneered at it. When the race began all swift horses ran out of the sight and the boy with his frail horse was left behind. When they were away from the crowd’s sight, the horse soared ahead and flew past the horses running on the ground and reached the destination.

Everyone in the crowd stood astonished at how such a frail and weak horse could beat all the fastest horses in the race. Hence the boy was married to the vizier’s daughter. After staying for a few days with his wife, the boy along with the other crew members went their way. Since they were to take the same route upon their return, he left his wife at home.

This time around they sailed over to another coastal city. Its streets were deserted. They asked a passer-by why there was nobody out on the street. He told them that the king had arranged a feast to pick a groom for his daughter.

They went to the feast. The king along with his courtiers, viziers and emissaries had gathered there. Whosoever wanted to marry the princess, had to defeat the wrestler. He was such an ugly, fierce man that just a glimpse of him was enough to send ripples of fear in people’s hearts. But the boy walked over and accepted the challenge. Before stepping into the ring, away from the sight of the crowd, he secretly exposed the hair to the fire. The horse emerged. The boy told him that he had challenged the king’s wrestler, and now he needed his help to defeat him. The horse said, “Just hold your arms around his waist, I will kick him so hard that it will soar in the air. Nobody will be able to see me”.

When the boy walked into the ring, the wrestler laughed at him. The boy held his arms around his waist and pretended to lift him up. In the very moment the horse kicked him so hard that he swung in the air and with a huge thud fell on the ground. Everybody, including the king, was amazed to see how the boy overcame their otherwise undefeated wrestler. Since he had won the fight, the king married his daughter to him.

After staying for a few days with his wife, the boy was told by the captain to prepare for his return. The king said farewell to his daughter. He gave an entourage of one hundred folks including servants and soldiers to accompany his daughter. In the next city, the boy took his second wife, the vizier’s daughter. He too gave her a group of one hundred soldiers and servants to accompany her. Then they went to jeweller’s city, where the young wife took his third wife along. The boy told his wives the everything about himself and his brother.

He also cautioned them that the captain wanted to throw him into the sea. He told his wives to tie him with a rope so that, if he was thrown into the sea, they could save him by pulling the rope. At night, he along with his wives, pretended to be asleep, the captain quietly picked him up and threw him into the sea. The wives immediately pulled him out. He told them to lock him inside the giant wooden box they had with them. In the morning, the captain told the women that since their husband had drowned, he was going to marry them.

One of the wife said: “We are ready to marry you, but marriage can’t be solemnised in the boat. Let’s reach offshore first”. The captain agreed.

After journeying for many days, they finally reached their destination. The king presented the pearls to the king and asked him to solemnise their marriage with the three women.

One of the women turned to the king and said: “Before performing the marriage ritual, let me tell you a tale first”.

“Go ahead”, said the king.

She started it with the tale of the bird which gave a pearl to the king’s father. Then she told the audience how the wood cutter’s wife persuaded his husband to catch the bird. When she said: “The two brothers ate the bird’s meat and liver and left their home”, the king thought how that story resembled their own but he did not interfere and continued listening.

However, when she told the audience that the boy was thrown to the sea, the king couldn’t help but shouted: “Where is the boy? He’s my brother”.

“I don’t know anything about him. I’m just telling you a tale”, said the woman.

But when the king insisted, she pointed towards the giant box and said: “Open the box”.

The box was opened and out came his younger brother. They hugged each other with tears of happiness. The king punished the astrologer, vizier’s wife and captain.

Both the brothers lived happily ever after.

(*This folktale was originally published in Balochi in Gauhar Qeemati, an anthology of Balochi folktales, compiled by Rahim Mehr and published by Higher Education Commission Pakistan in 2012. Fazal Baloch has the translation rights to this piece.)

Fazal Baloch is a Balochi writer and translator. He has translated many Balochi poems and short stories into English. His translations have been featured in Pakistani Literature published by Pakistan Academy of Letters and in the form of books and anthologies.

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Viral Wisdom

By Rhys Hughes

Courtesy: Creative Commons

The Optimistic Hypochondriac

“I caught covid last week but I already had typhoid, rabies and malaria, and they all cancelled each other out.” — The Optimistic Hypochondriac

I like the Optimistic Hypochondriac. I regard him as my friend, but not a close friend, oh no! I don’t want to get too close to him in case he gives me his germs. I am sure he has plenty of germs, more than he needs for himself. And he has always been a generous chap, the sort of man who would be very happy indeed to share his illnesses with anyone else.

I remember in the old days how hypochondria wasn’t an infectious disease. But there is now growing evidence that the virus that causes hypochondria has undergone a mutation and is starting to spread among people who never believe they are ill. This means that hypochondria will probably become rampant in the next few years. What a dreadful notion!

I keep myself fit by going for regular runs on the beach. This morning I ran five miles on the beach. I am pleased with my performance, but my fear is that after finishing I will be stopped by the police. “Why are you out of breath? Why are you sweating? Why do you have a high temperature? You must have the virus. It’s off to quarantine with you — on Devils’ Island!”

Devils’ Island is an extremely unpleasant place. It was where all the devils in the world lived before they emigrated. The devils’ diaspora is one that hasn’t been studied in great depth yet by academics. Some of the devils went North, East and South, but most of them went West.

To “go west” can also mean to perish or disappear. The devils who went North went west, if you see what I mean, but the devils who went East didn’t, nor did the devils who went South. It gets rather confusing. But if you meet a devil, no matter where you happen to be, you can be sure that originally he was an inhabitant of Devils’ Island, which is still covered with cooling lava. People who are imprisoned there have to keep hopping.

I keep hopping too, or rather I keep hoping — hoping that I will never be sent to Devil’s Island just because I have broken the quarantine rules imposed by my government at short notice. I ought to pack a swimsuit in a suitcase just to be prepared for that horrible eventuality.

Some women pack swimsuits that are radioactive in their luggage if they think there’s a chance they might be sent to Devils’ Island. Radioactivity keeps any remaining devils away. Are there any remaining devils? Difficult to say, but not as difficult to say as “imagine an imaginary menagerie” which is a sequence of words I often have trouble with.

Better to be safe than sorry! If you are a woman in danger of being sent to Devils’ Island, be sure to pack a radioactive swimsuit. Is it bad advice to suggest the wearing of a radioactive swimsuit? No, because there’s nothing wrong with bikinis atoll. Now let’s move on —

Well, I moved on, and here I am. The Optimistic Hypochondriac has called me on the telephone to tell me that a new pandemic has started.  The singer Buster Octavius is going to give a concert to raise money, but no one knows what the money is being raised for. Buster Octavius says it is being raised because that’s better than letting it fall onto the ground.

It will be a socially distanced concert, which means that members of the audience will have to stand six feet apart. Most audience members don’t have six feet. They are human beings and only have two legs, like you and I. The six feet rule might be good for insects but for mammals it’s a disaster waiting to happen. And have you ever seen a disaster waiting to happen? They get nervous and pace up and down and growl in the wings.

The reason they wait in the wings has nothing to do with the fact that such shows as Buster Octavius is planning usually take place in a theatre. No, they wait in the wings because birds have wings and bird flu is a disease that is always a strong pandemic candidate.

Buster Octavius is a pseudonym. His real name is a closely guarded secret and the guards who guard it cannot be bribed. I have already tried. And so has the Optimistic Hypochondriac. He says, “He broke twelve semitones and that’s why he calls himself Buster Octavius.”

Quarantine regulations are coming into force and it has only been a couple of hours before the new pandemic was officially announced. My movements will be restricted once again to my home and a small area around it. I might begin to dig a tunnel in my cellar, both to pass the time and to enable me to travel further than I am allowed. The tunnel will point in the opposite direction to my office. Just to give me some illusion of freedom!

I can’t honestly say I dislike my job. When I started there last year, I was warned by my new colleagues that my new boss was a “micromanager” but when I started work at the laboratory the conditions were relaxed and no one criticised the details of anything I did.

In fact, there didn’t seem to be a manager of any sort present in the work space. Then one morning I happened to glance through a microscope and saw him jumping about on the slide and tearing his hair out. He was very angry but his voice was far too quiet to be heard.

I had never expected him to be a virus instead of a man!

The Optimistic Hypochondriac advises me to wear a mask. In fact, he tells me to wear two masks — over my ears. If the singing of Buster Octavius doesn’t kill the virus in a fifty-mile radius and help to end this new pandemic, then nothing will. It is good advice and I take it. But then, having taken it, I change my mind and put it back. But he doesn’t want it back. We argue and tussle for almost half an hour before we both admit defeat.

If the pandemic is already here, then why not just quarantine the whole world in one go, instead of sections of it? That way, we will technically be in quarantine, as all the health authorities recommend, but able to travel around freely just like we used to, and everything will continue on the surface of the planet as before. I think this is an excellent solution. A win-win!

We would only have to deal with that tiny minority who call themselves “astronauts” by refusing to let them back into the atmosphere and presto! This approach would save a lot of money and time and effort. Lots of my friends at school were interested in outer space and wanted to be astronauts but I don’t think many of them managed it. When I was little and was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I replied, “An adult.”

An impractical choice, I feel.

Buster Octavius is allowed to sing his doleful dirges, highly amplified, out at the captive inhabitants of the innocent city, but all the theatres have been closed and actors are out of work. This seems unfair.

To put it another way: thanks to this new pandemic, all theatre has become Japanese in style because ‘Noh Plays’ are being performed on every stage. Even Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre is about to close. But I bet they will stage one last play there… “Two Gentleman of Corona”.

The rules are being tightened. Now we aren’t allowed out of the house at all. I doubt if the Optimistic Hypochondriac will conform to this restriction. He will be arrested for breaking the law and sent to Devil’s Island instead of me. One thing I still find baffling. If people aren’t allowed out at all because of the risk of spreading the virus, why are the police allowed to approach and arrest those who do venture out? Surely the police spread the virus just the same as any other human? Oughtn’t there to be a second set of police to approach and arrest the first set, and a third set to approach and arrest the second set, and a fourth to approach and arrest the third.

And so on, forever? If not, the process isn’t logical.

As part of the fight against the virus I note that Washington DC has changed its name to Washinghands DC.  This news doesn’t concern me very much at the moment, but when I have finished tunnelling under the Atlantic Ocean I surely will sit up and take notice

It will take me at least nine months to tunnel as far as the comfortable home of the Optimistic Hypochondriac. In the meantime, Devils’ Island is rapidly filling up with arrested police officers. It will take me centuries to tunnel as far as the city of Washinghands DC. Even nine months is too long to dig tunnels. But that is how I intend to keep myself busy.

How will other people occupy their enforced leisure time? I am supposing that there will be a baby boom in nine months. And thirteen years after that, we will witness the rise of the “quaranteens”.

It turns out that the Optimistic Hypochondriac is also digging a tunnel of his own — in the direction of my house.

Therefore, we meet each other after only four and a half months of toil. He has some strange news for me. The virus responsible for this pandemic is one that hypochondriacs are immune to. But everyone else can catch it. He knows that I have never been a hypochondriac.

“I think you should change your name,” he tells me.

“To what?” I ask him.

“Virusman,” he says, and he grins.

Virusman. Unlike other superheroes he never catches criminals, they catch him instead! There is a little song that will be associated with him and it goes like this: “Virusman, Virusman / does whatever a virus can. / Can he replicate inside the cells / of all the jails in Tunbridge Wells? / You bet! / Atchoo! / Here comes the Virusman…” But I have my doubts. I have never been to Tunbridge Wells. What if it is worse than Devils’ Island?

I knew it was rash to sign the new contract sent to me by my virus provider, but I never imagined how itchy the rash would be. Fortunately, I was able to use the get-out claws to scratch myself.

Buster Octavius has been sent to Devils’ Island. Those poor remaining devils, how I feel sorry for them!

Courtesy: Creative Commons

The Polite Antibody

An antibody met a germ and said, “How do you do? I am very happy to make your acquaintance. Would you like a cup of tea? May I fetch you a cake? If you require anything to improve your comfort, please let me know and I’ll do my best to provide it. I like your colour, shape and other physical characteristics. What a fine germ you are! I admire you so much.”

 “Well, that reaction wasn’t what I was expecting!” cried the germ. “I came here to infect this bloodstream, but I don’t think I’ll do that now. I am too charmed by your kind words.”

 “It’s a new style of resistance and I’m glad it seems to work. It’s called diplomatic immunity,” said the antibody.

Courtesy: Creative Commons

Rhys Hughes has lived in many countries. He graduated as an engineer but currently works as a tutor of mathematics. Since his first book was published in 1995 he has had fifty other books published and his work has been translated into ten languages.

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The Agent

By Paul Mirabile

Nisa, Portugal. Courtesy: Creative Commons

  “ … And do you think our present government is meeting the demands of its people ?” spouted the Spokesman Doctor, chairman of the Portuguese Communist Party Delegation in Nisa. Seated in a squalid, fly-laden café, he directed his poignant words towards a group of glassy-eyed villagers, seemingly rather perplexed at such a display of political pathos. He had been at it now for at least two hours.

A dusty gust of wind and shuffling of feet directed the villagers’ languid attention to the doorway. Long strips of coloured plastic peevishly scraped against one another. Someone stepped in : a young man, well-to-do, by his appearance, obviously not from Nisa. He side-stepped a dozing dwarf, making his way to the counter. All glassy eyes fell on the stranger.

 “You never answer questions,” the Spokesman Doctor said, turning on the villagers coldly, although keeping a watchful eye on the stranger at the counter. “All of you, how long are you going to sit here swallowing insult and humiliation ? You can’t live on olives and bread alone. Look at our land … where are the tractors ? Where’s the money from America ?” There was no reply to those beseeching questions, only the slight chuckling of the stranger, who leaned gingerly at the bar sipping a coffee.

 “You’d rather live then without running water and electricity ?” the Doctor spat out, staring hard at the stranger, who stared back at the Doctor even harder. “And still you don’t understand my questions.” One skinny, toothless fellow made some effort to amuse the Spokesman Doctor, but only succeeded in ordering another cup of coffee. The stranger broke into a wide grin. All eyes peered at him from yellow, sunken sockets. He broke the frosty silence by asking in the most delicious courtesy, but in the most atrocious Portuguese, for a glass of iced lemonade.

The unexpected appearance of this stranger brought whispered comments from the villagers. The Spokesman Doctor’s wiry face eyed the stranger with suspicion. He set aside his cup of coffee. A fly aimlessly found itself inside the sugar-coated rim of the cup where it remained until the Spokesman Doctor swished it disdainfully away.

“Are you Portuguese ?” he asked, rhetorically, with a slight accent of irony. The young man turned to him and answered in his choppy Portuguese that he was not, adding a few instants later that he was an American on visit to a friend whom he works with in France. This last phrase was declared in excellent French, something which surprised many of the villagers, most of whom had worked in France for years. The most astounded, however, was the Spokesman Doctor.

“So you have a friend in Nisa ?”

 “Yes I do,” returned the American, catching a note of doubt in the Doctor’s authoritative tone.

 “Who is this friend of yours ?”

“Domingo Flaco, but he’s still in France just now. I think he’s on his way, or at least he should be. I’m not certain ; he wrote me some time ago.”

“Do you still have the letter ?”

The American searched the Doctor’s tiny, black eyes, twitching nervously in their sockets.“No, am I supposed to have it ?”  the other retorted dully.

The lanky American’s easy flow of speech and command of French relieved some of the villagers’ mistrustful thoughts, thoughts put there by the Doctor’s obsessional fear of alien spies in the mountain villages. Domingo’s name set the villagers at ease, but the Doctor remained on his guard, shifting irritably about the table, playing mindlessly with his empty cup of coffee. Another fly, finding itself helplessly stuck in the grounds of the coffee, the Doctor savagely crushed it with his thumb. He seemed to sense something foul ; something amiss, even insalubrious in this clean-cut American who spoke excellent French. Domingo indeed did live in Nisa, that was an undeniable fact. But what would an American be doing with Domingo … a poor mountain peasant who had immigrated to France, and there was presently working on a wine farm ? This relation had no logical link to it, or if it did, it completely escaped his wits. A well-to-do American visiting a peasant in the poverty of Portugal concealed a reason that his imagination could not fathom.

The Spokesman Doctor fell on his prey like a lion : “Does anyone know him ?” he asked the villagers in Portuguese. There followed a long pause. During that pause the American ordered another lemonade, quite unaware that he had become the topic of discussion. Nonchalantly he drained his glass, eyeing the assembly curiously. Again a jumble of words struck him oddly. The cold lemonade contrasted sharply with the heat that had been accumulating around him.

“Do you know this American ?” asked the Spokesman Doctor again, but this time addressing the veiny-face villager behind the counter.

 “I think he does work with Domi,” he responded, wiping the counter for about the hundredth time which scattered the vexatious flies.

 “No, I don’t think he does work with Domingo,” rallied the Doctor hurriedly. “I saw him handing out Jesus Christ leaflets yesterday. He was haranguing people for money. Then he went from bar to bar asking questions. Where’s your papers, American ?” The Doctor shot a fiery glance at the young man, who for one, was relieved that this man had finally spoken to him directly, and in French.

“What papers ?” he inquired. The Spokesman Doctor laughed haughtily. The others followed, but with more restraint. The Doctor now felt he had hit the nail on the head. His ‘people’ were with him, as always. “Come on, we want to see your papers. I saw you yesterday handing out Jesus Christ leaflets to people in the streets.”

The American wiped the sweat off his forehead, intrigued more by the use of ‘we’ than by the accusation. “What the hell are you talking about ?” replied the American, crimsoning under the glow of a dozen eyes.

“Are you a Communist ?” rifled the Doctor. The American nodded in the negative, taken aback by the bluntness of the question.

“Are you then a Capitalist ?” Again the same negative nod.

 “Then you are nothing but an evangelizing parasite !” A pasty smile flitted across his lips. The American breathed deeply, moving a trembling finger across the counter. He couldn’t think of anything to say to defend himself ; all this seemed utter nonsense.

“Where are your papers ?” asked the Spokesman Doctor cloyingly.

 “What in God’s name are you raving about, man ?” fired the American, stepping back, the enraged flies skirling about his red, sweaty face.

Again the Doctor smiled, slowly pushing his way towards the circle of villagers round the counter.

“Do you know about the CIA here in Portugal ?”

This question frightened the stranger. He brushed his flaky blond hair from his forehead, then threw the villagers a bewildering look. “Should l know about it ?” he retorted, involuntarily shifting his right foot towards the swaying, plastic strips of the doorway.

Suddenly a man shouted out coarsely : “No Doctor, he does work with Domi in France. I saw him there six months ago when I visited my cousin in Beaune.”

“No !” brayed the Spokesman Doctor vehemently. “I tell you I saw him yesterday handing out  Jesus Christ leaflets. You know, there’s lots of those people in Portugal today, mostly Americans, too … you know, with the elections coming up … Look what happened before the last elections … the same thing, American agents running about the countryside posing as people of the Jesus Christ Movement.” This last statement was met by incredulous glances from the villagers. They all acknowledged the Doctor as a grand man, politically astute and well-read, but a doubt reigned over their blurry, uneducated minds. And yet, it was true: an American in Nisa posed a problem, and raised a mystery that none, at least in that hot and illiterate café, could unravel.

“You know a lot about many things, don’t you ?”enquired the Spokesman Doctor, ingratiatingly. This time the subject of conversation did not deign to reply. The Doctor scoffed at this show of pretense. “I don’t know American, but I saw you yesterday going from café to café with those dirty leaflets in your hands. There’s something about you I can’t understand. I know you speak excellent Portuguese, too.” With this ‘compliment’, if it may be considered as one, the American lifted an enigmatic eyebrow.

“There’s a lot of CIA activity in this area round election time,” continued the Doctor with his pasty smile. “Communism is very strong in our villages. Look around you … everything is falling apart in our villages. Americans are to blame for the poverty of our country.”

 “Not Americans,” blared out the young man beside himself. “The …”

 “No !” screamed the other louder than his rival. “I don’t want to listen to your sweet, poisoned words. Laughing, he turned away to speak quietly to his people.”

Many words darted in and round the savage, swirling flies, words which the American was at a loss to comprehend. He could have left, the way was clear to the door. But he remained adamant in his right to be in that café and drink coffee with the villagers. No proxy lout of a Communist courtier would eject him from that public place. Then a strange sensation crept up on him : everyone appeared to have come to some sort of resolution … verdict would be a better word … As if he had been accused of some crime. He saw the jury to his right … then the judge, to his left, a dark man, sporting a moustache with a horrible pasty smile.

“We have found the accused guilty,” came a hushed, indescribable voice. A wave of panic seized the accused.

“Guilty … guilty of what ?” The sad, sunken eyes of the jury hung suspended in the air. The flies, too, seemed to have adjourned their monotonous gyrating. The eyes of the judge were laughing at him, as a sickly moustache inched its black way into the left corner of his mouth.

— Has everyone gone crazy ? the American thought. –An innocent man has been falsely accused. Yes, something is very wrong here. How could this have happened ? I only came in for a cup of coffee ! Really I did … — These inner pleadings hammered at his temples, hot and pulsating. Was it real ? –To the doorway– were his next whispered words. –Must escape before they trap me in here.– The American rushed towards the doorway but scraping feet forced him to swing his shoulder to the left. –It’s not true … they’re on me. For what ? — A knotty fist shot out. He blocked it with his forearm. Then another which again he easily countered. –They’re all crazy … really crazy, — a tiny voice within him admonished.

He wanted to speak aloud but his voice found no chamber to echo his confused thoughts. Something cracked in his mouth; blood filled the spaces between his teeth. He stumbled back, catching hold of the counter. Turning, he faced his judge, and in an instant of crystal clarity he caught sight of a dull, metal object in his hairy hand. A flame tore through his belly. He grabbed at it … fingered it … found clots of blood smeared on it.

“What have you done ?” he managed to spit out in a flow of blood, his eyesight gradually fading into an empty space behind his head.

The American crumbled to his side, still conscious of his surroundings. A face slid across his sight, that of a moustached man, smiling a very pasty, wicked smile. A glibly voice nettled what remained of his pride. “That will be all for you,” said the pasty, wicked smile.

And it was true what that smile said. For the young man moaned aloud, then lay still. Everyone rose and left the café …

Paul Mirabile is a retired professor of philology now living in France. He has published mostly academic works centred on philology, history, pedagogy and religion. He has also published stories of his travels throughout Asia, where he spent thirty years.

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Stories

The Rebel Sardar

By Devraj Singh Kalsi

Sikh Altar. Courtesy: Creative Commons

On Sangrand, Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife went to the Gurudwara with a bagful of marigold garlands in the morning. The canopy of the Lord would be bedecked with flowers of the season on the first day of the new month. The response was cold when he handed it over to the priest who walked a few steps to place it on the wooden table near the entrance door. The prolonged silence seeded doubt in Sardar Ratan Singh’s wife who asked him politely, “Any problem, Babaji?”

“The Gurudwara Committee has ordered flowers should not be brought inside the hall.  But I will do the job of decorating. Put these on the railings, the front part at least, and the rest near the main door. I will manage if the Committee members object,” Babaji assured the couple who brought these garlands with much devotion.

Sardar Ratan Singh was unable to figure out how the Gurudwara Committee, headed by the elderly, could issue such a guideline. Sardarni Simran Kaur was anguished to hear these words from the priest who was supposed to be the custodian of the Rehat Maryada, the code of conduct for Sikhs.

“The guideline goes against the Sikh tradition. All Gurudwaras are decorated with flowers during Gurpurab and other festive occasions,” Sardarni Simran Kaur asserted, with hope that this comparison would suffice.

Babaji endorsed her statement before reiterating his stand: “What you are saying is correct. I have myself seen that in many Gurudwaras. But I have to obey the Committee rules. I will do it today since you were unaware of the order, but next time onwards please do not bring flowers to decorate the Guru Granth Sahib. They will hold me responsible for breaking the rules.”

Although Babaji conveyed the rules of this particular Gurudwara, it was agonising to hear the outright rejection of floral service by devotees. Not the one to be cowed down, Sardarni Simran Kaur transformed herself into a warrior-spirited lady and made herself clear: “Thanks for being kind enough to allow this today, but the Gurudwara Committee has no power to frame such laws. I am going to bring flowers and garlands again and decorate the canopy myself. I would like to see how the Committee members gang up and stop me from doing this sewa (service).”

Babaji understood that the lady was determined to proceed with her plans. He stood with folded hands, with lowered gaze, with a humble request to reconsider the decision. Sardar Ratan Singh gauged the growing discomfort in Babaji who feared losing his job if he failed to execute the orders of the Committee.

Assuring Babaji that they would not drag him into the tussle with the Committee, Sardar Ratan Singh said, offering his visiting card, “You can mention my name to the Committee and ask them to have a word with me. We are going to bring flowers next month as well. If they charge you, just dial the number on this card and connect me to the Committee.”

Babaji was relieved he had their contact number to give to the Committee in case he was charged with dereliction of duty. Somewhat enthused by their confidence, a fleeting smile appeared on his sullen face. He carried the garlands inside the hall while Sardar Ratan Singh and Sardarni Simran Kaur proceeded to bow down before the Lord and pray for strength to stand up against injustice. Babaji began to decorate the front part of the canopy and specified to the couple once again that the remaining garlands would be used to decorate the entrance door. It appeared to be a risky exercise for Babaji to cover the sanctum sanctorum with flowers as he knew the members of the Committee would corner him in the evening durbar.

That is exactly what happened that evening when Sardar Ajit Singh entered the Gurudwara. Anger was etched his face as the garlands brushed against his turban. He cast a furious glance at Babaji who sat fine-tuning his musical instrument. After genuflecting before the Lord, Sardar Ajit Singh swerved around and hurled his first question: “Who brought these flowers?”

“Sardar Ratan Singh,” Babaji replied promptly without looking at him. He muffled his simmering anger with a tight slap on the tabla.

“Did you not tell him the Gurudwara rule?”

“I told everything but he gave me the phone number, to forward to the Committee if they objected,” Babaji responded while fishing out the visiting card from his kurta pocket and flashing it before his eyes. Sardar Ajit Singh hated English and he never read anything written in the Queen’s language. Babaji further added without losing composure, “Sardar Ratan Singh’s wife said she would come again with flowers next month.”

This nugget of information weakened the resolve of Sardar Ajit Singh who had a bad record of losing arguments with women. A couple of months ago, he threatened to drive out girls who spoke English instead of Punjabi inside the Gurudwara premises. Since he did readings from the holy scriptures every day, he exercised special authority and treated the Gurudwara as his fiefdom, seeking submissiveness from people to support the rules formulated by the Committee, based on his recommendations.

Despite being well-versed with Guru Granth Sahib, septuagenarian Sardar Ajit Singh showed no signs of understanding the true meaning of Shabad, the words of God and crushing his haume or ego. Since he hailed from a money-lending family which  had diversified into respectable businesses like travel and transport, he knew his brothers would support his decisions and the sangat, the fellowship, would never mess with those who wielded political clout and muscle power in society.

Showdown was unavoidable. The Committee would definitely object to what Sardar Ratan Singh was up to. Sardarni Simran Kaur expected the misgovernance phase to be over at the earliest – preferably through amicable discussions.

From reliable sources, it was gathered that Sardar Ratan Singh was relocating to Punjab. The Committee wondered whether it was better to avoid a conflict. Most of the members suggested a wait and watch policy. But the secretary and the treasurer were adamant that punitive action must be taken otherwise this would encourage others to flout the norms.

Sardar Ratan Singh noticed another shortcoming when Babaji did not offer the traditional karah parshad of flour halva after Ardaas, the Sikh prayers. When he asked for it, Babaji said with a tinge of regret, “The Committee stopped making karah parshad. Allowed only on special occasions.”

The cauldron was stirred once again as Sardarni Simran Kaur resumed the discontinued practice of preparing karah parshad in the gurudwara every day. Sardar Satwant Singh, who had become the Secretary five years ago, implemented this order and his acolytes rallied behind him in support. Being diabetic, many members of the Committee could not consume karah parshad. Babaji was asked to stop this exercise as the turnout was thin every evening. Though this excuse was not justifiable under any condition, the sangat was made the scapegoat.

It was a momentous decision in a Gurudwara but the Committee members harboured no guilt. The practice started by Guru Nanak had been discontinued by his followers here.

Sardar Ratan Singh and Sardarni Simran Kaur came with the necessary ingredients to the Gurudwara next week. Offering ghee, wheat flour, and sugar to Babaji, she said, “From now on, we would like to do karah parshad sewa every day, every month, every year.”

Babaji did not know how to react. This was the second instance in one month that made him nervous. Although devotees chose to prepare it for a day or two, this was a unique case where the couple wanted to take the full responsibility of sponsoring karah parshad for the entire year. Babaji realised this would be another provocation challenging the Gurudwara Committee. One individual was trying to revive a tradition that was suspended by the Committee. Since they were not incurring any expenses, they should have continued to stay out of it. But the pesky members would get curious to know who was behind the resumption of karah parshad.

“Babaji, use words like ‘Gurmukh parivar’(Gurmukh family) during ardaas instead of mentioning our name because it is not proper to highlight that while we perform a service for the community,” Sardar Ratan Singh requested the priest.

It was a valid ground to hide this secret. Babaji accepted the ingredients and specified the monthly quota of ingredients to be supplied henceforth. Agreeing to deliver the requirements, she said, “Since the Committee has stopped making karah parshad, we see no point in informing them about it. But we know they will interfere in this matter again. Just like flowers are thorns for them, this one is going to prick them as well. It is not our intent to antagonise them. But if they make an issue out of it, we are definitely going to oppose them again. You can convey this to the Committee head in advance.”

Babaji looked confident of handling this better. When he served karah parshad the next evening to all, he was very happy he was doing the right thing after a long time. The sangat got parshad and looked blessed. Sardar Satwant Singh took a small bit reluctantly and his wife asked, “Gurmukh parivaar who?”

Babaji pretended not to hear it but the question was repeated. Left without choice, Babaji had to disclose the name of Sardar Ratan Singh. The karah parshad was stuck in his throat now. Instead of saying anything to Babaji, Satwant Singh communicated through Vimal Rai.

Babaji got a call late at night. He felt like dropping the call because it was time to sleep as he had to wake up early for the pre-dawn prayers, the amrit vela. But he changed his mind and answered the phone call. The voice on the other side hollered right away, “If anyone wants to do karah parshad sewa, tell him the Committee should be approached first as we alone decide the quantity. Tell him to pay us the money and we will take charge of making it. It has to be done through us only. No direct sewa allowed. You should mention us instead of directly taking up such responsibility.”

Babaji got miffed this time and said, “How can I stop a devotee like that? You should call him and tell him all this. I cannot. Sat Sri Akal.”

The priest knew this behaviour would be read as gross insubordination with dire consequences. But he had restored full faith in God because he felt God had sent Sardar Ratan Singh with a definite plan. He was mentally prepared for the worst now.

When Sardarni Simran Kaur came in next week with the supplies, Babaji made brave effort to defend the Committee and test her resolve, “Avoid taking the trouble of bringing this every week and instead give the money to Committee to prepare karah parshad.”

She sensed some kind of agreement had been reached and the Committee wanted to take charge. “Is there any problem if we bring the samagri? We maintain hygiene and purchase from the best shops. Besides, I want to do this on my own, just paying money is not enough. We do not trust the Committee. Whether they would use pure ghee or not, whether they would save money and divert it. There is enough ground for mistrust an suspicion. It is quite possible they would ask you to mix Dalda (vegetable oil) with desi ghee or reduce the daily quantity after taking full money. The Committee that discontinued parshad sewa cannot be trusted with its resumption.”

Babaji heard the candid reply from the lady without saying a word. The Committee had indeed made incorrect decisions with brute majority and imposed the same upon the sangat who did not expect this would happen.

When Vimal Rai came for the evening durbar, he heard Babaji’s reply. “I told them to contact you, to give the Committee the duty of making of parshad but they refused. They said it is the duty of the Committee to make it themselves instead of seeking money from us to make it. This tradition is followed in all Gurudwaras across the country.”

Vimal Rai was upset to hear this valid point. He came with the desire of singing Shabad Gurbani but the notes of harmony were lost. He delivered a spiel as the Sangat was yet to arrive: “Why doesn’t he understand we are Committee, here to look after everything. Where was he all these years? Why does he emerge now and try to run a parallel system? You can tell him our decision is final and binding. In this Gurudwara, karah parshad will be made with our permission only. Warn him not to try our patience. We have been merciful but we cannot let this rebellion take root while we sat quiet and observe anarchy spread like wild fire.”

Harsh words flowed out instead of ambrosial nectar. The situation was spiralling out of control, reaching a flashpoint. If he conveyed his message in the same language, Sardar Ratan Singh would retaliate. When the couple came for morning prayers, Babaji conveyed bad news to them. It was the most important task he was assigned to prove his loyalty to the Committee. He tried to look the other way to make it less hurtful: “Actually, the Committee has made new rules and these do not allow me to prepare parshad unless it comes as an order from the Committee. The order came last mid-night. Please excuse me and understand I am working under the Committee. My hands are tied.”

Realising these were sacrilegious words, tears welled up in his eyes. He broke down and disclosed that he was planning to leave this place as his salary was delayed every month and he was never paid in full.

The couple had full sympathy for the priest as he was conveying the words of the Committee. “I do not understand what sadistic pleasure they get by delaying his salary and deducting money? He has a family to feed, kids to educate,” Sardarni Simran Kaur urged her husband to take note of this injustice. “Don’t you think the Committee has crossed the limits by misbehaving with the priest who serves Wahe Guru every day? Our silence would mean participation, don’t you think so?”

It was a fact that Babaji was not accorded respect. There were several such instances. They shouted at him for trivial reasons and dominated him as much as possible. The Committee had deviated from the path of righteousness. After listening to his wife, Sardar Ratan Singh assured Babaji, “Will pursue these matters but you do not think of leaving this place. Our ancestors built this Gurudwara and it is our duty to ensure injustice does not happen.”

Feeling encouraged, Babaji spilled the beans, revealing the recent case of theft. The donation box was emptied but the locks were not broken. This mischief pointed to the fact that the members of the Committee who had the keys played a role in it. Besides, there was no official complaint lodged. The large sum of money collected throughout the year just vanished. Not reporting such grave offences meant there was some kind of tacit involvement.

In the afternoon, after lunch, Sardarni Simran Kaur urged her husband to raise his voice, and he said, “Such issues will not get community support. Haven’t you seen how these members stand with folded hands in front of Sangat? Who will believe us? Babaji will be the loser as they will sack him and bring another one next month.”

Sardarni Simran Kaur highlighted these points in her group and specified salary deductions. “Why does he not speak up?” The headmistress of a primary school wanted to know.

“He is under their employment. He was promised free gas and electricity connection but he has to bear these bills every month.”

“I will discuss with my husband and let you know,” she assured Sardarni Simran Kaur.

“Just make sure Babaji is not involved otherwise he will be in trouble. My husband says men should quit and women members should form the Committee,” Sardarni Simran Kaur added, to make her feel enthusiastic about the slew of changes on the anvil.

In the meantime, Sardar Ratan Singh started gathering more facts from those who lived near the Gurudwara. The inside stories always help. He spoke with a senior lady who stayed beside the Gurudwara and she gave a true account of the events inside.

“Many things are not right here but there is nobody to object. All are businessmen and linked to each other and they do not offend the rich. That is the story. Small fish afraid of big fish,” she summed up the story without mentioning the names.

“That does not mean the Committee should have the freedom to commit wrongs and get away with it. There has to be some accountability,” Sardar Ratan Singh reasoned.

“Beta, we have lost faith and have accepted this as the reality. We go to Gurudwara, pray, and come back. No discussions. They change timings, set their own programmes as per their convenience and the sangat is never involved. There are many improprieties but it is useless to discuss these now,” she gave ample indications.  

The cashier of the Gurudwara entered the premises while they were discussing. He wished her a loud Sat Sri Akal intentionally while ignoring Sardar Ratan Singh. She quickly made her move as he would report this interaction to other members of the Committee. With the glut of information indicating multiple misdoings, Sardar Ratan Singh went inside and bowed before the Lord seeking the strength to set things right. When he came home, he thought of possibilities. The easiest way was to bring in changes unilaterally – without involving the Committee.

Next day, both of them came to the Gurudwara with three large crystal chandeliers to light up the aisle, along with an electrician who cracked open the false ceiling right from the middle to access the electric points and hang them firmly. The entire operation was done within two hours. Babaji observed the smooth execution in stunned silence. When everything was over, Sardar Ratan Singh called up the Pradhan, the chief of the Committee, from Babaji’s phone and introduced himself, “Sardar Ratan Singh calling. I have installed three chandeliers in the hall without seeking your prior permission.”

 
The Pradhan could not utter a single word even though he was keen to teach the rebellious Sardar a good lesson in the recent past.

“Do you have any objection, Pradhan ji?” Sardar Ratan Singh asked in a stentorian voice again.

“No, no, it is guru ki sewa. Every person has the right to do it.”

“Exactly, Pradhan ji. Hope you really believe so.”

Babaji took the phone and clicked pictures of illuminated chandeliers and posted them in the group of Committee members along with the name of Sardar Ratan Singh typed in the message box. Babaji was glad to see the flood of lights inside, the dazzling shimmer inside big gurudwaras was here as well.

Thrilled, he extended a personal invite: “Performing special kirtan in the evening, please be here.”  

“Ok, Babaji, we will come in the evening,” Sardar Ratan Singh promised, “and if any member of the Committee worries about the spike in electricity bill, I am ready to bear the extra charges.”

Babaji kept wondering that the Pradhan who spoke angrily had turned into a meek lamb all a sudden. God’s miracle? One thing was clear that the Committee members did not shoulder individual blame. They preferred to hide behind their collective might. Since Vimal Rai was charged directly, he chickened out despite the golden opportunity to lambast the rebellious Sardar.

The hall was packed with Committee members and their families who were looking at the dazzling lights and pondering over the inflated electricity bill. The Pradhan was informed by Babaji that Sardar Ratan Singh would pay extra for the electricity consumed by the chandeliers.

Such a lit-up Gurudwara they were seeing for the first time in the small town. The Sangat was happy to see these chandeliers inside the Lord’s abode. They were curious to know the name of the donor. Sardar Ratan Singh rolled off the priest’s tongue with pride and the Committee members looked down. By this time, Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife came in and bowed before the Lord and then proceeded to sit near the door. The Committee members sat close to the Lord.

Babaji sang two new Shabads with full energy and the Committee members looked around, asking each other in hushed tones how much these would have cost. The guessing game kept them away from God and Shabad Kirtan.

When the Durbar drew to a close, Vimal Rai and Satwant Singh smiled at Sardar Ratan Singh and exchanged pleasantries in front of the Sangat to cultivate their good image. Was it beyond their power to switch off these chandeliers forever? Should they formulate a new law to stop Sewa by individuals?  Every evening they would switch on the chandeliers and get dazzled by the glare. The name of Sardar Ratan Singh would flash before them.

The reaction to assert hegemony came in fast. The Committee suspended the services of the tabla player using the excuse that the turnout was poor. When Sardar Ratan Singh noticed that the tabla player was not coming for more than a week and Babaji had to face difficulty because of the missing accompanist, he posed this question to Sardar Satwant Singh in front of a sizeable crowd, “Why did you stop the tabla player from coming in the evenings?”

 He was not expecting to be charged in this manner in front of so many people. He looked at the faces of his team mates but they were not willing to rise up in his support. He delivered whatever came to his mind in his ruffled state of mind: “The sangat does not come regularly, no use wasting resources that should be put to better use.”

“The sangat is blamed for everything. You stop karah parshad, the sangat is blamed. You don’t want flowers inside. What is going on in this Gurudwara? Rules are made to break rules. From where does the Committee learn this audacity? Even if one person comes to Gurudwara he should get karah parshad, he should get to hear kirtan. With all modesty, I am ready to bear the salary of the tabla player if the Committee cannot afford. But make sure he is hired soon. And if you want to do good, hike the salary of the priest so that he can engage an expert to train his son to play the tabla with him daily.”

Vimal Rai inched closer to Satwant Singh and pulled his arm. There were women who got to know many startling facts. The Committee was exposed in front of the Sangat for the first time in years.  

Vimal Rai cut in politely, “We will look into the matter and respond soon. Many charges were pressed against us, but it should not have happened. We are elderly and deserve respect from the younger generation.”

Satwant Singh and Vimal Rai went near the garage to have a brief meeting. This open mutiny meant this man had to be reined in somehow otherwise they would face further insults and all their misdoings and misuse of power would come out in the open.

Sardarni Simran Kaur tried to explain certain facts to women but the wives of the Committee members formed a separate group. The split was clear. How this face-off was going to pan out? Whether the priest would lose his job, whether the Committee would get stricter now? Speculations were rife.

The Committee decided to hold a Durbar with snacks and tea on Sunday mornings with the hope that this session would fetch big crowds. It was also an attempt to mobilise the crowds and keep up appearances. After Sukhmani Path, the prayer for peace, snacks like samosas and jalebis were served. But the turnout was not as expected. The next month, the Committee decided to hold langar every week. They hoped this would surely bring in more sangat. Even this bait was a damp squib.

Finally, the Committee started wondering why these arrangements failed to draw large crowds. Was it God’s will that the sangat would not be impressed with whatever the Committee did? Was this a retribution for their misbehaviour with Babaji in the past? The Committee ordered that more members of each family participate and that the appeal of the Committee should be honoured by the entire community. Forwarding messages was suggested as an effective way to make the sangat aware that the Committee was indeed doing a lot.

Sardar Ratan Singh continued with his makeover exercise. He donated chhatars to decorate the canopy. The gold and diamond plated pieces looked wonderful. When Sardar Ajit Singh came to pray and saw the chhatars, he was livid and charged Babaji with gross negligence, “The canopy cloth must be damaged with piercing in several places. Who will pay for its replacement?”

“Sardar Ratan Singh has said he would donate a new Chanani next month,” Babaji said coolly. He was inside the Gurudwara otherwise he would have grabbed his neck for uttering that vile name. Sardar Ajit Singh did not sit for Chaur Sewa and stomped out of the hall.

Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife continued making visible changes inside the Gurudwara and the Committee was irritated by all the new installations without their consent or permission. Sardar Ajit Singh turned competitive and donated three chairs for the elderly. Sardar Ratan Singh matched this move by placing three velvet cushions on the chairs. Babaji was given a new comfy mattress with frills on the bed cover for the wooden diwan where he sat for Kirtan every evening. Sardar Ajit Singh was miffed but he could not say anything. He kept asking himself: Why is this man after us?

In less than three months many things underwent changes and the Committee became jittery about losing control. It tried to do new things to win the trust of the sangat. But the sangat had seen this Committee for years and the sudden switch to action mode was not difficult to comprehend. It was clearly to suppress the dissident Sardar Ratan Singh, who enjoyed the support of the sangat for the makeover that made them feel good. Besides, they were happy that a single person had stood up and fought against the Committee. All the energies were invested in the task of painting Sardar Ratan Singh as a villain who did not respect the senior members of the Committee. Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife had quietly overturned their rules and set new things in place.

The pipe of the wash basin was broken. It remained like that for months but now it was replaced quickly. Satwant Singh approached every single member to seek feedback regarding the efforts to spruce up the Gurudwara premises. The cashier was engaged with the task of collecting more funds.

One evening, they planned to approach Sardar Ratan Singh for monetary assistance as he was spending a lot on the upkeep of the Gurudwara. His response took them by surprise: “I am doing sewa for the Guru and that is all. I do not intend to pay money to any Committee.” His refusal to shell out big bucks inflamed them. Sardar Ajit Singh went ballistic, “We are committee members and you do not acknowledge us. The Gurudwara is under our control.”

“Yes, the Gurudwara is under your control, but not the Lord. How can you stop us from doing sewa? What kind of devotees you are? Are you Sikhs?”

They chickened out one by one without answering him. It was clear the Committee would make it a rule that Sardar Ratan Singh would not be allowed to do sewa on his own.  

Next morning, a big truck with marbles arrived, followed by sand and cement bags. A team of masons arrived within hours. The Committee was challenged to stop him when this process started. Sardar Satwant Singh and Vimal Rai were asked to be present.

“You have to answer an important call from Amritsar. Come to the Gurudwara,” Sardar Ratan Singh called up the Pradhan using Babaji’s phone.

Satwant Singh and the cashier came along with Vimal Rai to boost his morale. The cashier was asked to answer the phone but ultimately the Pradhan had to connect.

He heard a faint voice from the other side in Punjabi seeking confirmation they were Committee members. The name of Sardar Ratan Singh was mentioned and the proposal to send a representative was conveyed to the Committee head. Vimal Rai could not muster the courage to seek identification of the caller or press for the purpose behind sending a representative. But he understood he was some authority and the representative was coming here to look into the affairs.

Vimal Rai stared at Sardar Ratan Singh for going this far. He informed his friends that an authority was coming here soon. Satwant Singh and the cashier looked worried about the external interference. Sensing that difficult times were in store now, Vimal Rai sought relief on health grounds and tendered his resignation from the post of Pradhan.  

Within a week, a senior person arrived and asked specific questions about the management of the Gurudwara. Babaji was asked to explain fearlessly and he disclosed how the Committee was mishandling everything. Based on the facts shared, it was clear that the Committee could not answer many questions. So, the visitors recommended dissolution of the Committee and the formation of a new one.

Many women wanted Sardar Ratan Singh to be the new Committee head, but his wife, Sardarni Simran Kaur explained, “We do not want power for ourselves. My husband hates it. But we would certainly like the Gurudwara to be managed by true devotees who pray, do the Nitnem, understand Baani, and lead honest lives.”

The task of finding such devotees was not Herculean as Babaji had already shortlisted two women who did Sewa with selflessness. They were made the joint heads of the new Committee and it was hoped the Gurudwara would not be mismanaged henceforth. Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife were now relieved of the tension.

Babaji was asked to make karah parshad every day and the diwan had to be florally decorated. A new tabla player was hired and the durbar was now teeming with devotees. Many people who had stopped coming to Gurudwara after a former priest was manhandled by a son of the Committee member were now back in full strength.

Satwant Singh, Ajit Singh, Vimal Rai, and the cashier also resumed regular visits to the Gurudwara. But they sat aloof, huddled in a corner. Stripped of power, they were now ordinary sangat who did not have the right to order other people to do sewa.

Sardar Ratan Singh and his wife would be leaving for Punjab from Bengal forever, and so they hosted a langar in memory of their parents. There was a huge crowd on the day of langar. A big change was introduced. The newly-formed Committee allowed the poor people to come in and sit beside the well-off people in true Sikh tradition. Without any discrimination of caste or status. The closed gates of Gurudwara Khalsa Diwan for the poor on langar* days were now thrown wide open.

*Langar is a communal Sikh Kitchen which feeds the poor and rich alike.

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Devraj Singh Kalsi works as a senior copywriter in Kolkata. His short stories and essays have been published in Deccan Herald, Tehelka, Kitaab, Earthen Lamp Journal, Assam Tribune, and The Statesman. Pal Motors is his first novel.  


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Categories
Stories

Before the Sun Goes Down

By Amjad Ali Malik

“It sucks, man”, he muttered and took a deep breath. His hands were folded on the back of his head as he reclined in the chair.

“And then count the age gap. Here I am barely twenty; just trying to acclimatise to the Varsity culture. And she? Well, I guess, not short of her mid-thirties”, he frowned.

Between the two of them they shared the rented flat.

He was from a remote small town and had arrived in the metropolis one year ago. After joining the University, he found that the hostel was already occupied to its total lodging capacity. So, his parents reluctantly chose to let him stay in a private accommodation, and this had landed him in the flat.

She was already a renter there. Initially, they had kept their newfound acquaintance restricted to a tacit exchange of casual glances. Then ensued the short verbal greetings, which eventually led to intimacy. She told him that she was from another big city and had been transferred to this city by her employers.

Earlier, he had been going to a small restaurant in the neighbourhood for his meals. Then she told him that she would make meals for both of them, and they could split the expenses. He readily agreed. 

Every evening she would walk over, carrying two cups of tea to his partially furnished room. Sitting across the oblong table, sipping the tepid tea, they often made small talk.  During one such session, she said she had got a Masters in Political Science. However, she hardly ever commented on national or international politics. Once or twice, he tried to plumb her political leanings, but she disappointed him. She exhibited the same stolidity in religious matters. 

“Why are you so cold on the topics which intrigue almost everyone these days?” he asked her once again.

“Is it necessary to toe the line of others?” she retorted with a discomfiting smirk.

“Um-no, not at all.  I only asked it out of curiosity,” he sounded flustered.

In physical terms, she was sensuous. But her personal aura did not encourage much passion in the opposite gender.  He had to admit that she had something about her, which stirred awe rather than evoked salacious thoughts.

As their relationship became more frank, he began to cherish some private longings for her. When she was away, he would often try to conjure her tall, lithe figure to indulge in a mock act of dalliance, but could never get much further with it. Thus frustrated time and again, he ultimately came to weigh the possibility of marrying her, but in her presence, could not breathe a single syllable on the topic.

“What is she? Why is she so courageous and confident, while I am neither?” he used to wonder.

One day, he felt touched on the raw. “Do you have any girl friend?” she looked him straight in the face.

“M, me. No, no, not at all”, he jerked out.

“Hmm” she took a deep breath, and smiled coquettishly.

“Would you like to have one?”

“Well, am not sure what to say”, he replied meekly.

 She burst into a guffaw.  “Looks that you have yet to be weaned, boy!”

Her sudden vivacity flummoxed him, as he sat there gazing at her.

“Is she trying to flirt or is it a serious attempt to seduce?” he asked himself.

Meanwhile, she got up, collected the crockery and came near him. She stood beside his chair. Her intent gaze and the intoxicating fragrance of her perfume rattled his assumed composure.

“Let’s spend this time together and have fun. Who knows how the sun goes down tomorrow?” she whispered and made for her room.

The next day, as he entered the flat at the usual hour, he felt quite weird. She had not yet come back from her work. His patience began to run thin when after making several attempts to catch a glimpse of her, on the chance that she might have tiptoed onto the premises to give him a surprise.

He waited and waited until dusk set in. Still there was no sign of her.

“Where could have she gone? Over these past several months, she has never got late even for a short while. Has she met with some accident?” lost in such thoughts, he got up to go and dine at the restaurant. While dining, he cast a quick glance all around the hall, and then forgot that he had been hungry. The breaking news that flashed on the television screen rendered him insensible to his surroundings. The police had arrested a woman on the charge of first-degree murder of an aged prayer leader. The camera was constantly zooming in on her face. He gulped incredulously still glued to the screen. No further details of the case came in.

He hurried to the flat, collected all his effects and made for the

wagon-stand.

“Who knows how the sun goes down tomorrow?” her passionate words echoed in his ears, as he bade a tearful adieu to the city for good.

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Amjad Ali Malik is a Pakistan–based writer. By profession, he is an Assistant Professor of English. The story “Before The Sun Goes Down” is his debut work.

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Categories
Stories

Chameleon Boy

By Kieran Martin

Courtesy: Creative Commons

T was a kid who lived next to Jake. He hung around with us a lot, but then, he hung round with a lot of people. Looking back, I’m not sure how he managed to fit us all in.

There’s not a thing you could say about T himself. You might only talk about the places you found him, and the people you found him with. I first saw him when he was nine years old. He was in a sandpit with a bunch of year one kids: average age about five and a half. As I waited for my brother to put on his shoes I listened to their chatter, and it threw me: T was much older than the others. He had their babble.

A couple of weeks later I saw him talking with some year seven kids, out by the bike stands. It took me a while to realise it was the same person. This time, he sounded like a twelve year old. I doubt whether anyone noticed that he was much younger, or that the things he said made no sense. He sounded right, and he looked right.

The only time T didn’t resemble those around him was when he slept. And he slept a lot. We had no name for the thing T did but it was clearly exhausting. During the night his mother would creep into his room and put a few drops of cologne behind his ear. It was a strange fragrance to the people who live here: in the mix of smells around a school, from dogs, packed lunches, wet jerseys and sweat. The smell of T’s Baltic perfume was never noticed.

One day T’s dad walked past the kitchen to hear his wife singing a pop song in English. He waited while she finished, then his car backed out of the driveway never to return. T was gone too, and within six months the smell of Baltic cologne left him.

Soon, no one on this earth was able to pick T out in a crowd. Even when that crowd was very, very small.

His dad never intended to take him away. T had fallen asleep in a warm spot at the back of the wagon. He’d been mistaken for the dog.

In later years, T gained some colour and the people around him stamped a shape that didn’t leave him through the early hours of morning.

He became a keen gardener, lying near the raised beds with one arm deep in the soil, slowly leaking colour down to the roots of their yellow and white roses.

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Kieran Martin wrote a couple of short pieces 14 years ago when living in a very small town. He also writes lyrics, essays and code. His sons taught him how to narrate; one of the many gifts they came to him with.

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