Randamoozham - Bhima and the lady characters in his life..

Prologue: I recently finished reading Randaamoozham (The second turn) by the celebrated author, M.T.Vasudevan Nair. Narrated from the perspective of Bhîma, the book shatters many age-old myths that we have grown up hearing. Though MT hasn’t tampered with the story-line, he, as he himself said, has tried to understand the pregnant silences that Vyasa had left behind without explicit explanation. I have read the book four times in all, and it leaves me stunned to bits, every single time.

M.T.Vasudevan Nair has also penned the script for the national award winning ‘Oru Vadakkan Veeragatha’ which received both commercial success and critical acclaim. In that story too, MT glorified the character Chanthu, who, in Kerala folklore, is a most treacherous and despicable villain, who defies the very ethics of warfare with his cunning treachery. With MT’s unique treatment, myths were shattered and Chanthu was transformed to a chivalrous, tragic hero, with his own tragic flaws; his much maligned actions now presented in a hitherto unseen light. The effort was supplemented by a brilliant performance from Mammootty, who too won the national best actor award for his portrayal of Chanthu.

Similarly, Bhîma, the more ridiculed and unsung among the Pandavas, receives a heroic shade to his character in this book. It’s through his eyes that each character is presented. The characters are humanized a lot more; they become ordinary mortals, shedding the supernatural shades that are attached to them in the stories that we have grown up hearing.

I recently wondered why Randaamoozham too, couldn’t be made into a film. Such an enormous epic to be fitted into a two and half hour movie would take some planning. The casting, with each role requiring tremendous histrionic expertise, would also have to be spot on.

What I have tried to do here is to draw a sketch here some scenes of Bhima, with the main lady characters, their relationships with him being the common thread which binds the story together. This article is just intended to give the readers a feel of the whole theme; of the unique ambience which is created in the novel.

Draupadi: An extremely beautiful and strong willed heroine, whom Arjuna wins over at a Swayamvara. Though she is wife to all the five Pandavas, her first passion has always been Arjuna. We see this trait of her character through Bhima’s observations - whenever her eyes light up at the very mention of his name, one such scene being that of her first night with Bhima (The day when his turn, the Second Turn, begins).

Bhima looks on, ready for the first night of his turn, very modest decorations done at his abode, after Draupadi’s year-long honeymoon with Yudhishtira, the eldest of the Pandavas, has come to an end. That night, the Pandavas and Draupadi sit around the bonfire, as she listens wide-eyed to Arjuna, who incidentally has come home that evening after a brief hiatus. Later, at night, when Bhima moves close to her in bed, lust rippling through his veins, she dreamily mutters Arjuna’s name, lying sleepily by his side. Bhima, then gets up, goes out and makes his bed on bare ground and lies down, staring up at the star-lit sky. He would have none of her cold body tonight, Bhima decides, when her mind dreams about Arjuna, even while she is beside him in bed.

On yet another occasion, she mentions her desire to wear the Sougandhika flowers, famous for their heavenly perfume, in her hair. Though Bhima gets the flowers from a heavily guarded pond after a minor adventure, he gets caught and is kept captive by King Kubera. It’s only after the arrival of his brothers and Draupadi that Bhima is released. Though it is an occasion to be embarrassed, Bhima proudly hands out the flowers to Draupadi, but she tosses it away disdainfully and later, when they walk past, the Sougandhika flowers lie, soiled and crumpled on the ground (This is purely the author’s innovation), a beautiful symbol of rejected love.

Draupadi always looks up to Bhima as a protector and someone who would grant even her extreme desires. Bhima realizes after a rare romantic rendezvous with Draupadi, when she pleads him to go instead of Arjuna to fight King Jarasandha, a formidable opponent, in a wrestling bout, that the lure of romance was just a bait. To her, Bhima is always the man who loves her unconditionally, someone who could be emotionally swayed with the slightest gesture of love.

Her pledge to let her hair loose, till it becomes wet with Dusshasana’s blood is yet another indication of her trust in Bhima. It is a trust which borders on the attitude towards a devoted servant. Bhima, during the war, tears open Dusshasana’s chest, in an action unbecoming of a Khshatriya and returns to smear Draupadi’s hair with his blood. Could there be any more that a lover could do? Could there be a sweeter revenge? Yes, it had to be Bhima, when it came to satisfying Draupadi’s most unreasonable whims.

The whole relation is captured in a nutshell, in the final scene, during Swargarohana, when the Pandavas ascend the path to heaven. They walk, in the order of seniority, with Draupadi behind them. Then Bhima hears a rustle of clothes, a sigh and a faint thud behind. Draupadi has fallen by the wayside.

Then Yudhishtira says, “She has sinned, she has loved Arjuna the most amongst us, instead of seeing all her five husbands with the same eye. That’s why she has fallen. Do not turn back, do not fret, and keep walking. Erasing worldly memories is a prerequisite for attaining heaven.” All of the brothers obey him, not turning back to look at their beloved wife.

Now comes the author’s classic intervention, a detour from the original storyline, raising Bhima’s love to a feeling bordering on ultimate, selfless submission. Ultimate submission, they say, is the highest degree of love; which is why; in poems and songs the woman whom one loves is often compared to a Goddess.

Bhima stops, ignores his brother’s wise words, turns back, walks up to Draupadi, bends down next to her and cups her face in his palms. She looks up at him, smiles, turns her head away and breathes her last. Peacefully. In Bhima’s arms.

Hidimbi: First wife to Bhima, the sister of Hidimba who was a Kiratha (a primitive aboriginal tribe, with enormous physical strength, who inhabit the jungle) whom Bhima slays in a jungle duel. Dusky, voluptuous, tall and bold, Hidimbi brings with her, womanhood with all its wild, unbridled sensuality.

Her character is brief, but in the context of what is to unfold, assumes immense significance. Bhima’s first taste of a woman, like many other Khshatriyas, is a devdasi in their palace, but the encounter leaves him unmoved. He even wonders aloud whether the much celebrated Bhima cannot satisfy even a mere woman.

But when he meets Hidimbi in the jungle, gets to know her and subsequently makes love to her, he is aroused to a degree which he has never thought himself capable to be. Bhima wonders whether the existing definitions of a woman’s capabilities in bed wouldn’t be enough to describe the fire of passion that Hidimbi aroused within him. He later marries her and introduces her to his mother and brothers. He then sees a glint of shock in Kunthi’s eyes, a shock which he alone notices. (This scene, the shock in Kunti’s eyes, is also a detour from the original storyline, but in hindsight, is one of the scenes in the whole novel which is plotted with inimitable foresight.)

They live together for a few days, after which Bhima and Hidimbi part, when the Pandavas have to leave the jungle to a nearby village. She is pregnant with his child, Bhima’s first child, Khadolkacha who arrives years later as their savior during the Kurukshethra war. They part, with Bhima kissing Hidimbi’s forehead in farewell.

Years later, Bhima does come in search of her into the same forest in the pretext of a hunting trip, but never finds her. Though a Khshatriya by birth, Bhima’s first wife, his first orgasm, his first child has all been from the lowly Kiratha tribe. It is this attribute of his character that Hidimbi so beautifully symbolizes.

Kunthi: The mother to the Pandavas, she is often portrayed in stories as a weak woman, but here she comes across as a wise, shrewd and calculating lady. A frail, non-descript woman; she always takes Bhima by surprise with her quick thinking.

When Vidura, uncle to Pandavas, who is always much concerned about the welfare of the Pandavas, sends an encrypted message to them while they stay in a castle made for them by the Kauravas in the jungle, Kunthi is the one to decipher the message and sense that the castle is made of firewood and could be set fire in an instant. And later, when a Kiratha lady and her five sons come begging, on the night when the castle would be set fire to, while they plot their plans of escape, she amazes him again by welcoming the beggars in. Her untimely urge to serve the visitors with food and liquor irks her sons, but when they question her, she coolly quips, amazing Bhima to no end: “When they search for our bodies tomorrow, the charred bodies of this Kiratha lady and her five sons would mislead our enemies into thinking that we are dead. What can these visitors be, if not God’s gift in disguise?”

Later, when the Pandavas return home with Draupadi after Arjuna’s victorious Swayamvara, Yudhishtira shouts aloud to Kunthi who is inside the house. “Mother, see what bhiksha we have got today!”

She shouts from inside, without looking out, “Whatever the bhiksha may be, my children, you must share it among yourselves equally.”

Yudhishtira, who is always inclined towards dharma, suggests that they must not disobey their mother’s words, and hence Draupadi becomes destined to be the wife to all of them, from the eldest to the youngest, the turn changing with each year.

Later, Kunthi says to Bhima, who was vehemently of the opinion that Draupadi must belong to Arjuna and not to the five of them together: “I knew that the bhiksha was Draupadi. I saw lust in each eye that looked at her, even in the eyes of the youngest Sahadeva. My sons must never quarrel over a mere woman, hence my words.” Bhima struggles to look Kunthi in her eyes again during that night, wondering whether his mother could have spotted lust in his eyes too.

But the real bombshell comes after the Kurukshethra war, when Kunthi asks Yudhishtira to perform the last rites for Karna, who, she reveals, was her first son. Karna knew it, but the Pandavas hadn’t and Arjuna had killed him in the war. The Pandavas sink to the ground in despair when they hear the news, the most distraught being Arjuna, who had killed him using unfair means. Yudhishtira even curses womanhood as a whole on this occasion that they can never keep a secret to themselves again.

A visibly angry Bhima shouts at his mother, deriding her decision to keep Karna’s secret from them for so long. He recollects aloud his umpteen encounters with Karna, in each of which he had insulted Karna in public, by calling him Soothaputhra (Which means, son of a charioteer. It was a humble charioteer, Adhiratha, who raised Karna, after he was abandoned at birth by Kunthi. Karna has to hear this insult many a time in his life, at various critical junctures in his life, the most important one being Draupadi’s Swayamvara, when, on the verge of being successful, Karna was expelled from the Swayamvara because of his
parentage).

It is now, that MT pulls off another magnificent, stunning and the most important deviation from the epic’s original story-line:

Kunthi looks at Bhima and to his consternation, remarks, “Karna was a Soothaputhra indeed.” She continues coolly, “At sage Durvasa’s ashram, amongst all the hardships that I suffered there, it was a handsome Sootha (a charioteer) who showed me some care, some love. Karna was born to him.”

A stunned Bhima listens as she goes on, “Listen. Dharma is Vidura indeed. And Vidura is Yudhishtira”, thereby breaking the secret of Yudhishtira parentage too, which is attributed to Dharma, the God of Justice. When Bhima shouts in despair, “Then tell me! Who am I?”, her reply is similarly icy cold.

“I wanted my second son to be strong. Strong like an elephant. Then he came to me, from the deep forests. Like an unbridled, violent wind. A Kiratha with the strength of a thousand elephants. Bhima, you were born to him.”

To Bhima, who has grown up, muttering silent prayers to Vaayudeva (the God of Wind) who was said to be his father, by Kunthi herself and also by all the paean-singers who sang praises of the royal families; this was a shock which was too much to bear. His life-long arrogance at his physical strength, his confidence in Vaayudeva, who he has always believed would incessantly keep guarding over him, all becomes meaningless myths when faced with this cruel, humbling reality.

It is then that everything falls in place for the viewer. His first marriage with Hidimbi. The shock in Kunthi’s eyes when she first sees Hidimbi. Khadolkacha, his first child. His first hunting success, which unconventionally comes in the form of slaying a wild pig. His forays into the forest, which is a second home to him, unlike other Khshatriyas. His obsession with wrestling, considered to be a low-grade war form. His wild, animal instinct which comes to the fore when he tears open Dusshasana’s chest during war and even drinks his blood. Uncle Vidura’s obsessive attention towards the Pandavas. Everything. The legends that we have grown up hearing now lies astray, shattered into pieces.

Final thought: It is through these three women, that Bhima knows life. Every emotion that a man needs to know comes to him through them. Love. Romance. Despair. The layers of superhuman facets, attached to him and his fellow characters through age-old mythical tales peel off, gradually, during his interactions with them.

What we see in this adaptation of Mahabharata is not a legend that we have come to see many times on the small screen, but a group of beleaguered ordinary mortals, Bhima included, forced into helplessness by the cruel turns of fate.

There are a lot of other characters – the other Pandavas; Balandhara, his second wife; Visoka, the trusted charioteer; Karna, the wronged brother, Gandhari and Dhritharashtra, all of whom play more than significant roles in the story. Bhima comes across as a worthy central character, a fulcrum around which the whole tale can be woven. Maybe I could write a sequel to this article to elaborate on the other characters as well.

But the greatness of this adaptation by M.T is that it simplifies the Mahabharata. The characters and their actions are no longer arcane and mythical; their motives and secrets become clearer and more justified now, thanks to the unconventional genius of M.T. And this is the reason why, this adaptation could, and should, be made into a film. A film which would transform these characters into mere mortals, which would demystify the legends and which could alter the common man’s perspective of this magnificent epic. Maybe, for ever.


PS: Malayalees, who have not read the book yet, go get your copy of Randamoozham straightaway. Non-Malayalees, try to get the English translation of the book, titled ‘The second turn’ or shop for it online at:
http://www.amazon.com/Second-Turn-M-Vasudevan-Nair/dp/0333923243

SOME LUCK!

orginally published in www.passionforcinema.com

http://passionforcinema.com/some-luck/

A quick idea which came to me while slugging it out in office...

Scene 1
4:30 PM
Sreehari’s Office

Sreehari sits facing the computer, tense, veins distending on his forehead, sweating in spite of the air-conditioning. The problem reported in his code had huge impacts and could incur huge financial losses for the client of the software firm for whom he was working for.

The client was one of the biggest privatized banks in the country.

The bank people had already kicked up a huge ruckus. The issue had already been escalated to the top management of the company.

And he was solely responsible.

Damn. What a horrible time for the issue to crop up, he thinks, with just a month more to go for the probation period to get over. The whole thing could even affect his confirmation.

Then, the cell phone rings. It’s Mom.

“Sreehari”, says Mom, endearingly. “That girl’s mother hasn’t responded yet….”

He was already into his third unsuccessful year of girl-hunting. This one suited him to a T; the horror-scopes gave in too. He wished her family would be as interested as he was.

Horrible day.

“Too bad. I’ll call you later Mom”, he tells. “Very busy now.” He disconnects the call.

Then, he nose-dives into the task at hand, frowning at the monitor, taking occasional sips of cold water, and furiously massaging his aching temples.

Scene 2
6:30 PM
Sreehari’s Office

Two tense hours whizz past, in a flurry of intense activity.

Then Sreehari goes out, has a smoke, comes back and strides confidently towards his Manager’s cubicle.

There is no tension now. Cool and composed, with an air of a person who was unjustly convicted, he starts to speak.

The issue reported has nothing to do with his code, which is working perfectly. Pucca.
All the fuss was a result of a mistake by some ignoramus dealer at the bank, who knows nothing about software. God help these fools!

The manager is happy. He realizes that he wouldn’t get the firing that he dreaded, congratulates Sreehari profusely and rings up the client, the Bank.

The manager waxes eloquent on the quality of his product, and on how unlikely it was for bugs to be found in the system.

Buoyed by Sreehari’s discovery, he even audaciously suggests to the bank that they employ people who are better trained so as to prevent such confusion in the future.

To which, the bank agrees and they also furnish their embarrassed apologies.

In the meanwhile, Sreehari packs his belongings and starts to leave home. The girl’s family must have called Mom by now, he hopes.

He rings up Mom, she doesn’t pick the phone. Must have gone to the temple, he guesses.

Feeling relaxed, he switches on the car stereo, and drives back home.

Scene 3
8:00 PM
Sreehari’s Home

A bit of shopping and Sreehari is back home. Mom has reached back as well.

“Did they call, Mom?” He asks.

Mom answers in the negative.

“Why don’t we call them up?” He pesters.

“I will call them now, then.” Mom consents, looks up the number from the directory as Sreehari waits by her side.

She finds the number and proceeds to dial.

Scene 4
8:05 PM
Sreehari’s Home

“We had come across your daughter’s profile in the matrimony site...” she says. “Wanted to know your reply...”

There is a click at the other end, and then the line goes dead. Mom places the receiver into the cradle.

“The girl’s brother says they are not interested.” Mom says with a tinge of sadness in her voice.

She feels for her son. She knows that her son had really wished that this proposal would go through.

Sreehari has a cup of tea, a quick bath and then climbs upstairs into his room, hiding his disappointment. He tries to get it out of his mind, but cannot.

He wonders what could be wrong, but he is not able to figure out.

He then locks the door, plays his favorite movie on the computer, and sits idly, smoking, cigarette after cigarette.

Scene 5
Ten Minutes Ago
Lakshmi’s Home

Lakshmi and her Mother looks up at her brother Vimal, who has come back from work.

He looks distraught.

They anxiously enquire and come to know that he was fired by the bank for which he worked as a contract employee.

“Initially I thought that it was the mistake of the software people”, he said, wiping the sweat off his brow. “Then they realized it was my mistake, and my contract was terminated.” He sinks into the chair, devastated.

The three of them sit around in a circle, immensely worried, pondering over what could be done. The job loss is a big blow. More so, in these times of recession. And he being the sole breadwinner in the family.

Scene 6
8:05 PM
Lakshmi’s Home

Then the phone rings, its shrill tones cutting through the silence of the room. Vimal gets up, and picks up the phone.

At the other end is the mother of the guy from whom Lakshmi had received a proposal last week.

“We can’t proceed right now”, Vimal mutters into the phone, in a dejected tone, “We are sorry.”

Then he disconnects the line.

The IPL - Love it or not ?

Browse for the IPL on the web, and you get a whole slew of posts on it, on cricket websites, on newspapers, on blogs. But there are not many columns which would make the Mr. Lalit Modi beam with pride - excluding those by the players and commentators of course.

Every second writer that we come across on the net lambasts the league. Viciously. The criticisms are, by and large, uniform. Here we go.

- Sixes are now DLF Maximums, every turnaround in the match is a CITI Moment, every also-ran, under-23 kid is now in contention for the CITI Find of the Tournament award, and Vodafone, as if zoo-zoos are not enough, keep on inventing outrageous ‘ultimate’ guessing games, which only leave you puzzled.

- If time-breaks in a match were an absolute no-no, we now have a compulsory time-out, every game. Not once, but twice. Yeah, and we are not counting the innings break.

- We all grew up eating, drinking and sleeping cricket. Cricket was religion, they said, and Sachin was God. Now, Ravi Shastri, addressed as an ‘overblown commentator’, is said to have offered the throne to The Commissioner himself. Shastri had gone on record, addressing Modi as ‘Moses’, it was said.

- The whole thing could be fixed. It might could even be a pre-planned script.

But this entire hullabaloo, does the average cricket fan care for? If I were asked, I would have simply quipped that I couldn’t care less.

Accept it, after the Kerry Packer revolution; IPL is the next biggest thing to hit Cricket. It is heavily commercialized, agreed. But in this age, what isn’t?

An average cricket fan could only dream of matches where a Shane Warne would bowl to a Matthew Hayden or Sachin taking guard against Anil Kumble. Most of the lineups in the IPL would even bear striking similarities to the World XI’s released by the ICC annually. And these guys, happily retired, wouldn’t consent to take part in a competition, if they are paid peanuts. The mind-blowing auction which preceded the tournament, with its sky high price tags only goes on to reinforce the same.

Adam Gilchrist once said he felt like a cow for sale, in a market. It is another matter that he joined IPL, and in the second edition is leading a side as well. Kevin Petersen, Andrew Flintoff and JP Duminy were left gaping, open mouthed at their astronomical price tags. They needed no further invitation to join the lucrative league.

Where does all this money come from? You can’t expect Lalit Modi and the franchisees to pump in millions just to enjoy the whole spectacle. Modi could be as much attracted to cricket and its nuances as Sonia Gandhi would be to the BJP. Money rules, that’s it. If tomorrow, Kabbadi suddenly shoots up in popularity, don’t be surprised if Modi starts endorsing a Kabbadi league even more passionately.

If he has pumped in Millions, he would want to rake in the moolah by the Billions. All of the franchisees would be listed on the stock exchange in a short time, and hence, the market value would be of prime importance. All the glitz goes on to increase the market value of their sides. In spite of their dismal record, Knight Riders are said to have the highest market value. So who can blame the sponsors and the franchisees, if they go overboard in raising money?

A rose is a rose is a rose, so goes the saying. A Six is a six is a six, whether we call it a six or a DLF Maximum. A turning point is a turning point, even if it called a CITI Moment of success. And what if sponsor’s logos adorn the entirety of the team outfits? Let them advertise, folks. Let them get a more than fair return for their investments. We wish to see this spectacle again in the coming years too, so let them.

The players don’t give each other an inch in the matches, and the average cricket fan isn’t complaining.

Who could complain? Most of the matches, barring a few, have gone down to the wire. At the business end of the tournament, six teams are battling it out for two semifinal spots. What more can you ask for? The intensity levels are simply amazing. The carnival atmosphere, with the music, film stars and the cheer girls wouldn’t please the purists for sure, but what do the purists have to show?

Test cricket is facing a stern test. Most One day internationals are starting to be tedious, drab affairs. We see test series played out on flat pitches, with teams trying to bore each other into committing mistakes. Draws seem to be order of the day, with an occasional three day test surfacing, which is most often a result of inept batting. Unless there is an Australia, or a South Africa or an India playing, there isn’t much international cricket worth watching going on. Even they can’t guarantee entertainment these days.

Two years back, we happened to see a certain tournament called the World Cup, with inconsequential, one-sided matches played day in and day out, and an extremely dominant Australia winning for the fourth time in a row. How we wished we would have a second division, a la the EPL, where we could delegate insipid teams like the West Indies and Zimbabwe! These teams were almost non-existent, simply serving to boost the averages of players from the top sides. Not to speak of Bermuda, Holland and Kenya.

Instead, here we see the likes of Dwayne Bravo, Dwayne Smith, Fidel Edwards, Ross Taylor, Dirk Nannes and Ravi Bopara, arguably from countries in the bottom rung of the test ladder, setting the stage alight with their performances for their respective teams. And their performances counted, because all the teams were evenly matched. And such contests were starting to become as rare as a white elephant, until IPL caught cricket by storm last year.

And Indian Cricket! Shouldn’t we be welcoming the IPL with both hands? Rohit Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, Ravindra Jadeja, Suresh Raina, Irfan Pathan – all these players, either emerged or came back into reckoning in the IPL. For long, we have been lamenting the non-emergence of young players and suddenly, the selectors seem to be spoilt for choice. There are several other young players too – Pragyan Ojha for one, who seem to give the senior pros a real run for their money. RP Singh and Ashish Nehra have been revelations as well, and have done their prospects no harm.

But honestly, what could have been dispensed away with, are the anchors on Sony MAX. Gaurav Kapoor and Samir Kochchar sound so clichéd that we keep wishing that the Extraaa Innings would get over as soon as it began. It’s a big glitch. Better not to talk of Mandira Bedi, it seems Sony MAX cannot find prettier girls who could articulate better. Let us wish MAX better luck, which I guess they should soon find, with the innumerable reality shows budding forth daily, on Indian Television screens.

And Bollywood seems to be driving the critics to exasperation. But let’s face it, television ratings are surest shot success meters and the SRKs, Zintas and Shettys would woo in audiences who aren’t too keen on cricket. Why should their presence dilute the cricket? Sure, one gets irritated at Priety’s chronic hugging and jumping, and SRK’s high handed talk, but why care, when you have such gorgeous cricketing action on view?

Maybe we should draw a line, between international cricket and the IPL. We watch enough commercial pot boiler films and we queue up at theatres, braving the Sun and the rain, to watch our favorite stars act in mindless comic capers. We have no qualms about leaving our brain outside the theatre. Even for a few of us who don’t really enjoy, we don’t really have a choice. Then why all the fuss about the IPL?

It’s a cocktail, the IPL. A heady mix of some really good cricket, a hell lot of money and glamour. With a shot of senselessness thrown in as well. A wholesome, palatable, pot pourrie.

Let us pardon the Commissioner for his greed.

Let us pardon the sponsors for putting their money over our cricket.

Let us pardon Ravi Shastri, Sunil Gavaskar, Harsha Bhogle, Robin Jackman and their tribe for their subservience. They have been fantastic commentators and they would continue to be so.

Let us pardon the perpetrators of the strategic time out. Let the sponsors make hay, as we walk around a bit, to exercise our lazy spines.

After a few weeks, we would be back to calling a Six a Six, a catch a catch and a turning point a turning point.

Maybe, the Khans, the Shettys, the Ambanis and the Zintas would be back, doing what they do best.

Maybe, we would be back to seeing Australia thrash a insipid New Zealand and South Africa maul a listless England. Smacking our lips at the prospect of Sri Lanka taking on the never-improving Bangladesh in a three-test triple whammy.

Maybe, we would be longing ruefully for the sight of Matthew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist, Shane Warne or Sanath Jayasurya, out on the playing field displaying their ageless guiles.

Maybe, we would miss IPL then. We can’t be sure. Cricket is such a funny game, they say.

But for now, grab some thing to eat, something to drink and settle down into your couch. For a month, leave the cynical half of your brain in the cold storage. Try if you can get the entertainment that they claim is guaranteed.

Happy viewing!

Tryst With Destiny

It was the wee hours of a cold, December morning. The mathematics examination loomed ahead, inching closer with each passing minute, like a lumbering leviathan. The main ingredient of the day’s examination would be Geometry, and the very thought of Geometry, I remember, had always given me the shivers. Showering curses on Pythagoras and his ancestors, I staggered onwards, trying in vain to memorize the countless formulae, which were strewn amidst the broad, pale-colored, unappealing pages of the textbook.

Overcome by fear, I sat sweating, near the window, praying that the morning would never arrive; the dividers and set-squares resting shakily in my fingers, as a spoon and a fork would rest in the unaccustomed fingers of a villager at an expensive buffet.

I wished I could know the result of the examination beforehand. Could have saved me all this effort, I thought. Not an uncommon wish at all. After all, it is man’s obsession with the future which fattens the purse of many a fortune-teller - the obsession to know, change and subvert God’s will through countless prayers and rituals.

In those days, I had this curious little habit, which I had picked up from one of my classmates at school. Whenever I found it impossible to resist knowing the outcome of something, whether India would end up on the winning side of a close cricket match or whether we would land a ticket for a new film release, I would toss a coin.

Up, high and handsome, the coin would soar. The coin in the air, my heart in my mouth. The coin would eventually end up on the ground, with one face upwards. Each face would symbolize a result, and the business of tossing the coin would give me a temporary respite from restlessness.

The entire ordeal which I had endured, the unbearable anxiety as to whether I would pass or fail, had enervated me enormously. I felt like a convict at a jail, waiting with bated breaths, for the dreaded moment when the executioner’s noose would tighten around his unlucky throat.

No more of this business, I made up my mind. Bring the coin!

I never used to have a lot of pocket money. Unfortunately, I did not have a single coin with me, on that wretched morning, rummage as I might, all over the room. And it wasn’t entirely normal to go fiddling in my Dad’s pockets in such unearthly hours; and if I did, landing a scolding seemed more probable than landing a coin.

That’s the way of life. When you don’t need something, it sits there, right before your eyes. When you need it so badly, as if your whole life hangs on it, the thing is nowhere to be found. A gentleman named Murphy, I heard realized this fact, centuries before I did, and formulated his own law, which was called Murphy’s Law. I couldn’t agree more with Murphy then.

How on earth, with what on earth, could I toss?

I took a bit of paper, wrote ‘Pass’ on one side and ‘Fail’ on the other, and tossed it. The paper flew away in the ceiling fan, landing expertly at an inaccessible corner of the room. The paper bit would have put an airplane to shame with its airborne antics.

Dejected, I had given up the plan of predicting the future and had gone back to the futile exercise of nibbling at my textbook, when my roving eye caught something.

Lying inconspicuously in my instrument box was the Protractor. An essential tool in a mathematics examination, the Protractor is a semicircular, plastic piece, with the angles from zero degrees to one-hundred-eighty degrees marked on one face, in a slew of closely spaced lines and semicircles. The other face is blank.

My sagging spirits soared; the situation wasn’t hopeless at all. I could use the Protractor for a toss. I took huge pride in the hidden justice that there was in it - what better way could be there, other than using a mathematical instrument itself to guess the result of a mathematics exam?

So it was toss time. Again.

I sat back, temporarily forgot everything about the exams and basked in my newfound glory. With experience, we had figured out a unique way to check if the outcome of a toss was reliable or not. Put the toss and check whether it predicts the outcome of an event that already happened.

Incidentally, I had passed in the previous mathematics exam, with a paltry forty-five percent score. I tossed the Protractor up in the air. If the side with the degrees marked on it falls, it would mean Pass and hence, the toss could be trusted, I presumed. Three times out of three, the marked side fell.

Fantastic. You could bet your life on the Protractor, I thought.

Now, to the big toss. I braced myself and tossed the Protractor up again. It soared up, did several somersaults in the air and landed on its blank side.

My enthusiasm dipped. God, would I fail?

One more toss. More airy somersaults. But again, it landed on the blank side.

Now the world came crashing down. The prospect of failure looked likelier than before. But I picked myself up quickly and thought over it. I would toss it five times in all, instead of three. So in all the remaining throws, the face with the degrees marked on it would have to fall, for me to pass in the examination. I muttered a few prayers and tossed it up again.

Up. Higher. Flipping in the air. Amidst thumping heartbeats.

I stared, anxious and open mouthed. God, It had begun its descent, and was hurtling down, right towards my nose. I backed away, just in the nick of time. The protractor brushed my cheek, diverted from its path of descent, and went sliding, nonchalantly, right out of the window.

Peering out, I found the protractor, lying forlorn, on the sunshade. Looking up at me, as if blaming me for its plight. Worse, it had it's blank side upwards. Failure guaranteed ?

I tried coaxing it down from the sunshade with a broom, but Life seemed to have chosen to teach me all the tough lessons on that horrible, chilly morning. The broom was just an inch too short for me.

Mom came in at the stroke of dawn, with the morning tea and found me, to her extreme astonishment, broom in hand, sweating all over from head to toe. She tried her hand, gave up and called Dad, who immediately took over control of the situation.

After half an hour of pushing and prodding, Dad managed to coax the Protractor from the sunshade, onto the ground. All the while, he had seemed to get madder at me with each passing minute. It was seven in the morning by then. Almost school time. Without any further preparation, I trudged off to school, ready to meet my fate.

Anyways, the toss was spot on, I must say. The day got more horrible as it progressed, especially inside the examination hall. Equations and formulae arranged themselves, deftly, into indecipherable jigsaw puzzles inside my head, and drove me crazy.

Eventually, I ended up with eighteen marks out of a hundred. For once, I remember, the marks where fewer in number, in comparison with the number of beatings I managed to get from home.

If my memory could be banked upon, it was the last time that I ever tossed a coin in my life.

To Be or not To Be

“To Be or not to Be.”

Thus cried out Prince Hamlet in great anguish, as he started off his tirade; a fierce debate raging in his mind, whether to “suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” or to “take arms against a sea of troubles by opposing end them”.

[William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Act three, Scene one. The essential purport is that his state is so wretched that death would be decidedly preferable to it. So Hamlet wonders eloud, in his dilemma whether to Live on or to commit suicide.]

One of the best soliloquies ever penned by the Bard.

Our English lecturer, I heard, did quite a wonderful job in teaching it, but sadly, I never could empathize with our hero; felt that the whole display of dilemma was unnecessary, unjustified and highly theatrical. I eventually ended up staring wistfully at the boys, who, without a care in the world, played basketball on the courts outside while I slugged it out in class. It seemed highly unlikely then, that I could ever relate to the plight of our prince. It is another matter that I did relate, rather strongly, in the most unrelated circumstances.

It happened while I was standing at a crossroad on the way back from office. I was quite tired, after a stressful day at office.

The road which went straight would lead me home. The road which went left had a rather non-descript looking building at its fag end. The building, in turn, had a translucent, diamond shaped name board on top of it. The name board was white, was fiercely illuminated by a bright, white neon bulb which shone inside it. Three letters of the English alphabet were inscribed boldly on it in blue.

'B', 'A' and an 'R'.

BAR.

It was New Year, and I was still fresh from my New Year resolution which forbade me from drinking again. The new-born teetotaler and the age-old beverage connoisseur inside me (sorry, I hate the word drunkard – it is so degrading and commonplace), engaged themselves in a duel. One pushed me forward. The other pushed me to the left. To the road where the bar was. A whole avalanche of ideals, concerns – both health and monetary, ennui and stress, weighed in to add spice to the duel.

It is tough to stop an old habit and tougher to refrain from it once you have stopped it. But it is toughest; when you have stopped unwillingly, and a chance to resume the habit comes up and there no solid reason to let the chance go.

The dilemma was all-pervasive. If I were not on the road, and if my creative instincts would have backed me up, I would have broken into a thundering soliloquy of my own, right then. Maybe Shakespeare, if he was alive and had seen me, would have needed no more inspiration to repeat his magnificent feats.

I stood confused, scratching my head. An epitome of uncertainty, very much like our Prince Hamlet. The board stood in the distance, a titillating sight to my weary eyes and stressed nerves.

It is such a lovely place, the bar. With its mysterious dim lights and its smell, which is a curious mix of alcohol, tobacco smoke and human sweat. You walk in, and somehow feel suddenly at home. The sight that greets you is that of a whole group of men, each at varying degrees of inebriation, staring dreamily at each other.

You never find such a relaxed group anywhere else - I’d swear by that. Some would be laughing, celebrating something. Some would be unwinding, after a tiring day at work. Some would be hunched close together, and sharing a secret or two. Overall, the air is of genuine relaxation. It rubs off on you, and once you have had your share, you blend seamlessly into the laidback air that seems to hang over the room like a comfortable woolen blanket.

The ambience and the drinks encourage you to wear your heart on your sleeve. How else, other than under the influence of the Divine Drink, can you give someone a piece of your mind; still walk up to him the next morning, and seek forgiveness, under the ludicrous excuse that you weren’t in your senses?

Of course, there are killjoys. Sparingly though. They throw tantrums, spread destruction, get into brawls and spoil the fun. Thankfully, they are just a minor aberration. Let us ignore them.

And then, there are the waiters who never cease to amaze you with their power of recollection. Walk in a couple of times into a bar and if you are consistent with your choice of brands, be sure the guy would not need to take an order the next time. So good, so reliable, are their retentive abilities. And not just in the matter of remembering the brands.

Once, somehow, I forgot my belt in a bar, and went in search of it the next morning. I struggled to find the waiter who had served me, and was trying to find him out from the assembly of white-and-white clad men who roamed about, when the guy came out running with my belt and even enquired what happened to the car that I regularly drove. Incidentally I had come in my friend’s car on the day.

These waiters; their case is a study in irony. They busily scurry around, catering to the calls from every corner of the room, handle the most liquor in the bar but eventually end up consuming very little of it. Very much like male bees who do all the donkey work for the females to feed on.

Speaking of males and females, there is one thing which is thankfully absent in bars as long as you are in India. Women. With the result that you don’t get an inferiority complex seeing amorous couples sitting hand-in-hand; you don’t damage your ear-drums by exposing yourselves to the high-pitched chit-chat and gossip. And most importantly, you don’t get distracted from the task at hand. Finally, you end up agreeing with the oft-disputed theory that the world would have been a much better place if it was not for the fairer sex.

You get such a lot of wonderful insights, few of which I have mentioned already, while you are at the bar, that you don’t realize how quickly time passes.

By the time you finish your drink, the bill comes. Figures typed out by a dot-matrix printer, on cheap quality paper. It comes, most often, in a porcelain plate with a bunch of Jeera thrown atop it. If you feel that the drinks leave a bad taste in the mouth (literally, not idiomatically) you could always take a handful of the Jeera and pop it into your mouth and masticate to your heart’s content.

The bill is often quite steep and leaves a medium to large sized hole in your pocket. But the beauty of the whole thing is that, as you stare at the bill, swaying on your feet and struggling to keep your eyelids open, you don’t feel it is expensive. You even go on to tip the waiter generously and his thankful smile and his barely perceptible bow seem to make you incredibly happy.

Now, that’s yet another thing that I have always noticed with people who drink. We don’t cringe over money. Over the little trifles that a human being is bound to loose, time and again, in this cruel, mad, insensitive world. We don’t bring money with us when we are born, nor do we take it with us when we die. Do we?

So much for philosophy. Unless exorbitant, every sum lost is equated to the price of a peg or two, or to the price of a cigarette pack. This helps us a great deal to reconcile to the loss at hand. And to drown the little sorrow that remains in even more drinks.

Okay buddies, I forget that I am still on the streets, staring at the lovely name board, perched atop the building, which bathed in twilight, now seems prettier than ever before. The teetotaler in me, I realize, has sunk away and no longer troubles me by pushing me into indecision. I ache for a drink, curse the wretched moment at which I made my resolution, and walk with firm footsteps towards the building which stands ahead and beckons me.

I am amazed that I needed so long to take such a simple decision. With due apologies to the Bard, I rechristen the fierce dilemma that I endured over the past few minutes.

With a couple of extra ooz’s thrown in between.

With the soul of the soliloquy quite intact.

“To Booze or not to Booze.”

Vicissitudes

The sun had begun to set on the temple town, shooting fountains of color from the horizon upon the streets, mingling with the neon light of the street-lamps, lending the town an ethereal look. Hari alighted from the bus, mulling over the uncanny coincidence of the day's events which had brought him back here – to this place which once had been his sanctuary, his second home.

Five years. Five long years had passed, Hari realized, since his last visit. Life had come full circle since then. He had seen it all. But the place was still the same. The calm, cool air. The occasional, high pitched toll of the temple bells. The wafting aroma of incense. The mumbled prayers of the dhoti-clad, busy looking priests and passers-by. Even the lodge still looked the same, though it looked a shade younger in its new coat of blue which had come to replace the faded gray color which had once characterized it.

Time seemed to stand still here. On this street, where he had once set foot on, as a twenty-five year old who had nothing to lay claim to, other than his own dreams, unbridled confidence and fingers which could weave magic on canvas with every stroke of a brush. Hari ran his hands through his unkempt, browning hair, wishing ruefully whether he could go back in time, and be that impetuous, prodigiously talented young painter once again.

No. It wasn’t to be. There was no way back. His shoulders had drooped from the agony of repeated failures. The eyes had sunk deep into their sockets and had black patches round them, lending him an appearance which would have suited a man who was double his age. The truth that he himself was accountable for his current travails weighed him down even more. In the frantic, mindless race to the top, in those years which sped dizzily under the spotlight, amongst the ubiquitous accolades and encomiums, he had never known what he had been losing; and when the realization finally dawned on him, everything precious in life had been lost.

Everything. Destroyed beyond redemption. Like dainty flowers trampled down into the sand by a firm, ruthless boot.

He stepped warily into the lodge, feeling a slight apprehension about meeting someone who knew him. In the very next instant, the sheer meaninglessness of his fear struck Hari. It was years since he had faded away from the spotlight and from the public consciousness. It was foolish to think that anyone would recognize him. His parched, tobacco stained lips cracked into a wry smile at the thought.

Hari was not fully in his senses, even as he signed the guestbook, pocketed the key and silently followed the room-boy to the room allotted to him. He was shocked into his senses, only when the boy stopped at the room numbered two-zero-six on the second floor. The boy unlocked the door which opened with a creak.

The familiar, faint, damp smell greeted his nostrils, as he stepped in. As he locked the door behind him and opened the window overlooking the temple, the golden flagpole of the temple gleamed in the distance. When the door which led into the balcony was opened, the cool night breeze rushed in like a playful, rogue child; bringing with it a whole deluge of memories. The past, with the aid of the day's numerous coincidences, seduced him, like a temptress.

The memories of a similar evening, in the same room, overlooking the same golden flagpole, floated up in front of his eyes. Hari stretched out on his chair and poured himself a drink. It had become his habit of late, to drown himself in drinks. Drink and drink till he faded out into unconsciousness, till memories no more troubled him.

But today, each peg that he downed only served to accentuate the memories of that evening. And about the woman who had been with him, that day.

Arundhati.

Her smile. With the warmth of a thousand flames.
Her touch. With the coolness of a mountain spring.

It had been on a similar evening, that he had made love to her for the first time. In this same room. Though it had been on impulse; as they lay in bed afterwards, spent, both of them had felt that they had never done a more natural thing to each other.

Hari had met Arundhati for the first time at one of his painting exhibitions. Then, she had flitted about him, like an insect around a candle flame. Blind in her adoration for the upcoming, brilliant, painter. That was just the start. He became besotted too, with her beauty and her vivacious self. The relationship grew. It was he, who then took the initiative. He had given her all the attention he could, so much so that, it flattered her; and had found time to be with her

She had been an elixir, an obsession. In her presence, his brush seemed to move as if in a trance, his works transcended the ordinary. The very sight of her inspired him. Life became beautiful. It was her prayers that drove him on. When, like a typical greenhorn, he was distraught at a failure, she would lend him a shoulder to cry, would fuel his optimism. When one of his works had not hit the right notes, she would come up, with prompt criticism.

Each of his paintings drew a thousand admirers. Awards and accolades seemed to chase him around.

But Hari could not recollect when the fame had started to get to his head. With each step up the ladder, his mind had grown narrower. Overconfidence and arrogance pulled blinds over his eyes. He had lurched mindlessly ahead, towards the beckoning glory. Like a firefly which rushes into light, unaware that it would only end up burning its wings.

And he did burn his wings indeed.

It was a dizzy ride to stardom. He toured worldwide, held painting exhibitions everywhere. The group of admirers grew; and he forgot himself amidst the paeans that they sung to him. Arundhati faded away into oblivion from his memories, just another forgotten one, amongst the bevy of starlets who now chased him around.

Like a hurriedly snuffed out candle flame. Little had he known that without this little candle flame that he snuffed out, life would plunge into darkness.

The last time she had come before his eyes had been at a public reception arranged for him. She had made her way, painfully through the crowd towards the dais, and held out a piece of paper on which she had scribbled her address. He never had heard, rather had chosen not to hear, the muffled sobs and tears. He had been too busy to think of the past. In the ensuing hubbub and the flash of camera lights, Arundhati was forgotten.

Only to resurface again at an obscure corner of a local daily. In an obituary report. It had been a suicide.

That was the beginning of the end.

He came to know of it only after a while, from a friend. The news shook him. He could not concentrate on anything, anymore. Unable to do anything to atone for what he had done, the magic, slowly but surely faded away. The fingers which once wove poetry on canvas were now numb and paralyzed by guilt. The colors and once elegant brush strokes now made only a fleeting appearance. The paean-singers left too, one by one. A permanent pall of darkness descended upon his life. The clutch of the past grew stronger, and had pulled him down, deeper and deeper into abyss.

He set up the canvas at a corner. He did it every day, a meaningless custom, in spite of the fact that he hadn't done a worthwhile painting in over two years. Sitting in the room, Hari drank hard, staring blankly out of the window at the crimson sky, which seemed to reflect the cinders which smoked within. Usually, no amount of drinks, no amount of drugs could free him from the memories and the guilt.

Ever.

But, now, in the same hotel room, in which they had lain together for the last time, looking into each others' eyes, each of their bodies pressing snugly into the grooves of the other’s body; the pall of gloom slowly seemed to lift steadily and he felt a rare lightness in his chest. He felt dizzy, and tried to keep his eyes open.

Then he felt as if Arundhati stood before him. Her hands outstretched, beckoned him. With the same bewitching smile.

Then she came close, and ran her fingers through his hair. The sights around grew more and more blurred. The sounds around became less and less audible. Tender fingers lifted up his chin, gripped his fingers and guided them, across the canvas. Slowly, but surely, he felt the magic return.

Bit by bit. Like the moon waxes from behind the clouds.

Lines and shades started to fall in place, as he drew on, still in a trance. She held him close as he drew, pressed her soft, luscous lips to his forehead as he applied the finishing touches.
Then Hari saw her drift away, as he closed his dreary,careworn eyes.

He woke up in the morning, feeling the warmth of the sunlight on his cheeks. He reached out for the whisky, and found the bottle broken, at a corner in the room. Then his eyes fell on the painting. It was perfect. The delicately carved temple walls. The crimson skies. The busy street. All were perfectly etched out on the canvas.

With tearful eyes, he walked out, to the temple pond ,stepped into the knee-high water and dipped his head into the pond and rose up. As the cool water trickled off his hair and bare back, he felt the burden of guilt wash away. Then he looked up towards the sun, closed his eyes and prayed for Arundhati's soul.

The Final Good-bye

"Dear Gomez", Moorthy scribbled, in his shaky handwriting.

“Heard you are in town.
Enjoy your birthday.
You will never hear from me again.
Good-bye
J.M.”

With trembling fingers, he scribbled the note, folded it into two, and enclosed it along with the gift in the cardboard box. Then he covered it in a gift-wrapper, hired a cab to the Hotel Presidency and handed it over at the reception, avoiding the suspicious glance of the hotel clerk. Afterwards, Moorthy went back to the run-down stingy apartment which he had rented for the day, poured himself a couple of drinks, walked across the damp floor to the window and looked down, watching the street which had already begun to darken.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Back at the Hotel Presidency, Antony Gomez, fists-on-hip, dressed in all his royal finery, flanked by suit-clad secretaries, surveyed the elaborate arrangements made at the plush roof-top restaurant for the grand birthday celebrations.

"Good. Excellent" ,he said nodding his shiny, bald head, reclining on the couch, grinning to his henchmen who flanked him, heads bowed in polite affirmation. The artificial golden tooth glinted menacingly, reflecting the yellow light of the chandelier.

"Is the guest roster finalized?" ,Gomez enquired.
"The Governor wont turn up" ,one of the men said, stepping forward.
"The old bumpkin", Gomez pounded his fist on the table. "Let him rot in hell. And the others?"
"All the rest will turn up on time."
"Good."

There was a knock on the door, and the hotel boy came in. One of the men walked up to the boy, collected the gifts and handed over to Gomez who would take a look and proceed to toss them, one by one, onto the pile of gifts that was stacked at the corner of the room.

The shaky handwriting and the initials scribbled on top of one of the packets made Gomez sit up and take notice.

“J.M….Oh..It’s from old Moorthy!” , exclaimed Gomez, slicing open the packet. “I thought the old fool was still in jail.”

“Heard he was released a month back”, said Johnny, one of the secretaries.

“My, there is a letter inside”, Gomez grinned, handing over the letter to them. “Read it for me, Johnny.”

Johnny read out to him, and looked puzzled. “What does he mean” ?

“To hell with what he means. Good riddance”, Gomez said, wiping his sunglasses on his shirt and replacing them back on. “If I hear from him, it is always the same, the same ‘I have no money’ story.”

Along with the letter, there was another cardboard box inside. As he opened, Gomez gleamed. A bottle of beer was inside. “Tiger Beer”, he said, grinning, “the old rat, he still remembers my taste.”

Johnny smiled weakly. “But boss, don’t we owe him some money? The man must be broke, the letter looks like a suicide note”, he said apologetically, almost as if he sensed the outburst that would follow.

Gomez stood up, glowering. “Bullshit, Johnny, Bullshit!”, he shouted, downing the beer in large gulps.

“This business, this business of ours”, Gomez went on, “is not for the sissies and the weak-hearted. It’s for men. Real, tough, men. The fool would have lost money anyway. If not for me, someone else would have swindled him of his money. Even if it was not for him, I would have still reached where I am now. Do you doubt that, Johnny? Don’t people always get what they deserve?”

Johnny nodded his head, remembering with a tinge of guilt about how they had deceived the unsuspecting Moorthy into signing a deal with them. The deal was an underhand one, and had Moorthy’s signature on it, leading to his arrest and a seizure of all his assets.

That had been the start Moorthy's decline and that of Gomez’s meteoric rise.
Johnny could do nothing. He shrugged his shoulders.

Gomez continued, “Let the fool go and die, that is best for him. This Brahmins, they are not made for business. We jews, we have it in our blood, don’t we, Johnny? You drinkin’ some beer?”

Johnny declined. Gomez finished off the beer, kept it aside, and reclined in his chair, muttering curses under his breath. “Let him go and die.”

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Back in his lodge room, Moorthy stood still near the window, watching the dark street. He paced back and forth in his small room, and stood near the window again, wringing his palm. Then he saw a sudden burst of light and traffic through the dark street.

Two vehicles were rushing across towards the Hotel Presidency. He sensed what had happened, picked up his duffel bag, paid the lodge bill, tip-toed out and walked with firm steps along the dark road which led to the railway station. The train was scheduled to arrive in fifteen minutes, and would take him out of the state.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few minutes earlier, Gomez had got up from his chair, clutching his stomach, his face contorted into a grimace. As Johnny looked on clueless, he staggered a few steps forward and had doubled over, headfirst into the wash-basin.

The guests, who had arrived and had started to help themselves to the feast, looked shocked and ran helter-skelter.

As someone rung up the hospital. Johnny ran upto Gomez and lifted him up from the wash-basin.

“The bastard, it was the beer, it was the beer”, Gomez had mumbled incoherently, before his body became motionless.

A Love Story

Leaning back on the bench, unsteady from the pegs of whisky he had downed, Walter watched Mary, standing with her back to him. The hair was unusually done up into a bun at the back of her head, and was adorned with golden beads arranged in a circular pattern. The yellow window-glass imparted a distinct hue to the beam of sunlight which trickled in through it and illuminated her ear-stud and her flushed left cheek.

And for Walter, who watched her, the sight turned the clock back, to four years back, when she had joined their office.

They had joined together, four ladies, and among them one would never notice Mary, unless he looked a second time. Lips set in a tight line, gaze fixed at her toes, hip-long hair braided plainly and unfashionably, there was some unsettling about her. He had liked her understated beauty initially, Walter recollected, but he couldn't remember precisely when he had started falling for her - but a similar sight, on an early June morning was still fresh in his memory. On his twenty-fifth birthday.

Mary and himself had been the first to reach office that morning. Her hair was wet, and was uncharacteristically let down, cascading to her hip and the sunlight had fallen on her cheek, spreading golden dust on it and lending it a cherubic charm, as it did today. She had come up to him, a rare smile playing on her lips, and wished him a happy birthday. He never had a way with women, did Walter, and the moment - her abrupt beauty and the unexpected birthday wish - had completely swept him off his feet. It was since then, that he, neither at ease with girls in general nor particularly handsome, started trying to catch her attention, albeit unsuccessfully. Mary went back to her normal self and seemed genuinely unaware of the affection that her colleague secretly harbored within.

For the smitten Walter, expressing his feelings for Mary was a struggle. He would rehearse conversations at home and reach office prepared, and either would end up deciding against it or would burn with envy at the sight of someone else talking to her. Almost a year passed before he decided that enough was enough, and come what may, he would go ahead with a proposal. Three tense days and two tossing-around-in-bed nights and a hell lot of deliberation, Walter remembered, was what it had taken him to summon the gumption to let her know.

He smiled to himself and craned his neck, looking over the tall man who sat in front of him. He could see Mary better now. She had turned sideways, her profile visible to him.

"Are you already engaged?", was what he had asked her then.
"Yes", came the reply.
"You know why I am asking this, I hope?", he had asked her, hoping that she knew all the while.
"No, never", she had replied, her eyes widening. "I never saw you that way, Walter. You have been a good friend. Always."

Since then, they grew closer. Walter found himself talking more freely, once he had let out his feelings for her. Mary too, when she talked to Walter, dropped the unapproachable air that seemed to surround her like a shroud. They found themselves talking to each other much more, and in one of their conversations Mary had told him something.

She wasn't engaged, she had admitted, and was smarting from a broken love affair. She had been in love with a guy, for three years, and had planned to marry him, but being unable to convince his parents, the guy had backed out of marriage. She had vowed never again to venture into an affair, she had told Walter and that she could never recover from the blow that the experience had given her.

Even then, he couldn't love her any less.

Instead, with each passing day, his obsession kept growing but he could never bring himself round to broach the topic again in their conversations. Status quo remained, till one day, he, excessively drunk and spirits buoyed by his drinking-mate’s tale of how he had won his girl over with his persistent proposals, had telephoned Mary late into the night. After a breathless drunken speech, he expected reproach from her, but the answer that she gave stunned him.
"I am okay with it", she had said, "but I need to talk it over at home". She wanted a week to talk it over, she said.

As the week passed on; Walter had waited, his own optimism both exciting and scaring him. He tempered his optimism with his own fears about how her conservative family would react to his proposal, and waited.

The bad news came soon from Mary. Her family wouldn't even consider taking up his proposal and spurred by it, had started arrangements to find a suitor for her at the earliest. He had tried to convince her, persuading, coaxing and cajoling but she wouldn't act against her family's will. He had given up, but still felt queerly contented. At least, she was ready he consoled himself; it was just her family who stood at loggerheads. If not for them, she would have been his girl.

He had been downcast for a few days, but had started to recover and life was getting back on track, when he had decided to pay a visit to Mary's apartment. They had tea together, and he loitered round the apartment, when a leather-bound book, with a pen kept inside to mark the pages caught his eye. It was her diary and he flipped through the pages. And a small note, scribbled on one of the pages, had left him shell-shocked.

“I like Walter.” Mary had written. “But I would never bring myself to marry him. I can't love anyone else in my life again. But I just can’t disappoint him anymore. After a week, I will tell him that mom and dad couldn’t agree to his proposal. So yesterday, I lied to Walter. I told him that I was ready to marry him, if Mom and Dad allowed me to. But I didn't. I know, anyhow, that they wouldn’t agree. Sorry Walter.”

She had written it on the day after he had made his drunken proposal. He had felt sick, and his mouth went dry. He hurried out quickly, bidding a quick good-bye to Mary, making it quick so that his face would not betray him. He never let her know that he had seen the diary, never when they talked afterwards.

He had felt cheated. All the way, she never intended to marry him. And even if it was for those few days, he had made castles in the air, day-dreamed; all for nothing. He had felt an intense loathing for himself. Slowly, he shook off the disappointment, and later, when she had invited him for her marriage, he had wished her good luck in the cheeriest way he could. She had to give in to her parents’ pressure, she had said.

Remembering all this, Walter smiled. Still, he realized, he couldn’t love her less.

Mary stood ahead on the dais, now facing him. He fought off the whiskey-inspired urge to walk up to her and proclaim his love once again; and instead clutched the armrests of the chair and remained seated.

The hitherto seated crowd now got up on their feet. The priest finished his prayers and the bespectacled, suit clad guy, who stood beside Mary slipped the wedding ring onto her finger. As the wedding bells tolled, he watched the old lady next to him; her eyes closed and lips quivering as she said her prayers.

Then, Walter got on his feet, crossed himself, closed his eyes and muttered. “God Bless”.