Prologue, Epilogue

Prologue

“Well, show me the way to the next whiskey bar”, hummed Arnab, hand light on the steering wheel, almost under his breath. To his surprise, Sundar heard him. He must not be very drunk. Owlishly focusing, Sundar slurred the words of their favourite college song, “Oh don’t ask why, oh don’t ask why.” Arnab took it up again, a little louder than before. “For if we don’t find the next whiskey bar.” All of them, the two half asleep souls in the back included, bellowed, “I tell you we must die, I tell you we must die.”

“I tell you, I tell you, I tell you we must die.”

Then they burst out laughing. The song seemed exquisitely funny, dredged out from young memories of so long ago; given their drunk state, they were proud of themselves, for having remembered this much, and for having made quite a performance of it. They were still giggling when Arnab stopped in front of Gautam’s house. Then suddenly they were grief stricken, Sundar more owlishly melancholy than all of them. “Bye Gautam!!” He bellowed. “Bye!” Then, unable to control his rising emotions, he swung open the car door, ran after Gautam, and embraced him from behind. They stood like that for a while, one monstrous, slightly swaying figure. In spite of themselves, Arnab and Naveen began to giggle again, helplessly hiccoughing, but made their faces sober by the time Sundar came back.

It was the same with the others, as Arnab dropped off Sundar, and then Naveen, they oscillated between mad laughter and wild grief; trying to recreate some magic they had once known, and falling just short. Once Arnab was alone in the car, that old old car they had driven when they were still in college, he put his forehead on the steering wheel, meticulously careful to avoid the horn. The pricking underneath his eyelids was strange to him, for a while he did not know what had happened; the last time he had cried was when he was fifteen years old.

*

“The same sky, the same stars, the same damn streetlights, forever. Either that, or her eyes. Something needed a makeover.” Walking angrily, with the ease of long experience, she avoided unseen potholes, stepped over unknown ruts. When she reached the little wooden shack, the shopkeeper smiled at her, and put a cigarette, a tiny matchbox, and two chlormints on the already crowded counter. She smiled at him in thanks and gave him the exact change. This unsaid bargain reassured her, for a moment. As she lit the cigarette and inhaled, sitting on rough stone steps outside an unkempt play ground, the assurance slipped away. She could hear the cries of the children playing, completely caught up in their game of cricket, unwilling to acknowledge the dusk. As if, by ignoring the lack of light, they could create light. Like saying the lack of hostility signified love.

Suddenly she grinned to herself. “Soppy simile. Get a grip, Ketaki.” She pondered over this curious habit she had developed lately, of talking sternly to herself. Everyone thinks in images, she knew, not in words. It was as if she was banning the images and replacing them with words, which were less dangerous in their associations. So with another “So stupid!” to herself, she took the last drag, threw the cigarette down and ground it out. Popping the chlormints into her mouth, she stuffed her earphones into her ears, and started her walk back home. “So here I am again in this mean old town, and you’re so far away from me.” She pulled the earphones out of her ears furiously, throat working, cursing this band she had loved for ten years. And she had promised herself not to cry today.

*

Epilogue

“How can you not like babies!” It was an exclamation, not a question. Arnab looked up from his scrabble letters, grinning. “I like dogs”, he told her. Ketaki opened her mouth, ready to argue, then realizing it was no use, shut up. And thought, for the umpteenth time that he would make a good father. Her father hovered around just outside the room, and she smiled to herself, a little irritated. As if they’d be stupid enough to try anything illicit when he was in the house at all.

“How can you listen to such nonsense?” he asked irritated. “You call this music?”

“It’s Natalie Imbruglia.” She said, unfazed.

“Whatever it is, it’s irritating. Turn it off.”

“I won’t. Turn it off yourself if it bothers you so much.”

He went over and turned it off. She felt that old familiar bite of anger contract in her chest and fought to keep it down. “Not today, please, not today,” she told herself, furiously. But he had seen that flash in her eyes. He sat back down and didn’t say anything. From there it went downhill for the rest of the evening. She was increasingly irritated by his feigned nonchalance and wouldn’t say much herself. And he was characteristically non confrontational. He hated a scene, and could stay silent forever to avoid one.

When it was time to go home, she waited outside for him to start his bike, and then said a clipped bye. When she turned to go inside, her eyes were already brimming over. Her tears had always been like this, for as long as she could remember. Sudden and unstoppable. And today she didn’t even know why. She was just tired of the whole goddamn situation. And she loved him so. So achingly, so preciously, so fucking wantonly.

And as the wind whistled in his ears on his way back home, he knew there were tears in her eyes. He always knew.

*

Ketaki had stopped crying now. It was all so damned silly anyway. She lay in bed now. Listening to the Doors.

I have an ancient indian crucifix around my neck
My chest is hard and brown
Lying on stained, wretched sheets with a bleeding virgin
We could plan a murder
Or start a religion.

The Doors were high in Arnab’s esteem these days. She grinned. She liked Jim Morrison too, but for other reasons. She smiled softly, warmly, wantonly; hot under the quilt, her hand reached between her thighs. Then she fell asleep. Arnab got drunk with many friends and watched porn. At four in the morning, he went to eat.

Hung over and happy, bobbing in the mob, he showed the finger to a passing tourist.