I needed a fag….desperately. Studies in the 21st century showed that nicotine addiction was mainly mental and physiological. It was the release of stress via clouds of smoke, in one form which hooked as surely the nicotine in itself. Dad used to smoke till he had his first heart attack and I remembered where his packets were kept.
Stealing, like any crime, requires nerve and timing and preferably an alibi. Filching the cigarette was dead easy, compared to trying to find a space to smoke the damn thing without the dozen odd servants about the place learning of it. I finally compromised by lighting up in the guestroom toilet and as soon as I took the first, much-awaited drag, I started coughing horribly!!!
My rose pink lungs were yet to get accustomed to the harsh beauty of nicotine….I compromised by taking small puffs and inhaling very cautiously but still ended up coughing up a fit. Worse was yet to come – deodorant’s were yet to be invented and toothpaste only works on the mouth. I ended up taking a cold shower with lots of soaping….I was seriously starting to miss adulthood.
Ma was usually on her afternoon siesta when I would arrive from school. The cook had my afternoon meal ready as I hit the dining table - greasy parantha’s and oily chicken curry. I got him to give me some cornflakes and cold milk with some chopped fruits. Kellog’s was yet to come to India and sugar-free tablets were aeons away. The 8 channel, Beltek television was still in the drawing room and watching TV while eating was not just frowned upon but absolutely forbidden.
My brother was sleeping like a baby when I went to my (our’s then) room. God, that boy was a runt then, I mean now…. But he still slept in the same way, all limbs tucked up and tidy.
I decided to take the hint and lay down beside him and closed my eyes….
I woke up with tubes stuck all over my body and a lot of beeping sounds. I could barely open my eyes and even then everything was blurry. The only thing I could hear above the beeping was someone frantically calling for the doctor.
It was only after a few moments that I realized I was in pain…..comprehensive, all pervasive pain. I could not locate any one segment of my body which was not burning and screaming in agony. I had a dry throat that scratched with an intensity that had to be experienced to be believed. I could barely rasp out my need for water.
But someone was listening and a few blessed drops of moisture made their way into my desert like mouth and I gasped for more. I could hear a voice telling me to go slow and easy, but it was hard enough trying to swallow much less listen to that damned voice.
A while later, no idea how long, I was aware of someone poking at various parts of my body and speaking in a voice like muffled thunder, but I could make out the words.
“Can …. You….Hear…. Me ?”
I tried to speak but couldn’t so attempted to move some part of my body….my fingers worked and my right arm moved, so I moved it.
Suddenly, there was a clap of thunder (it was the doctor clapping his hands near my face, I later found out) and I could hear a bit more clearly. I thought I could hear bro’s voice in the background of the cacophony of beeps around me, so I tried once more to utter his name.
This time, they heard me and there was that runt sleeping beside me…..but I was sleeping and he was standing…..and he was not a runt anymore, he was all grown up. I could make out his eyes and face as he leaned in towards me. What was he doing back here in India???
“Dada, can you hear me? Make some sort of sign, if you can” he said
Thank god that squeaky voice disappeared over the years, this voice I could live with. Make a sign, what did he think I was, some sort of retard. I thought I spoke that last sentence aloud, but he could barely hear me. Was I speaking so softly or was he getting hard of hearing.
“The…. blast at the offices…..only 2 survivors……You …. near … window …. flung out …. blast”
I could hear bro speaking, but my mind was unraveling fast. The pain was returning in all extremities….
I had forgotten what a release lunch recess was for more than a thousand boys, as we barreled down the crowded stairs towards the open grounds. It was a heavy press and I didn’t speak till we reached our school canteen, innovatively named “Sip ‘N Snack”.
I sat down on the stone tier’s in the hot sun and loosened my tie and top button and tried to just gather my thoughts.
“Okay, what’s wrong with you?” asked Anupam, in tones of absolute wonder “you just gabbled out a lot of nonsense in class since morning and just now you nearly broke that bully’s arm. Who ARE you?”
I swallowed and sat in the hot sun, trying to look at my hands. They were flabby and soft and most importantly without any scars. The hands I remember were big, hard and especially scarred over with burns, nicks and cuts gathered over the years. I was a softy in school but lawschool and years spent out of home toughened me up so much that I remember my own father take a second look at the DelhiAirport, not being able to recognize his eldest son after a especially long hiatus of abt 2-3 years.
These hands knew how to handle a butcher’s cleaver, a ladle & wok, steering wheels, gears, wrenches, spanners, knives, guns, ropes and keyboards at 60 words per minute. These hands were my tools of the trade, just like my tongue and brain and I had spent long years teaching them how to do things. Only thing, was that now, they were yet untrained so I looked at them and wondered if they would remember how to do the things I could take for granted.
“Are you going to look at your hands like you saw them for the first time or will you look at me?”
I could hear the tinge of anger in his usually even voice. My dentist, the cool and calm friend who would call himself “the molar mercenary” and fall in love with and marry and have kids. And also not grow very tall physically but grow mentally and in personality till he was one of the oaks of the forest of my life. This was a friend who had remained loyal all his life and saw me through the best and the worst times. Maybe he might understand, if I tried to explain. But how do I explain?
“Your favourite colour is aqua green and you dream of the day when you’ll have a cool bike and a girl behind you on your bike, yes?” I ventured.
“THAT is your answer?” queried Anupam, “after all that, you tell me my favourite colour and day-dream?”
Hmm….not that way then….
“Okay, you want to be a doctor, but you’re going to be a dentist” I tried.
“And Why won’t I be a doctor?” smirked the boy who was usually in one of top 5 positions in class throughout school.
I don’t know, I wanted to shout at his smiling visage. I went away to lawschool for 5 years and came back to see you studying dentistry and never had the courage to ask you what happened to med school and becoming a surgeon. I followed my dreams and didn’t care to ask about failed ambitions fearing to lose yet another friendship. As I looked at him blankly, I noticed he was still talking
“….and dentistry is so boring, why would I even consider poking around people’s mouth’s when the rest of the body is there to do all that”
I gave up, there was no bloody way I was going to explain to Anupam that I was from the future, albeit one in which he is a dentist.
“Nothing really, I’m just tired and hallucinating perhaps from my tummy-ache” I walked off leaving him open mouthed and went to splash some water on my boiled face. The over-abundance of hair was becoming a problem – I had forgotten how hot it could be with a full thatch on top. So I went and doused my head under taps in the drinking basin. Then I sat in the shade and waited for the bell to end recess so that I did not walk into any more goons awaiting me in the classroom.
The next class was chemistry, not one of my favourites. In fact, I would narrowly scrape through it in my matriculation or the high school leaving exams. It was taught by a middle-aged brother who was called Brother Augustine. The guy was not too bad, as I remembered him, however, it was simply not my subject.
Opening my textbook to the relevant chapter, I tried to listen to Brother Augustine’s steady drone about salts and acids as my eyes roamed the room and tried to identify the boys around me by memory….
Manab Kakti, now an expat in the UK, a doctor I believe…
Riju Konwar, another doctor, though in the States, Baltimore presumably….
Sundeep Kapila, an engineer and entrepreneur with a divorce behind him, in Delhi…..
Sukhpreet Singh, a Ph.D in IPR, teaching in Bournemouth….he was due to be a dad soon….
Sarfaraz Nawaz, Marketing guy, now based in North India….engaged, I believe…..
Ron Barooah, French translator & project co-ordinator for Orange, closet gay, in Delhi last I knew….
“And Debashish will kindly give us the formula for water, since he is all wet”
Bloody hell, where did that come from? Brother Augustine was waiting expectantly with the rest of the class sniggering at my present state of awareness.
“Water, brother?” I asked
“Water, my son” he replied with great solemnity. Brother Augustine loved to ‘make jokes’ as he would put it. Well, okay then, I thought.
“HIJKLMNO” I stated clearly
“What was that?” came back from the desk.
“The formula for water, brother. HIJKLMNO or if you would prefer it, H20”
The class held its silence for a tethering second before erupting into gales of laughter. I could see even Brother Augustine was trying very unsuccessfully to hold back a grin so I looked innocent and quirked my eyebrows. It was enough to push him over the edge as well.
Humour as a weapon or even as a defense mechanism was something I had taught myself in lawschool. I had completely forgotten about it. In fact, there was lots of stuff I had forgotten but using humour was unforgivable. After that, I was apparently forgiven and forgotten as the events of the day moved along.
The rest of the classes went without incident and when the final period bell rang, I was still packing up my satchel following the mass exodus of the class, leaving me alone in the classroom. As I got up, there was Amitabh with his two sidekicks at the doorway, trying their best to do a menacing smile.
Thing about menacing smiles – if you cant pull it off, you just end up looking silly and retarded. For all I knew, these guys WERE retards. However, they were big, I was fat and there was nowhere to run. So, I did, what I do best.
“You guys can beat me up or I can show you how to make easy money” I sat back on the bench and put my feet on the desk. Worst comes to worst, I can always shove it at them with my feet in case of an attack.
The easy money part however, did its trick as the heavies stopped in their tracks. It was the early nineties and parents would not part with money as easily as they would in the years to come. Smoking and drinking were cardinal sins and girls were of a different species (the devil’s own, my sons as Brother Anthony would expostulate!!)
“I can also show you how to get cigarette’s, whisky and girls” I drawled on, lying through my teeth.
The heavies were slower on the uptake, but Amitabh was the typical small minded hood, he would grow up to be.
“How?”
“Meet me after school tomorrow with casual clothes” I replied. I had no idea what I would or could do, but the idea was to escape today to fight tomorrow.
“If you’re lying…” started one of the heavies, when I got up, yawned and walked up at them “yeah, yeah, you’ll break my bones and kill me. In fact, if you want to, go right ahead.” I kept on walking towards them till I was face to face with Amitabh with barely an inch between both our chubby tummy’s.
“You hit me, injure me, I’ll fall down the stairs and actually break a bone and claim you beat me up for not giving you my pocket money. Chances are, with your previous record, you’ll be suspended and I’ll enjoy a holiday at home. Your choice.”
And pushed my way through them, with my heart thudding painfully in my ribcage - I couldn’t wait to grow up. It was sure going to be easier bluffing and negotiating as a lawyer with criminals rather than as a school kid with moronic goons.
Anupam was waiting a ways off watching the scene with bated breath, so I strode at him and asked if he wanted a lift.
As long as I would remember, my dad would try to drop us kids off at school and the chauffeur would pick us up and drive us to our respective classes (piano/swimming/tuitions) as per schedule. The minute I saw old Moni Singh, our Manipuri driver in the old (No it was brand new now) fiat premier padmini, I was happier than I had been the whole day.
That damned car was my jalopy for a long time. It lasted for about 23 years with us before dad finally sold it for scrap metal once I was away in Europe. I would take apart its engine and put it back together, cut off the roof, put in a catalytic converter set to run on LPG gas and paint it deep green. It would die on me and my pals in the middle of the street and I had to coax them to push it till I could pop-start it, but I still wouldn’t sell that car. Seeing it in its pristine original glory, I was nearly moved to tears. I needed a smoke and I needed to drive.
Moni Singh, the old retainer was a reliable old driver with a penchant for pretty girls and strong liquor which would eventually lead to him eloping with a girl when drunk and papa promptly firing him. However, he had one more vice which was not known to many – the poor bugger couldn’t resist gambling. So, as he opened the doors, I asked him
“Moni, do you want some really good whisky?”
I swear that man must have got whiplash from turning at me, “What are you talking about, baba?”
“Nothing, just that I would bet that I could take the car forward in first gear for 4 feet – if I cant move the car, you win and I’ll give you the thirty rupees I had saved up”
Moni looked at me for a minute and then at the empty street outside Bosco. It was late afternoon and there was practically no traffic. And of course, thirty rupees was thirty rupees in those days.
“Baba, your father would kill me….” He started whining but didn’t really do much as I tossed my school bag in the back seat with Anupam and gestured Moni to get in the front seat. I truly was a spoilt brat, I realized there and then.
Anupam was sweating buckets as his worried eyes told me in the rear view mirror, however, he stayed firm, holding his school bag in front of him, like an antique air bag. With utmost nonchalance, I checked if everyone’s door’s were locked and then started the car.
It was like coming home…..the engine gunned cleanly and the gear shift by the side of the wheel was new and smooth as it slot into first gear. I revved and let go the clutch softly and took off.
It was brilliant driving again and the blessed empty roads were like manna from heaven. Moni Singh and Anupam were too much of a captive audience to comment on my driving ability, till I reached the Ulubari overbridge. In a choked voice, Moni Singh asked me if I wanted him to take the wheel. I grinned at him and gunned the car through the familiar and yet unfamiliar streets of Guwahati.
When we reached near our farmhouse on the outskirts of the city, I quietly slowed the car to a stop, got out and got into the back seat. Moni took the wheel and drove me home without a word.
The school of my memory was frighteningly different from that of this reality. The school of my memory did not remind me of the merciless pushing and jostling of hundreds of boys as they raced for their classes. Mumbai locals were nothing compared to this, I was left thinking as I gripped my bag closer. The water bottle had been quietly ditched way back in the car.
Worse, I had no idea where the hell I was supposed to go? As I stood there, looking across the field barren of the concrete stands, the awnings etc of the future, I was rudely poked in the back. And it was quite a hard poke too. I swung around and grabbed the shirt of the guy behind,
“The f**k are you doing? Who…” I started, but did not get to finish as I stared at the guy whose shirt I was holding.
The guy was about four feet high and had a grin larger than himself. I mean, I was done staring and getting surprises since morning, but looking at my dentist in a school uniform is a bit unsettling. I last saw this ass about a week ago for my bi-annual dental check ups and the grin was a permanent fixture.
“Now, what’s the matter with you, you big oaf? You look like your eyes are going to pop out.” He squeaked.
Ah, I am not alone. Well met by sunlight, fellow squeaker, I thought.
“Mr. A. Deka, I presume,” I said
“Well presumed, shall we presume that walking is an option and not missing morning assembly is also an option?” the gnome cheekily retorted.
I could only grin and follow him.
The stairs were horribly crowded and it seemed that my classroom was way up on the top of the bloody building. Huffing and puffing, I reached the top and took a breather.
“You really need to move fast, we have to run.” I liked this guy, he did not comment on my obvious bulk.
That gnome could really move his ass. He had parked his bag and was back by the time I was done puffing. I looked up as I entered the classroom, VII C, the plaque stated. I parked my coolie bag on the desk where I could see A’s bag was lying despondently and ran out with him as the bell sounded.
Morning assembly in Don Bosco was a ritual, much like most missionary schools. We stood in lines in the corridors, accorded by class and size. The whole thing was an exercise in futility but the captains of the classes tried. Oh yeah, we had captains, vice captains, games captains, the whole shooting match and a rather harried looking lot they were too. A voice was shouting us into attention and no one took much notice. I was fast becoming uncomfortable with the continuous jostling and pushing and fidgeting.
Anyway, amidst a lot of shuffling, coughing, and other general chaotic noise, the principal clad in a white cassock, walks onto the dais in the front of the lines and starts off with the morning prayers into the mike placed there. We chant out the Lord’s Prayer in absolute disharmony and tempo. This done, the principal addresses a few words to us which I completely missed out. Then, a short dark man shouted us into attention and dismissed us back to our classes.
As we filed out towards our classes, I could make out the faces of the principal and the short dark man who shouted us into attention and later dismissed us. Damn, I recognised both of them. The principal was a pretty handsome guy who was supposed to be very charismatic and many said that he was the one who got the funds together for the massive central edifice and auditorium that was being built now, only he quit the school and the fatherhood over some issue about some girl or something. He and my dad were quite friendly, if I remembered correctly. The short dark man was Mr. Larzar, our school drill sergeant and sports instructor. He had a wicked cane when we were kids and a very affable manner when we grew up and out of school.
All this just flashed through my mind as I shuffled past the dais.
We filed into class and sat in the benches, three boys to one desk. It was not a comfortable fit and I was used to working on an industrial sized table. Must have picked up that fancy after squatting on these monstrosities for twelve years. A sits down in the middle and starts digging into his bag for books as the other occupant arrived and sat down. The fellow was familiar but I could not quite place him, so I generally compromised with a fast grin as I asked A what class we were having.
“English, what’s wrong with you?” he muttered
“Nothing, just not feeling well.” I muttered back.
A bell sounded again and another dark fellow, obviously the teacher walked into the class with some books. As I looked up, I did a double take. It was X, an old, old, enemy who harassed me in school for not attending his tuition classes and when I tried to get even by playing the joker in his class, he took out his frustration on my brother and cousin even years after I had passed out. I finally got even with him much later with expulsion and criminal proceedings against him for molestation but that’s way into the future. He was here now and I was not ready yet.
“Homework on my desk, please” stated X, in south Indian accents. Gods, where did thy dig up such specimens to teach English?
A pulls out his exercise book, so I fished around for mine in the bag. Unsuccessfully however.
Shit. No homework done, I am in deep trouble.
We used to have this hated thing called calendars in school, a small notebook kind of thing. It had pages where the teachers could write in for offences like being late, insubordination, general mutiny and no homework done. The worse thing was, if the teacher wrote in it, you had to get it signed by your parents. That’s where the trouble started.
Okay, what did I have to work with? Hmmmm…
I stood up and walked up to X’s desk with no books in sight.
“If you’ll forgive the intrusion, could I have a word, sir?”
X nearly jumped up at the words. He was accustomed to sullen homework-less boys, accustomed to silence but direct speech had an interesting effect on him.
“Yes, not done your homework, as usual.” He managed though the words came out more like Yaaais, nooo hooomwok dunnn, aaas usuaal
There was pin drop silence in the class, no one wanted to miss any fun provided.
“Not really sir, I was taken to have some medical tests for gastroenteritis and a possible peptic ulcer, hence I was unable to complete the given assignment. If required I could provide medical transcripts or even my prescription tomorrow if you please.”
I thanked my old professor of forensic jurisprudence and medical toxicology who made me go through an entire dictionary of common illnesses one term for pulling some prank in his class.
X was rendered speechless. I believe the medical jargon was a bit too much, but I had remembered in time that this was one fellow who loved bombastic words, so I liberally applied myself.
“I must express regret and apologize for the intrusion, sir and sincerely am repentant for not being in a condition to terminate my assignment”
X just settled for nodding his head and motioned for the next boy to bring forward his homework.
I walked back to my desk with a wooden face and sat down. A instantly whispered to me
“You okay? Seriously what’s wrong with your gas-tro –whatever?”
“Chill dude, faked it.” I murmured back looking straight at X, who was intently watching me. Years of law school, later law practice and hundreds and thousands of meetings taught me the art of talking without moving my lips and in a rather sibilant whisper which does the job rather well.
“Chilled milk? You want cold ‘doodh’ now? What..” A started
“Shut up. Now.” I murmured
X was looking rather intently at me, but to be honest, in a 70 strong class full of fidgety andrestless boys was no sinecure. I almost felt sorry for him, almost. I remembered my younger cousin and later my brother coming home with long faces due to his public harassment in class. Almost, not quite.
The subject was English, taught to us vide a textbook containing short stories and poems by famous authors and poets, respectively. The class was deadly boring, but I had already dozed through drier country of civil procedural law with my eyes open. The questions now assailed my mind, ever since I realised this morning that I was not dreaming and was back in the past. My past.
What was I doing here? What was happening? This is not a movie or even some stupid music album, but slowly the scene was getting to me. I could look around and tell the futures of half the class. The other half I did not know, which in a way reminded me how isolated my school years were. I stole looks around and saw young faces, some showing the proud young traces of beards and mustaches. What’s the point of all this?
After 45 minutes of mutilating a famous O. Henry story, the bell sounded and I was never so happy to hear it ring.
X quickly picked up his books and left the room as A turned towards me, but I got started before he could;
“I am sorry, really sorry. Did not want to give him another chance, see?”
“What’s the matter with you? You are not behaving like the person I know.” A replied.
“I don’t know, I don’t know what is the matter with me.”
“He is finally growing up, that’s what is the matter with him.” This from the background…..
Yay, I had forgotten the then-hated back-bencher’s, bane of my existence in school, though useful acquaintances later on. I didn’t dare turn my head back for a full minute before deciding on what to do.
I thought to myself, I’m back in my past (definitely an overdose of Spielberg’s earlier movies) AND I remember my future….this could be FUN – I just had to figure out how!!!
I shifted my not-inconsiderable bulk backwards and side-whispered “you’re not going to believe what happened last night. I’ll explain in the break”
There was incredulous silence and finally a snort as we arose again to wish the next teacher “Goooooooooooood Maaaarrrnniiiiinnnng Saaaaaar”
A quick look at A’s textbook showed that it was Social Studies, an amalgamation of civics, history and political science.
Ah….. the subjects that catapaulted me to law school and beyond….
The teacher was a beloved one, I remember him from my future as being the most vocal supporter of mine in the regular PTA meetings. Of course, in class he was a holy terror, by the name of Phillip Thipthorpe. He was the youngest of a clan of 3 brothers who terrorized hundreds of bosconians while grounding the basics into our thick skulls and it was only years later we realized what a bunch of sweethearts they were.
Uh oh, sweetheart was heading right at me. This was NOT a man to cross. A huge wasp had alighted once on his French beard while he was explaining a democratic election process. The man just twitched his jaw and went on lecturing while the surprised wasp flitted off. That incident became part of the lore surrounding the fearsome reputation of Mr. Phillip Thipthorpe, B.Ed.
“Heard that you have got gastroenteritis and a possible peptic ulcer, Goswami?” he growled through his famed French beard. Something I would copy years later. However that was neither now or then. I gulped and nodded.
“No doubt, you will be happy to explain exactly what are the symptoms of your particular illness?” came the next broadside.
Oh boy, here we go again….
“Access secretion of bile, involuntary oral emission, severe pain and possible issues of diarrhea leading to internal inflammation of either the abdominal cavity or the rectal passageway….”, I gabbled out in automatic mode.
“Enough!!!” shouted Phillip sir.
As I first ventured to eyeball him, I could see the poor man’s face redden and look suspicious.
“You seem quite well versed in medical lore. Not to mention, having acquired a different diction and enunciation, Goswami. How is your history today?”
“Er, no sir…”
“What’s this, yes sir, no sir – come, come, let’s have the salient features of the revolt of 1857” Phillip sir smirked.
“Erm, sir….sorry sir” I belatedly tried a retreat.
“You’ll be cured of your tummy illness soon enough if you cannot answer boy” growled he, looking meaningfully at the cane on his desk.
THAT was NOT acceptable, shrieked my abused brain and my mouth went on auto-pilot
“Sir, the revolt of 1857 or the first war of Indian independence as coined by Subhas Chandra Bose, was an amalgamation of a variety of factors leading up to the situation and resulting in the eventual eviction and termination of the East India Company and India, as it was to a status under the rule of the British monarchial system and being a part of the British Empire. The factors involved could be noted as being divided into 5 causes; political, economic, social, historical, and finally the immediate cause, i.e. the Lee Enfield Cartridge or more specifically its outer casing enclosed in fat. The causes as stated would be political initially evolving from Dalhousie’s infamous Doctrine of Lapse, rendering….”
“ENOUGH!!!” bellowed Phillip Sir
I almost cowered, shut my eyes and braced myself for the worst. After a few moments of silence, I opened my eyes to see Mr. Phillip Thipthorpe, B.Ed, goggling at me bug-eyed and the entire class following suit. That man was a walking coronary, my analytical brain stated, observing his almost puce-color. Finally the colour abated as the classroom whispers started and he walked back to his table. I was going to get a proper whacking, I thought to myself, hoping to steel myself beforehand. However, he picked up the class textbook, left the cane alone (whew!!!) and walked back to me.
“You will get up and come with me. Now. Class captain to mind the class.” Beckoning me outside, Mr. Phillip left the room.
I looked at A who was staring at me goggle-eyed and silently picked myself up and trudged out. I could hear the birds chirping outside and thought, birds chirping in Panbazaar – that’s something I had completely forgotten.
Mr. Phillip stood outside the classroom and gestured for me to walk beside him. I had no choice but to comply.
“So, Goswami, been doing a little reading, have we?” he asked in quite a normal voice.
“Not really, no sir” I ventured, looking at the floor. It was an old scuffed cement floor, but it seemed safer than looking anywhere else.
“Come, come boy, you’re not usually that attentive in class and you hardly bother with homework. That answer was not really your style, is it? So, tell me, where did you read it and how did you memorize it.”
“Not sure sir” I tried, “Perhaps some of your lessons got through my head subliminally?”
“Subliminally? And how does that work?” voiced the man towering above me. I wondered how tall I was. I would grow to an inch beyond 6 feet and remember Mr. Phillip as being of average height. I was lost in thought as I answered “The basic principle of absorbing ideas or facts or even desires via a medium such as…..”
I stopped. At that moment, I knew I was in trouble. This was after all a conversation with a kid in Class Seven that Phillip Sir was having, that too in the late nineties, not with an adult from the 21st century. I mean, hello, even internet was going to take a few years to get into gear – man, I wish I was old enough to buy shares……all this flashed by my mind in a flicker as Phillip sir, stopped at the end of the corridor and faced me.
“What exactly did you say?” he asked, in a mild-before-eruption voice
“Nothing sir….Sorry sir” I squeaked out, hating and blessing the squeak in turns.
I was confused….should I behave like a dolt and pretend to not know anything….should I try to explain ? Naaah…..bad idea, no one would even believe me, much less allow me to disprove their belief in reality. I could hardly believe it myself, for cryin’ out loud.
“Is there something you might want to talk about, boy?” asked Mr. Phillip in a far gentler voice than I had ever heard.
“N-no sir, n-nothing, thank you” I stammered out, not daring to look up.
There was no way I am going to spill the beans.
The rest of the class went by in a blur as did the ones after that. I was too dazed by events to actually realize when the bloody recess bell rang till I felt a hard poke at the back of my neck. Reacting instinctively, I whirled around, impulses glad to be let loose. Before I had realized, my lips had pulled back into a feral grin in anticipation of violent release and my fists were clenched as I turned; and looked into a pair of eyes which mirrored fear and uncertainty in no small measure. That served to jolt me back to my senses. Looking beyond the eyes, I realized that I was about to launch myself at one of my recent board members called Amitabh .
This was a man, sorry, boy I had reason to suspect…..part of my original board, he had taken advantage of my absence and tried to get his dirty paws on as much easy cash lying around. Rumoured to be connected with the various disbanded extremist factions, he had nothing but brute force and fear to aid him in his nefarious activities. I had used the leverage of a number of pending criminal investigations and his own unsavoury reputation to dislodge his ill-gotten gains.
Dark, swarthy and chubby as a boy, the years would not be kind to him, but here he was in my past, a typical bully scavenging on the weak and scared. And I had just committed the cardinal sin of scaring him on his own ground WITH witnesses.
Bad move, I told myself, buy time…but I was unwilling to back down, especially to a bully. Unclenching my fists, I still kept the grin on my face, only not showing so many teeth.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Amitabh, showing his own grimy teeth, already in the process of being stained by his new habit of chewing gutka.
I shrugged and kept quiet and looked at Anupam for some kind of inspiration.
Bad move.
I suddenly felt my collar and upper body jerked backwards. This time, I didn’t hesitate and laid hold of the arm gripping my collar and slammed my open palm into its elbow. It was a knee jerk reaction and one that took the owner of the arm by complete surprise.
The next thing I felt was Anupam pushing me away from the bench and outside the class, as Amitabh roared with pain and shame on the floor.
“Where did you learn to drive? Did papa teach you? Who taught you?”
I could hear a shrill piping in the background. I turned around and saw this scrawny little thing looking at me with really familiar and twinkled eyes. It suddenly hit me that the last time I saw those eyes, I was at Heathrow airport and the owner of the eyes was telling me to forget Guwahati, forget the NGO and just forget the past and settle down there itself. Those twinkled eyes I remembered were duplicated in the faces of my lovely twin nephews whom I was holding when the original owner was advising me not to go back. I wished I had listened to him….
Bro….
Mr. Hell-on-wheels, the ladies man, the corporate whiz, father of the greatest brats in the world and my brother, M. Now as a scrawny little kid in the back seat and to be honest, a bit ratty looking. I told myself that he is going to grow up into looking better, especially once he gets his pair of rimless glasses and stops behaving like an insane pomerian with a attention deficit problem. But right now? Ummm, allow me to reserve judgment. And that voice….Ouch!
“Where did you learn to drive? Did papa teach you? Who taught you?” He repeated again, in a higher shrill. The cars windows were beginning to quaver.
Man, was he this irritating always, I wondered. No wonder I used to try to hit him when we were kids.
Hmmmm….
“If you’ll keep quiet, I’ll teach you too” I opened with a weak defence.
“When?” came back the instant query, dripping disbelief in anything but what’s in hand. Yeah, my bro was definitely going to be a corporate lawyer, the damned pessimist.
“As soon as you can look over the wheel and see the road” I tried a stronger ploy for time.
“I can see over the wheel if I sit on two cushions, like that boy in the Indiana Jones movie we saw last summer”
Hmmmmm……..
“Okay, fine, we’re cool, as long as papa has no issues in you banging up his car while learning how to drive.” I went for broke.
“What do you mean we are cool? Its hot, isn’t it?”
“Erm, nothing. Ask papa for permission to use the car.” I threw out the bait as diversion and made good my escape.
“Papa, can I……”
I mentally switched off the voices as bro went to work on the poor old man and started looking around at the roads.
It was just like coming out of a really bad bender or a really wild party and seeing everything with totally zonked out eyes. I mean, it was all the same, jut different and eerie.
The roads were smaller, the cars were less, traffic was brilliant, the flyovers did not exist and there were no brand name stores, coffee houses or restaurants lining the road. We were traveling GS Road, which would later become the main brand-shopping avenue for Guwahatians and boast of nearly as many brand showrooms as Kolkata, no wait, its still Calcutta.
GS Road was a dump, right now…Oh man, for some hard cash, a few decent builders and architects and the body of a grown up and I would be king of the world, this world.
Hmmmm…. there were possibilities, I had not considered. Hmmmmm indeed.
I think I spent the rest of the journey with my mouth shut and eyes really open till we reached school.
DonBoscoHigh School, as we know it now is a towering edifice with a massive auditorium and very smart interiors as well as exteriors. The place we had reached in my dad’s old ambassador was something out a photographs page in one of school’s yearbooks. The foundations for the auditorium were just starting to be laid down, the old classrooms building was still standing and not yet torn down. The boys of Bosco were still the cocks of the walk in Guwahati, the teachers were allowed to utilize corporal punishment and most did with a rather worrying cheerfulness, the principal himself would have made marine drill sergeants shrink up and wilt and I was still expected to carry a water bottle on a strap that hangs from my neck.
I woke up with a start, my body was drenched with sweat and I needed water. Stumbling and fumbling, I felt around my bed and suddenly felt a fierce joy that I possessed use of my arms. I found the restricting confines of a mosquito net and was again suddenly angry with my houseboys for draping that foolishness over my head. Anyway, I got it up and tried to go to the bathroom, stumbled some more, cracked my shins well and finally found the door to the bathroom.
I switched on the lights and doused my face with water and drank from the tap, something my mom would give me hell about in my younger days. There is a sublime pleasure of committing childhood crimes as an adult, safe in the knowledge that retribution is lacking. Sating my thirst, I wiped my face on a nearby towel and…..
Something was wrong.
I wiped my face, then felt my old mug. I could not feel my beard. It was a weird feeling, like waking up in the middle of a dream and finding yourself in an alien land. I put away the towel and rubbed my face. My jawline seemed as smooth as a baby’s bottom and I am a guy who shaves everyday. Wondering, I started looking into the mirror, wondering if the guys played a prank on me as they used to try in the college hostel.
The face that looked back at me was not mine!
I rubbed my eyes, adjusted my spectacles and looked again. The face was mine, all right, but there were some glaring differences. I had no beard, no moustache, nothing. My jawline was drooping with slack jowls, and most important, I had hair on my head. A lot of hair, a full thatch to be precise and black as the night without a colour of gray. It was as if I was looking at a picture of myself, aged 14, instead of 34 as I actually was. Even my specs were the hated plasticky sort, which I had replaced with thin metal rims the day I earned my first salary. I concentrated, shook my head and looked again, trying to assimilate the information my brain was receiving from my eyes.
I was looking at myself aged 14 and I was wide awake…….
I was wide awake…….. or was I?
Try the old trick, pinch yourself said my brain. I did so.
Even my fingers felt flabby. Ouch. That hurt. The image in the mirror did not change.
I need sleep, that’s all. This is all a really good dream. As I turn to the door, I take my first look around me. The room is my old bathroom, just the way it still is, with differences that strike the eye, only when the eye falls on the specific item.
The toothpaste was the old white paste Colgate tube. I used gel now, or then, well, whatever. My electric razor is missing and so are my shaving foam cans and aftershaves. I gave it up as a bad job and tried to navigate back to my bed, rolled up the mosquito nets, tucked them up and lay on my back. Maybe it will look better in the morning, but something was not right. I fell asleep trying to figure out what it was……
A shock got me up again, the sort of buzzing type that comes from a very generalized area. I almost jumped out of my skin and screamed out
“What the f**k is going on? Who the hell is that?”
I get a quicker response than could be expected. There was another buzzing shock. This one got me to hunting for my specs, groping blindly I finally found them and put them on.
I wished I had not. It was my mom.
Not wrinkled and tired and arthritic, not with white hair and dentures and still hoping that her wild elder son would settle down with a nice decent Brahmin girl.
Nope, this one still had black hair, was definitely not tired of wielding the feared hairbrush that had delivered such clear wake-up calls and very definitely not arthritic. And she was in full top gear, screaming like a banshee,
“Its 8 o clock in the morning and you are still in bed? What have I done to deserve you? Other boys would have been up by 5 am and finished two hours of studying besides being ready for school….”
Yup, that was my mom all right. It took her about another ten years before she realised that I had left her other boys quite far back in the field, but that hairbrush was coming closer with each rise of her vocal pitch and I might have grown to 6 feet later, but that hairbrush still held some memories for me.
These memories, I thought, as I walked or rather waddled to the bathroom.
Yeah, I was still 14 or so, I believe as I looked in the mirror again. No differences, except maybe the eyes were not those of a 14 year old, or so it seemed. No matter, I had to get ready, what a blessing I did not have to shave. I was done in ten minutes flat and out of the bathroom. My mother was flabbergasted as she watched me come out of the bathroom.
“Did you take a bath or not? I’ll make you go in again if you haven’t” suspicion dripped and poured off her voice.
I grinned to myself and thought of my law college hostel days and asked for my clothes. If she told me to get them myself, I would take ages to remember the locations. I mean, hell, does anyone remember after 20 years, where their clothes used to be when they were back in school? I sure as hell did not and was greatly relieved when she handed out my school clothes, apparently in shock.
The clothes were a horror freak show. I mean, the trousers could have accommodated a baby elephant and the shirt was unbelievable. Grey trousers, white shirt, maroon tie and Bata naughty boy shoes. And once I tried them on, I realised that the clothes were tight! I mean, they were not comfortable. I was just not a comfortable shape!!!
Gods, no wonder the kids used to tease me back then….I mean, now. Oh well, this is not going to be fun.
I was ready and moving when my mom called back, “No school today or what? Who is going to take your school bag?”
School bag? The horror show was getting settled in. I mean, hell, even my juniors in practice carried smaller satchels of briefs. That thing must have weighed near to ten kilos. Great, I was back in the lovely old days where school bags weighed tons and uniforms had to be worn and gods bless us all, corporal punishment was the norm rather than being illegal.
No matter, lets get some juice and coffee said I. I slumped down in the dining table when things were again going crazy. The table was still covered with the old Formica finish that dad and I got replaced with some decent black marble tops before I went off to college. The chairs were in their old covers and the paneled sideboard was not yet built. I mean, things were really psyching me out but they were moving too fast. I had never been this harried along since…..since I was this age. Humph!!!
A plate is put in front of me and I see a mountain of rice and dal and chicken curry and sabzi and some kind of potato fries, it seemed. No wonder I was a blimp in school and still could not get rid of my waist ‘handles’.
I push the plate away. I was back in the land where people looked after the calories and let the vitamins go hang. Nowadays, that is in the present…ummm, the future…whatever, usually the menu for the meal, could be seen on my cooks apron and the food would be good solid stuff, all calories and fat and protein and maybe a vitamin crying softly because it was all alone. I had tried explaining nutrition to my cook, who dated from my mom’s dictatorial days of kitchen rule but the man’s three chins wobbled so menacingly at words like "vitamins" that I refused to go back into my kitchen ever again and subsisted on coffee, juice and cigarettes. And the gods bless me, if I was not back in the good old days.
“Can I get some orange juice and coffee?” I squeaked. Oh my god, my voice! I did not have a voice, I had a squeak!!! The lords have mercy!!!
Clearing my throat, I tried a lower pitch, “Can I get some orange juice and coffee?”
“And who is going to make it? You? Coffee and orange juice indeed, like they grow on trees. Eat what’s on your plate. Deepening your voice won’t get you anywhere.” That shrill voice was no match for my appetite, I gave up.
I juggled my bag and walked to our garage. Thank god it was in the same place as always. Only there were two huge ambassadors there now. No new shiny TATA indigo or my gleaming silver and black modified Enfield cruiser there. That was hard, very hard to take. No air-conditioning, no music in my cars, I could take, but a bike less existence was not going to be easy. I humped my bag on the bonnet and walked back to the house and hooked out the car keys from the hooks hanging in the kitchen, I remembered that much.
The old car still smelled great. I loved the big old amby as we used to call it. Big, roomy and built like a tank, this was the car of the Indian roads and I had learned to drive in the chaotic traffic of India on one of these monsters… this very one actually. Something finally that’s nice.
I started up the engine and the big motor turned over with a roar of exhaust and fumes. I loved it. I moved it into gear and drove to the gate, made a perfect three points turn and backed into our porch area. I could do it in my sleep in a 18-wheelered truck, I had been doing it so long. After all, I had just done it yesterday when I took dad for his check up before the final boardroom meeting. Damn! I had forgotten all about that meeting and the final series of events. Was there really a bomb? Did I really see P’s head roll into my view? What the hell had happened? I switched off the ignition as I stopped the car in the porch ready to move out when dad came.
I was still sitting and thinking about last night in the silent car when I could hear my mom’s shrill voices and the clamour of the household boys. Looking around, I was surprised to see them all on the verandah on the porch. Our old house was built on the old ‘Raj’ bungalow type lines and the porch had a verandah lining it, which fronted the house and the main doors. The whole family was out on the bloody verandah and talking all at once.
I could instantly recognise my father, and though I was better prepared for the shock it was still quite disturbing. The man I had taken yesterday to the doctor for his check up was about 20 kilos lighter and fitter with totally white hair and the usual changes of age. The man standing on the porch and ordering me to get out of the car was a different individual.
“Where did you learn to do that? Who told you to do that?” he asked.
The inevitable questions, I was getting tired of it all.
“I know how to drive, relax. I wont crash the car” I said.
This did not get the reaction of easing the situation that I was hoping for. In fact, it seemed to get me more into the soup. My dad’s face reddened and for a moment, I thought he was going to hit me. Not that I was afraid of being beaten up, having got quite a lot of deserved thrashings from him all throughout my childhood, but at that moment, I must have looked like I was not going to take a shot lying down, right now.
To my surprise, he stomped off and I was left feeling the old need for a cigarette. I almost started patting my pockets for the case and lighter when I remembered where I was and what I was doing. I walked back to the car and slid into the passenger seat and sat down and tried to not think of cigarettes and coffee.
A few minutes later, dad gets into the car and drives out of the house. I sat back, determined to look around and see what the morning brought.
The wolves were through, past the thickets and jungles, past the streams, the prey in site. The bloodlust was visible and each face was palpably strained as the pack closed in. One could almost hear the last screams of the prey, defiant or submissive, screams they were after all.
But it was not in a jungle in the deeper reaches of Assam, where the wolves still-hunted in packs, it was said. The setting was more scenic and the prey was human. The look of the pack was however ruthless and the smiles wolverine.
It was the seventh floor boardroom of the flourishing NGO that I had set up during my early years in Guwahati. When I had started out, we had operated from a dingy one-room studio apartment in the same building. The building belonged to my dad and he rented it out to various business and shops, but he allowed me a room there for my use and furnished it up. He would usually sit there in the mornings and conduct his business, as it were with his tenants and I would take back possession in the afternoons and the evenings as my chamber or NGO office or whatever I chose to call my work. The relationship was not an easy one, however it sufficed, for I had my own space for a decent period of time and the address was a decent one and not too far from the courts where I used to practice.
Today, the shops and other sundry businesses were a memory; the NGO occupied the whole building. In my dad’s time, there were only two floors plus the ground. Today, the vista from the seventh floor tinted wall windows offset with the setting sun was worth easily the entire rent that the old man charged the whole lot in those times. I stood there near the side of the windows watching the setting sun hoping to drown out the muted wails and seething whispers from the large boardroom table at my back.
I dragged my eyes back to the table and looked around at the wolf pack. The faces had aged, but they still retained traces of youthful vigour and growing caresses of age, arrogance and success. Three men and two women looked back at me with the ghosts of the smiles still on their lips, asking the unasked question.
“Lets finish this. I am tired of haggling like fisherwomen at the Kachari Ghats,” I said
The smiles became more prominent as the other sitting members seemed to wilt in their chairs. Was it from relief or from loss, I wondered?
My NGO was built for aiding the poor and underprivileged classes of society. As one those things which click due to the right combination of factors, it did so, in a rather pleasant fashion. I had appointed my father the president, my aunt the treasurer and a few other relatives and friends as executive members. The Secretary was my cousin Rantu, who alongwith me were the dogsbody pair doing all the dirty work.
Well, the work paid off big, but Rantu was not around to observe the success story we made of the NGO we had started together on a motorcycle, riding around the interiors of Assam. The poor fellow succumbed to a to a family malady of heart related illness and I missed him especially today. He loved the joy of success of a well laid down deep and dirty plan.
Gods, I missed him and his wisecracks.
Initially watching it grow in those early days, I had dreamt dreams of never leaving ever, but a torturous heartbreak and a rather lasting case of wanderlust saw me pulling up my stakes and heading off for the west. I went abroad ostensibly for the purpose of higher education, but the true cause of nursing a broken heart was rather clear to one and all.
Returning from a rather long sojourn and various misadventures, I had returned to find my NGO affairs in sad disrepair. My work demolished and fed upon by moulting vultures and other scavengers, my original board overturned and the proceeds of the funds I had accumulated lost to the four winds.
Sick at heart once again, I had set about and built up my old team and went to work, which was culminating today, this afternoon as the present board members went from mocking defiance to cowardly sniveling as the tables turned over the last six months.
“The papers are ready and the signature’s attested. We are done” said my legal chief, from the right.
I turned back and looked around the long table and the various people sitting on it, the afternoon light throwing weird and impossible abstracts across the table and people both. My people dominated the top half of the table while the idiots who ruined my organization sat in a bunch towards the lower end.
The prey to my wolves….moving off in a file, as if eager to shake loose of the roller coaster ride of tax raids, official enquiries and law suits that we had set for them in the last few months. Each and every one of them had fallen into the pit and today they were lucky to be able to walk out the office without arrests. Or so they thought….
As I look around the table, I could see faces in both triumph and defeat, except one. That one face was looking at my own instead of reflecting either joy or sorrow. P, an old school friend, was someone I had picked up to co-ordinate the NGO when I had left on my travels. She had done a good job, better than I had expected, but she was never on the board and decisions made were out of her control to do much damage containment. On my return, my greatest information came from her and her price was a seat on the board. She did not want to be over ruled again without a fighting chance and she loved the NGO a bit too much. I was only too happy to give in. And today, as she regained control and took her place on the board she had served so long, I could see an almost cold detachment on her usually expressive face.
I didn’t like that…..but I was too busy praying that everyone signed on the dotted lines and ended this sorry affair. I was too tired to really give a damn about fighting the next 20 years for the right to do some good.
The sun had set a long time back, I was in my shirtsleeves, again near the window’s. I could see the stars twinkling and the city lights blazing as a soft breeze blew the sweat dry on my bald scalp. The booze was flowing; the cigar smoke made the room uninhabitable for anyone else but us, the only topic was the future. We were invincible, unbeatable and we had finally been into a good battle after so long. It was getting late, so I tried to make a final toast to get them all moving.
Turning and raising my glass, I leaned on the sill of the bay windows and stood framed with the night at my back and the well-lit boardroom to my front, “To the best goddamned team of wolves and to the future”
A perfect cacophony of howls resounded around the room ……………and nearly drowned out the blast that shook the building to its foundations. I felt like I was hammered by a giant fist and blown along with the wind. As I was flung out I thought I saw flying debris and my conference table half out of the window where I just was leaning.
That was the last thing I remembered before everything went dark…..
As I recovered some consciousness, I saw my boardroom demolished and destruction everywhere. I couldn’t seem to open my left eye and my lower body was immovable.
“Anyone there?” I had intended it to be a ringing shout, what came out was worse than a croak. In the distance I imagined I heard sirens and klaxons of approaching aid, but as I looked around to call out again, the first thing that swam into view was P’s severed and discolored head. I could not believe my eyes and tried to reach out for it but couldn’t move my hands.
I tried to look beyond but saw only gore and blood and dust and concrete or cement blocks everywhere and after a few moments, everything seemed to go slowly dark……
