Most days while on the road, I normally have an objective, a destination and a reason to be traveling but that day I found myself with a lot of time and I was in no real rush. So I took a normally forgotten turn on a commonly traveled road just to see where it led. It opened up to a pathway on one side and a lake on the other. An unfenced lake.
At one point on the road, it became clear that vehicles weren’t the way to travel any further. Instead there was a semi spherical wooden thing that people were seemingly supposed to get in and slide down the rest of the way. There were a bunch of these arranged alongside a wall on the left side of the road.
I got into one and set myself in motion. It was very cool. I slid down the road and up when the road curved up and sideways left and right similarly. When it finally stopped, I was precariously (I’d just noticed) close to the edge of the lake. The water was sparkling under the sunlight. I forgot myself in the shimmer for a bit. Then I looked around me to see where I’d ended up and that’s when I spotted the sign – “Beware of snakes”. I immediately decided my little trip was over and set my semi sphere in motion down the nearest slope again. This time after a little while it stopped suddenly. And while I was examining the reason for my abrupt halting, my eyes fell upon a heap of a coil sitting motionless. I decided I wasn’t going to wait for it to move and ran, semisphere dragging after me. In the hurried motion, the part of the semisphere I was holding broke from the whole into my hand and the rest of it rolled away into the water. But I was so panicked to understand what happened that I kept running. I ran and I ran and hoped to run up to my vehicle I think but on the way, I tripped and fell. And passed out.
When I woke up, I saw a pair of beady eyes staring down at me. My vision cleared up and I realized I was face to face with either a mongoose or a badger, not knowing which because I’d never seen either in the flesh before and even the pictures I’d seen weren’t very clear in the difference or I’d just not paid enough attention. The latter is more possible. It must have been the shock of the sudden sight but I passed out again.
I woke up this time in the safety of my bed. I rubbed my eyes groggily and decided I must have dreamt it all. “These dreams are getting way too realistic these days” – I mulled. I fell back again on the bed, my head hitting the pillow with a heavier thump than I was used to. I felt under it and retrieved the reason for the thump –
The piece of the semisphere that had broken….
Category: AtoZChallenge
S is for Silence
When was the last time you were silent?
Not in the sense that you were listening to someone and for that interval you said nothing, but truly silent. That feeling of calm emptiness both because there’s nothing on your agenda that demands your urgent attention and because you’re completely actively unengaged – no phones, no conversations, no thoughts.
Just …silence.
I can’t remember the last time I was silent. Perhaps it was in an age before Uninterrupted Power Supply and smartphones. On evenings when mum wasn’t back from work but the power had gone out. I’d carefully make my way to the kitchen and feel around for one of the candles, guided sometimes by the moonlight streaming in through the meshed window, sometimes merely by touch and a mental memory of the kitchen layout. And once it was lit, I’d sit and look at it. The flame was always beautiful to look at. Sometimes I’d poke my finger into it rapidly and sometimes just place my palm a little over the tip of the flame – foolhardy actions of a young boy and yet, some of the most fun I remember having. And after I’d had my fun, I’d just sit in front of the candle and slip into a daze of conscious nothingness. I’d look at the wax dripping, not really paying attention to it. And for that remaining period of 20 minutes to an hour – while waiting for the candle to die out or the power to return, all that was there would be peaceful silence.
This thought bubble about silence isn’t going to end with a plan to simulate that state of being. Because I think I’m far too down the road of continuous stream of random thoughts to try and muster silence in my brain.
I’ll settle for a state of perpetual satisfaction.
R is for Repeat
The man stood on his crutches on the pavement watching the sea of vehicles speeding by, each trying to make it over the imaginary finish line before the next red light would arrive, indicating the end of the current race. And arrive it did. A few errant motorists ignored it.
The other vehicles dutifully halted, a new tetris grid forming. The man took this as his cue to hop onto the road, aided by his good leg on one side and two crutches on either. His hand stretched out mechanically as it had for hours before that for days on end.
Many ignored his eyes that bored into the side of their helmed faces. Some obliged, fishing into their pockets and digging out spare change that they surprisingly found and some came back empty-handed with sheepish looks as if to say – “I wanted to… :-/”
The man repeated this exercise with as many vehicles as he could before hopping back with timed precision onto the pavement just as the traffic lights turned green. This went on for hours. An hour after sunset as the traffic dwindled, the man began counting his earnings for the day. No grumblings, just silent counting.
Finally he sighed.
He looked around cautiously.
The other leg miraculously appeared out of the folds of his “lungi” and he walked back home with his crutches held at his side.
He had to rest for tomorrow.
M is for Material
I didn’t think I cared for many things material. There’s a small wooden bird figurine I bought on a trip to pondicherry that I’ve grown extremely fond of. When its tail broke off, I remember feeling very sad. And I remember how happy I felt when I realized I could superglue it back. That’s probably one of the countable material items I care for in my life as of today.
Among the tiny list of things I care about, I did not think my kindle was among them. Nor did I think a Keychain I had as a primary would be on that list. But the old saying about knowing how much you care about things only when they’re no longer with you is true. I lost both of these items earlier this week and when constant efforts looking for them in every corner I could think of proved futile, my nonchalance of “yeah, they’ll turn up eventually” broke. And I’ve found myself thinking about them every now and then all evening. I did not know I’d miss them so much. But I do. The Keychain was a gift from a friend who’d brought it for me from China. It’s not a terribly rare Keychain, just Spiderman themed. But he’d thought about me when he saw it, enough to ping and ask if I’d like it if he bought it for me. And that act of his meant a lot to me. The Kindle was also brought for me by another dear friend from Germany and I’d taken it from him on the day of his wedding, when I’d attended it. I’m leaving out a lot of details but I guess those details are the reason I find myself regretting not being careful about these two specific items.
I don’t know if I’ll get them back. If I’ll remember suddenly with a jolt where they might be. I probably won’t. This post is acceptance of that.
But it’s good to know I care. About things people give me or make for me.
It’s a nice feeling.
K is for Kitten
The person on the bike in front of me didn’t move even after all the vehicles in front of him had moved and I thought, “Oof, a stall so early in the morning. Poor guy.”. I made a move to go around him, but he stuck his hand out and I halted. I looked at him and followed his line of sight onto the road where there was a tiny kitten looking very agitated and confused, at everything around it. It all happened within a fraction of seconds – I braked hard and like a daisychain of hands stuck my hand to stop the vehicle on my right, but the person who stopped hadn’t seen the cause yet and the car on his right moved on, in the interval of which the kitten had darted across the road right in the path of this car. I yelled inconsequentially. The car, incredibly luckily moved right over the kitten and it stood there unscathed. Two men on the bike I’d stopped yelled at me for all of 3 seconds before grasping the situation themselves. I yelled back, asking them to help me catch the kitten and release it to safety. One of them jumped to action and stopped the goods vehicle behind him and the other guy and I ran behind the kitten, our vehicles abandoned on the middle of the road. The next minute was a blur, in which the kitten had managed to find himself stuck right on top of the wheel of the goods vehicle Boy ‘A’ had just stopped. With Boy ‘B”s help, we carefully extricated the kitten from under the vehicle and amidst its frantic, clueless struggles to get free, picked it up and dropped it off at a building by the side of the pavement. By now, a longer line of vehicles had assembled, blocked by our vehicles in the way. Relieved and satisfied about the kitten’s safety, we hastily got back onto our vehicles and thanked each other awkwardly.
It was a small thing, but I shudder to think what would have happened if the first biker had been just as carefree and careless as the rest of us. What if he’d been as apathetic as the biker on his left who in fact, scolded this guy callously and moved on even after assessing the scene? What if he hadn’t noticed the struggling kitten in his path and stopped sensibly?
But he did.
And as long as there are people who will stop for a kitten, the world will never be a bleak place.
J is for Jealousy [#AtoZChallenge]
Subbu’s jaw dropped.
“And I got this for my last birthday”, Mani said as he produced a white, shiny Hot Wheels car. “And this one was for my previous 95 out of 100 in Social Studies”. Another item emerged from the bag that seemed to hold an infinite supply of toys – this time a GiJoe. It was the short break hour and Mani had decided to exhibit his collection atop Prema ma’am’s table that day to his huddled group of gawking, incredulous classmates. “Mani”, Subbu asked when he finally found his voice, “What does your father do?”. This endowment of seemingly hundreds of toys could only be justified if Mani’s father owned a toy shop. “Don’t you know da?”, Mani asked with a mixture of condescension and genuine puzzlement, “Your father and my father are colleagues at the same company.”. The knot in Subbu’s chest tightened and he found himself looking at the bench lost in thought about the unfairness being meted out to him by life, his parents and everyone. He had scored a lot of 95s as well. Mostly in English, but it counted, didn’t it? He was shaken from his reverie by Murugan who was by now staring daggers at Mani. “He thinks he’s some sort of big shot just because he has more toys than us. We’ll see who’s smiling when something goes missing.”. Subbu didn’t like the glint in Murugan’s eyes but he didn’t want to antagonise his friend, so he meekly nodded hoping his face didn’t betray his conscience. Mani had just finished displaying a tiny He-Man eraser (that held in an outstretched plastic hand a small, but sharp plastic sword of sorts, sharp enough to prick any of Subbu’s mental balloons of happiness, if any were left), when Prema ma’am walked into the classroom and Mani hastily replaced all the objects back into his “akshayapatra” of a bag and the rest of them hurriedly took their places in their seats.
Later during lunch, Subbu spotted Mani frantically looking for something. He had an inkling as to what might have happened but he innocently went and asked the worried boy, “Mani, are you searching for something?”. Mani looked up ashen-faced at Subbu and said, “My brand new kaleidoscope, Subbu. Have you seen it?”. Subbu thought Murugan might have something to do with this missing tube of mirrors but he shook his head vigorously…perhaps a little too vigorously, for Mani surveyed him for a few seconds as though the location of the missing cylinder was marked with an “X” on Subbu’s forehead, before resuming his search under the desks. The latter stayed there a few more minutes watching the former struggle before sympathetically patting him on his back and walking away.
As he moved away from the seeker he saw Murugan, standing a few benches away, looking at Mani with a satisfied expression on his face. “See how he pitifully searches for his Parker Pen”, he smirked with a whisper once Subbu was within earshot. Subbu furrowed his eyebrows – “Parker ..Pen?” he thought, but not aloud. “Now Mani has lost two items, only one of which he has noticed missing”, he brooded. “Subbu?”, Murugan enquired, “Do you think we should keep it for ourselves or break it?”. Subbu frowned. Of course, he had been jealous of how many more things Mani had and maybe a tiny part of him had revelled at the thought of Mani grappling with the loss of one of his prized possessions that he had “shown off”, but was he, Subbu, an evil person? What would Harry Potter do? He pondered the paths his heroes from fiction and mythology might take if faced with such moral questions and decided with a resolve as a wave of shame washed over him – “No”, and prepared himself to patronise Murugan for his action; but the thief had vanished out of sight and Subbu’s eyes wandered back to a still worried-looking Mani. He walked back to the bemoaner and said with the tone of a savior, “Don’t worry Mani, I’ll help you find your pen…err..telescope.”, he corrected himself as Mani looked at him quizzically. “Kaleidoscope”, he was corrected. Subbu adopted a loftier expression all the while muttering to himself about having overcome jealousy and being the bigger man and yet being corrected by ungrateful monsters. As he bent under the desk himself, he wondered if he should bring up the topic of adequate compensation with his parents and ran a possible scenario over in his head about how that conversation with his father might go –
He would gingerly broach the topic – “Appa, Mani had brought 4 HotWheels cars today.”
Appa would remark only partially listening – “Mm Hmm.”
He would repeat the premise for father’s benefit.
Appa would feign interest this time and look at him as if to wonder why this sentence was being posed to him.
Then he would ask for an increase in number of cars for himself and let the chips fall where they may. He had no idea how Appa would react to this new man with a spine, but he was prepared to try, for justice’s sake.
For the second time that day, he jerked back to reality only to notice that he had wandered off to the opposite row of benches on his knees, all the while, trying to look for Mani’s kaleidoscope, obviously unsuccessfully. As he prepared to abandon the search, he spotted a glint of something shiny by the trash can situated at the left end of Prema ma’am’s table. He rushed to it and picked it up even as it came undone in his hand, the glass pieces smashed to smithereens. It would seem that in Mani’s haste to pick up his things, this tube had fallen to the ground and scattered. He brought the remnants of the tube and the bad news back to Mani. The boy took one look at the glass pieces and started weeping profusely, spluttering pieces of speech from which Subbu gathered that Mani had had to sweep the entire house to get his Appa to buy him this what-was-once-a-fine-bangle-piece-displayer. Subbu felt even more sympathetic towards this boy and thought he should probably, at this point, not add insult to injury by enquiring if Mani had noticed anything else missing from his Bag of Wonders. By this time, two more of their classmates had arrived by Mani’s side and had begun consoling him. Subbu felt confident about the moral support Mani was receiving and decided to confront Murugan immediately, chide him, maybe teach him a lesson or two about the virtues of honesty and the horridness of jealousy and get the pen back to Mani before the latter even discovered its loss – surely the poor boy had suffered enough already.
His thoughts and actions were interrupted by Prema ma’am walking in again with an expression of what he could only surmise was absolute rage. She slammed the notebooks she was holding onto her table and dust from 1947 rose up to fill the air in the classroom, it seemed.
“Everyone take your bags and keep them on your desks”, she said, in an icy tone. Subbu blinked and looked around at his classmates who looked equally clueless.
“One of you has stolen my Parker Pen and I’m going to find out who.”
I is for Ignored [#AtoZChallenge]
“Whoaaaaaaa”, he yelled, a sound only he could hear. One second he saw the clear blue skies and in the very next, an expansive patch of brown mud and this pattern repeated as he rose into an arc and his ascent slowed to a halt and then he descended in the same topsy-turvy fashion with increasing velocity before crashing onto a rough surface that was immediately engulfed in darkness. He blinked. He could see nothing for what seemed like ages, but heard muffled voices in a tongue he’d come to understand in bits and pieces – some words more familiar than others. He’d learnt a lot of things over the years. He knew his name was what his handlers called “fifty paisa” , but he was always spoken about carelessly, it seemed, with lesser reverence than others of his kind.
“Heads”, he heard someone call out. And he knew his outing for the day was almost done. A brief glimmer of sunlight when one of the voices would whoop and the other would groan (he’d come to distinguish these sounds over time as well). And back into the recesses of a velcro covered, stifling enclosure he’d go with the rest of his species for company – who didn’t say much but sometimes brushed against him involuntarily.
He closed his eyes and waited for the familiar scrape of velcros indicating his nap-time. But it never came. Instead, today, he found himself being slipped in a crevice of sorts lined with material he was unfamiliar with. He fell and waited for a landing but he kept slipping further down, grazing a surface, rolling slightly and falling through another hole of sorts for a duration only slightly lesser than the time it had taken him to down the arc moments earlier. “Thump”, he fell face down on something hard and dusty. He whimpered. Again, no one heard him. He waited for some agent to retrieve and return him to his familiar surroundings. No one came. He kept waiting even as dust settled on his side that faced the skies. Once in a while he felt enormous pressure on his backside, but it was always a hurried application that was immediately lifted. Initially he mistook those events to be rescue missions. But they weren’t and he stayed where he was.
After a while, he felt something he hadn’t felt in a long time. He felt akin to what we would describle as …moist. “Patter”. “Patter”. “Patter”. The sound accompanying the object that caused the wetness kept hitting him and eventually he felt himself rising slowly. From his vantage point, all he could see was the surface he had been lying on but from a slight height through a medium he could not explain, but it wasn’t clear. Now this surface seemed to be moving and him along with itself. He felt himself being rocked gently initially – back and forth – and then the surface began pushing him. He kept moving for a while and then fell sharply. Another thump. This time he’d fallen face-up so he could see the new gap he’d fallen from – one among a series of adjacent gaps. By now, the skies had cleared up so he could see the skies but the view was punctuated uniformly by the surface above.
He sighed in resignation. As he felt the moisture slowly abandoning him, so did hopes of his being rescued this time.
Not that it mattered to anyone.
H is for History [#AtoZChallenge]
“Good morning maaaaa’m”, the class bleated obediently like a herd of sheep, Subbu among them, as a stern looking Miss Prema entered the room with a thick book in her hand. She eyed the class suspiciously and dropped the book on the table where it landed with an resounding thud. The class fell silent and Prema ma’am spoke in her high pitched voice, “This quarter, we have a lot of History to cover. So, we will not waste any time and continue where we left from before the test – ” Chapter 5: The Rise and Fall of Alexander the Great”. Subbu frowned. Why was she starting off on the first day? More importantly, had she corrected the papers yet? But he didn’t dare interrupt her as she read monotonously, “The land of Macedonia was already a great military power …”.
He instead nudged Venky, his best friend who always sat next to him in class (or rather they’d grown close as a result of being made to sit next to each) and said “Hey, why don’t you ask Prema ma’am for the marks. You did well in History no?”. Venky looked at his friend with a mixture of pride and condescension that Subbu had not only assumed his prowess in the subject, but also entrusted him with a task that he was too cowardly to do himself. “Okay you chicken”, he commented as he cleared his throat in preparation, a little louder than he’d intended. “Venkatraman!”, the teacher yelled, “What is it? Why are you making sounds?”. The lion in him had shrunk into a kitten at the admonishing and he mewed incoherently. “What is it boy? Speak up!”, she yelled again. “Ma’am..Can you..Can I drink some water ma’am?”, he managed to squeak. He was disapprovingly given permission and had to make a show of going to the back of the class, fetching his water bottle from the array of baskets and drink it despite not being thirsty at all. Subbu looked back at his courageous friend, disappointed that the soldier had fallen without even getting a chance to yell a war-chant, let alone draw a spear. When he returned to his station sheepishly, Subbu had half a mind to taunt him, but seeing the ashen expression on his face, thought the better of it. He gave him one last look before shaking his head and looking to the other side for another chess piece to move.
“Muralii”, he hissed at the boy seated at the edge of the bench in the column next to his. “Ask ma’am for test marks”, he mouthed, half voicelessly. Murali gave him a puzzled expression. He repeated his request once more before giving up hope in the method. He tore half a sheet from the last page of his neatly covered notebook , wordlessly begging Saraswati Devi forgiveness for having hurt her so and scribbled his message on it. With as much ninja skills as he could muster he casually passed the folded slip to Murali. Murali grabbed the note and read it. Then he scribbled something and passed it back clumsily to Subbu who received it with surprise. He had not expected that there would a second phase of transactions. “Ask her yourself.”, the message read. Subbu cursed under his breath , then closed his eyes and exhaled. He raised his hand and waited patiently for Prema ma’am to pause at the end of the paragraph she was impassionately reading and look up at the class to make sure no one had slept off. Their eyes met and she called, “Yes, what is it Subbu? Do you also want to drink water?”. The class laughed. “Silence! “, she barked and there was. Subbu realised at that minute what Venky must have gone through and a sudden rush of sympathy for the boy washed over him. But he’d powered through the fear and asked, “Ma’am , have you been able to maybe, correct our papers yet?”, with as much respect and doubt as he could fuel into the sentence. “Is this what you were thinking about then? Were you not paying attention to the class? When was Alexander born?” . Subbu was stumped. He hadn’t yet received feedback about his performance in the previous test when here he was being posed with a new one! Never mind the fact that he had no idea what Alexander’s birthday was! Why, he didn’t even know Venky’s birthday! Involuntarily, he felt ashamed that he was unaware of such an important detail about his best friend. Meanwhile Prema ma’am had decided that this silence was proof of inattentiveness (a valid accusation) and told Subbu to stand at the back of the class. Subbu was aghast. Not only had he not got an answer to his question, now he was being punished? But being the anvil, he had no choice but to meekly comply.
He walked to the back of the class like Venky had and stood next to a blue basket, facing the board. As he stood there, his eyes flicking from student to student and occasionally to Prema ma’am, he wondered if Alexander had ever taken orders from his teachers like this. Surely they wouldn’t have conferred the title “Great” upon his if he had been so cowardly? Then again, being the son of a king probably came with perks like not having to listen to anyone. He stood there for what felt like a long time, day-dreaming up his own version of what Alexander’s life would have been like. Eventually, the end of the class arrived and as the students grew restless, Subbu slipped out of his reverie and saw what was happening. The class monitor, Maran was distributing the answer sheets! He waited until all the sheets were distributed and waited for the teacher to call him and give him his paper. She called out, “Subbu, because you interrupted my class, you will not be getting your paper today. Come for it tomorrow.”
Subbu stood at his station, dumbstruck. But after a few minutes, he comforted himself that he was probably sacrificing himself in a war for his kingdom like Alexander the Great. After all, it was because he had asked for the papers that Prema ma’am had allotted time to distribute them, he told himself. He had fought bravely, just like Alexander had, for the sake of his people and perished valiantly. Once the papers had been collected back, she said she would complete the last para that she had paused at. The class groaned but had no choice.
He listened, despite himself as she finished –
“…At the young age of 32, Alexander died of chronic liver disease due to excessive drinking, thereby ending his glorious reign.”
G is for Googly [#AtoZChallenge]
It had been 2 days since the wedding fiasco had happened and Subbu had had to lie through his teeth that his Bio paper had gone well. However, school was not due to start for another 10 days however and this was the reason for his renewed exuberance, having already forgotten about how guilty he had felt for lying to Appa. “Today I am going to Venky’s place and we will ride our cycles near his house for the whole day”, he announced to Amma. She surveyed him and decided there was nothing violent or idiotic about his decision, but said nothing. Empowered by the lack of protest from Amma, who normally always poured a bucket of water on his well laid plans, he continued, “Who knows? Maybe we will stop by Venky’s appa’s bakery and have some veg puffs. “. Amma did not take kindly to this next plan of action and promptly said, “Dei, do you know what oil they are using? Don’t eat anything from outside.”. “Then we will have sponge cake and salt biscuits”, he bargained, confident that neither of his new objects of desire had any oil in them. When Amma had nothing to say to this argument, he felt victorious and strutted back to his room to read a novel.
He was soon lost in the world of wizards and witches and did not stir from his cozy armchair for close to two hours. When Harry had finally walked towards Platform 9 and 3/4 with Ron and Hermione, he closed the book and sat for a minute. Then he rushed to the hall with a brainwave. “Amma”, he said,” Can you buy me a diary?”. “A diary? For what?”, she enquired. “I want to start maintaining a record of what I do everyday. Tom Riddle also had a diary Ma.”, he said. “You have your school diary no?”, she asked. Subbu frowned at the lack of understanding Amma was portraying. What if Tom Riddle’s amma had also asked him the same question? He would have never been able to store a part of his soul in it. He gave her a cold stare and without further explanation walked away to make Appa the same request, all the while thinking if he should call himself The Heir of Iyer or The Heir of Sundaram. That would depend on whether his father agreed to buy him the diary or not. “Appa?”, he called meekly, poking his dad on the shoulder as the latter animatedly watched an exciting match of India vs SriLanka. “Appaaa”. Clearly Mr.Sundaram was questioning all his life decisions and regretting having a tiny dependant member in the family because it reflected in his exasperated “Yennada?” [What, boy?]. Subbu repeated the request he’d made of his mother, but Appa was not in a state of attentiveness, because he had immediately yelled “Oh you idiot, how did you miss that shot!” and drowned Subbu’s request in the process.Subbu loved cricket, but at that moment he hated the 22 players on the field on that tiny 21 inch box more than anyone else in his life, maybe even more than Veerappan. He wondered for a second if he should repeat himself, but recognising the futility from the madness in Appa’s eyes, he thought better of it, took his cycle and rode out the gate to Venky’s house. On the way he saw Murali uncle at his shop watching a tiny TV on a shelf near the counter. “Hi Murali uncle!”, he called as Murali uncle’s gaze lifted from the TV and focused on Subbu. He had also been watching the same match Appa was. Subbu immediately gave him a disgusted look in response to the “Hello Subbu!” he received and pedalled away from a confused Murali.
He knocked thrice on Venky’s door, each time with increased force, before it was answered by a distracted Gopi uncle, Venky’s father. Gopi uncle’s torso faced Subbu, but his head was turned in the opposite direction. Subbu peered through a side to match his line of sight and closed his eyes momentarily. The same idiotic cricket match that had thwarted his one desire in life (He always referred to his current desire as his “one desire in life”) . Subbu muttered a hurried hello, eager to get away from the vile person’s presence. But he was told to sit on the sofa along with him because Venky was busy with something at the moment. “Busy???”, Subbu wondered. He felt an immediate sense of inferiority and shame that he was not busy himself. It was all Amma and Appa’s fault. If they’d got him a diary, he would have been busy as well chronicling his life in said diary while also pondering how he could save a part of his soul in it. He had also wondered if it had to be a soul that required preserving or if it could be something a little more tangible, like a nail or a strand of hair. “So Subbu”, Gopi uncle asked,” How were your exams?” . “This question again”, Subbu cursed internally. Why did the man want to make small talk? He was perfectly happy with his thoughts about objects to preserve and what kind of stunts he would try on his cycle with Venky. But he had no qualms about lying to this man who he had no obligation to, so he said “Great uncle!”, his previous feelings of shame now washed away by a sense of pride at having impressed Gopi uncle, which was evident by the wide smile he gave him. This happiness on uncle’s face may have been induced by the six that had just been scored seconds earlier on the screen, but that did not strike Subbu. “Good, good”, he absently remarked and his gaze returned to the screen which was considerably bigger than in the Sundaram residence. Subbu returned to his reverie and a few more minutes passed in silence. “Subbu!”, a voice came from behind him and he went running to it eager to escape Gopi uncle and any further incriminating questions he may have to face.
“Dei Venky! What kept you so busy? Do you know how much mental torture I’ve had to face in the interim?”, Subbu exaggerated with a pained expression on his face. Venky replied with an equally grim expression – “Amma said I had to complete a whole chapter of Shakuntala Devi Maths problems da. Otherwise she wouldn’t let me watch the cricket match today. Let’s go fast, I think almost half of it is over.”
F is for Fate [#AtoZChallenge]
Subbu walked out of the classroom having just completed his last paper of the unit-test-series. His hatred for biology was second only to his hatred for geography, which had however gone fairly smoothly, thanks to the additional day he’d got for preparation. Biology on the other hand, had not. So it was no wonder that his face was filled with dismay and apprehension as he walked to the school bus that would take him home. His friend Murali spotted him on the way despite his efforts to get away unnoticed and called out – “Dei Subbu!! Wait da!”. Subbu tried walking faster, but Murali caught up with him and Subbu had to pretend that he was happy to see him. “Heyy Murali, didn’t see you there.”, he said. “Hey, what value did you get for the seventh question?”, Murali asked. Subbu froze. “Wasn’t this the Biology paper?”, he asked, shocked, “What value are you talking about?”. Murali’s face broke into a grin. An unamused Subbu punched him playfully on the arm and continued walking towards the bus accompanied by Murali, who still wore a proud expression having successfully pranked his friend. Subbu couldn’t be bothered to entertain anymore nonsense from anyone. He had more important things on his mind. Like how he would deal with Appa. A grim face floated lazily to the surface of Subbu’s mind – “Do well today, Subbu”, he had said. Despite the laconic tone, Subbu knew each of those words weighed a ton. He frowned. First of all, it was unfair for a Maths professor’s son to be expected to do well in a subject like Biology. Isn’t that what genes were all about? He had, despite his general disinterest in the subject, written a short para on whatever he could remember about genes in the test (the question was “Describe the different types of human chromosomes [10 marks]”) and felt qualified to assess the situation objectively.
He got onto the bus pondering the complications of life and trying to convince himself that genetics had to be the main reason for his less than awesome performance in today’s paper and the fact that he had spent the whole of yesterday playing cricket with Venky couldn’t have played a role. The bus weaved in and out of traffic for 30 minutes before reaching his house and he still hadn’t thought of a compelling reason to give Appa for what he considered to be a dismal performance in the test. He wondered if he could stall the inevitable by perhaps interesting him in some juicy school gossip. Apparently the school sweeper, Babu had been pilfering equipment from the headmaster’s office. Surely that would interest Appa? That’s what adults did, right? Talk about other people? Why, just yesterday he’d heard him calling out loudly to Amma about something he’d read in the paper – some guy had robbed an elderly gentleman not far from our place. “Did you know either of them appa?”,Subbu had asked innocently and he’d been told, as usual, to continue studying. But no doubt, the topic had piqued his interest. Yes, the Babu diversion would be the way to go.
He stepped into the house and called out, “Amma, Vandhutenn” (Mum, I’m back), trying to appear confident, well aware that his knees were involuntarily shivering. “Subbu?”, his dad called out from the sofa on the hall. “Hi pa”,came the nonchalant reply. “Drink your milk and get ready. We’re going to Kalyanasundaram uncle’s son’s wedding”. That threw Subbu’s entire gameplan out the window. No questions about the test?? Who was Kalyanasundaram? Nevertheless, he got ready still pondering this weird turn of events. On the way, Appa chatted animatedly about the current political situation, among other things, mostly for Amma’s benefit. Subbu kept nodding knowledgeably whenever he heard a word he was familiar with. “BJP” and “Congress” were names he’d read about in his Civics text. Kalyanasundaram (KS) uncle turned out to be a tall, burly man (“close to 7ft tall”, Subbu would later tell his friends) who greeted Appa at the entrance of the wedding hall and took them with him to get some refreshments immediately. They had been childhood friends and were colleagues at Appa’s college. K.S and Appa were soon busy discussing the qualifications of his son and the bride and the color of their new Audi Q3. Subbu got bored and entertained himself by observing the movement of a chain of ants that had just discovered a few cubes of sugar. Just then K.S called out, “Ah! Mr Sekaran, meet my friend Mr. Sundaram”. Subbu looked up. Something about the name seemed familiar. As he looked at the man in the horn-rimmed glasses walk up to K.S Uncle and shake his hand, Subbu’s eyes widened. “This is my son’s father-in-law, Mr. Sekaran”, K.S said to Subbu’s dad. Subbu was still in a state of confusion. What was his Biology teacher doing there? Meanwhile Mr. Sekaran had spotted the scrawny kid and said, “Hey Subbu!”. Subbu groaned internally, but managed to arrange his face into an obsequious smile. “Hello sir”, he greeted obediently. “This boy is in my Biology class!”, he explained to Mr.K.S and Appa. Subbu had by then broken ten thousand coconuts to Lord Ganesha in his head in the hope that there would be no further exchanges between any of them about him. But Ganesha was busy in the kalyana mantapam, it appeared.
“So how was your exam today Subbu?”, Mr. Sekaran enquired. Subbu looked at Mr.Sekaran, staring daggers at him and then at Appa, who was watching intently.
“Sir, do you know Babu, the sweeper?”, Subbu asked hopefully.
This is not OZ 