Category: fiction

English, fiction, Humour, satire

Great Expectations [Fiction] [Self-deprecating Humour]

When I was 9 years old, I picturised a 17-year old boy as someone who knows what he is doing,someone who is the master of his own motherfucking show,someone who got his shit sorted. He seldom hides things from his parents and isn’t scared of them,talks to his younger sibling in a blend of authority,care and direction. He gets out of home when he wants to, watches a movie when he wants to,returns home when he wants to and not return if he doesn’t. He is neat,clean,and always geared up for an interaction with anybody-talking in a cool interactive tone.He was nothing short of a mythological Norse God to me.

In the September of 2019, I will be turning 17. Yes,S-E-V-E-N-T-E-EN. And to put it mildly I am as far flung from the expectations I had of a 17- year old boy as I possibly could have been.

Do I have even a semblance of idea what I am doing? Usually,No. Except when I am trying to look at some beautiful girl while trying to not look sleazy and creepy. I always know what I am doing then.So I would take this opportunity to tell the beautiful girls who are reading this- If you ever find me looking around you in a somewhat funny way, you have more reasons to believe that I am looking at you than you have to believe that you are beautiful.

The other times I have an idea about what I doing is after I dismount the metro every weekend when I run off to the exit in a race to be the first one among a couple of hundreds to exit the metro station from that metro. And contrary to what the dumbwit,who is reading this, probably is thinking- this isn’t imbecile. Far from it. It’s not a child’s play. Nada. You need the balls of a motherfucking Greek alpha male to win this. I proudly state that I have won it many times. Not easy. Not at all. Walking briskly,almost running,with a backpack clinging to your shoulders,trying to snugle ahead of men,women, girls (sometimes beautiful) to be the man of the fucking metro.

This race takes the tests real test of a person,testing perseverence, determination, physical fitness,mental fitness, intellectualism fertility,and lastly of course potency. I will even go as far as to say that this small test should be incorporated into the academy for the Nation’s elite Special forces,the Para Commandos. I will also make one another controversial claim – if we abandon current system of electing Parliamenterians through polling in a constituency and replace with it with this contest, it will produce more competent results.( With the quality of Parliamenterians in the country, anything new will always be an upgrade on the older system. Anything).

Am I the master of my own my show? But firstly, do I even have a fucking show? The only thing close to a shoe I have is a circus. And I am the clown in it. The elephant too. The dancer too. The President of Congress party too. If you think that my description of a circus is getting wayward, it is because I have never been to a circus. Seen a Congress Press Conference on TV though,many times. And watching it gives me hope. The master of the circus? Me? Possible. If that half-witted buffoons can be a leader of a circus, I for the heck of it sure can.

But what discourages me is the daily happenings of my life. Everyday after bathing when I come out of the room wearing my clothes,my mother invariably objects to them and hands me some other piece of fabric? Her objection? It’s friday,so you should be wearing banana shaped pants. It is mosquito season, you should be wearing mosquito repellent clothes. If I am not the master of my wardrobe,mastery over the show(or circus for that matter) ? That’s makes sense as much as Modi’s Kashmir policy.

He isn’t scared of his parents and doesn’t hide things from them. Absolutely. I am not scared of anybody and from my parents?Not a whisker. Right now in my room,I have hidden only a packet of condom,a packet of cigarettes,a lighter,a couple of paintings gifted to me by a special girl,101 tonnes of Uranium-236,a couple of ISIS modules,enough supply of marijuana from Mexico to last a couple of lifetimes,and a latina Victoria Secret model. Who’s scared of his parents? Not me. Absolutely not me. They do know everything about me. Except about some of my test scores,friends, or What I do and whom I meet during those extra classes,or except what I do on my mobile or watch on my PC.

He talks with his sibling… Firstly I don’t. Secondly even when I do it is monosyllabic sentences shamelessly commanding my brother to do some of my mundane chores(which he usually turns down and I have to get my ass off to work). Authority,care, direction what? The only emotions with which I talk with my brother is impatience and “When-will-he-shutt-up-and-leave-my-room”. My brother respects me as much the nation respects the traffic laws of the road.

I do get out of my home without asking my mother. Without justification. For long duration of times like 43 seconds. I need not elaborate more on this, on how big a rebel I am. I listen to nobody. No fucking body. I have had stayed outside home without my mother’s consent for very longer durations of time than your feeble mind can even conceive to think on-as long as 53 seconds.

Continuing the point,yes,I return when I want to but it’s also a fact that my want mostly coincides(or is made to coincide) with the want of my mother. And if I get late while returning home by even a femtosecond(one quadrillionth of a second, that is), my phone is attacked with the all the artillery of the virtual arsenal of my mother – texts,calls, SOS, BHIM App( We are Upper caste Rajputs- we don’t use the BHIM APP for duck’s sake).

My ideal seventeen-year,when I was nine, old is neat. He is clean. 7 years hence, I have forgotten a lot what K have learnt and am not ashamed to say so,but Ma’am or sir what does neat or clean mean? Haven’t been either of them for more than a millenium now.

Always geared up for a conversation. I am nearing the seventeen mark,but I don’t myself being ready for a conversation with anybody at anytime ever. It is not rare for me to take up the staircase and leave the elevator if I am to share the lift with somebody- especially Of the opposite sex. The only good experience I have with an elevator and a girl is when a girl in hurry collided with my chest while she was hurrying for school. Old experience. The girl is in University now. Has a boyfriend too. I was born a bit too late for the script of a Romcom to dominate my life starting with that collision.

Being a Norse God? The only Norse thing about me right now is the body hair. Abundant and everywhere. I may soon audition for the role of King Kong in it’s upcoming sequel. One thing about having hair on your body is that in summer sometimes the hair starts to itch and you start rubbing yourself like a chimp. And these moments are that of brilliance,speaking from an evolutionary point of view . A young Homo sapien rubbing his chest imitating his cousins,from a different species.

fiction

Once I had a Girl (Fiction)

That night the moon shone as if it was never going to shine again. In the moonlight, things gained a divine silvery tinge in their appearance. The trees,the fences,the Huts seemed to be right out of a mythological tale.

The moonlight had an aura which had thrown us into a fit of lunacy and we had set off for Gandak’ s Ghat at midnight without our parents having the slightest clue of it.

I could hear Parkash- my companion in this little adventure and my cousin brother – panting from the sprint we had made a couple of minutes ago to save ourselves from the police patrol jeep searching the town for young men to put them into jail for nor reason. It is as much as the truth as it is funny—police catching young men for no reason.

2 years ago,in 1976,after megalomania and authoritarianism took over our Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, making her declare a National emergency,things are not the same anymore. Chaos has become the norm and our ears are slowly getting. Used to the cacophony. Abuse of power is on an all-time high with the police becoming the local warlords,and the local warlords have become the rulers.

After escaping from the police patrol by taking a rushed detour, we briskly dragged ourself to the Ghat.

Hajipur is a small but ancient town on the confluence of the Gandak and the Ganga in North Bihar. Sharing much with the general history of Bihar,it enjoyed glory with Gautam Buddha immortalissing the land, with the Lichhavis practising pro-democracy,with the golden age of the Mauryas and the Guptas ,but today it lays in ruins of misrule,hunger,poverty,casteism,sexism,crime,lies and deceit.

After reaching the Ghat, we sat down on the steps leading to the river and sat down looking amazed at everything and nothing. The beauty of moonlight multiplied manifold by meeting the tributary of Ganga, and took us into a hypnotic state of mind.

Contrary to our usual demeanour together, I and Parkash were not joking around making funny jokes and planning risky escapades. At that moment, we wanted to have to ourselves as much as the never-ending serenity of the place as possible.

Near the river, the air was misty and a tinge of coolness told us to brace ourselves for winter.The moon flashed and formed a beautiful reflection on the Peaceful river water. “A Thing of Beauty is a joy forever”,I hushed in delight not quoting a cliché but recalling Keats’s magnum opus,”Endymion” containing these lines written about a beautiful young boy who was loved and visited by the moon every night as he slept,bathing him in her silvery light.

Admiring the scene,I slowly lost myself in a trance-like absent-mindedness thinking about this girl who has taken my heart under siege for sometime. When I am thinking about her ,I am thinking about her but When I am not thinking about her I am longing to think about her.

I have been seeing her regularly near the Playground talking with her girlfriends .Today, I saw her again. With the excuse of having tea at the nearby stall,I went and stood near her and tried to get visual treats from the corner of my eye. She was wearing a red choli,and was looking older than she usually looked. Her slim midriff made her look taller than she was. She wore a choker necklace,and talked flailing her hands in a very innocent yet expressive manner.

While I was busy thinking about fantastical ways to talk to her, the owner of the tea stall rudely shooed away the girls and with a face of justification said,” Beta,Never fall in the trap of these lecherous girls..nay.. Prostitutes.. They…” and he continued on his trip of condescension,but his last word made me drop off from his talk and I blurted out inadvertently,”Was she a prostitute?”. The shop-owner shook in affirmation and my heart drowned and I could feel it getting heavy.

While sipping the tea,I tried hard to come to the newfound realisation but the heart is a rebel organ-it never listens to you. The girls had shifted a few metres away from the shop and were still talking among themselves. I decided to approach them and make an acquaintance. I took a step,and two, and with every subsequent step I found it getting difficult to do walk. What will my friends say if I befriend prostitute? Won’t they laugh at me? How will I look eye-to-eye at the tea stall owner whom I meet everyday when I come here to play. What will the talk in the neighborhood be? “No,I am not going to talk to her,at least not now”,I thought and changed my route.

That night, sitting on the banks of the Gandak,I thought should I have talked with her? Let the friends laugh and the shopkeeper scorn at me. The neighbors can have any talk that floats their boat. But I found my contemplations broken by a shrill and muffled cries of feminine throats. I looked at Parkash in a questioning face and we both gave our heads a revolution to search for the source of the cry.

Our eyes found a group of young girls carrying something on their shoulders,and it took no time to guess it was a dead body. They saw us and panicked about,but Parkash approached them in a reassuring way and asked one of the girls about why they are their at such an odd hour with a dead body? “It is odd indeed. Women are forbidden to cremation grounds and no cremation happens after the sunset. Moreover,this was not the cremation ground at all. That is on the other side of the river “,I thought, as they talked in whispers.

After their hushed talker was over,Parkash signalled to me to prepare for the cremation but I asked him the obvious questions. He stayed silent but his eyes told me that the answer was not coming anytime soon and I better not reiterate my question without preparing for the cremation.

I got the wood from the nearby boat port,and placed them in a systematic packing which reminded me of how crystalline solids pack in a tetrahedral void. I could still hear the girls cry and after taking short looks at them,asked myself,”Who are these girls with a dead body? Where are the men of their house? Has the Indian culture come to such a dire strait that women have started entering cremation grounds?”

After placing the the woods for the cremation,I helped Parkash lay the dead body on the wood and then placed few other thin blocks of wood on it.

Then,I lit a torch and looked at Parth asking him who was going to light the funeral pyre. Girls are not allowed to so,and it is generally done by male relatives and of girls the size of the girl whose body was there to be lit,it was done by their husbands. Parkash,for his all height and muscular body, is a sensitive soul and I knew he was going to ask me to light the funeral pyre and he did.

I took the torch,and with a cup of Ganga jal on my head made seven rounds of the pyre and stood in front of it and gave fire to it.

One of the most interesting parts of Hinduism is its rituals and cremation too had a fair number of them – one of them being to break the skull of the burning body on the pyre by hitting it thrice with a bamboo stick. This is called the “kapal kriya”.

I stood near the burning pyre with a bamboo in my hand and took three blows at the skull of the dead body cracking it with unbearable sound coming off it . To this moment ,I had little sympathies for this dead girl,but now had developed it. A thought was echoing and gnawing my brain,”After performing the funeral rights of the girl,am I not her husband now?” In my fantasy arose the urge to see the face of the girl who was my “wife” ,which was till now covered by a white satin cloth.

In the passion of the moment,I lifted the white cloth of the corpse. Since then,I regret that moment of passion every day.

From the hairline of the pale face dripped blood- the reddest blood I had seen in my life,the lifeless eyes still had the kohl,and they looked into the void above them. She was wearing a red saree-like the ones worn by the bride on the wedding day. In the flame of the burning pyre, the face glowed and nerves were visible through the fair skinand I tried to check twice,thrice what I was seeing.

The dead body,which lay here burning like a moth burning from a lamp, was of the girl who had snatched away my heart from me and who had conquered the kingdom of my thoughts like some Mughal prince. I had performed the funeral rights of the girl whom I was in love with but had never talked. By religion, I had perforemded the rights her husband was supposed to perform. the irony of it all made my vision blurry. For a moment,I felt it was a movie and although I could see the first rays of the sun illuminating the earth, I felt darkness wrapping upon me. Kneeling down on this very land of Bihar which had englufed Mother Sita when she had called for it to do so,in another outcaste woman’s tale, I called for the land to swallow me with all my remorse,but it cared little to pay any heed to this poor boy’s mournful dilemma.