Six Months Episode 3

                                                            FIVE

-“I think my brother has started doubting about our friendship”, said Suniti.

-“What?  Your brother? He hardly knows me! How could he come about us?”, said Ravi.

-“I don’t know, but last night he gave me a huge speech like a philosopher.”

-“What sort of speech?”

-“About growing up, life, struggling,  not trusting strangers and so on.”

-“Yeah I understand. Don’t worry, guardians give such lectures and ‘bla bla bla’s at this age, don’t take it so much seriously. Just relax.” He planted his hand on hers.

She smiled, “Yeah, probably you’re right, I must not get tense. Thanks! You’re my best friend.” She held his wrist tightly, shook it and giggled. Ravi smiled, “you are so simple and child-like, you deserve a best friend in your life. Why are you so introverted?”

-“You forget, I do have a friend”, she kept her hand on his shoulder, “my best friend indeed.”

Ravi put down her hand from his shoulder and held it softly, “I know dear, I am not talking about myself, other than me you’ve no friends, you are so shy.”

-“Why should I need other friends when I have you?”

-“Yeah, we wouldn’t have been friends if I did not interact with you.”

Her eyes became bigger as she said “I paid attention to you, that’s why you approached me!”

-“Well yes, but I played the main role.”

-“You!” ,she planted a light punch on his hand. Ravi laughed and returned the punch back to her.

-“You hit me!”,she said dramatically and returned it too.

-“Ok my friend you win. It’s because of you we’re friends, you are so smart, so, so smart”

Suniti laughed.

MONTH-3

“ I never asked her about the boy. I always wanted to, but I could not, because I did not want her to feel that I doubted her. I chose to keep silent.

       After two months, I had six truckloads of packages in my store. Gradually I grew eager to know what was there. I knew that it was forbidden and I also knew that there were electronic goods in there, still, I had a strong intention open up and see the products. Besides, Suniti and my mother always wanted to know about what kind of business I was doing. I did not want to disobey that man who had given me such an opportunity.

     There was also a telephone in the bungalow. That was always for business purposes. I was not allowed to use that phone except for contacting Mr. Sam. He used to call me sometimes and collected the necessary information for his business from me. That day he called me again,

-“Hello. Sunil speaking.”

-“Hello my boy.”

-“Yes Mr. Sam , what can I do for you?”

-“How’s the business going Sunil?”

-“It’s wonderful, as usual. There are eight trucks full of goods in the store.”

-“Right. Two weeks left for the returning truck to arrive.”

-“Yes sir, that’s right.”

-“Okay. Keep calculating, After this month, I want to talk to you.”

-“About what sir?”

-“About the job, my boy.”

-“Why Sir? Is there anything wrong?”

-“Oh no no no no, Sunil, you are very simple, no there is nothing wrong with your duties, It’s about something else, relax, okay?”

-“Okay sir, thank you sir.”

             He hung up the phone. I started to think what he was talking about? Would there be any change in my duty? Or, would there be any promotion in my post? Well, whatever, all I knew was not to worry, as he had asked me to relax.

             It was afternoon then, after completing my lunch and siesta I dressed up and went out for my evening walk. I changed my evening walk path from the one Suniti used to return, to a road through woods. It was a beautiful path and a very ideal for an evening stroll. I didn’t want to be a cause of such an awkwardness to them. I thought it was enough to understand for her from that speech that I told her that night. It was a narrow path covered with dry leaves falling from the trees on the both sides of the road. So, there was only sound of my feet crushing those dry leaves on the path. The silence was beautiful, periodically broken by the sound of my feet on the dry leaves. After a walk of twenty or thirty minutes I stopped to take some rest and breathe.

But, there was something wrong happening behind me, yes, something that was invisible, something that was following me all through the road, because as soon as I stopped, there was sound of feet and leaves lasting for just a moment later, and I was damn sure that I had not missed that moment.  It was not a fancy, I was sure. I turned back and looked around for a long time, but I could not see anyone or anything. I was afraid thinking that it was some kind of wild animal, because I was inside woods and I had walked a long path and the woods had become deeper. But this narrow path was created by daily walking of human beings and I never heard about any animal in these woods, the woods weren’t dense enough. May be it was a snake! I assumed that and kept on going further. That sound did not come chasing after me anymore. It  was definitely a snake.

                       Suniti returned home a little bit late, no, she did never returned so late after the previous night, but she never returned at regular times too, it was not tough for me to understand what is going on between them.

-“Suniti, I want to talk with you about something”, I could not hold my anger and my will to warn her again to be with a stranger, because I knew she was a very simple girl and she could never make out what a stranger had in mind, anyone could fool her. May be that boy was a really nice guy, may be not. But I had to talk about it.

-“Wh-what vaiya?”

-“Come here.”

                   I pulled her to her room. I did not want my mother to hear all the things that could worry her sick at this age.

-“ Who’s that boy?”

-“What vaiya?”

-“Don’t behave like you don’t know anything. Tell me!”

-“What are you talking about vaiya?”

-“Don’t lie to your own brother. Stupid!”

-“You followed me na?”

-“No dear I didn’t follow you, I saw you with him.”

-“How would you see him if you weren’t following me?”

-“I was on my evening walk. Now don’t question me, answer me!”

-“ He’s my only friend vaiya.”

-“Suniti, couldn’t you find a friend from your own school?”

-“ I don’t have any friend in school. I hardly speak to anyone.”

-“Then how did you get acquainted with him?”

-“ He spoke to me first, and now we are such good friends. Don’t scold me for this, please.”

-“Look Suniti, please try to understand, it is not safe for you-“

-“Please vaiya, my life is boring without that friend. I can’t only study all the time! I need a friend to talk to! Please try to understand vaiya!”

-“Okay, as you wish, I can’t make you realize what I am talking about, may be one day you will know.”

              I came out from her room. I did not want to argue with her any further.

The next day, I took the same path for walking. And this time I took a small bag on my back and kept a bottle of carbolic acid in it, to spare myself from snakebites.

This time I walked for just five minutes, I heard the noise again. I stopped, then it stopped also. But I didn’t turn around, again I started to walk, it started again. Well, now my patience had crossed the last mark of my patience-meter and I turned around quickly without stopping and waiting and quickly brought out the bottle. But something moved away behind the trees. No, it was not an animal and obviously not a snake. It was a human being, he began to run away, I chased him, I didn’t want to lose him because he was following me from the previous day, I wanted to know the cause. He was too slow and it took me a little seconds to catch him. He looked like a mad, he was wearing dirty clothes, clothes were torn at different spots, his hair was grey and rough and tall enough, he was very weak. He looked at me making his eyes bigger and he had a clear fear in his eyes for getting caught by me.

-“Who are you?”

      He didn’t reply. I repeated the question sternly. He remained silent for some time, and then, laughed out loudly. It irritated me to handle such a mad guy, but I had to know why he was following me?

-“Tell me, who are you and why are you following me?”

    He kept his smiling for a while. Then he said just three words,

-“Don’t do this.”

    Then suddenly he gave a jerk and released himself somehow from my grasp and ran away. I had no energy and intention to chase such a mad guy down again. But his words left me astonished. I stood there for a while thinking about what he had said to me.”

Six Months: Episode 2

                                                                THREE

MONTH 1

                     “It was a very beautiful and pleasant day to me.All my dreams seemed to become true.Mr.Sam shows me the place where I will do my job as a part of his business.

                       It was a cabin at a bungalow at the end of the district.He said,“This cabin is yours,this is your office.And guess what?”

I said-“what?”

-“This bungalow is also yours.”

My eyes started shining with joy and obviously greed,but most of all,it was the joy of success,yes,the success of the dream that one day I would keep my mother and sister happy,at least just for a moment.And my work?Well it was very simple,every week an agent of the company delivered me a truck full of products of the company,I had to store them in the storage room beneath my bungalow.Then,after four weaks a truck from the company used to arrive and I have to dispatch the stored products to the truck and it would dispatch those to other some places. My job was to keep the necessary calculations, number of incoming and outgoing products, their prices etcetera. I was a kind of accountant of his business, so, he taught me how to use a calculator and calculate things, as I was not educated enough due to poverty.

           I brought my mother and Suniti to the bungalow.I can’t forget the tears of joy in my mother’s eyes, the sweet happy smile that I would die for to see on my sister’s lips, that smile which was last seen when she was a little child, when she didn’t understand we are below poverty line and the moment when I fought with life to get her admitted to a school, the moment when she passed her 10th standard examination with a brilliant result, but had to leave that smile when she understood she couldn’t study further due to lack of money. But the smile was back again! I was so happy to see my mother crying first time out of joy rather than out of sadness, I was so happy because I became able to fill my mother’s empty stomach  that sacrificed every single grain to reduce the hunger of mine and my sister for a long years.

               It was a remarkable day of my life.

Mr.Sam helped me a lot. He also made arrangements to help Suniti get admitted to a higher secondary school. Finally, all my dreams were suddenly becoming true, but I had never doubted about this sudden change because I was so happy,I was able to deliver the joy of  living  a life to my old mother and my young sister ,the joy that they had never imagined to achieve before, the joy which we all assumed impossible to achieve in our life ever! All our assumptions became false, all the farfetched hopes had become reality! Why would I want to doubt at that stage of my life?

              There were some rules in my job, set by Mr.Sam. The rules were-- first, I should not open the packs of the products fetched by the company to me, second, I had no right to know where the products came from and where would they go. All I knew was there were “electronic goods, be careful” written on the packs. Some of packings had pictures of LCD monitors on it, some had mouse, keyboard, CCTV, digital camera. I had no permission to open those because those products came here in sealed packs and if I would break those seals then it could not be accepted at the electronics stores.

I spent a month by doing the job. I got a healthy salary, Suniti started to going school. My mother was just enjoying the life. Everything was so perfect.”

                                                                     FOUR

Suniti was returning from her school. It was a charming day and she had been going to the school since last five days.

       There was a college just beside the school where Suniti was admitted. Both the school and the college had the same time of ending the study hours. It was quiet natural that at the end of the day there would be a huge line of college boys attempting to gain attentions of those school girls, some of them even got commited to each other. Among those wanna-be lover-boys , there was a boy who was always there beside the road whenever Suniti crossed the road after the study hours ended. After two or three days,his activity of standing regularly beside the road and noticing her caught her eye. Suniti was very shy, she had a very limited friend circle in school. She used to give a shy look to the boy during crossing the road and quickly returned it back before the boy could make out that she is giving him a little attention.

    But that day there was an exception. Suniti was returning from her school in a regular manner and she stood beside the road to wait for the traffic to be cleared so that she could cross the road safely. She always did this on her way home after the school. She crossed the road safely and stood on the other side, now, there was an exception -- she stood and after a terrible effort she looked at the boy and she watched him for a very long time. He had black thick hair, a good-looking face, fair skin, a fit and muscular body (probably due to gym work and regular exercise), a very handsome guy. For the first time,she had noticed someone with such an intense attention and felt attracted. It need not to be mentioned that during all the time she was noticing him, the boy noticed her back, the beauty that no boy could avoid noticing, the addiction that no boy could avoid feeling.

         It was about a couple of minutes that had passed, Suniti was still staring at him. A beauty like her, enthralled by someone else--the boy couldn’t stop himself from approaching her. He crossed the road, came towards her,

-“Hi”

-“H-hi” ,a reply with hesitation from Suniti.

-“I am Ravi, Ravi Kumar.”

-“Oh, I am Suniti Ray.”

-”What are you studying now?”

-“I am studying arts, I am at class 11 now.”

-“That’s great, I am studying in the first year, do you live near?”

-“Yes, it’s a 30 minutes’ walk from here”, she pointed her finger towards the direction.

-“Oh that’s great, that’s also my way to return home, let me accompany you, if you don’t mind please.

-“Yeah sure”, she replied.

          They started to walk the road together.

MONTH 2

“A month passed. In one month, four trucks full of goods came to me, I kept those and necessary calculations, and at the end of the month I gave some of the goods to another truck. So, at the end of the month, there were three trucks full of goods at the store and one truck full of goods returned, it was easy to calculate.

          Every day of mine had the same routine. I woke up late, then I had tea, after that, keeping calculations, eating lunch, getting a siesta, an evening walk. My sister used to return at the afternoon, so after the evening walk, I returned home, gossipped with her and helped her  study.Sometimes the routine at noon changed because of arrival of goods and the routine after dinner when goods had to be returned. Yes, goods were supplied at noon, after 3 pm and the truck arriving after four weeks would receive goods after 10 pm. This was my routine during those greatest days of joy.

           Now,I am talking about a day on which an exception occurred. I returned from my evening walk hoping to see my sister, but I found her to be absent. I checked her room -- no she was not there. I asked mother if she had returned home, she replied in negative. I worried about my only sister.

           She returned very late in the evening. I asked her gently, controlling my anger at her irregularity, “what happened, Sunita?”

-“Nothing much, vaiya”

-“Nothing much? You returned home so late, and you say it’s nothing much?”

-“I am so sorry that I’ve returned home so late, actually there were assignments to be submitted, so I, along with some of my friends, were doing them. It took so much time to prepare and complete the work totally that I could not follow the time, I am so sorry vaiya! Please forgive me, please, please, please.”

                    I could not get angry after such a sweet, childish apology. My anger subsided and I smiled. I could never be angry with her actions, because she was everything to me, the reason I took the job, the cause of my wish to live on, the cause of my pursuit of happiness -- all were she and I loved her so much.

                     Well, I thought such an exception was possible; after all it was because of her school that she was late. So, the exception ended there, actually, I had thought so.

                     But I was wrong.

        After that day I shifted my walking route to the road which is on her way home. It was around 5 pm, I was walking along the road enjoying the fresh air coming from the woods beside the road, the sky was cloudy too, as a whole, it was a weather to enjoy the soothing  feeling of wind and nature. But that wonderful feeling did not continue long. Soon it was transformed into an itchiness in my mind, because what I saw afterwards was not soothing enough. There were two persons walking towards me, a boy and a girl. I didn’t know the boy, but the girl ,well, the girl was my sister!

        I was just stunned to see them together, obviously I would not be stunned if it was a school boy, but he was not wearing a school dress and he didn’t look like a school boy at all. So, here is my sister with an unknown boy who is not from her school, there were enough reasons to me to concerned. But I couldn’t stop them, I didn’t want to. As soon as I saw them, I hid myself in the woods beside the road and kept my eyes on them. They were so happy and busy gossipping, they both looked shy whenever they were making an eye contact and sometimes they were giggling. It was very clear to me to what the two teenagers were up to. I left them, I did not want to run behind them like a spy. I decided to return home.

       That day she returned home late, again, like the previous day. I asked the same question she replied as she did before. I was ready to get the same answer, that’s why I had asked her the same question. I did not know what to say, it shocked me that my sister had started to lie. It hurt me so much,the person for whose happiness I was struggling with my life had started to lie to me. This was very, very unexpected.

   That night, during studying, I told her, “Suniti,you are growing up now, you will have to interact with strangers, you have to struggle to live, struggle with the nature of those people, their actions unto you. I only want to say, don’t trust a stranger so easily, whatever his or her behaviour is, it may be polite, very good, very bad, but you will believe them only when you have reason to, when you know them fully. Also, keep in mind one more word -- never disobey this in any situation.” I became silent for a while.

-“What is it vaiya?”

I looked at her, smiled with pain in my heart and said,

-“Don’t betray or lie to dear ones who have always thought for you and live their lives just for you.”

I planted an affectionate kiss on her forehead,

-“Goodnight vaiya”, she said.

I looked back at her, smiled again and said,

-“Goodnight sweetheart.”  ”

Six Months (1st Instalment)

--“Who are you?”

-- “What? Where am I?”

--“That’s not the answer of my question.”

--“I can’t understand, how am I brought……”

--“Just answer my question, I don’t have so much patience”

--“I am Ravi Kumar…”

--“Good, Shyam. You got the right person.”

 

Chapter One

Sunil works as a daily labour.  He has to bear bricks and cement bags to the building construction site from the dump. He used to work in a machine factory, earned a salary good enough to run a family of three. But days changed. Things became more difficult for him, ever since a machine took away two fingers from his right arm, leaving him unfit for operating machines. Well, he doesn’t want to look back now. Somehow he manages to run a three wheeler van with absence of two fingers.

            Sunil has a family of three -- he, his fifty years old mother suffering from paralysis and sister Suniti. She’s a teen, to be eighteen this year. ”Beauty” feels proud if it is spelled to describe her -- her eyes are ebony black; eyebrows are thin, perfectly shaped; she possesses a sharp nose, beautiful lips ready to be kissed gently. Her cheeks, hands, face, figure everything spoke of elegance, not perfect, but the natural beauty in her is enough to make a boy  give attention to her when she's in front of him and make him think ,”shit man! Am I never gonna see her again?”

            Sunil has also a temporary job to do, his right arm without two fingers doesn’t permit him to run a van full of bricks for a long time. Hence sometimes he has to take a break from his daily duties and then his only companion to help him earn is begging. Yes, begging is his “temporary job”. It doesn’t help him to earn a satisfactory amount, but he has to do it to fed his mother, at least his beautiful sister.

--“Sir,help me. Some rupees, please”, begs Sunil.

--“Just get away, bastard!”,shouts the “gentleman” being annoyed.

It hurts Sunil’s self-respect. He was a fit worker, now he has nothing just because he has lost his  fingers which is not even his fault. Though he begs, he believes that he doesn’t deserve this. Thus, his self-respect got struck with the arrogant behaviour of the man. He always had to quarrel with different people showing themhis attitude. Today was not an exception.

-“Excuse me Sir, if you don’t want to help then say it easily, but don’t behave like that…”

-“How dare you!”

-“Sorry sir, but I asked you gently, It’s okay you can’t but it is not the right way to…”

-“Just shut up you stupid! Look at you, what are you? A beggar! How dare you to talk to me like that?”

-“Sir, this is my job to earn food, money, you can’t bring disgrace on me just like that.”

-“Oh! Job? So what is your job? The great begging?”, he told in a humiliating tone.

-“Look sir, I can do anything for living for the sake of my family”.

The man looked at him, being silent for few seconds, he asked him in a low tone--

-“Really? You can do anything for living?”

-“For the sake of my family, yes I can.”

-“You want a job?”

-“What? Are you joking with me?”

-“No, absolutely not, I really have a vacant post for one of my business.”

-“What’s that?”

-“I will tell you later. Just say do you want this job?”

-“Surely,  Sir!”

   The man keeps a slight smile at the corner of his lips and said,

-“Then you’re in.”

 

CHAPTER TWO

6 months later…

-- “Esplanade, Park Street -- two murders, both brutal. Caught because of evidences -- no evidence was hidden by him. I haven’t seen such a stupid murderer in my police career.”

-“I’m not stupid.”

-“You shut up!”

-“No I won’t. I absolutely did the right thing, there’s no feeling of guilty in me.”

-“Are you insane? You killed one renowned businessman with a gun and pierced a knife into the brain of his assistant and you are just saying you aren’t feeling guilty?”

-“I do what they deserved.”

-“God, you are a fucking psycho!”

-“Everyone assumes that, no one wants to hear the real story, the whole society is corrupted.”

-“Look, stop talking, I have important work to do rather than enlightening myself with your great knowledge of fucking corruption.”

-“As I said, no one wants to hear.”

-“Ah, Mr.Bakshi! Come, come, please take your seat, Sir.”

The inspector welcomes, ignoring the statement made by the accused, Mr.Bakshi, the best criminal lawyer in Kolkata. The inspector says again,

-“So you are the lawyer of the accused.”

-“Yes.”

-“Sir, he just murdered two men and left all the evidence around, everybody knows that. How are you going to win the case? He’s a murderer and it is decided.”

 Mr.Bakshi smiles slightly. ”Let me have a chat with my client, please.”

-“Sure, Sir, this way. Vikram?”

-“Yes, Sir?”, answered Vikram, the sub-inspector.

-“Lead Mr.Bakshi to him.”

-“Sure, Sir.”

Vikram led Mr.Bakshi to the accused.

-“Hello Sunil.”

-“Hello Mr. ?”

-“Bakshi.”

-“Yes, how can I help you?”

-“I want something from you.”

-“Me? Huh! What can I give you sir? I’m a murderer!”

-“I want that thing that you always wanted to give but nobody cared.”

-“Wha-what are you talking about? What do you want?”

-“Your story.”

-“You want my story!”

-“Yes Sunil, I want to have your story, please.”

 To be continued..