Belhaven - I

"This is insane!" Rohan said suddenly, "I won't do this!"

The three of us turned around from inspecting the ladder and looked at him without speaking. Somehow, it didn't surprise any of us that he was the first to back out. He had been iffy about the plan from the beginning.

"I can't believe you guys are actually thinking of doing this!" he said. "No matter what we think of her, this is trespassing! We can't break into somebody else's house!"

"But think of what she did to Viju." That was the tiny voice of Kanishk. Small and slender, he was the pacifying force in our group.

Neither Shiju nor I would have bothered to reason with short porky Rohan with his glasses and his perpetual sweatiness. After all, his family had moved into the colony just last month. Our mothers had forced us into including him in our group.

"She didn't do anything to Viju. He had a bike accident, that's all," Rohan replied.
"Which she caused! I'm telling you! I spoke to Viju!" Shiju burst out. "She ran after him with a stick when he stole mangoes from her mango tree. She was really angry! She said she would teach him a lesson."
"Shiju, I'm very sorry about what happened to your brother, but there's a limit. We can't break into her house and snoop around just because you guys think she's a witch!"
"She is a witch! And we'll find the proof tonight. If you're scared, you can stay at home!" I said.
"It's not that I'm scared..." Rohan's voice trailed off. "Anyway, my grandparents are here, so I can't come."
"Fine. Sit at home on your granny's lap," I said, turning back to the ladder. "You're missing out on the biggest adventure ever!"

Kanishk, Shiju and I dragged the ladder out of the shed and towards the eastern wall of the compound. Rohan stuck around for a while watching us. But when he realized that none of us would speak to him or even look at him, he went back home.

"Good riddance," I said, the moment he had left. "Imagine having to haul his fat bum up the wall." Shiju snorted. Kanishk didn't say a word.

Both of them were to spend the night at my house, since mine was the only one that bordered the witch's. So they left to pack and get ready for the stay-over. We decided that we would meet at six.

**********

It was around six-fifteen when the doorbell rang. I was in the living room, on my PS3. Mum had already opened the door before I could reach it.
"Hello, Kanishk bete!" Mum said, opening the door. "My, somebody's looking dashing in a black t-shirt!"
"Mum!" I said. Why do mothers have to be so embarassing?
"Come on," I said to Kanishk, and took him upstairs to my room. He was carrying a small knapsack.
"Sorry I'm late," he said. "I was halfway here before I realized that I'd forgotten my flashlight."
"Good thinking with the black t-shirt too," I said. "But I wonder where Shiju is."

We deposited the knapsack in my room and came back downstairs. Mum was on the phone. "Bopu, it's for you," she said. As I took the receiver, I glared at her for using my nickname in front of my friends. I could hear Kanishk's smothered snicker behind me.

"Surya, it's me," Shiju's gloomy voice said. "I can't come."
"What! Why?"
"Mum's saying that with Viju in hospital and everything, I should stay at home."
"But we asked her days ago!"
"I know. But she says she's changed her mind."
"Oh no!" I said, looking at Kanishk. What would we do now?

(to be continued)

Loss

Perhaps it was meant to be. Perhaps this was what God intended all along. We thought that we had finally done enough penance for our past sins. But perhaps this was just more punishment that His mind devised for us. And now I must be strong, I must console her. I must pretend that it doesn't matter, that we can try again.

We must try again.

I have to do whatever I can to make her happy. It will mean spending a lot of money, I know. We will have to visit temples, donate money for new gopurams or for feeding the poor. We will have to visit hospitals, spend lakhs of rupees on doctors and treatment. But I will do it.

I must win back the favour of the Gods. I must make her happy again.

The Red Flag

He sat on the long verandah in his ancient grandfather chair. The chair's arms were scabbed with age and heavy use. Its seat and back were made of cane, carefully plaited years ago by some poor artisan. The threads were sticking out here and there. They needed replacing, but who could find skilled people these days? Those arts were dead and gone. Chairs were made of plastic these days. They lasted longer, he had heard. But nothing could be as comfortable as these old cane chairs.

He opened the morning paper and scanned the headlines. But even Desabhimani wasn't good these days - no news, just the latest doings of some party group or the other. Though he would never subscribe to those capitalist newspapers. And even if he wanted to, how could he look the news agent in the face and ask him for any other newspaper! Not that he, a young boy with barely any hair on his upper lip, would know anything. Even his parents would have been toddlers in the heydays of Communism in Kerala, when he, Cheparambil Balakrishnan, had raised the red flag in this village and led a grand procession against the landowners! Ah, the glory of those days!

Ever since Sathyabhama had died, a girl had been coming in every day to do the housework. His sons had engaged her, perhaps to assuage their guilt about living far away in the city and leaving their father to rot in this old house. They had asked him to come and live with them, of course. But he had said no. He would live out his days in this village, where he was known. Even now, when he went to collect his monthly pension, wearing his starched white shirt and his pale cream Karalkada mundu and carrying his black umbrella, the villagers always greeted him with respect. He was given preference at the lines at the pension office, too.

Of course, a lot of things had changed. The party candidate no longer came to seek his support and blessings before elections. But that was to be expected. After all, what use was the support of a lonely old man who spent his days dreaming of the glory of his youth? These days, it was all about which group you were part of and how much power and money you had.

He remembered the days when he would leave Sathyabhama in the house alone and go to the city to attend party meetings and demonstrations. God alone knew how they had survived those times! But all of them, the party workers, knew that what they were doing mattered. That they were part of a movement which would bring power to the masses, so that they could rise up against those who had tormented and oppressed them for centuries!

But those days were over now. All that was left was the scrabble for power. Nothing to work for, nothing to believe in. Nothing to experience but the twilight of decline, nothing to wait for but the certainty of death.