JENNIFER

This one’s dedicated to the loving memory of Jennifer, the finest female Golden Retriever I have ever come across. I just met her owner – a loveable 65+ Grand-pa by the name Mr. Nandu Kulkarni – a couple of weeks ago, and came to know Jennifer passed away month-and-a-half ago.

Sweetheart, this one goes out to you…

They say a dog can understand upto 500 human words. I don’t know that, and I can’t vouch for it. But this I can say for sure – dogs do understand human emotions perfectly. And they particularly can tell a dog-lover from a non dog-lover.

I used to see Jennifer everyday when I was in school. She was easily the finest female Golden Retriever I had ever come across. Driving to school, parking my bicycle in the parking lot, going up to my classroom on the fourth floor, and then waiting by the window to see Jennifer had become a routine for me. As for Jennifer, her eyes would begin to search for me as soon as Nandu-kaka crossed the street to the side on which my school was. She would look up at my classroom, and would give me a friendly bark everyday – every single day.

It all started one day when Nandu-kaka was stalled close to our school by one of his friends I suppose – and Jennifer had nothing to do. She was sniffing the ground when I reached our classroom and saw her from the window. She might have been 6-7 months old back then. I could make out she was beginning to get restless and wanted to continue with the walk. I decided to entertain her.

I looked around to check no teachers were anywhere within ear-shot, and I whistled.

Jennifer was as if frozen on spot. Not a muscle moving. I smiled. I leaned a little out of the window and whistled again.

This time Jennifer turned to face our school building. Clever bitch! I laughed.

The third time I whistled, Jennifer precisely looked up at the exact window in which I was standing and started barking. That caught Nandu-kaka’s attention. He followed Jennifer and looked up at me. I smiled and waved at him. He smiled back.

‘Such a fine pet you have! What’s her name?’ I asked. It was quite early in the morning and there was practically no one on the road, so I didn’t really have to shout.

‘Jennifer!’ the old man replied.

The incident repeated the next day. But by the third day, I didn’t have to whistle to catch Jenny’s attention. She’d by default look up at my window when Nandu-kaka reached our school.

I started to come a little late to school everyday, in the hope of catching the old man and Jennifer someday. But somehow things just didn’t work out. They’d always come only moments before our school began. But one fine day, I got lucky. I reached school about 20 minutes early – we had to put up some charts and all in the corridors – and was in the parking lot when I heard someone call out – ‘Good morning!’ I turned around and saw Jennifer and the old man. I was so happy! I immediately sat down on my knees and called out –

‘Jennifer!’

She looked at me for a split second, and in the next she was bounding and leaping towards me! She came and crashed right into me and within moments I was slobbered all over! Jennifer was licking my face, my hands – it was crazy! She was barking and jumping and going round in circles around me! And I couldn’t stop laughing.

Dogs can always tell dog-lovers from non dog-lovers.

I had to ride back home that day and change into my other set of school clothes and go back. Obviously the ones I had been wearing went straight into the washing machine. But I was still smiling when I reached school.

I continued to see Jennifer every day till the end of that year. After that I forgot all about her in the summer vacations. But I never saw her after school re-opened.




Just a couple of weeks ago, I met Nandu-kaka. It was great to see him after all these years, and I was surprised to realise we both still remembered each other so perfectly. He told me they had shifted to another part of the city, that’s why I never saw them again. And with that he gave me the news of Jennifer having passed away – peacefully, in her sleep.

That meeting brought back all the memories of Jennifer, and particularly of that day when she licked me all over. It felt nice to know she had not suffered in her last moments. May her soul rest in peace.

BEAUTY

I get off the train – sticky, sweating and smelling like a pig.

I lay eyes on her.

And suddenly I am not feeling tired anymore, and my fatigue is gone..

She’s not beautiful. Not even close. She is just an average looking Indian girl.

But nothing about her is average.

She is wearing a beautiful sky blue colored salwaar kameez, and long dangling ear-rings. Ok, the ear-rings are a bit too long for my taste. But it really doesn’t matter. Everything else about her is so beautiful.

I look around, as I try to comprehend what I am feeling.

I would never otherwise describe her as beautiful.

But that sight… of my best friend… whom I am seeing after all these years… the sight is beautiful… the light scent of her perfume, which is still the same after all these years… the wait in her eyes… her frantic search for a familiar face in the crowd… for my familiar face… the stillness in her stance, her calm body language contradicts her state of mind, which she cannot hide no matter how hard she tries… for her eyes are too innocent… and bare… I see her anticipation, her excitement right through her efforts to conceal it. And the child like beauty amuses me and pulls me like a magnet.

She still hasn’t seen me, almost as if purposely. She is looking in every possible direction but mine.

I linger close to the edge of the platform where I got off, and enjoy the moment… the moment that will soon be gone…

I’m almost crushed as I realise it won’t last too long.

She looks at her watch, as if to remind me how long it has been since I have seen her.

I pick up my bag and start walking towards her, and I laugh as it comes back to me…

I had asked her for a recent picture of her, just in case I don’t recognize her. And I realise that at that moment, the picture just isn’t coming to my mind…

LIVING WITH YOU

I stop writing suddenly. The pen falls out of my hands.

A gentle breeze brings in that peculiar smell that I have just begun getting used to.

I sniff.

I can’t believe it.

My heart starts racing.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath till the smell fills my lungs. I take a deep breath till your smell fills my head and drives me mad. That typical smell after you have just had a bath.

I breathe again, and I forget all about my submissions and notes and books.

It couldn’t be!

Has your love driven me so mad that I am imagining and feeling things like they were real?

How could you be in my house!

But the smell… it refuses to go away.

I get up from my chair and walk out of my room. My heart’s begun to race faster, if at all it can. I tip-toe towards my door.

I open it.

The smell hits me. Stronger.

I am sure by now that my olfactory has gone haywire.

I track the smell to my parents’ room.

My parents’ room?

I reach for the door.

I open it.

My heart stops beating

“Hey, you up already?” Dad asks, looking at me.

“What’s that smell?” I ask.

“You like it? One of my friends gifted it to me,” Dad says, throwing a bottle of cologne at me.

I catch it.

I open the lid.

I smell it.

I close my eyes.

I smile...

ITI

There was once a scene I randomly came across in a daily soap on TV. The girl’s face was new, and for a change she looked sensible. I paused momentarily. The girl was reading a letter. From her father. A sentence in the letter kind of stayed with me for a long time… ‘There is no one in the world who hasn’t at least once felt like ending it all and taking his/her life.’ I pondered over it for quite some time, and it led to me filling up over six pages of my personal diary.

But I couldn’t recall any of those pages.

All I could recall that moment was that line I had randomly heard that day.

There is no one in this world who hasn’t at least once felt like ending it all…

I looked at the white hills around me. I took a deep breath in. One among my last few ones. I felt the cold air pass through my nose and into my lungs. It filled my lungs. The cold was getting to my bones. I could feel it. I looked up at the sky.

I threw my shirt off.

My upper body was bare.

I began climbing again. My mind clogged with thoughts for a few moments, and then cleared into an emptiness that I never thought I was capable of feeling… just like the clouds were clearing from time to time to reveal a plain, blue-grey, empty sky. With no airplanes. No birds. No eagles even, when it is known they ‘fly above the clouds’. But then I realized.

I was above the world.

Just like I had once been.

But this time, I was really above the world. Up and above. Where no one could reach me. Or find me.

Up and above the hypocrites.

Up and above people.

Beyond the reach of mom and dad.

Beyond the reach of anyone.

It felt amazing.

My pace quickened. I was almost jogging up now, the stones cutting at the bare sole of my feet. The blood caked around my toes almost as quickly as it started flowing. It froze, and the red crystals fell off my feet and crushed beneath them as I broke off into a splint___ or as close to a splint as my condition could allow me. No clothes on, except my thin track-pant. No shirt, no shoes. Nothing. Except the cold cold wind blowing across my entire body, determined to throw me off my feet. To bend me. Break me. And I determined not to be broken.

Not to be broken before I decided.

Before I chose to break.

I felt small drops of water freeze over my body and melt___ for surely I couldn’t possibly sweat in these conditions. Even with all the running. I possibly couldn’t. You don’t sweat topless and in below freezing temperatures. The wind was cruelly cold. It stung my bare body, as I ran against it.

I ran like my life depended on it.

Ha.

How far the truth was from this thought. This stupid stupid thought that had entered my mind.

Even in these final moments, I hadn’t given up being stupid.

Stupid.

Fucking stupid.

But no more now. It was all going to end. Shortly.

I had reached the highest point I could. I looked around me and took in the earthly beauty, as an unearthly calmness settled over me. My breathing grew steady. I wasn’t feeling cold anymore.

I looked up at the sky. It was blank. Empty. Just like my mind, at that instance.

I looked down, into the valley.

My final resting abode.

I looked up at the sky again.

I saw her face.

The only truth of my life… which had ceased to exist… which stole away from me any reason to live.

I closed my eyes.

I spread my arms.

I am coming…

I jumped.

BLANK CALL

Aditya entered the board room and the lights grew dim. Geet was standing in front of him, wearing the bright red skirt, flamenco-like white shirt and black jacket she was wearing when Aditya last saw her. The chorus began.

‘Aa-a-a-aa-a-aa… Aa-a-a-aa-a-aa…’

A tingling sensation ran through my body, and after months and months passing by without a thought of Neel, my mind suddenly floated back to the memory of my calls to Neel when ‘Tum Se Hi’ was his caller tune.

I smiled.

I lingered in the moment for a while. I could almost hear his voice, happy and clear like the morning sun.

‘Hi,’ I would begin.

‘My God! I thought you were dead! Or probably that you thought I was dead. Where’ve you been!’

No matter how often I called Neel; either of us had to be dead, to account for the gap between two calls.

‘I am good, just been busy with college. You say how is office going?’ I would ask him.

‘Ah! Going on…’

‘And how is Sheetal?’

‘Can we talk about you and me before we move on to that subject?’ he would suggest, only a tad angrily. I would laugh.

‘Ok, ok! So how have you been?’

‘Okay-ish man. I told you about our trip?’

‘No… What trip?’

‘Oh all of us from office are planning for a trip to Kanyakumari…’

‘Oh that’s great!’

‘Yeah, but what is not so great is, I have been given the responsibility to make the reservations.’

‘No way! Then I am sure you guys are going no where!’ I’d tease him.

‘Shut up!’ he’d say.

And so we’d go one for at least an hour. Talking rubbish at times, talking things too mature for our respective ages sometimes, and just enjoying the comfortable silence that fell upon the conversation sometimes. Neel. My best friend, albeit an online friend. Frankly, I don’t remember how we bumped into each other. But Neel does still remember… or so I think. Sometimes I feel I live with him, I know so much about him! I’m sure I would be able to find a small ear-ring lost in his apartment if ever I get the chance to be there actually. I could probably draw a map of his apartment for you. Or even a road map all the way from his place to his office, although he is just about more than 1000 kilometers away from him. We talked about the silliest of things. Neel. I feel like something’s gone terribly wrong if I don’t talk to him once every couple of days.

No I haven’t met him in my life ever.

No I am not in love with him.

No he is not a long lost friend.

He is like the best friend I never had. Miles away and yet right next to me when I want him to be. Few can understand the chemistry we share. A lot more ridicule our friendship for the mere fact that we haven’t met each other in person as yet. Right from the day we became friends in fact.

But there is a part of Neel that lives in me, and a part of me that lives in him.

I would tell him anything in this goddamn world if I had to, and not feel scared or insecure or like I maybe ridiculed. I could tell him I don’t ever want to talk to him again and that he was the most heartless person I ever met, and as sure as the sun rises in the east every morning, he would call me the next day, and we’d talk like nothing happened, or like whatever happened happened so long ago, we don’t even remember it. He knew my darkest fears, my deepest secrets. He knew things my mom-dad didn’t know. He knew things I’d not dare to tell my gal-pals about.

He actually knows me inside out… or so I think.

And now its been almost 5 months since our fight. 5 months since we last spoke with each other.

And now that I am listening to this song after all these days, I remember him.

His laugh rings in my ears.

His voice fills my head.

I miss his laugh.

I miss his voice.

I miss him.

I miss the senseless conversations we used to have.

I miss the times when I cried over the phone and he consoled me like no one else could even in person.

I miss the times he got angry at me and shouted at me and then felt bad about it and called me up and apologized.

I miss the times when we spoke till 2 in the night and I cut the call as mom got up and called him again when she went back to bed.

I miss having someone by me who was dearer than the dearest.

As I come back to reality, I realise the song is over, but I’m not in the mood to finish the movie now. I turn the TV off and sit on the sofa with the remote control in my hand for a while. I look at the clock on the wall… its still a while before mom and dad get back from the dinner. The song keeps playing in my mind, and with it my conversations with Neel.

Suddenly I get up from the sofa and dash towards my room. I rummage through a countless number on things lying on my bed and finally find my cell phone. I go to the contacts and type ‘Ne’. But Neel’s name doesn’t appear in the list. My heart sinks deep down in my chest as I remember having deleted his number just a couple of weeks back.

I sigh. I sit heavily on the bed. My eyes start to well.

Out of the blue my old diary pops up in my head. I lift a shoe box thats on the top of my cupboard and put it on my table. I open it and go through my old diaries until I come upon one that’s covered in brown tinted paper. I open the last page of the diary, and my face splits into a wide smile as I see the number.

I take the diary and go sit on my bed again. I pick up the cell phone. I think for a minute and toss it aside. I pick up the cordless and punch in the number. And just as I am about to hit ‘call’ my doorbell rings.

I jump. My heart is racing. I quickly gain control and open the door. Its my neighbour. I remember I had asked her to pick up a parcel that a courier-man left with me when she was out earlier in the day. I give her the parcel. She thanks me and goes back to her apartment. I close the door and go back to my room. I look at the phone and Neel’s number typed onto the screen. I pick up the phone and sit on the bed again. But now I cant bring myself to press the ‘call’ button. I keep staring at the screen for a long time.

I finally hit the ‘call’ button.

The bell rings. I realise Neel no longer has a caller-tune.

I start counting the bells.

I put the phone on the ‘speaker’ mode and put my hands under my lap to prevent myself from cutting the call.

Neel answer’s the call.

‘Hello?’

I take a deep breath. I am scared to exhale. I begin to tremble.

‘Hello, who’s this?’

I open my mouth to say something, but suddenly I feel like I have forgotten to talk. I try to think of something to say. I can’t.

‘Is anybody there?’

Neel’s voice! Hearing his voice after all these days makes me want to burst into tears. It makes me want to scream with joy. But I sit still, not moving a muscle. I have no control over my body and my voice.

There is a long pause. The silence is deafening.

I can hear him breathe – slow and steady.

He begins to say something but stops. I silently pray he’d go on, for even though it was for a nanosecond, I heard his voice – he was going to call out my name.

Please... please...

But he doesn’t go on.

The line goes dead.

I finally breathe out.

My body relaxes.

I unclasp my fingers. They hurt.

I look around.

Lost.

Numb.

I keep staring out of the window, willing myself not to cry. Suddenly the phone rings and shatters the silence. I pick up the cordless and see the number that’s flashing. It doesn’t look familiar. I take a deep breath. I swallow. And in the best voice that I can manage, I answer the call,

‘Hello?’

Silence.

‘I knew it was you…’

Its Neel.

I hold my breath again.

I try to control it, but I can’t. I sniff. Really softly.

But who am I trying to fool? I forget its Neel I am talking to.

He hears the sniff alright. He responds with a sigh.

‘God, I missed you so much…’ he says.

And the tears finally run down my cheeks.

BULLY

I frowned as I got out of the lift and banged the doors shut. Never had I hated going to school so much. But school is not really fun when the biggest bully in the class is made to change places and sit right in front of you. I mean, ya he is the brainiest boy I have seen in my whole life, but, so what?

He was a bully. He is a bully. He will remain a bully.

And I hate bullies. Anyone would actually, especially if you are on the receiving end. I mean ya, being a girl, and him being a boy, I didn’t really suffer much. But God! That didn’t make him any less annoying.

Plus I was about as tall as he was. Maybe that is what made him stay at an arm’s distance from me. But still, there are a number of ways to bully someone. And I was seeing them everyday.

Really. Every single day.

Each day, Monish would enter the class, and catch the first person he could see as his first bakra. And the day would begin with getting some homework done. It would be followed by scrawling the black-board with some stupid stupid cartoon which only he found funny. Of course, the cartoon would carry the artist’s name, and that would be his second bakra for the day. In the recess, no matter how much you tried to hide it, Monish would come to know if there was something yummy anybody had got in his or her lunch box. The periods between the first and the second break would go quite uneventful, and the day would again conclude with one of the teachers probably getting her sari or dress wet as she sat on her chair. And finally, as school came to an end, Monish would run down the stairs, pushing practically anyone who came in his way aside, without much caring to see the consequences.

Really, what went wrong when boys came to fifth grade?

Like many other bullies, Monish had a huge gang of boys who followed him everywhere. They would literally lay their lives down for him I guess, if he asked; they all liked him so much.

Puh-lease!

But my guess is, they were all scared of him.

Oh by the way. I guess I didn’t tell you what he did to me.

He untied my hair.

Everyday.

Without fail.

So what was the big issue?

I had hair that came down to my waist. Mamma would braid them and fold them up and tie them so that I had two short plats that just touched my shoulders. And Monish simply loved to untie them. He took care to not let me notice it, obviously. He would just loosen the knot, and the next time I turned my head, my hair would all come loose and fall on my back.

Boys. They can be irritating, I tell you.

I reached school bang on time. I parked my cycle in the parking area and bounded up the stairs. We had a ‘half day’, since it was the last day of the month. My bag was a little lighter hence, and my tiffin a little interesting. Not the regular poli-bhaji. I had corn and potato sandwiches, my favourite! A part of me was happy, and a part of me was, scared. i didn’t want Monish to eat up my tiffin! Please! At least not today, considering he ate half of it almost everyday.

He liked everything my mom made.

I hate bullies.

I HATE BULLIES!

But today seemed different.

The first four periods went uneventful, and I could see the Monish’s impatience build up. All the teachers had come bang on time too, giving Monish almost no time to plan anything. I feared this was the quiet before a huge storm, but prayed for the best.

Recess came, and my stomach sank. Me and my bench partner Kaustubh both took our tiffins out. I looked around. Monish was not in the classroom. I quickly opened my tiffin and started eating.

Suddenly the table shook.

I looked at Kaustubh. He was banging his tiffin on the edge of the table.

“What are you doing?” I asked him.

“My tiffin… it’s not opening,” Kaustubh said, and banged the tiffin on the table again. My tiffin inched towards the edge of the table.

“Arre bang it against the other desk na!” I said. “My tiffin will fall.”

Kaustubh continued banging the tiffin on the table. And with his fifth bang, just as I was about to gather my tiffin Monish entered the classroom.

“Boo!” he shouted.

I looked up.

Kaustubh banged the table again.

And my tiffin fell to the floor with a big clang.

There was a momentary silence, and suddenly everybody burst out laughing.

I looked at the spilled sandwiches.

I looked at Kaustubh. He was laughing. I turned around to hit him, but he quickly got up and ran out of the classroom.

I looked at the sandwiches lying on the floor in a mess. My stomach was rumbling with hunger. I was sure the sound was almost audible to everyone around me. I got down and started cleaning the mess. Suddenly fat tears started rolling down my cheeks. I looked again and again at my empty tiffin and the sandwiches on the floor. The tears kept coming. And just about as suddenly as my tears had appeared, two more hands appeared on the floor beside mine. I looked up.

It was Monish.

I looked at him. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Was he so mad as to eat food off the floor?

He put the pieces of sandwich into the tiffin in my hand.

“What happened?” he said.

I told him the incident.

Within a few moments, his gang had brought Kaustubh in front of me.

Monish got up and hit Kaustubh.

“Say sorry,” he said, and immediately Kaustubh said ‘sorry’ to me. He helped me clean the rest of my tiffin.

My crying still didn’t stop.

“Why are you crying?” Monish asked, after Kaustubh had cleaned my tiffin. He was standing next to my desk, mute.

I didn’t answer.

“Should I hit him again?” Monish asked.

“No!” I exclaimed.

Monish looked at me.

“Then what?”

I looked down at my tiffin.

“I’m hungry,” I said.

Pronto Monish pulled Kaustubh’s tiffin out of his hands and opened it and held it in front of me.

Mooli ke paranthe.

I didn’t move.

“Eat na! He won’t say anything,” Monish said, glaring at Kaustubh. Kaustubh looked down at the floor.

I didn’t touch the tiffin.

“You don’t like it?” monish asked. I nodded. Monish immediately turned the tiffin upside down. The Paranthe fell to the floor. Kaustubh didn’t budge. Monish opened his tiffin and held it in front of me.

“Eat na!” he said.

“What about you?” I asked.

“I’m not hungry,” he said.

I looked at him

What was wrong with this guy? He wasn’t hungry??? What was he saying? How could that be?

“Really, you eat,” he said. I took a bite from his tiffin.

“Thanks,” I said. He smiled.

“Put it back in my bag after you are done,” he said. “I have to go!” and before I could say anything he had stormed out of the room, faster than he had come in.










Nothing altered much after that day. Monish was still his annoying self. But, I had seen the side of a bully which I had never expected to. And Monish now smiled at me every time we saw each other.

THE WAIT WAS OVER

I looked at the sky as I stepped out of the hospital. It was a bright blue colour. Absolutely cloudless. I smiled.

The first thing I saw ahead of me was a mother playing with a small kid in a pram. The kid had a rattle in his hand and was shaking it wildly. He got his mother on the head with his rattle a couple of times, but she seemed not to mind it. I walked over to mother and child and got down on my knees. I ruffled the kid’s hair and he looked at me. I smiled, and the baby chuckled and let out a delighted squeal.

I was thrilled and made to pick up the baby.

‘He must really like you,’ the mother said. ‘He is not so good with strangers.’

I smiled at the mother and looked back at the baby. His eyes were a sparkling blue. Ice blue. Ocean blue. Baby blue.

‘He is adorable,’ I said as I handed him back to the mother. She took him and put him back in the pram. I was too elated to say anything. I just smiled at her and started walking back to my car.

I got in and started driving towards our home.

I stopped at a crossing as the signal turned red. I glanced around me. my eyes fell upon a small girl sitting in the car next to mine. She must have been about two years old. She was wearing a white coloured frock. It had a lemon yellow ribbon around the waist and beautiful big balloon sleeves. She had a doll seated in her lap and was busy combing her hair. She happened to look at me. I smiled at her. She turned pink in her cheeks and looked away. She made a straight dive for her mummy’s tummy. The mother jumped in her seat and looked at her daughter. Then she looked at me. I smiled at her. she smiled back.

The signal turned green, and we were on the roll again.

I stopped by a toy shop, just a few minutes before our home. I parked the car and went inside.

The spirit of the place gripped me and I literally felt the ‘kid-in-a-candy-store’ feeling. I looked at all the bright coloured soft toys, play stations, dolls, teddy-bears, stuffed puppies and kittens that looked so amiable I felt like picking them all up and stuffing them into my car. I looked at the fur pillows, at the jigsaw puzzles, at the play-houses. The shop was almost empty, except a few kids and their parents. Suddenly I felt this compulsive need to go talk to each of the women and befriend them… I felt like one of them.

I picked up a huge life-size koala bear. The girl at the counter helped me carry it back to my car and get it in. just as I was about to thank her and get in myself my phone buzzed. It was a message.

‘wer r u? cnt wait. come coon.’

I smiled. I got in the car and drove straight home.

Just as I entered our front gate, I saw Siddharth come out of the bungalow. His face was tensed. I purposely took my own sweet time to park the car. Siddharth’s eyes caught the back seat till then. I could see his face go from tensed to confused as he tried to figure out what it was that was occupying the back seat top to floor. Finally I turned the car off and got out. I opened the rear door and set about trying to pull the koala bear out. Siddharth looked upon. Just as he saw the furry arm of the toy emerge out of the door, he grabbed my hand and pulled me towards himself. I threw my arms around him and hugged him tightly. I could feel his heart beat against mine. He pulled me away. I was smiling ear to ear, too overwhelmed to say anything. My eyes welled up with tears. He looked at me, into my eyes.

He put a hand on my tummy.

He raised his eyebrows.

I blinked.

The tears rolled down my cheeks.

I smiled, blushing ever so slightly.

And the next minute, Siddharth had scooped me off the ground and was turning round and round in circles.

When he finally put me down on the ground and helped me remove the koala bear from the car, we walked back into the house, me holding the bear by its tummy, Siddharth holding me in his arms. My head tipped onto his shoulders, as his hand came down and rested on my tummy. I put my hand on his hand and he grabbed it.

The wait was over.