The Gingerbread Boy

I'm going to tell you a story, now. It's a nice story, filled with juicy twists and even one or two lines that you can play back in your head later and chuckle. It's a bildungsroman, I suppose. Or - if big words aren't your thing - an adventure. What this story really is is a tale with a moral. And if you sit tight and listen well we might even get to it, in the end.

Are you listening? Good.

It begins like this:


There was once a gingerbread boy. He was a normal child, very much like you or me, made of the same rosy skin and jet-black hair and razor blue eyes. The same slightly-pudgy arms and legs and the same sparkling teeth, the same self-conscious expression. A flesh and blood boy.

A normal child. Except deep at his heart - in some lonesome dank corner that lay at the end of too curved a path for even him to see - he was also a gingerbread boy.

Now the boy lived and worked and grew like normal children do. He went to classes, tried his hands at debating, worked like a heathen charm upon the ladies (for he excelled at athletics and had the broad shoulders to answer for it). He was respected by all, feared by none, admired by quite-a-few. People nudged each other to watch him pass in the corridors.

And then one day the dank thing lying at the end of the curve reared its head - and it was a head made of molasses and cinnamon and ginger and flour.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

It must be the diluter, thought the gingerbread boy. All those fumes.
He was standing in class, trying to make sense out of the words in a file. The file was lying on the desk in front of him. It was filled with a brief assortment of rumpled papers. The words were on the papers.
They were in his own handwriting.

Not the diluter. It is the walls, thought the gingerbread boy. The walls are sneaking about when my back is turned.
He whipped his neck so fast there was a dry crack. The kid dozing behind him started.

"Are you ok?" the teacher's glasses had slipped a quarter inch. The fan periodically made a sound like somebody's face being slapped against sand.
Someone in the back sniggered.
They're in on it, thought the gingerbread boy. They're all in on it.

There was a dull clicking from the front of the class. People were beginning to turn away from the whiteboard, where a projector was shining the closing slides of a presentation on the mitotic cell division observed in carbide batteries. The kid conducting the slides (and now the verbal cues as well) was tapping  the screen with a Westwood School Wooden Chalkboard Pointer with Plastic Tip (36") in his desperate bid to regain the attention of the class (which was focused on his teammate) and the attention of his teammate (which had long since wandered away).

His teammate was the gingerbread boy.

"In conclusion, when a pseudonymous receptor and a shot of pure energy in the jugular love each other and wish to procreate-"
"They give birth to a gingerbread boy," said the gingerbread boy. Every eye in the room turned back to grab at his face. "I'm a gingerbread boy."

"This is highly irregular," said the teacher. "I demand an explanation, Mr-"
The walls are closing in, thought the gingerbread boy.

I better get out of here.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

And so the gingerbread boy ran. He ran to the window, first, out through the glass like it was a brittle sheet of water, and then he was off.

He ran and he ran until his cheeks puffed blue. He ran as the shadows darkened and grew.
That's the stuff, thought the gingerbread boy. I was born for this.

On the way he ran past a stalled DTC bus, a busted transformer. He ran past a couple fighting playfully in their car, a balloon seller trying to weed out a stray green balloon out of a host of red ones.
 This is a good high, thought the gingerbread boy. Better than eau de acetone, at least.

He wanted to keep running but there was a sharp smell from an alleyway. An overripe smell but an inviting smell, an enticing smell.
Maybe I'll stop a while, thought the gingerbread boy. Rest my legs a bit. 

He stopped and made his way inside.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

Somebody had set up shop there.
It was temporary shop, at best. A tent nailed up inside a dead-end alleyway. Row upon row of wooden planks nailed up inside the tent. Green glass bottles sealed up with pieces of cork and blobs of wax.

"What is this place?" asked the gingerbread boy.
"The Watering Hole," said a voice in the distance.
"Destination Unknown," said another.

A carrion bird flew up, up, up till it was nothing but the fading blue silhouette from an oversized pair of wings. It flew too close to the sun and was roasted alive.

This is where the animals drink, thought the gingerbread boy. I shall drink with them. 
Across the sky, the moon licked its lips in anticipation of a fried vulture dinner.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

There were six of them at one headcount. At another point they were four.

A friend of his stayed throughout. It wasn't necessarily the same person, but his friends all had refreshingly similar views on practically everything; he sat and basked in their conformity, their lack of lateral thinking.

I am different from them, he thought as he took another sip and the seats around him emptied and filled, emptied and filled. I am the gingerbread boy. It is my lot to run.

There was an exciting exchange at one point.
"We're currently escaping from reality," declared a sloshed friend in brown muttonchops and a dhoti. "We're wasting ourselves. Into oblivion."
"Probably," replied the gingerbread boy and took another swig.
"I'm s-serious, man." The dhoti was dishcloth green. The muttonchops were three weeks untrimmed. The level of sobriety was Not Even Slightly. "We're n-neglecting our duties. Well, not anymore, I say."
"What do you suggest?" asked the gingerbread boy and took another swig.
"I'm  turning over a new leaf. Starting today."
"Is that right?" The world kept floating in and out of focus.
"Yeah, man. No more smoking. No more betting on horses. No more hanging down at the arcade all the time. No more gali cricket in the afternoon."
"What about drinking?" The gingerbread boy could feel his head travelling down in a soft, loose arc to settle upon his forearm. He felt the same thing over and over at least a dozen times before his friend responded.
"You serious? Nothing is ever the booze's fault, man. In fact, I'd strongly recommend using it as a vacation for when things get really bad."
"Whatever you say, pardner," the gingerbread boy slurred, and then the ground was coming up to meet him.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

When he left it was late afternoon. The pylons all threw heat in squiggly waves that collected under the tin blanket that served as the roof of the world. There was an infernal screeching from the cosmic kittens as they  hotfooted their way across the metal, leaving pawprint indentations from the other side.

The gingerbread boy felt on top of the world, too. The world tilted inexplicably to either side on random intervals, but that was okay.
I feel boy, thought he. I am the gingerbread fine.

There was a clatter from somewhere down the road. The gingerbread boy cocked his ears in a passable imitation of a dog. Steady as she goes, he thought to himself. Then the clatter repeated itself and he was off again. "Just one foot after another," he called out to nobody in particular.

On the way he ran past an upturned car. The doors were open and a brief trail of blood and snot led off to where the passengers had managed to crawl before being picked up by somebody (he hoped it was the paramedics). The windscreen wipers lay crumpled below the spiky glass shards of the windscreen. The cumulative effect was like staring at some giant mechanical bug in the few seconds between its swatting and the last exhale of its oily breath.

The clattering came closer.
I will see the source of the noise for myself, thought the gingerbread boy. I can outrun trouble, should trouble find me. I am, after all, the gingerbread boy.
He turned a corner and came upon the manhole cover.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

It was around thirty inches across at its widest, and then it tapered away to nothing in all directions. It was a round manhole cover, of the sort handed out quite freely by the Government on roadways.
The gingerbread boy had seen nothing like it in his life.

"Is there anybody out there?" he called out. The road pulsed in an intense burst of aquamarine light.
A merman poked his head out of the gap where the light was coming from.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

I will stop here, for a moment. You do know what a merman is, don't you?

Imagine a creature just over five feet tall, standing on hind legs that have webbed feet at the end. Imagine fins on the side of its knees, behind its elbows. Imagine spindly arms that would end in webbed hands, too, except the creature slit the membranes down the middle and wrapped each individual finger in a thin strip of cloth (the webs would grow back, given a chance). Now imagine a thin layer of scales on the whole thing.

Done? Good.
The key word here is imagine. There is no such thing as a merman, not really.

The merman who peeked out of the manhole that afternoon was called Fathead. He spoke on behalf of five other mermen, three merwomen (they'd stopped being maidens a long time ago) and a boy in a green shirt.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

It was a breathtaking moment, history in the making, the landmark first interaction between two completely alien species (nobody remembered the first thing they'd said to the green shirt, and he wasn't even a part of the narrative yet). The gingerbread boy even stopped jogging in place for a while, leaned in closer to listen.

"You wanna come join our party, bro?" declaimed Fathead.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

Of course the gingerbread boy acquiesced - you haven't been listening at all, have you? He followed the merman all the way down the rickety ladder, past a bunch of grimy-looking pipes through which the river Yamuna flowed sometimes, through a revolving door that looked rusted shut (but wasn't), and through a secret door in the back of what seemed like a padded cell.

The gingerbread boy continued to walk, spellbound. There was a gigantic cavern under the sewage system (if that's where they still were - he found it harder to tell directions without the sun standing in the background hemming and hawing) and they seemed to be near one of its walls. The dull grey stone rose up in front of him and faded into black somewhere high above. Peering closely at the darkness, the gingerbread boy realized it was made up of clouds.

Trees grew near the wall, at irregular intervals. The soil felt warm and crumbly in his palm - a little stale, but still more than potent enough to whelp trees that went up a good five-six storeys themselves.

They were all sitting with their backs to the wall, the mermen and the merwomen, a boy with a green shirt tucked away somewhere in the middle. They watched him with genuine curiosity as Fathead went up to one of them, took the gnarled and elongated wooden pipe they were smoking and handed it over to him.

"This is our peace pipe," said Fathead. "Would you like to share?"

The gingerbread boy looked carefully down the stem. He felt the roundness of the bowl against his thumb and forefinger. Then he dipped his finger into the bowl, scraped some of the powdery residue with his nail, and sniffed it.
He smiled.

"I am the gingerbread boy," he said to them all, as one. "Let's get baked."

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

They sat there for a long, long time.
The walls turned purple for a while but nobody really noticed. Jagged forks of foliage bored through the ground and shot up towards the sky (The roof, Vermivore said it was the roof). Lightning flashed occasionally and by its light they could make out the gigantic tree painted upon the ceiling. The air was heavy with branches falling back to the ground utterly spent and the sound of rain.

"Is it safe to be sitting here?" the gingerbread boy said. He wanted to stand up to lend his statement weight but his legs were jammed against the ground.
"Yes," said one of the merwomen. "You sit where you are and you pull with everything you got. That's all."
"Shut up, Saffron," said Fathead. "You're a woman. Go fix us some worms or something."

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

The gingerbread boy followed the motions of the guy in the green shirt. He seemed to flow from one state to another - sitting leaned back against a rock, then neck craned to see where the pipe had gotten, then jutted forward like a monkey going after a jar of cookies as he received the pipe, then cross-legged, shoulders hunched slightly, the bowl of the pipe a smoldering orange against the greenness of his shirt.

"He makes me slightly uneasy," whispered the nearest merwoman to the gingerbread boy.
"Shut up, Saffron," said Fathead. "Didn't I ask you for something to eat? Get off your fat arse now!"

Saffron stood up.
Everyone stopped talking. The green shirt forgot to hold out the pipe to Fathead.

Saffron left.
Everyone slowly started talking again. Fathead snatched the pipe from the green shirt.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

The green shirt waited for the pipe to go out before getting off his perch and going to sit with the gingerbread boy. "Got bored of crushin'," he said affably.
The gingerbread boy coughed a little and nodded. He had no opinion of the guy in the green shirt. He didn't need one. He could run whenever he felt like it.

The pipe was refilled.
"Good shit," said Fathead. A couple of mermen raised their index and little fingers at him.
In some cultures that is taken as a sign of respect.

This is perfect, thought the gingerbread boy. I have never felt more inclined to stay in one spot.
The rain came down harder now. It ran down his cheeks and his throat. It drenched his shirt in a matter of moments. Small bits of light snaked in through far corners of the cavern and the rain got at them, too. Great gobs of water smashed themselves up around them and depending on the light the pieces that fell were either a deep purple or a bright green.

The green shirt had to light the pipe again when it came his turn. The gingerbread boy leaned forward to hold the flame to the cup and saw that the other boy had an even set of clean, white teeth.

Halfway through the second round Saffron walked back into the circle, pulled a saucepan from somewhere in her dress, and smashed it upon the titular fat head of Fathead.

The green shirt watched the pipe sail over his head and smash against a tree. Then he turned to the gingerbread boy.
"Let's get out of here," he said.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

So this time the gingerbread boy didn't have to run alone. The guy in the green shirt did not offer any conversation beyond what was necessary. He just kept pace with the gingerbread boy as he made his way back to the rubber room and then out towards the surface.

They ran over the crest of a hill and then skirted down the smooth pavement on the other side.

The gingerbread boy squinted back in the direction he'd come from and saw the irresponsible fizzle of fireworks above a dead town. He thought he saw rainwater pulling on the sides of the road like some long-delayed shutter. Occasional forks of lightning framed them against the backdrop; the image of a green shirt squeezing between cars at an intersection burnt itself into the retinas of the gingerbread boy.

He's got some balls, thought the gingerbread boy, and Ow.

"Where do you live?" asked the green shirt.
"Nowhere," he replied. "I belong on the road. I am the gingerbread boy."
"Are you, now?" the green shirt grinned in the darkness. "What do you run towards, gingerbread boy?"

This was a new question. The gingerbread boy pondered and pondered.
"A place where things keep happening," said the gingerbread boy, finally. "A place that does not sleep."

"Great way of inviting yourself over," said the green shirt. "My house is not far from here. You can meet some of my friends. Sound all right?"
"Yes, it does."
"Unless you have somewhere to be getting to, I mean."
"Let's just shut up and sprint already."

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

The green shirt lived in a dilapidated old house halfway between the University and the Transit. The gingerbread boy had passed it often, back when he was a human child and had to go to distant corners of the city and make people listen to his speeches.

"Is it safe to live in there?"
"Better in there than the road, man," the green shirt grinned. Somebody finally opened the door on the third knock.
It was a girl.

"You should've told me there would be guests," she said to the green shirt, eyeing the gingerbread boy up and down. "Decent-looking ones at that."
"It's no use," said the green shirt to the girl as she followed them inside and surreptitiously sniffed the back of her guest's neck. "He's a runner."

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

Once again, there were anywhere between four to six people in that room. Nobody got up and left but they all looked so damn similar it was difficult to say whether there were three girls and two boys or two girls and three boys or two girls and two boys and one incredibly gifted master of disguises.

The gingerbread boy looked for his friend but it was difficult to tell which of the two boys play-wrestling on the couch was the one who'd come in with him - was it the one on top twisting the other's ankle or the bottom bitch yelling in pain and reaching slowly for the cricket bat lying a few feet away from them?

There were no more shirts. The guys and girls all wore blue shorts and white vests. The guys all had chiseled physiques. The girls were all incredibly easy on the eyes. The gingerbread boy had taken off his own tattered school blazer when he entered the room but he felt self-conscious in the presence of what were obviously underwear models who'd gotten bored of hanging on the billboards.

"Wanna try something mindblowing?" the familiar clap on the back meant it was his friend formerly of the green shirt.
"Always," said the gingerbread boy.
A thrill of anticipation went through the gathering.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

"Like that?"
"Yeah. You managed not spill any. That's good."
"Does it usually come in droppers?"
"No, it has to be extracted and put there. Delicate process. Sorta."
"And what does it do?"
"It's a really intense high, man. Puts you right in touch with the other side."
"The other side of what?"
"Everything, man."
"Oh. What is it called?"
"Got a weird-sounding name. Biological shit, man. I'd tell you but your eyelids are getting red. It's hitting."

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

It was a strange sensation.

The gingerbread boy found himself floating, floating, detaching from the body splayed awkwardly on the couch, from the circle of spectators (definitively proven to be three girls and two guys apart from the green shirt - one or the other person was always in another room, hence the confusion), from the green shirt (whose turn it was in the other room), from the room itself, from that giant depressing bitch of a tether everybody likes to call the ground. He was...

... Not just a gingerbread boy. He was the gingerbread boy. And running was for retards, especially when one could fly...

...Back to the days before his trip to the condemned building, to the days when the fumes from the peace pipe went straight up his nozzle and into the slot machine that was his head...

...Back to the days when he first met the peace pipe, in a gathering of familiar faces who only surfaced when there were green stalks and murk in the sky and a clean surface to crush on...

...Back to the days when his world was populated by locked rooms and empty faces and liquid fire that you drank straight from the bottle to burn the demons scrabbling in the recesses of your soul...

...Back to the day years and years ago when he first saw that there was something damaged irreparably in the workings of his mind, some blighted short circuit that would light up a neon arrow if ever he got within a mile of an open road...

...All the way back to the day he was born, a few moments after all the blood and slime and bits of his mother's womb had been washed away, the moments of utter quiet when every eye in the disinfected white room stared at him, the moments when he could be anybody, any random miracle of chromosomal interaction and evolutionary progress...

This is who I am thought the gingerbread boy and I better tell them my name.
So he did.
He finally cried out his name.
And it resonated across all the disparate strands of his story, unifying them under a common umbrella that would grant them form and context and meaning and purpose and cohesion.

This was the gingerbread boy's finest hour.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

And this is where the story ends. No, seriously. It's a positive note, right? Everything turned out okay. The hero gets his moment in the sun, and there's always the vague promise of sex in the distance to spice things up for the more mature audience (subtext, folks, all about the subtext!). All is right with the world. Except..

Except there's no moral yet. I mean, come on! We don't want empty words like closure, do we?
We want a teaching. And we want it drilled into somebody's head (foreshadowing alert).

The gingerbread boy's story could be over.

Except it wasn't.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

The green shirt walked to the other room, the one where somebody had to be present at all times. It wasn't a hard and fast rule, of course, but it would be decidedly impolite to leave the other occupant of the room alone - especially since he was sponsoring their trip, so to speak, and also happened to be tied to the bed.

"P-please let me go home now," sobbed the man in the bed. He was hardly a man, what with crying in front of somebody out of sheer helplessness.
He also didn't have the required number of limbs.

"We'll be done soon," the green shirt reassured him. He checked on the swathe of tubes and cables attached to the base of the other's neck. He checked on the clear receptacle - half an inch of fluid remained, enough to fill in at least five more droppers. He finally checked on the man's body. The right leg and left arm both ended in bloody stumps, wrapped in rags that had barely stemmed the bleeding when first applied a couple weeks back.

"Please. It really hurts..." the man wasn't crying anymore. He'd tried everything already.

"I'm telling you, man. We're almost done with you." The green shirt checked to see if the scalpel was still on the tray where he'd placed it on his last shift.
It was.

"We've found a new lamb, you see," he said, and then he walked out of the room.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

The gingerbread boy was still falling over the edge of the sofa.
He'd been falling for over twenty minutes.

"Human body. Beautiful thing, ain't it?" green shirt fondly stroked the boy's hair. "Creates hormones, regulates their presence, knows how to hold a party. Shall we get the last formality out of the way?"

The female on her way out mock-bowed. Green shirt grinned as he turned to their guest.

"It's getting really late," he said. "We're thinking of adjourning for dinner. You good?"
"Mmpff-fine," said the gingerbread boy. "S'really good stuff."
"I know. But," he asked casually, the third and final time, "don't you have to be getting home?"
"No home, nowhere to go. I am the gingerbread man," said the gingerbread boy.

"Good." green shirt stroked his hair again. "We've been having takeaway for ages so we decided to cook in. You're welcome to join us whenever you want."
The gingerbread boy lolled. Green shirt got up to leave.

"Just the one thing," he called back from the door. "I almost forgot. You don't have a problem with non-veg, do you?"
The gingerbread boy didn't hear, but that was OK.
Green shirt hadn't really waited for an answer.

       *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *                

...And that's the real ending. The gingerbread boy is safe and sound, the butt of a few jokes perhaps but in good care. The lost boys and girls living at the condemned building look out for their own. Drug abuse aside, look at how beautifully they tended to their invalid friend until he succumbed to his injuries.

It is things like these that give me hope for humanity.
Anyway. You have made it this far, haven't you? And I promised you a moral.
I didn't think anyone would make it this far.

I guess I'll have to freewheel, then. Here's me casting a look about my room for inspiration: a grimy, boarded-up window, a hole in the wall where I can press my ear and hear the rambling of the stretcher-bed's current occupant (he's been babbling nonstop for the past ten hours. This story was restructured out of the more coherent parts of his soliloquy) and, right next to the cot I currently share with one of the girls (there are no restrictions here. There are six of us and five different partners is more than enough for anyone), a slightly-faded but crisp green shirt that I wear when I am outside.

To return to the issue at hand. The moral of this story is, always try to be like the gingerbread boy. Take chances and allow life to surprise you, every once in a while.
You never know where the culmination of your travels shall find you.

Now if you'll excuse me, I believe I left something in the oven.

Superhero Movie

You wanted to see a Superhero Movie. I wanted to see a Superhero Movie. Everyone else wanted to see a Superhero Movie, too, but then they went without us so we went later.

We spoke on the phone in the morning before going for the Superhero Movie and you asked me, when did a Superhero Movie turn into the Superhero Movie?

Does it really matter, I asked. It was hard to hear you clearly because the phone lines had been dug up a little. There were craters the size of thirty children going around the mulberry bush. Elephants, the government reported. Just, like, elephants, you know. Falling from the sky.

Because nobody in their right minds would go watch The Superhero Movie, you retorted.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell sat down to a quiet early dinner with his immediate family, unaware of the cruel oblique jibe at his expense. There was too much butter on the shrimp.

I reached the theatre a whole forty minutes early. There was a lot of time to spare so I sat around with a suitably thick tome to swat at the air with. After what seemed like eternity I looked at my watch and realized I’d only killed ten minutes.

You called with twenty-five minutes remaining. I’ve just woken up, you said.

It’s a fine sort of day to have just woken up to, I supplied. I decided to walk while I talked. There was a temporal anomaly where the mall's central promenade had been; people walked into the blue-green haze and suddenly found themselves bitter and resentful, wondering where the best years of their life had gone. A minor leak, a man standing on a wooden crate was yelling into a megaphone, we were laying gas lines and there was a minor leak. Nothing to see here. Move along. 

I sidestepped the anomaly. 

All of this for a stupid superhero movie, I grumbled.

I had forgotten all about the stupid superhero movie, you confided.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell waited until the rest of his family was asleep before creeping down to his study. He picked up a salt-shaker half filled with grade-A Bolivian snow and helped himself to a toke. He looked at the walls, decorated with prime-time Teen Choice Awards, none of which he’d won in this decade. He decided to help himself to another toke and then some.

It was decided that you'd make it by the skin of your teeth and we'd watch the movie minus the irritating trailers that we'd wanted to gasp at.

And what if I don't make it in time? You inquired.

Come on, I exhorted. It's not like we haven't had our fill of superheroes.

And that was true: the only known superhero alive at the time was a young man from Tampa Bay, Florida. He called himself Horsedick Fuckaton (spelled Fuckathon in EU countries) and was victim to a severe case of functional retardation. He was also the metahuman equivalent of a truckload of Supermen on steroids: a Godlike entity who couldn't tell apart his various abilities, let alone control them. 

Each and every one of his adventures caused billions of dollars worth of property damage and almost always culminated in the gruesome deaths of at least a thousand people. It had come to a point where criminals stayed at home just so they didn't have to be guilty of causing the spontaneous implosion of an entire housing complex because ol' Horsey couldn't discern between his left hand and his right.

We could always Google Horsey's latest exploits and feel terrified, I reassured you. The elevator to the top floor had been wrenched clean out of its moorings and skewered into the ground like a flagpost, six miles away in an open field. Some government official was probably on site, lying through his nose. 

It felt good not to know for certain.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell hit himself upside of the head to clear the ringing. Then he realized the ringing was the alarm of the battered sedan into which he’d plowed his Porsche. He felt himself up and down before ascertaining his only injury was a moderately severe nosebleed; but he’d had that since before he got into the car. He opened the door, fell outside like a discarded juice carton, and then fumbled to his feet before continuing down the nearest darkened alleyway.

I'm sorry I made you miss your superhero movie, you said.

That's all right, I suggested. You'd turned up seventy minutes after the movie was supposed to begin. I'd tried reading my book for all of five minutes before taking the temporal anomaly for a spin. I felt too woozy to be upset. I also felt a strong urge to watch Nirvana live.

No, I feel like I wasted your time, you said as you typed out yet another text to yet another friend - your fifth or sixth in the past two minutes.

You don't, actually, I said in a more perfect world.

We were standing outside now. I felt fine. A little less woozy but in control.

Pardon me? You looked at me politely. Your fingers on the keypad never slowed down.

It was just another Superhero Movie, I remarked. In a season when superhero movies are a dime to the dozen. It had more to do with spending a bit of time together. Maybe it wouldn't have been awkward. Maybe it would even be worth it.

You stopped texting and looked at me intently, in this perfect world I had in my head. The intensity of your gaze increased considerably as I took off my jacket, revealing red and black tights underneath. I raised one fist towards the sky and then I was off - over the buildings, the concrete hills, the rivers of smoke - far, far away from the realm of your all-too-human eye.

Halfway across the world renowned actor Drake Bell slumped against an overturned trashcan and waited for his breathing to regain some semblance of normalcy. Then he took the .38 Magnum he'd yanked from the Porsche's dashboard and put the barrel in his mouth. He'd already cocked the hammer and squeezed his eyes shut before he realized he could not do it - he could not possibly die with that terrible overbuttered shrimp as his last meal in this world. He waited momentarily to see if he'd change his mind before tossing the gun in the nearest garbage can and starting upon the long walk home.

The story ends quite unsatisfactorily.
Which, in retrospect, happens to be the point behind this poorly-constructed narrative.

We don't live in a perfect world. Or else Horsedick Fuckaton would have choked to death on his own umbilical cord. And Drake Bell would have the best shrimp in garlic butter sauce he'd tasted in his life; and then he could off himself less than a hundred meters from the carcass of his beloved Porsche.

And I could afford to be a raging alcoholic with writerly ambitions. And you could be utterly self-absorbed and insensate, because we'd know ourselves with all of our problems and failings.

And there wouldn't need to be the tantalizing promise of some larger-than-life icons sweeping up our trash for us and making us whole again.

You'd see what I've seen all evening - what drove me to try something as preposterous as this in the first place.

All we have - all we really ever had - is each other. And no matter what our problems might be, we can take them on. You and me.
The way we were before we became this twitching mess of neuroses and inability to communicate with one another, let alone relate.

We'd watch the stupid Superhero Movie because we'd have three hours in a darkened theater to hold half a million discussions that the world wouldn't have to share in.

We'd have reaffirmation.

And the Superhero Movie could go back to being what it is - a stupid goddamn Superhero Movie - rather than a metaphor for all that is wrong with our world right now.

Mating Habits of the Bonobo Monkey

I

Love comes to the University in the spring of 2012. Lust has been there for the past sixty-odd years, making the beds a little warmer and the nights a little colder, but love can lay claim to enough seedy places of ill-repute without needing another gathering of hormonal nitwits in its repertoire.

Love comes to the University anyway. There is a grand parade in its perpetual dishonour, and the incumbent students' union sends in a fleet of white Innovas to attract a crowd.
Everybody sees the shining white cars roaring up University Avenue and decides to stay at home.
You end up going nevertheless because you have long believed love to be a socio-political construct invented for the sole purpose of acting as a deterrent to the overburdened cause of Feminism.
I go because I am currently the wrong degree of coolness to do drugs and there is nothing good on TV.

Would you look at that, you declaim without inflection. Such a gross display of chauvinism and testosterone.
A carload of unionists skid past on a bike and a half.
You remark that you've never seen anybody grosser and in more urgent need of emasculation.
I introduce myself to you.
You ignore my existence.

We are passed by the motorcade proper. The first two cars contain random dignitaries and one-fourths of a momo stand. The third car contains love for real.
It's got a heady odour, you observe.
I was expecting someone taller, I confess.

The big car is followed by half a dozen smaller ones and a man leading a fulmination of marmots on leashes.
Then there is a bunch of wattle-necked ladies chasing inexpensive fur coats.
Then the road is empty.

There's that, I say.
What a cheap and degenerative display of Capitalist pedagogy, you say.
You wanna grab a bite, I say.
Only if you don't expect me to pay for you.

II

Things go great for the first three months. They also go to hell in two weeks flat.
There is too much milk in this coffee, you say as I pour out espresso shots from our stolen coffeemaker. There isn't enough milk in this paneer kulcha. I learn that cottage cheese is a dairy product.
Three-fourths of a momo stand opens in our locality. There are dumplings but no steam. The boiler plates have been requisitioned by the Students' Union.

We take a long walk spread over dozens of evenings. We bicker incessantly over the splitting of cafe bills. We watch poorly-hidden wrinkles spread over poorly-interpreted scripts playing out on poorly-observed silver screens. I write about our burgeoning romance in a poorly-thought out idiom.
We make out every chance we get but there is nothing poor about that.

We measure rainfall in hours rather than centimeters. We cross a road together.
There are bad bits too, of course.

I complain that you do not give me enough time. You blame me of sabotaging your bi-weekly assessment preparations, your political career, India's chances in the T20 World Cup (though I contend it is all that damn Tendulkar's fault for making us complacent), and your plans for breakfast with an ever-growing roster of attractive male underwear models.

I call you beautiful on a morning when you're at your ugliest. You read a story by me and fail to make the appropriate sort of noise (which, in case you are wondering, is halfway between an indignant oink and the post-coital clicking of a dolphin).

Things come to a head when a perfectly-serviceable joke is allowed to accelerate constantly at a rate of nine-point-eight-meters-per-second-squared until it reaches the floor.
We watch the joke falling and know it represents both the general quality of writing currently produced by our generation (read: me) and the arc of our relationship.

We decide to move in together.

III

The end begins at the midway point of our first night in the new flat.
There is something about the moonlight that inspires-
Did you remember to get the vegetables for breakfast, you ask.
Yes. But there is something about the moonlight-
Because one of us will have to get some milk for the tea and I'm not a morning person, you insist.
I'll do it. There's just something-
You should get your own sheets by the end of the week, you add.
Screw it, I concede, and spend the rest of the night trying to cut off the oxygen supply to my brain with a borrowed loop of blanket.

The tenant before last drops by the following morning to ask after his coffeemaker. We serve him tepid tea and make regretful noises in time with his story. We also crack him over the head with an inside joke and try not to laugh as it runs down his face.

After he leaves we make our penultimate set of espresso shots and chuckle a lot. There is some sloppy kissing in the kitchen that leaves two Tupperware boxes bruised but is still deeply satisfying. Halfway through our third quarter of tonsil hockey you stop and ask me when we'd last been this happy together.

I try to signal the end of your time-out but the Tupperware boxes seem to be squinting reproachfully up at me. Your uncanny knack for being correct continues to infuriate.

This isn't working out, you say.
Don't say that, I say.
I'm bad at sugarcoating stuff, you say.
The secret is to preheat the oven at one-five-oh degrees for thirty minutes, I say.
You don't necessarily have to make this harder, you say.
I love you, I say.
You shake your head and say nothing at all. Your eyes follow my rapid strides and clumsy fumble with the doorknob, but you still say nothing.
Silence begins to leak out of the windows and the neighbours come around to complain that they cannot hear their televisions.

By the time I return with three packets of skimmed milk you've locked yourself into the balcony and refuse to leave while I'm still in the flat.

IV

Love departs the University at the beginning of the monsoon. There isn't enough of it to go around at the House of Commons and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting feels it would be deliciously ironic on their part to recommend love being a mandatory presence in Parliament.
The demand for camera-phones amongst senior party officials quadruples overnight. So does the viewcount of racy 'party' videos on YouTube.

There is a grand farewell followed by a horrible squall of rain. People who'd earlier been looking forward to the meeting of separate glances see no interesting strangers in the street.

There are a lot of Dear John emails written, sent, and then discarded from Inboxes without being read.

Here we are, I say.
Here we are, you say.
The last car in the procession passes us again.
I suppose we gave it our best, you say.
It's all that damned Tendulkar's fault for making us complacent, I say.
I suppose I could laugh at that, you say.
Don't leave me, I say.
Thank God we're handling this like mature and sensible individuals, you say.
I'll make it all up to you, I say.
It goes without saying that we'll still be friends, you say.
I'll write something terrific about you, I say.
Don't do that, you say. Write about something interesting instead. Like the mating habits of the Bonobo monkey, which seldom forms permanent monogamous relationships with an individual partner.
I don't know anything about your monkeys, I say.
Something people would want to read, you know?
I mutter something about wikipedia while you get yourself a rickshaw.
You have a good thing going. Don't fuck it up, you say.

That's all the goodbye I am going to get.
I contemplate my slightly-tragic moment as I stand in the last of the summer sunshine. I am still standing there when the rains proper hit the sidewalk.

This is the lowest point of my existence, I say.

Then a freak meteor strike decimates humanity in December.

Siren

It was a dream, of course. That much I knew long before the dash through the theater, long before leaving the party, long before things went from strange and interesting to all-out screamathon. It was a good-ol' fashioned dream... Except it was also one of those things that pop into your head and then refuse to leave - like an unbidden guest standing at your doorstep one fine midsummer morning, all set on gracing you with his presence until Diwali at least.

There were two ways to deal with it - either let it pick at the insides of my skull until it dissolved (which would take an inordinate amount of time, given the complexity of the factors involved), or get it down on paper so I could mutilate it into gibberish and give up on it.

I chose the latter.
So this is the story of my dream.


It began on the stairwell of a multi-storey. I was fifteen again, going for tuitions to the home of an old lady who would smell like cabbage and jasmines on the edge of decay, and offer to turn us over to our parents at the slightest indiscretion. I knew all this from the chattering crowd of children walking around me; in the real world I hadn't been to any tuition classes till I turned eighteen.

I happen to be tall, but those kids barely reached my elbow. I would've thought they were much younger if it weren't for the identical sky-blue mathematics textbook we were all carrying.

I scanned the crowds for familiar faces. There weren't any. To make matters worse the kids all insisted on pushing me to the front; I found myself at the door of a house on the seventh floor, a crowd of tiny kids behind me, the whole tableau uncannily similar to the Pied Piper coming home after a long day at work.
I pressed the door bell.

A deep bass note reverberated through the floor. The kids stopped chattering and were still. I looked back and saw them all gazing up at me, tiny eyes reddish in the late evening.
The first pang of unease hit me then.
I tried to cut back through them but the door opened and a pair of hands dragged me in.


The lighting inside was no better than outside - strobe patterns lit up the walls at random intervals. I barely had a moment to wonder how they'd fitted a discotheque inside a 3BHK on the wrong side of the Yamuna - then the door banged shut behind me, and the bassline enveloped me completely.

The hands on my shoulders let off the pressure but did not let go. I waited for my eyes to adjust and then hazarded a look.

It was a girl.
The second pang of unease hit when my brain did a complete critical appraisal of her (the sort that I wouldn't dare try in daylight because I'd inevitably end up getting slapped) and still couldn't decide whether she was good-looking or not. She had pixie hair that actually reached her shoulders but looked much shorter. Her neck was long and slender, her height considerably more than that of the pipsqueaks who'd pushed me into the flat. She was wearing a little blue dress, and her features seemed vaguely familiar.

-Who are you? I mouthed the words but wasn't sure she'd heard.
-Does it matter? Her own voice was no more prominent. I was pleasantly surprised to discover I could read lips as well. She had a nice mouth.
-Where is this place?
She shrugged. One hand remained on my shoulder, the grip firm but comfortable. She motioned for me to follow her deeper into the house.

-I'm dreaming, aren't I?
I had just seen a couch set up in front of a flat screen with half a dozen guys crammed on top of each other, watching some sporting event or the other.
The entire party (along with assorted paraphernalia) was situated inside a single shower cubicle.

She grinned. It was a nice grin, but slightly wide. She made me a little nervous.
Her expression didn't change as she started to say something funny, but then her face suddenly went blank.

-What is it?
-We have to leave. Now.
-What? Why?
-Siren, she mouthed. I felt a slight chill. Not at the word, but the doomed expression that flitted across her face.
-Excuse me?
-Listen. Can't you hear it?
I stared at her for a moment and then realized I could. There was a faint wailing somewhere in the background.
-We have to leave, she repeated. Now.
-But we aren't exactly felons, are we?

In reply she gestured into the next bedroom down the line.
I peeked in.
A bunch of kids were sitting around an empty flower-vase, uttering weird incantations and making even weirder gestures. Just before I could burst out laughing, however, the vase... Glowed.

I continued to stare as a thin tendril of green fume emanated from the mouth of the vase and burrowed its way into the nose of the nearest kid. He fell back as if physically pushed; his eyes rolled up into his head.

The other kids continued their incantations; the vase was filled with green fumes now. I imagined I saw a spark of electricity somewhere in its depths.

-I don't want to be anywhere near them when the cops arrive, I admitted.
-Thought so. Come with me.
-Where are we going?

She came to a door that was, by my reckoning, the other bathroom.
-I'm not a big fan of sports!
-Shut up and get in.

She opened the door and pushed me


the smell of freshly cut grass
-What the hell was that?
-What?
-With the door and... Wait, where the hell are we?
-Could you stop emphasizing random words? It sounds kinda weird.

-Sorry.
We were on the streets of Connaught Place. It was long past midnight by the looks of it - the roads were all deserted, the stalls shut, not even a single smackhead dozing on the pavement. I looked down Janpath and noted how much it appeared like the setting for some post-apocalyptic movie.

-How did we get here?
-That's a good question.
-So are we safe here?
-Not really.
The sound of a car alarm from the other side of the circle. Red and blue lights reflected upon the pockmarked white pillars.

-Let's go.
She picked up a half-brick and hefted it through the glass shopfront of the nearest sportswear showroom.
Klaxons went off almost immediately.
-Wow. So you have a mad impulse and you Just Do It, huh?
-Save your product placements for the real world.

Her hand upon my forearm this time. Propelling me after her into the shop.
-Hey! There's glass and stuff here!
-Crybaby.
The door of a changing room with some actress in a sports-bra on it
-Do you think we could go to her place and
-Shut up!

The slightly stale smell of room freshener


-What the hell is that stench?
-We're in a public restroom.
-Ugh! And where exactly is
-See for yourself.

And I did.
We were at the one place in the city I'd sworn to never visit again. The river Yamuna flowed a few dozen yards down, oily with ghee and incense and practically carpeted by rotting flower petals. And in the marginal distance of a few dozen yards, five funeral pyres at different stages in the process of incineration.

-Nigambodh Ghaat.
-It's the last place they'd look for you.
-Who are they anyway?
-You'll probably find out soon enough.

The heat from the fires bathed my face. I found myself perilously close to a flashback that I desperately wanted to avoid. Except-
-Yep, they're aware of reverse psychology.

I hadn't seen or heard the sirens but I knew she wasn't lying. We ran down to the doors of the electric crematorium, which she kicked twice or thrice before the lock began to give way.
-Right now I'm actually kinda glad that my mind is blacking out the actual period of transit.
-Is that right?
-Yeah. I don't want to see the insides of this place. Can we please go somewhere a little less... Uninhabited?

-Are you sure?
The door finally fell open.
-I think so. I mean, what could possibly go


the inside of a theater blood red carpet pounding underfoot something black and white on the gigantic screen to our left and everybody to the right lit up by reflected blue light her hand warm but rough in mine pulling me to the side trying to block out the audience but too late to begin with
much too late

reptiles
all of them reptiles

lizards and snakes and iguanas somehow bundled into human clothing tongues lapping black in the semi darkness screeching and hissing and baring stained fangs and the stench of decay and offal in the air

-Over here, her voice right next to my ear the fear in it genuine but somehow disconnected from her person, and then a towering neon EXIT sign glowing red red red flicker red
only spot of colour in the room

the sound of her hands fumbling with the doorknob
one last look back into the theater
and the reptiles all of the slithery slimy reptiles wearing human clothes rising up in their seats
plastic toys and bleached balloons and windup animals in their hands
(claws not hands reptiles don't have hands)
shiny in the dim lighting somehow emitting light on their own and then

at the same moment as the door falling open

a hungry despicable babble of voices unruly chorus saying different words but the same thing all the same thing
-come here boy we have candy
-let me show you a magic trick
-ice cream trucks do you want ice cream jangling bells
-come a little closer and we can make this pencil disappear would you like that boy would you

and then out through the door with the neon EXIT sign and complete silence like unplugging a radio


-How long will this go on?
She looked like she hadn't heard. Then she cut me off halfway through asking again.
-Until we can outrun the sirens.
I strained my ears. She was right - there was still a mechanical screaming somewhere in the distance behind her. We were standing at a busy intersection five minutes from my own doorstep. I had no idea how we'd gotten here from the theater.

-We have to cross.
I took her hand, unbidden. She smiled a tight smile. Trucks blared past before us, burning rubber in both directions, glowing acid green and fire red in the sodium lighting. Her complexion looked orange. It suited her, somehow. The dress from the discotheque had been replaced by a plain shirt and skirt combination.

I let her lead me to the divider. I pretty much trusted her blindly by now. There was a paanwalla on the other side of the intersection. The roof of his stall smoldered, unseen and unnoticed. The air was heavy with the sweet scent of tobacco.

We crossed again. We were stepping past the tobacconist when the screaming in the distance turned into a continuous wail. Blue and red lights reappeared in the distance, a sense of inevitability embedded in the ruckus they were kicking up.

-Run, she said.
So we ran again - off the open road, into the half a mile stretch of barren fields and muddy paths that separated my locality from the nearest metro station.
I somehow knew we would never make it to the station.

Halfway down the empty stretch she suddenly turned right, towards the gate of a tiny enclosure marking off some faceless man's miserable holdings from the rest of the wasteland.

-Why are we
But I needn't have bothered
A gate is another type of door, after all


one of the narrow by-lanes on campus. Once again within walking distance of my college but on slightly unfamiliar territory.
-I am starting to detect a pattern here, I said.
She said nothing for the moment. Her breathing was becoming slightly ragged.
-We can stop for a bit, I suggested, although I knew we couldn't. I could hear a chorus of wails from the main road. We hadn't got a headstart.

There were doors all around us but they looked like they'd been bolted for decades.
-We're headed towards a
-Yes. Yes, I know.
Right on cue we turned the corner and came upon the brick wall we both knew about.

-Now what?
She said nothing. The catch in her breathing was more prominent.
The sirens came closer and closer. In a moment they'd turn the corner and light up the dead-end street.
She thrust something into my hand in the semi-dark.

-What is this? She didn't answer. It was too late.
The blue and red lights turned the corner. They threw her features into sharp relief. I realized with a jolt that she really was beautiful. All she'd needed to do was tie back her hair and change into a salwar-kameez.

A car door clanged open behind me. Somebody stepped out.
I didn't really care. I continued staring at her.
Something fluttered in my hand. I looked down.

It was a single black feather, the sort you'd see on a crow or a raven.
I looked back at her and saw that she was crying.

A fat red drop gathered at the corner of her eye and trickled down, leaving a shiny trail that was too bright and viscous to be anything but blood.
I let go of the feather. I turned to face the coppers
(pigs they call 'em pigs)
the front grills of the cars suspiciously like chrome-plated jaws
(they steal eggs and suck goats dry)
and then, at long last, a chance to look at my tormentors proper


I awoke screaming.

"Baby! What is it?"
I turned to the right. She lay in the bed beside me, on the soft downy mattress that was the most comfortable surface I'd ever slept on (even though I seemed to have nightmares with a sickly regularity whenever I slept on it).
My parents' old bedroom. My parents' old bed.

The only light came from a dim green zero-watt nightbulb, but I could see the silhouette of her nightgown, the way her hair was falling across her forehead.
I knew her, in this light. It seemed impossible not to. My struggle to identify her in the dreamworld felt strangely disconcerting now - this was the woman I loved.

I spoke her name out loud.
She said mine, the pronunciation flawless but slightly muffled. I ran my fingers though her hair, tucking rogue strands behind her ear.
She pulled me closer.

I didn't need to tell her what was wrong. She didn't really care. Her sole interest was getting my breathing back in check, to calm me down so we could go back to sleep. I felt the smoothness of her skin against mine, slightly cool compared to my own feverish pallor, and on an impulse I reached out and kissed her.

She was motionless for a moment before she reciprocated. Her mouth opened, soft and pliant.
I finally knew why she'd been having difficulties pronouncing my name.
She had the wrong number of teeth.

Too many, in fact. Too many teeth to fit into a human mouth. Fifty, a hundred, two thousand, serrated needles
(hypodermic)
crammed into that impossibly lovely mouth. She gave me a moment to explore, her tongue thin and scaly against mine, and then the teeth clenched shut on my tongue.

There was no pain. Some sort of toxin in the venom, I guessed.
Besides, she'd only done it so she could establish her grip proper. She wouldn't hurt me unneccessarily.

Things finally made sense. The word siren had multiple connotations, didn't it?
She pinned me upon the bed, her mouth now grey and elongated upon mine, and the zero-watt bulb was hidden as she finally stretched her wings, the ones she'd been hiding all along.
They were the jet black wings of a raven.

Feathers flew away in torrents around her. She raised her hands and I saw her nails, long and luminous and sharp enough for the tips to taper off into nothing.
The glow vanished as she plunged both her hands into my chest - and this time there was pain, tremendous and horrible and unimaginable. I tried to scream before remembering my mouth was otherwise occupied.

Her rough cheeks squirmed against mine. I realized she was smiling. There was a wrenching as her mouth left mine, and I could finally feel the inside of my head again.
Whatever was left of it, anyway.

She spat something fleshy and rubbery off the bed. Then the hands widened the gap between each other, like an excited kid opening a window on the first day of his holidays, and she cackled in triumph as she saw what she wanted.

There was another wrenching but this one was too big to respond to.
My senses began to fade away, and the last thing I saw was the creature sitting on my chest, wingspan almost as big as the width of the room, holding my heart up so it could be the last thing I saw.


I woke up for real and counted to ten to keep from screaming. I needn't have bothered - the urge was too halfhearted to be a problem. I'd already had my chance to test my lungs. And I'd taken it.

After the counting I lay back, the sole occupant of my own bed - slightly harder than the floor and (hitherto) nightmare-free.
There were earphone wires wrapped around my head and neck like some geek's bondage fetish. I untangled them and tossed them onto the table across the room.

I felt fine. Slightly shaken by the bizarre sequence of dreams, yes (the details were fading but the sense of unreality persisted). I couldn't recall the occupants of the police-car, or the face of the siren. I had a feeling she'd look like nobody I knew; the note of recognition in  the last dream had been the only false note in an otherwise-flawless night of terror.

The clock on my phone said it was barely past 3AM.
I cursed myself for turning in at midnight.

Then I lay back down to wait for sleep - pausing only to fall out of bed when a firetruck passed on the road outside.

Last Call

“Get fucked,” the bartender said in an even monotone.

I turned 90 in a fluid motion and continued telling my story to whoever was sitting there now.

“It’s not like I’m inventive or anything,” I said reasonably. “I know I’m not. I don’t got what it takes to const- constric- create narratives. It’s just that I can read beginnings and predict endings.”

What do you mean, I waited for the man with the mousy blonde hair to ask; but he continued to stare miserably into his glass. 

"I had to give up on Agatha Christie when I was ten," I confided. "It was a total buzzkill. The basic sort of crap people can't get. And don't even get me started on serialized novels."

The mousy-haired man's lady friend finally came back from the restroom. I could tell by the way she put her hand on his shoulder that they'd end up marrying each other in a couple of months. I also knew that it would be a desperately unhappy marriage - although he wouldn't realize that until just before her untimely death, seven years from now. He'd be convicted. I decided I had to warn him.

"Get away from her, good buddy," I warned him. "Shizz-shisss-she's-"

"Get fucked," the blonde man's lady friend suggested. She slammed a wad of notes on the bar and dragged him away in her wake.

"-not a keeper," I finished my sentence. Then I finished my drink.

"What exactly are we doing here?"

"See that man standing in the corner?"

"The one who is indescribably handsome and yet extrudes an air of silent melancholy?"

"No, to the right."

"The self-assured shark with the silver hair chatting up a sultry woman half his age?"

"No, you idiot. The one next to the pinball machine."

"What, that tall, slouchy man in the crumpled suit who's facing the wrong way?"

"Yeah, that one."

"What the hell is he doing?"

What the hell was I doing?

That was a good question. I had a lot of good questions.
Who introduces new cast members in the second episode instead of the season premiere?
Why insert your writerly persona into a novel when the narrator himself is already a thinly-veiled analogy of you?
When do you realize there is a hole in the lining of the inner pocket of your coat, out of which your little blue pill has fallen fifteen minutes ago, thus rendering your pursuit of the sultry woman half your age redundant?

And while we were at it, where were the Snowdens of yesteryear?
I realized I was on a roll.
I also realized I was slightly drunk.

What I was doing was this:
I was standing next to the pinball table, facing the wrong way. I would stand there until the next contestant came up, shoved a quarter in, and started his game. I would stand in the same position, not looking at the person or the table, listening to the sound effects and nursing a drink. As soon as the last ball fell through (which seldom took long - most people who stepped up to the pinball table at twelve fifteen on a weekday night were too drunk to tell the difference between the fruit machine and a urinal), I would finish whatever was left of my drink and announce their exact score without turning around. Then the loser would pay for the winner's next drink.

I hadn't lost even once. People assumed I was winning by listening to the sound effects and calculating. If they found out the scores were popping unbidden into my head there would probably be a riot.

"Nineteen thousand six hundred and eighty-four," I called out.
The man with the silver hair was led out by the sultry woman half his age.
My glass was magically refilled.


"Why not use your ability to fry some bigger fish?"

"Excuse me?" I looked up. I hadn't realized anyone was actually listening. I'd been ranting on about how I missed the simple joys - how it was hard even to laugh at newspaper comics, knowing that half of them would be cancelled midway through important arcs (in one memorable instance due to the cartoonist faking his death to move to Bucharest).

"I mean at some high stakes poker game or something. The races." It was the sultry woman who'd been led out by the dysfunctional man earlier tonight. Or was it some other night? "I mean, you could be rich!"

I grinned. It was about as funny as cancer.
"I don't actually see the exact endings of things, miss," my head was starting to swim but I tipped my glass at the bartender again. He rolled his eyes. "I just have a knack for guessing possible outcomes. Pinball games are the only exception. Even if I go down to a race and think really hard, all I'll get is a brainwave that says some horse will win." I stared moodily into my empty glass. "Even my disease has a sense of humour."

"Don't be ridiculous!" She laid a warm hand on my arm. I looked at it. Then I looked at her. She smiled. "Have you ever thought about why you have this gift?"

"It isn't really a gift," I said. "I don't even think it's all that special. The thing is, everything that begins at a fixed point already has its conclusion nestled away inside. Nothing ever changes. If you really want to know how something ends, you just have to read the beginning closely enough."

"Sure." She hadn't moved her hand.
She wasn't all that pretty - she'd dressed carelessly and the nightlong barhopping had taken its toll - but she had great eyes. I was a sucker for those eyes.
The smile didn't hurt, either.

"I'm going to die around twenty years from now," I said evenly. "It will be sudden and violent. I won't feel any pain. I will die solvent but not rich. Happy but not satisfied. And I will be alone. There is no greatness to hang around for."

"I don't really believe in worrying about the future," she lied. "Plus my place is nearby. Do you wanna continue our little conversation there?"

I nodded. Her smile widened. Her teeth were bright and her hair fell rather fetchingly over her ears. I adjusted for prettiness accordingly.

It was all a sham, of course - she'd been staking me out for over a week. She - and her employers, who I couldn't get a glimpse of yet - were very interested in my ability. I swirled around the last drink I'd be consuming at this particular bar, and then drained it in one gulp.

The thing was, I hadn't started my story a week ago, when she first bumped into me (accidentally, as she assured me then) on my way out. I had realized then how that particular story would go.
No, this was a story spanning the breadth of just one night.
Because I was getting tired and needed somewhere to begin.

I paid for my drink and followed her into the ending I'd been working towards.

Apophenia

Mildred listened to George's breathing slow down and finally even out in the other room.
There had been a brief moment when the inhale-exhale had snagged, somewhere between 3:34 and 3:35 on the digital clock in front of her. She knew it was because George slid his arm, elbow onward, into the space where it would lie upon her if she was lying beside him.
George and Mildred had been married for thirty-five years.

"And right now I can feel every second of it," Mildred said out loud, to no-one in particular. Her voice - generally clear and rhythmic (though nothing like the 'sonorous warble' her husband told guests about at dinner parties) - sounded rusty and disused to her. She hadn't said a word to George all week. It was her idea of giving things one more chance.

She got up to get her glasses from the dining table. She'd placed them within easy reach of the armchair before she went to bed, but George continued to arrange them at the exact center of the table every godforsaken morning.
The morning tableaux were another thing Mildred could do without - her husband smiling at her over the paper, mottled chin moist like some godforsaken retriever, straining his eyes for the slightest sign of approval.
"Too hard," she said, and it was true. He was straining too hard. Missing other things which should have been obvious a long time ago.

The joints in her knees popped like gunshots, and Mildred felt rather than heard the sound. She held her breath for a few seconds, but George's breathing continued along the same lines.
The glasses were kept over the telephone bills from the previous week. She picked up the limp envelope by force of habit, and it took her a concerted effort of will not to place it on the mantelpiece among the bric-a-brac that comprised the padding of their little household.

She put it back on the table, put on her glasses, and spared a brief glance at the picture of her son in his football jersey, the bright yellow and green stripes and number 15
(I don't want kids not now not ever just to roam the world live at my own pace you know)
of the fullback. He'd made her proud; very proud indeed. But her husband's reaction
(of course dear I understand I totally do it's not like I wanted one that bad)
had put Mildred to shame; the incessant preening and proud exclamations and those godforsaken awestruck whispers about strong jawlines and his mother's eyes.

The clock hit 3:47 and Mildred quickly sat back down; the time had been the one thing she had been particular about. Sure enough, there was the muffled thump of padded footsteps and then a brief ratcheting as the lock on the front door was overcome.

Four men in black overalls and balaclavas entered the house. They were greeted by the sight of an old woman seated alone by the dining table, her glasses opaque reflectors in the green glow of the digital clock.
"Listen to me closely," she said in even tones. "We have an agreement and you're going to keep it. Your payment is in the bedside cabinet. Touch anything else and I scream for help right now. Improvise and I call the cops. Try to get any funny ideas about taking orders from old ladies and a dead man's switch lands you in jail. You know about dead man's switches, don't you?"

The men nodded, hesitantly. They'd probably taken her for a senile old windbag when she first approached them at the bar; but this was unquestionably a voice of authority.
They would have to obey her.
"Good," Mildred smiled. It had been a hobby of hers to collect obscure lexicology, and it made her happy to see it come back. George had all but cured her of that particular affliction. "Now get to it."

The men marched into the other room. There was a brief spell of silence as they readied themselves.

Mildred closed her eyes.

She heard her husband's gasp as he was yanked awake by the lapel of his dressing gown. She also heard the first blow land in the middle of his garbled protest. Judging by the sound he'd been struck across the face, which meant the loud crack was the bridge of his nose breaking open.

After that the sounds resolved themselves into a more regular rhythm, and she let it flow over her like the intro to some plodding march. The only false note came when George (in a desperate bid to escape) tried to squeeze between two of his assailants; he ended up losing his footing and falling facedown off the bed, breaking his maxillary central incisors (one of which had been chipped during a skating accident on their honeymoon). To give them due credit, the men instantly improvised by tossing him against the wall, after which the earlier rhythm was miraculously regained.

Five minutes later (the digital clock said 3:53) the men strode out of the room, overalls stained with sweat and large quantities of AB negative. The man in the front held a thick wad of cash, which he waved at Mildred as they passed her.
"Don't let me see you again," she said. The men nodded, hastened their steps, and were soon part of the night.

Mildred took off her glasses and placed them back where she'd found them.

The only sound that came from the bedroom was the occasional broken sob. She walked back inside, where she found George lying on the floor in a crumpled heap. The bedsheet lay pulled on the floor around him, stained with blood and sweat and tears and snot.
"Baby," George said as he saw her. "Baby Ruth."
It was an endearment that she'd actually liked (and, perhaps consequently, hadn't heard more than half a dozen times in the past few years); so Mildred wasn't really surprised to feel tears pricking her own eyelids.
"Are you okay, Baby Ruth?"
"I've been better," She said. She wanted to stroke his hair but there was a leaky hole on top of his head. "What happened here, George?"
"I didn't see you when they... When I woke up," George said. A sense of unreality was settling on the whole conversation. "I didn't know how long they'd been here. I'd hoped you were in the bathroom."
"Of course." She looked the other way; her husband was moments away from his demise and yet this close to descending into the same banality that he'd embodied throughout his life.
"Why, Baby Ruth?" She turned back sharply, but it was merely the delirious rant of a dying man. "Why? Why? Why?"

Mildred sat and stared at her husband. It had been a perfectly planned operation - from the hired thugs to the depersonalization of George (a proper noun) into her husband (a common noun). It had been a cold and calculated act of hatred, the sort meticulous people commit when pushed beyond the edge. But what edge? He'd always been faithful. He'd loved her dearly. How was she supposed to explain to him the idea of loving someone too dearly? Of finding patterns and sequences where there weren't any? He'd blown a casual summer fling into a lifelong romance, a slightly-crazy girl who sought freedom into a godforsaken ice princess, to be cherished and adored and held captive in a steel cage of material comfort.

How was she to explain to her husband that the past thirty-five years of his life (of her life, of their life) had been a lie?

Instead she ran her fingers through his hair. "Apophenia, George," she said. "The word is apophenia."
George didn't hear her because George was already gone.
Mildred sat there for a few more seconds. Then she got up, pulled her husband's mobile from the dresser drawer, and called 911.

As the slightly-accented voice of the operative answered, it finally hit Mildred that George - her husband of thirty-five years - had just passed away in her arms. And despite his flaws, despite his eccentricities, despite his madness, she'd always loved her Musketeer (the one who called her Baby Ruth, dear God). So the tears that began to flow were real.
"A b-bunch of armed thugs just broke into our house and killed my husband," she said in one gasping breath, and then she was crying, sobbing over her George's body, too broken even to put two words together, beyond inconsolable. It took the operator over a minute just to get her address right.

After the call she dropped the phone and sat gently rocking the corpse of her husband. And that was how the paramedics found her, seven minutes later.

Orpheus & Friends

Orpheus at Home

Orpheus takes off one sneaker and then the other. He tosses one northwards, across the room.

He tosses the other one southwards, across the room.

He trudges shamefacedly to the toilet to retrieve his second sneaker from inside the bowl.

Then Orpheus sits down on his bed and watches the fan revolve in a counterclockwise motion.

After a few minutes Orpheus types Hi on his phone and sends it to his ex.

After a few more minutes Orpheus types in Help I'm Slipping Again and sends it to his three or four best friends.

Orpheus is about to give up and go fix himself a sandwich when the phone vibrates upon his thigh.

The next half an hour is broken down into long intervals of tortured waiting followed by frantic text messages typed and sent in less than thirty seconds.

The first of his friends replies to his text after half an hour but by then Orpheus has already convinced his ex to let him call her.

The beginning of the text is read (Worst Idea Ever, Buttface) and peremptorily discarded.

His ex picks up the phone with the sole intention of setting the record straight but Orpheus cuts her off.

Listen, Orpheus says.

He strikes up the first chords to a mournful melody on his synthesizer.

It is self-composed, Orpheus offers by way of explanation.

Orpheus segues into the melody proper and clears his throat.

The universe cocks its ear in anticipation.

First Drunken Interlude

Worst idea ever, man

Oh, come on it's not like you've never acted on instinct yourself

Yeah, instinct of self-preservation maybe

You stay out of this you can't even keep track of your footwear

Worst idea ever, man

Come on, dude you could show some enthusiasm for once

Yaay our friend just committed ritual disempowerment on his lovelife

I think you mean disembowelment

Worst idea ever, man

Orpheus in High School

... The fifth and final event of the academic calendar was the Ad Lib competition, conducted in the first week of September (2/9/11). Four teams of four people each put together an advertisement in the given timespan.

The first prize was awarded to the Argon team, who performed a short skit promoting an energy drink. A protest was lodged by the other teams since only three members of Argon acted in the skit - the fourth member, Orpheus, remained on stage strumming a guitar and singing. The judges, however, lauded this as a 'groundbreaking display of innovation'. The Argon team was the only one to receive a standing ovation from the crowds - the noise of which was later blotted out by Orpheus hitting his crescendo.

The second and third places went to Krypton and Xenon, who presented advertisements for a shaving gel and omniscient pen, respectively...

Second Drunken Interlude

Just outta curiosity what song did you sing her

I am betting it was something gay

Began with an original melody followed by Nobody Home

Like something by the Backstreet Boys

Seriously, Floyd to a girl you're trying to get back

I wasn't trying to get her back I just wanted to sing it to her once

Before they tried to clean up their act with Never Gone I mean

But you did get her back

Yes yes as a matter of fact I did

Was it As Long As You Love Me

Does anybody here remember Vera Lynn

Orpheus in Happier Times

This just feels right, Orpheus says to his girl. Doesn't it feel just right?

Don't push your luck, she retorts.

They lapse back into silence. Orpheus takes her fingers in his hand and she lets him. Orpheus correctly interprets this to be a good sign.

You need to stay away from the tall grass, Orpheus cautions his girl.

Why?

Because there could be snakes? Orpheus wonders why he is compelled to lameness from time to time. He hurries a little to catch up.

The Hauz Khas monument is ethereal in the encroaching evening. Orpheus stares up at its mottled walls and jagged silhouette and feels a million strings vibrate inside him.

This is one of the few times when he feels completely at peace with himself.

Orpheus cannot find his girl anywhere. He follows her into the tall grass, peering into the dusk like a cormorant in pursuit of some eel.

He turns a corner and finally comes upon her sitting in the grass. She has taken her shoes off and is probably enjoying the sensation of coolness beneath her feet.

Orpheus sees her smile and comes forward, wanting to share the moment with her.

She sees him.

He sees the phone in her hand.

One minute, she mouths, and Orpheus nods. He waits in the grass for a while and then wanders off to lean against the mottled wall of the monument.

A pleasant scent of moisture emanates from the wall behind him.

Her clear, sonorous laugh fills his head with a phantom music that leaves him vaguely dissatisfied.

Orpheus puts on his earphones.

He begins to rummage through his playlist for the right song to play.

Final Drunken Interlude

So was it unconditional

What

Guys I'm hallucinating

Somebody shut him up

Your return or her return or whatever this is

As in

Guys seriously I'm seeing things here

We're trying to have a conversation dude shut up

As in did she lay down any conditions because it got ugly last time

Guys the frigging walls are on fire

Just the one dude get your hands off me

But the walls are on fire

What was it

I had to promise I'd never

Guys I don't wanna die here

Oh for fuck's sake shut up now tell me what

I'd never

Looking Back

Orpheus doesn't go all the way.

He promises himself he won't make his move until they reach his door. But halfway up the first flight he realizes the landlord's door is locked and his flatmate has left for Goa already.

Orpheus puts his hand on her waist and turns her around. She is surprised but receptive. They kiss as he half-walks, half-carries her up the next two flights.

This wasn't such a bad night after all, she breathes, and Orpheus grins although a jarring note has been hit. He had been under the impression that it wasn't a bad night to begin with.

They reach the front door. Orpheus has to try thrice before he manages to get the door open without letting go of her. Everything comes back in a rush and his fingers move along familiar paths, touching innocent squares of skin but still setting all synapses haywire. Her breathing becomes more laboured.

What happened, Orpheus asks as she breaks momentarily away. She snorts by way of explanation, her shoulders shrug beneath his palms, and in that one moment they are in perfect synchronicity with each other.

I mean what happened last month, Orpheus says. His own breaths are erratic now. His thoughts more and more diffused. She stiffens.

You promised, she says.

I did. But I think I have a right to know.

Orpheus can articulate again. He does not particularly enjoy the sensation.

I mean we are together now. Again. And it is only fair that we remain honest with each other. About everything.

Yes. She starts to disengage from him. Her bracelet catches on the zipper of his jacket.

Yes, she repeats. It is only fair. But it is the one thing I asked of you. The only thing I asked of you.

But I was just asking, Orpheus starts, aware the moment now lies shattered on the floor around them. He does not like the cleanness of his flat, the smoothness of its empty surfaces. He'd cleaned up the place specifically for this.

The only thing, she repeats. And you were doing so well.

The bracelet refuses to yield. She pulls. He gets a sudden vision of her walking out amidst a shower of beads.

But-

No, she says.

No, she says again. I am not doing this anymore.

She slips her hand through the bracelet, leaving it hanging on his jacket like some strange new sort of decoration.

Goodbye, she mouths. Or maybe it is a trick of the light.

Orpheus watches her trudge down the stairs. He knows he can follow her down or maybe shout entreaties at her receding back.

He also knows it would all be futile.

A few minutes later he finally notices the bracelet and cups a hand under it.

Christmas comes earlier each year, he says. The wisecrack does not help him feel any better.

Orpheus goes back inside.

He shuts the door behind him.