Paragon

After what seemed like forever the escalator began to slow down.

There was a pair of wrought iron gates somewhere in the distance above me. I gripped the rubber rails tighter. The sound of screaming had all but receded; the proverbial tunnel of light had turned into a wall and then a blanket, covering everything with a layer of whiteness that hurt the eyes to look at.

An old man stood between the last tread and the gates. He was dressed in a rough-looking bathrobe that almost reached his ankles. His beard cascaded over his chest like molten steel at some foundry. His eyes twinkled with the sort of blue warmth I'd only read about in stories.

-Vaibhav, right? he scratched his beard. He was probably speaking in a human voice-I saw his lips move and his throat work up and down in time to his words-but every syllable echoed in my head with the sound of a vast celestial choir. I found myself kneeling almost involuntarily before him.

-Excuse my attire, he said. We don't often get new arrivals here.

I blushed slightly but managed to hold his gaze. Why am I here? I asked.

-Because your actions ring true, Vaibhav. Because-

No, I get that. I mean why am I here? I am a Hindu. This isn't my idea of-

-Ah, yes. The Pearly Gates are a Western construct, right? Well, Vaibhav, you see... Virtue is rightly perceived as its own reward. The Hindu concept of the hereafter is slightly different from this, but we'll get you transferred as soon as they're done with the paperwork.

But-

-The important thing for you to remember is that the afterlife does not try to distinguish between denominations.

But-

He stepped aside, and the iron gates hardly protested as they swung apart. I had a lot of questions left unanswered but he fixedly let out a big yawn and excused himself.

I stepped forward through the Pearly Gates.

Silence bounded out of the blinding light and welcomed me as an old friend.

The ground beyond the gate was pale, cold and featureless. I briefly wondered why my feet felt benumbed before realizing I was dressed in nothing but a monogrammed bathrobe like St Peter had been. I tried to recall what I'd been wearing before but couldn't.

Is there anybody out there? I called out, but to no avail. Worse, after I walked a few hundred yards and turned around, I found both the gate and my footprints vanished. Looking too closely disoriented me so I gave up.

So what is one supposed to do in heaven? I wondered aloud. The answer came into my head, unbidden.

Meditate, said a slightly dissonant voice. Take stock of thy virtues.

That seems like a good enough plan, I said to nobody in particular. There had better be more people in the Hindu version, I added under my breath.

The ground wasn't as uncomfortable as it looked. I sat cross-legged, arms arranged in the lotus position.

I took a deep breath.

I closed my eyes.

"You're the best," Trishna was saying, "The best thing that ever happened to me."

That's not true, I replied, although I didn't really mean it. I took her hand again as we left the metro station

Now pull the switch.

"Are you sure that is how it is supposed to work?" Girish asked.

Yes, I did this when I was in tenth grade.

"Here goes nothing." Girish pulled the switch. The entire room was lit up by a network of LEDs on a cardboard base, spelling his name in letters that kept changing colour.

See?

"You're the best, bhai," he said as the lights skipped from red to blue

and I'm not going to make any more promises. Because you don't deserve promises. You deserve change. You deserve something better. And I will be better.

Steady round of applause. "Friends, as the incumbent student body president I have to defend my post. But if I were being very honest I wouldn't be able to. And that is because my friend, Vaibhav, is a paragon of virtue. He is the most tireless unselfish level-headed individual I know, and no matter how we disagree on matters of polity, I feel-"

applause rising to a crescendo

drowning him out

"You're the best," Jigyasa was saying. "The nicest person I have ever met. I love you."

I love you too, I replied, although I didn't really mean it. I took her hand again as we left the cinema hall

I stumbled to my feet. The landscape flickered a little. Meditate, the other voice repeated. It kept repeating itself.

I picked a random direction and started walking. Five minutes later I came to the man in the bathrobe making tea on a tiny stove.

-Do you want some tea?

Where are they?

-I might have a few biscuits here somewhere.

Where are they? I had set out to scream but my voice came out in the same even tone.

-What are you talking about?

My memories. The rest of my memories. All I have is good deeds.

-Haven't you led a good life?

Yes! I mean I thought so. But this doesn't make any sense! None of it is coherent!

-I wonder why. He finished making tea. He poured it into two cups. He started rummaging for sugar in the kitchenette.

Where are the rest of my memories? What happened with those girls? After the elections? How did I die?

-The one with Trishna is slightly clichéd. The old man took a sip of his tea. He made a slight face. He went back to rummaging for sugar.

Meditate.

-The one with Jigyasa, on the other hand, had a lot of juicy bits to offer. The old man grinned. It was an ugly grin.

Take stock of thy virtues.

-That has a direct correlation with how you die, you know.

I raised my cup to take a sip but found it empty.

You're not going to tell, are you?

-I don't think so.

You're not really St Peter, are you?

-Far from it, kid. Far from it.

I put my cup down on the ground. The old man, the stove and the kitchenette had all vanished again.

Meditate, repeated the other voice.

I sat down on the ground and closed my eyes.

Pridesbane

In the midst of the valley a forest.

At the heart of the forest a clearing.

He'd been living in the clearing for fifty years, now. Men and women came from the farthest reaches of the province just to hear him speak, or to offer their sorrows for his perusal. He seldom provided them with solutions, but it lessened their burdens to share with him.

"I bet you're a goddamn fraud."

He didn't bother to look up. The young man who'd spoken had been peremptorily loud as he made his way across the clearing, and the air had long been curdled by the dirty looks being cast his way.

"Are you listening to me, you phony freak?"

He finally looked up at the young man. His jaw continued to work up and down on its relentless journey of mastication.

"Look at you wallowing about in the filth." The young man seemed to be warming to his subject. "I bet you love living caked under a layer of dirt, don't you?"

The crowd in the clearing had turned into a giant circle of spectators. He was as aware of their unease as he was of the young man's discomfort. He continued to say nothing.

A couple of hours passed. The young man followed a regular pattern, like clockwork: a couple of laps of the darkening enclosure, a few insults spat at him, and then waiting around for a response that never came.

After the evening gave way to night the young man finally stopped. The clearing was completely empty - most of the spectators had given up in disgust, carving their ways out of the forest and back into their lives.

The young man was in the middle of a sentence when he lost steam. His hands fell limply to his sides, and he stood staring blankly at the older man.

"What ails you?" The ascetic finally asked him. To give him due credit the young man didn't really need to think before answering.

"Jealousy," he said. "It eats me up on the inside. It corrodes me. I see the world going about its business, uncaring of my existence, and I feel jealous."

"The whole world or just some bits in particular?"

The young man looked at him, startled. There was a wry smile beneath the hermit's beard. His jaw never stopped working.

"Your jealousy comes from a sense of being wronged," said the older man. "And that feeling of injustice, in turn, arises from false pride."

"What do you mean, false pride? I'm-"

"All pride is false pride. Why should your existence make a difference to anybody else's? You are meant to live and breathe free of obligation."

"Easy for you to say."

The hermit's smile widened slightly. "Nobody owns anyone else. It is not possible. We'd be fools to try. What we can do instead is destroy this false pride."

"And how can one do that?"

"Here." The hermit opened a knobbly fist. A bunch of spindly leaves unfolded in the moonlight. They seemed to have a purple tinge to them.

"What is this?"

"Pridesbane," said the hermit. "Help yourself."

The young man took a couple of leaves and put them in his mouth. He chewed for a moment or two. He spat them out in disgust.

"Yuck! These are bitter!"

"Yes. That is because they are meant to be."

The young man stared at the older man for a bit.

The knobbly palm never wavered.

The young man helped himself again.

This time he concentrated on the chewing.

"How long do I have to do this?" he asked with his mouth full.

"As long as it takes."

"And when can I stop?"

"When you have conquered your pride," said the hermit. "Or when the leaves stop tasting bitter. Whichever comes first."

The young man looked around for a moment.

The older man pulled a spare rug from under his own and spread it next to himself.

The young man sat down cross-legged.

The forest was silent except for the rhythmic tide of two pairs of teeth working in the darkness.

with regard to Jamie

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A Bad Day

So this was going to be a rant but it is not.

It has every right to be, I think. Things have been weird on both personal and creative fronts of late, and the past few days have been a different sort of pain - nothing particularly bad happens, the books are seldom in the red when you take stock at night, but there is a small feeling in the back of your mind that all your cynical notions about specific people and the world in general are being slowly but irrevocably reinforced.

All days but this day.

Had a (slightly) productive morning, an eventful afternoon and a good evening. It is just that the people I enjoy hanging with and the conversations we tend to have veer into melancholic territory, so a good discussion is generally not indicative of the state of mind it leaves one in.

Had been discussing Vonnegut (again) today - how his career graph shows his struggle with the growing sense of despair that he felt with regards to the world around him. He was of the opinion that we are all passable people as long as we concentrate on our intrinsic humanity; but he also believed that we were steadily losing our ability to recognize that fact.

The journey home was supposed to be brief, but it gave enough time to acquaint oneself with another poem in G.M. Muktibodh's repertoire. The poem was bleak, too. So I was in a slightly morose state of mind as I made my way up the looong escalator to the red line, to Welcome, towards home.

The red line was more crowded than the yellow at this point: most of the Jamna-paar workforce headed homewards at the end of a hard day's work. I wedged myself into the doorway, completed the Herculean task of turning around, and began making my way across the width of the compartment, since Welcome (unlike Kashmere Gate) is one of those few stations with an island platform that serves both rails.

In the end the crowd got a little too dense to handle, so I hung about in the middle as the train began its long journey to Shastri Park station.

It was while we crossed the Yamuna that I first noticed him: a short, thin man standing slightly to my right, positioned so that his dirty backpack was digging into my shirt. I shuffled a little to the right to minimize contact, and the resultant paradigm shift gave me an excellent view over his shoulder. The first three things I noticed (in order) were:

1.) The fact that he was missing a couple of nails

2.) The scar that ran down the side of his neck (stopping just before his jugular); and

3.) The fact that I would be forced to look at the screen of his phone unless I was willing to attempt another change in position.

A change in position was impossible, for now; I stayed put. Besides, the dude wasn't even reading any embarrassing texts or anything; all he was doing was going through his phonebook at a sedate pace. It was an interesting exercise; he had a nondescript moustache and no discerning marks to tell me his religion, and there were both an Amit Chacha and an Adil Mamu in his phonebook; was he another one of those lovechilds born out of the bounds of religion? And if yes, did he have an interesting story of his own?

Presently he came to somebody called Ashu. This Ashu seemed pretty interesting himself: he seemed to have numbers across every network! An Ashu was followed by an Ashu Airtel.. an Ashu Airtel (2).. An Ashu Docomo.. An Ashu Dolphin.

The first stirring of unease came with Ashu Hutch (2). I had a vague idea that they checked a person's records before handing him a new phoneline; a guy with seven numbers (eight now, and counting) had to show up as a pretty big blip on some radar somewhere.

By the time he finally reached Ashu Virgin (2) I was starting to get distinctly uncomfortable. My mind skipped over all the jokes about sexual inexperience that had no punchlines. And I listened closely as he pressed the green button and brought the handset next to his year.

"Main metro talag pahunch gaya hoon," he said. "Haan. Haan. Theek hai. Baad mein baat karta hoon."He hung up. His part of the conversation had been innocuous-I'm on the metro, I'll talk to you later-but his choice of words was slightly strange. Why would he say he had reached the metro? The metro was a path, not a destination!

ding

Said the PA system, followed by "Shastri Park.. Station."

The man with the scar reached forward into the crowd, cutting through to the door with an exaggerated sense of urgency, and he was at the head of the mass exodus that would follow within a moment or two.

ding

"Stand clear.. Of the doors."

And suddenly I could breathe, loosen my grip on the handhold, actually turn my head without establishing potentially-embarrassing eye contact with a perfect st-

And there it was.

Lying a couple of feet away, packed in a layer of newspapers and frayed twine, a rectangular crate the size of a large shoebox. Exactly where my friend with the scar had been standing.

I looked up blankly, uncomprehendingly, and the last thing I saw before the doors hummed shut was him, shoving his way through the crowds, trying so hard to get as far away as he could.

What followed were perhaps the longest four minutes of my life. Three people were standing equidistant from the crate - me towards the left, an old man with an apologetic face behind it, and a young guy in a black pullover with oversized headphones to the right. We broke the cardinal rule and established eye-contact, trying to establish if the crate belonged to one of us.

All we saw was our own confusion mirrored back.

There was absolute silence, and in my head I could already hear the rumble of the collapsing overpass, the flare of light and sound so bright and loud it would cause people miles away to flinch, the screams of the twisting girders drowning out the screams of the people onboard.

I probably wouldn't even get to scream.

ding.

"Seelampur.. Station."

I was pretty sure we'd've reached Dilshad Garden by now. I would get off, cross over to the other platform, catch a train back to Welcome, and laugh at my idiocy all the way. If only. If only. If only.

The doors opened.

"Y-ye bag kiska hai?" It was the guy with the oversized headphones. He had probably started off trying to sound nonchalant, but his voice had betrayed him on the first syllable itself.

"Kiska hai, bhai?" The old man this time. I wanted to get in my two cents, too, but I wasn't sure I could manage at this point.

The air was thickening. I was positive of that. It shouldn't have been so difficult to breathe.

"Mera! Mera bag hai." We all turned simultaneously. A middle-aged person rose from a seat behind us, his salt&pepper hair in a tizzy, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

He came forward to stand beside the crate, babbling disjointedly about inconsiderate morons who kick other people's luggage into the netherworld, and we finally relaxed a bit. The old person shook his head resignedly, the young man began humming (a bit too forcefully?) along to his music-an old Kishore number that I didn't mind being slaughtered. Not here. Not now.

I turned to the window and looked out. A pale face stared back at me, his expression completely blank, his complexion ashen.

It took another two minutes before my heart-rate returned to normal.

ding.

"Welcome," said the automated voice, and I laughed like an idiot as I got off the train.

I sat on a bench for a few minutes before making my way home, and turning on the PC, and beginning the entry I am about to end. There,. on the bench, I had a weird thought. I had a lot of weird thoughts, but this one has persisted through the bus ride, the inevitable scolding, and my dinner (which I have forgotten ten minutes after eating).

I know my thoughts and actions aren't completely in sync with the sort of life I lead - I have it easy, mostly, and the sort of melancholia I display (enjoy, suggests a small voice in my head) isn't exactly called for.

I am not going to justify anything I say or do - I have a right to lead my life the way I want, after all, and even five-car pileups are a rubbernecker's paradise - but I still think it is my life, and I have the right to infer the glass is half empty and whoever drank half and left are probably dying of thirst somewhere remote.

What I hate is being forced down certain paths by events beyond my control.

I had a bad day (or a good day that left no impression on me, if you want to be anal about this) and I hate the fact that I am feeling lucky to be alive.

That Time Of The Year

Little Ruthie hid behind the stairs and watched the big red man tinkering beside the tree.

It was a little past 2AM and her parents had been asleep for ages. She'd managed to stay up solely because of the large shot of coffee she'd managed to slop for herself from mommy's espresso maker.

The big red man grunted once and Ruthie shivered with delight - it was true! Johnny had kept on saying Christmas was a big lie but Ruthie knew now; she'd tell him!

There was a soft clump as the big red man overturned the small plate of cookies that had been lying on the table beside the tree.

Ruthie finally dredged up the courage to go up to him.

"Mister Santy Claus, sir?"

The big red man started upright and clonked his head on a heavy ornament hanging from the tree; the branch from which it had been hanging rent into two with a dry crack. He jumped again before finally turning to face the little girl.

"For fuck's sake," he said testily. "Not again."

Ruthie gasped - Santy had just said one of the Big Bads! She opened her mouth to reprimand him when the razor finally caught the glint of firelight.

Ruthie choked a little then.

"Hold still, kid. This won't hurt at all."

"But-but that's what Mister Sandman does!" Ruthie found the glint of the straight edge almost hypnotic. "You're supposed to be a good guy, Santy!"

"Those old myths were badly in need of an update," the big red man said. Up close, his beard was more faded yellow than white, his clothes a congealed red rather than the bright crimson she'd seen from the stairwell. "Besides, this would probably mean one less brat to lose my sleep over next year."

Ruthie tried to scream but the big red man was surprisingly fast.

Then it was over as suddenly as it had begun.

The big red man wiped his razor on his sleeve. The motion bore an easy fluidity that only comes from practice.

Then he set off across the room towards the chimney, taking care to pick up the grubby parcel he'd left beside the tree.

There was a spring in his step that had not been there before, and if you listened closely you could hear him humming the same monosyllable over and over.
"Ho," said the big red man. "Ho. Ho. Ho."

Then he said to a radio clipped to his vest: "What do you mean you're nipping out for a drink? Come back before I skin ye bastards alive."

The radio squawked, after which it said: "Go fuck yerself, Nicky."

The big red man said: "I'm getting you neutered first thing tomorrow, Rudolph."

The cobbled chimney protested as the big red man clambered fitfully in again.

Then nobody said anything at all.

Dénouement

Then he pulled the trigger.

Then he closed his eyes.

Nitin swayed for a moment, dancing to some unheard music, far away from the grotesque tableau of which he was currently a part.

“It is too late for that now, Otto.” He took in a deep breath. “Can you feel it? In the air around you? It is all coming together. The strands are all resolving themselves.”

“It was an honest mistake! We were kids, don’t you get it? We were just kids!”

Otto was babbling faster and faster – his mind was finally coming to terms with what his heart had been screaming for the past five minutes, the past hour, the whole three weeks he’d known Nitin.

“I’ll-I’ll make it up to you! I’ll make it up to her!”

“I happen to be shooting pool with my cousin as we speak.”

“I think I will, Otto. You see, I’m not even here.

He looked back at the pickup but five steps seemed like a billion miles.

“You won’t get away with this!” A thin trail of spittle flew from the corner of Otto’s mouth.

“I know what you’ve done.” Nitin cocked the revolver. “All I am looking for is payback.”

“I’m not here for your confession. I know what you are.

“Get what?”

“You still don’t get it, do you, Otto?”

“Otto, Otto, Otto.” Nitin grinned in the darkness. “I love saying your name. It sounds the same forwards and back, did you know that?

“You can prove nothing,” Otto declared. “I wasn’t even here that night. I was shooting pool with my cousin. I’ve already testified once, and-”

“Her brother was a wastrel and a layabout, Otto. But he was around. Still is, in fact.”

“She wasn’t alone in the world, Otto. The papers said she was an orphan but they didn’t say anything about siblings.

“Where do you figure in all of this?”

“Nothing much. Except she destroyed the rest of her life that night.” Nitin scratched his chin with the barrel of the gun. “You know the details already, Otto. Need we waste our time?”

“And so what if she was?”

“Resisting your advances but too drunk to care too much.”

“I was telling you a story,” he continued. “Where was I? Ah, yes. Party spot. And this was where you first met her, didn't you? Dancing with her schoolmates. Young and hopeless.

Something chrome gleamed in his hand.

“Looking for this?” Nitin said.

He had already began searching in his pockets for the Magnum he always carried on him but it was nowhere to be found.

“I don’t see where you’re going with this,” Otto whispered.

“Five coyote maulings in eighteen months. But of course, that didn’t stop teenaged vagabonds from coming out here to party.”

“They moved the rest stop a couple miles down the road,” Nitin offered. “This one happened to be located too close to the woods to be safe.

They both knew who the she was.

“Who?” Otto swirled around to face the other man, but his voice belied the fact that the question was a redundant one.

“Neither did she,” Nitin quietly replied.

“I don’t like this place,” he said to Nitin.

Otto shuddered.

The Servo billboard in the background had faded almost completely to white, the lettering and the car barely visible, the eyes of the driver quite deliberately ripped open with a hunting knife that had a four-lettered name scratched upon its ratty scabbard.

The building looked like it hadn’t seen any visitors in decades.

“Yeah. This is it.” Nitin got out in front of the rest stop.

That was the important bit taken care of.

“Are you sure?” He looked doubtful, but he’d stopped the truck.

Otto stomped down on the brakes and the pickup cluttered to a halt.

“This is it,” Nitin said at length.

Otto grunted again, and after that they drove in silence for a while longer.

“I mean the dénouement. You know, the part where all the interweaving plotlines are resolved for the benefit of everyone keeping score at home.”

He fancied he could see the silhouettes of the household sitting down to dinner.

“No, not the ending, per se.” he stared at a dimly-lit farmhouse passing to their right.

“The ending?” Otto hazarded.

“The interpersonal dynamics are all very fine,” Nitin lumbered on, “And I get how it is an organic medium. But it sucks that the good parts are generally held back until the end.”

Intelligent discourse wasn’t exactly his forté.

Otto grunted but kept his eyes on the road.

“You know what I hate about theatre?” he asked suddenly.

Nitin looked at his watch again (9:24PM; hardly after hours) and wished for some divine intervention, some deus ex machina that would let him skip forward to the end of their journey.

Otto chuckled.

“I’m fine,” he finally responded through gritted teeth. “Mind if I stick my head outta the window?”

This just happened to be Otto’s idea of a joke.

They were both sitting in the front, like they had been for the whole four hour duration of the ride.

“All right back there?” Otto asked for the fifth time, and Nitin fought off a wild urge to rip his throat out.

His hands trembled slightly in his lap, but that was about it.

To give him due credit he kept his composure.

He was too old for that, for one; and the guy behind the wheel was too damn large to be ignored anyway.

He could hardly pretend he was alone in the car, could he?

Nitin stared out of the window for a bit but then it got old.

They drove in silence for a while.

Empty House

This is not exactly a happy sort of day to be posting.

The morning started out ok. Woke up at 9. Showered. Dressed. Takes me a while to come to terms with the world, so don't remember much about the morning till then. Dadi looked slightly off, but she's looked slightly off before. Nothing that another dozen colored pills won't solve, right?

Wrong.

The only significant interaction I had with her was after I put on a shirt. Went up to her room, asked her how I looked (wearing a shirt is a bit of a ritual, since I generally don't do it too often). She said she had no clue.

Not a downer by itself-she's been putting up with my retarded fashion choices way too long-but her responses are generally more positive.
Either way.

Put on a Tshirt instead (white, Harry Potter motif, old reliable) and off to college it was.

Here's what I did in college today:

1.) Mooching about

2.) Marxism

3.) Mooching about

4.) Ice-cream

5.) Mooching about

6.) Gaming arena (Call of Duty, let's kill us some motherhumpers)

7.) Mooching about

8.) Going Home

Called home from Kashmiri Gate - my Mausi resides at Connaught Place, a visit is long overdue, and have been instructed to call home in case I am delayed for some reason.

Mom said she had some work for me. Told me to come home.

Her voice didn't quiver.

Her laughter did not sound contrived.

I came back to an empty house.

Because while I was away, this is what my grandma had been up to:

1.) Dizzying spells

2.) Disorientation

3.) Nausea

4.) Bouts of confusion

5.) A complete loss of will power.

That last one means she could not even muster the strength to get out of bed.
And you thought you were having a bad morning, eh? Ha ha ha. What a card you are.

Try building a joke around the punchline provided.

Ready? Set? Go.

Brain hemorrhage.

She was hospitalized somewhere between 1.30 and 2PM, which means mom already knew when I called her in the afternoon.

Dad thought it would be best if I wasn't told over the phone.

Apparently they did not want me running over to the hospital and making a nuisance of myself.

They are currently in the process of shifting her to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital. And while I can see why they wouldn't want me turning up and being a hindrance rather than a help, it pains me slightly to note I cannot read my own parents. We tell ourselves how we're keen judges of human response, how we can read our friends' tells without breaking a sweat, and here I am, a stranger to the house of my father, so to speak.

And while on the subject of the fallacy of human nature (I am going to assume the rest of the human race is as inept and retarded as I am), who am I going to talk to, about this? My closest friends from yesterday are either as insensate as I am or out of touch (through no fault of their own, let me tell you - I would fall out of touch if I were them, and since they're obviously not smart enough I have no qualms making the call for them). The ones I made today are nice people. Do not want to dump this upon them, because I don't know how they'd respond. I mean, I wouldn't know if I were them, either.

So that leaves You. Who have read this far because either

A.) You have nothing better to do, or

B.) You thought I had something worthwhile to say.

Do you have something comforting to say? The one other person I told said I should buck up. He talked about how I'd been the one he turned to when he lost someone close to him. He also said that while RML has the best neurosurgeons in the world, I should prepare for the worst.

Could you do better?

Didn't think so.

Are you still here?

Good.

Here is what I have to say to you:

A.) Do something more productive. Life is a fleeting bitch and you have no clue what she'll throw at you next; and

B.) The amphitheater of your world is running empty. So stop listening to the lines that the actors keep spouting. Watch their body language instead.

Words can be fickle bastards.

Now fuck off and let me brood in peace.