2S
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Archive for fiction
December 3, 2007 at 9:48 pm · Filed under fiction
The first few days of the month always see the longest queues at the teller. Understandably. Breadwinners, after all that work, line up outside the ATM, each one running the same question through their minds. It doesn’t matter what your CTC is, how many people you support, where you live, what rent you pay, or if your vehicle runs on diesel or space-fuel.
Everyone in that queue have the same question. How much? The answer decides what enters the pocket.
The first withdrawal of the month pinches you. Always. After sweating bullets at the workplace, and earning your reward, it takes a heart and a half to walk up to that miserly box of steel and pull funds out of your account. Of course, you’re usually forced to it. Rents. Bills. Medicines. The cable guy. The milkman. The maid. A cousin in need. An uncle departing on a pilgrimage. Something, somehow, someone and somewhere almost always shows up with the need to eat out of your hard-earned money.
Thank goodness for mobiles. Long queues could get boring, and we’re lucky to have the cellphone double up as a means of infotainment. As the queue slugs forward, everyone in there are up to something, fingering their phones. The ones at the far end of the queue are usually playing a game, or checking out a movie review on GPRS. As you move closer to the entrance, people are texting their loved ones, or in some cases, the home ministry to figure out exactly how much dough is needed that evening. The folks on the threshold of their shot at the machine constantly switch focus from the clock on the cellphone to the guard, and then, to the door. The door itself is opaque, except for a little bit of a transparent portion, through which the frontliners burn their gaze.
The atmosphere gets volatile soon enough. Machines sometimes dispense only hundred-rupee notes, and the limit is forty at a time. This could lead to an extended waiting period which, in a fast city like Bangalore and a restless race like the Bangaloreans, doesn’t go down too well with the tech-savvy masses.
On luckier days, the machine dispenses hundred-rupee notes as well as thousand-rupee notes. But there are a few people in this world who will never be satisfied in life. The guard had to face the wrath of one such stubborn brat.
‘Why doesn’t this machine dispense five hundred rupee notes?!’
‘I don’t know, sir.’
‘What do you mean you don’t know? Aren’t you the guard here?’
He thought about it, and came up with a logical explanation.
‘Sir, in this area, only the rich reside. They have no use for five hundred rupee notes sir.’
The guard, at this moment, is busy aligning the queue. It’s like that rough draft in Microsoft Word with arbitrary spaces that doesn’t really need an alignment, but is a constant source of irritation, an itch, when left the way it is. I finally get my turn. I walk in, and in an uncomplicated manner use the fast withdrawal option. As my hard work vanishes electronically, making its appearance through the flat, thin, metallic cavity in the machine, I pull the notes out and shoot a look at the last line of the receipt that just printed itself out. I curse and crumple the slip before chucking it into the bin and heading out of the cube.
The queue is now longer. Same question, though. I manage a smile.
On the way back home, I have the option of picking between two routes. One is well-lit, a ‘link’ road, home to slums, strays and a pungent mixture of cow dung and human urine in a field. The other is darker, and hosts more drunkards than you would find outside Purple Haze on Saturday night. With a bad cold, I had made the choice: the link road any day.
The slums are, contrary to popular belief, very organized. It’s absolute chaos within, but there’s a method to the madness. The one I walk through, for instance, has a person they refer to as ‘anna’, which translates to ‘big brother’ in Kannada. Anna manages everything operational in the slum, including rations, logistics and scheduling the consumption of utilities.
While I step aside and hop on to the sidewalk, a tempo comes spluttering in. Anna walks out and whistles. Thrice.
Whistle, whistle. Pause. Whistle. Three sounds, when timed accurately, suggest that the week’s supplies have arrived. Anna was here, and he brought with him the grocery.
A call for the hungry. For the starved. Like water seeping through the cracks of earth, they rushed in from every corner of the slum. Children, carrying steel tumblers. Women, with jute bags. Some men too, although more relaxed. It isn’t a queue, but a huddle around a tempo that catered more to survival than mere hunger.
Ironically, everyone in that huddle too have the same question. Only this time, the answer decides what enters the stomach.
December 2, 2007 at 9:36 am · Filed under cricket, fiction
Harsha Bhogle: So, down we go to Ian Chappell who’s at the presentation
Chappell: Thank you Harsha and we’ve seen an engrossing game here today. I have with me on the dias the Maharaja and Brig. Gen. Peters. First, the losing captain, Captain Russell.
(applause)
Chappell: Nearly got through, eh mate?
Russell: Yes we did, we batted well and put up a good score, and I thought the boys fielded well but the villagers sneaked through somehow. Credit must go to that bastard Bhuvan though for seeing his team through.
Chappell: Where did you think you lost the match?
Russell: We didn’t read Kachra well, to be honest, and he was getting good turn off the track. There was hardly any variable bounce so we ought to have played more horizontal bat shots.
Chappell: So, where do you go from this?
Russell: To my sister’s bedroom and fuck the bitch. (laughs). No, really, we need to work on our game, we have a tough tour coming up against the Madras Sappers in a few months.
Chappell: All the best, don’t forget to collect your cheque.
(applause)
Chappell: And the winning captain, Bhuvan!
Bhuvan: (in Hindi) shukriya sarkaar, maaf karna, hame angrejji nahin aati hai …
Chappell: Never mind Bhu, so, a good win eh?
Bhuvan: jee, aur upar waale ke diya se hum match jeetgaye … Gauri bhi khush hai
Chappell: A good batting track?
Bhuvan: jee, aur upar waale ke diya se hum match jeetgaye … Gauri bhi khush hai
Chappell: And I think you got good support from the crowd as well.
Bhuvan: jee, aur upar waale ke diya se hum match jeetgaye … Gauri bhi khush hai
Chappell: Where do you go from here?
Bhuvan: jee, pehle hum apni maa ke paas jaayenge, phir devi maa ko prasaad chadayenge, phir hum vapas apne gaaon chalejaayenge pehle ki thara
Chappell: Well all the best, thank you, and that’s it from here, it’s back to you Harsha.
Harsha Bhogle: Right, so there you go, and we’ll be back after the break as Sunny shares his thoughts on how Bhuvan’s team will adapt to T20. Stay with us, don’t go away.
November 27, 2007 at 7:22 pm · Filed under fiction
I walked out of the multiplex into the INOX parking lot, and looking around, I counted three cars. It was well past 2.00 am and, personally, I really enjoyed Johnny Gaddar. Well, to be honest, I enjoyed the whole cinema experience that night, considering it was a true test of my will power - I was dating this drop-dead gorgeous chick I bumped into while at Calangute and the animal in me lost out to the movie-buff that I was. No mushu. Unlike many couples in the theater, we ended up watching the movie.
Besides, I had just gotten off the phone with who I think is my ex. I’m not sure if she counts as an ex anymore. We haven’t broken up although we never really went out either. But try as you may, I can’t be friends with a girl I’m in love with. No freaking way. Ask me to blow the JD(S) supremo instead. The problem was me. Mea culpa, as always. Luckily or unluckily, I had this other one-night-buddy for company tonight, and her idea of a date was a movie in INOX Panjim. Sigh. Whatever made her happy.
But she didn’t like the flick. She probably didn’t get it. I’ve always maintained that most single women are blessed with either beauty or brains. If they had both, they wouldn’t be single, you see? Which brings me to another of my increasingly growing number of fetishes.
Older women. Sometimes, married women too.
I’m just being honest - I somehow can’t get my mind around single women for too long. And while I’m no Daniel Craig unless he gives up gymming for a year and lives off Pizza Hut, allow me to quote a scene from Casino Royale:
Vesper Lynd: am I going to have a problem with you, Bond?
James Bond: No, don’t worry. You’re not my type.
Vesper Lynd: Smart?
James Bond: (shaking his head) Single.
I got into the black Santro I had rented, while the other two cars were still in the parking lot. One of them was standing still. The other, most certainly, wasn’t. Apparently, Johnny wasn’t long enough (the movie, I mean) for that bit of the Animal Kingdom to benchmark their reproductory capabilities. I was humming the title melody oh-so-softly. Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy aren’t just musicians - they’re the pied pipers of Indian music - and yours truly is just another music-maniac rodent succumbing to their beckoning. I invited her inside, and, with the belts safely strapped and the car in motion, I asked her what she wanted to do. Very, er, gentlemanlike, if you may. Which was very unlike me.
It is only apt that, at this stage, I must remind you that this was a civilized catch. Very unlike ‘my’ type, which includes the unsophisticated ones who wouldn’t mind spending the night out at the airport having a six-buck mallu chai. Six bucks I have, a six-pack I don’t - and as beggars can’t be choosers - I simply make do with whatever comes my way. This one, however, was different. She was fussy, she had long fingers which only accentuated the importance of nail-polish to womenfolk, she never left the vehicle without spending a lifetime adjusting her face (although that is some face, I tell you), and she was totally brand-conscious. Well, so am I, but atleast you’d find desi Provogue all over me, and all inside me (or, inside my wardrobe, to be precise). This one was a Levi’s freak, and maybe a Benetton loyalist as well, and everything she wore was as firang as it gets.
Personally, I didn’t care. The lesser the better, if you ask me. As I sped south with a midnight Miramar breeze caressing my cheeks, I nurtured this part-sexual part-occidental desire to lose the clothes that guarded her lovely frame. I thought about what might happen tonight. I wasn’t sure. She was a bomb, but she was as boring as she was beautiful. It was awkward. The kind of girl you don’t want, but can’t takes your eyes off.
That she would spend the night with me was a taken. That she would sleep with me, wasn’t. I needed to figure it out somehow. Like every other guy, I’m blessed between my legs with an itch too. Besides, sex is as addictive - if not more - as smoking or boozing. Add that to the fact that she was sitting adjacent, in the navigator’s seat, although she wasn’t much of a navigator herself. Honestly, her sense of direction was as accurate as Jack Sparrow’s compass. She had gotten rid of the footwear, and a good thing too. Those were lovely feet. A bit of a tan from her stay at Baga, I guessed. The pair of denims that enveloped her legs was probably a bootcut, hugging her hips firmly. She wore a white strappy top, the neck as deep as the Atlantic’s bed, and if the idea behind the shirt was to conceal anything, it failed miserably. The lips were still wet with gloss - cherry, to be precise, as I luckily found out later - although they were slightly marred with a tinge of darkness.
‘She does nicotine’, I heard myself saying, trying hard not to recall that scene from Desperado. I don’t particularly like the idea of getting a smoke smooch from a Zamira. I looked at her again. She wouldn’t, would she?
I was clocking 110kph now, and the Santro started to wobble on the road, like jelly on cheesecake. I didn’t bother braking, instead, I continued accelerating until she - the car - started screaming for mercy. Babe adjacent was uninterested.
This was the moment, though. If she refused me now, I might’ve gotten us killed. I don’t know if she knew it or not. But, honestly, that was a lame way of landing a girl for the night, don’t you think? It was all too complicated, and being the simple guy that I am, I brought the vehicle to a halt and asked her the easy way. My style.
‘I need to tell you something.’
‘Yeah?’
‘You’re beautiful.’
A smile. Was it out of pity? Honour? Self-praise? Whatever. She just smiled, wihout saying anything. I had to do the talking, for sure, otherwise the only sex I’d get that night was from a stray mongrel on the sidewalk. And I don’t do dogs, hadn’t reached that state of desperation yet.
‘Honestly, you look seriously hot today. I can’t get my eyes off you.’
Another smile. I started to wonder if she was losing her ability to speak. Mute-sex isn’t my idea of pleasure. It isn’t attractive, is it?
‘Can I get a kiss?’
She looked at me, probably wondering what had gotten into me. True, I mean, what had gotten into me? A kiss? What? Where? When? How? Why did I ask? Did I really want to? Of course not. I looked back at her. This was the moment.
This girl, I figured, she can’t kiss for nuts. No authority, no seduction. Just skin-contact, and the only take-home from that smooch, or smoochlet, if I may, was the aftertaste of cherry. I love fruit.
‘Back to the hotel then?’
‘Yes.’
This was it. This was the moment I’d been waiting for. It was now or never. I asked her.
‘we are gamperilonger hotel, imbomburanchu single bed, howprunkanivongal sleep fawghrealsy night?’
Gibberish. What the fuck? I tried again.
‘You don’t mind sharing the bed with me, do you?’
A giggle. Atleast, she evolved from her mysterious smile. ‘No.’
‘I can’t promise I’d keep my hands to myself though.’
‘Why not?’
‘You know why.’
‘No I don’t.’
When girls go into this play-dumb mode, you got to be wary. Luckily, I was there before, so I knew how to play this one.
‘Ah, no worries. You’ll find out soon enough.’
Curiosity killed the cat, but it absolutely murders the pussy. Women just can’t NOT know a half-fact. She nudged, poked and even scratched at me all throughout the journey back to the hotel, but I wouldn’t give in. She was dumb - yes - but not that dumb.
We entered the room, and she fell plop on the bed immediately, stretching her arms out and stifling a yawn. Like, she’d been waiting to sleep all day. By herself, of course. I asked her to make way for me too, unless she expected me to sleep on the floor. She promptly moved across. I then did the stupidest thing I’ve ever done in my life.
I asked her. My style. Straightforward, and very, very lame.
‘I want to have sex with you.’
‘You what?’
‘Listen, don’t be playin’ dumb. You know it, doncha? Lookit you. Lookit me. I can’t do this anymore. Now, will I be getting somethin’ tonight, or am I not?’, in the best black accent I could come up with, sounding like a 15-year old Chris Tucker trying to land the black women in the audience. Half-invite. Half-request. Total hunger.
She made a weird face, a cross between a frown and an teacher’s inquiring gaze, before she spoke. And she spoke slowly.
‘You said I will find out tonight.’
That was my cue. Was that my cue? It was, I guess so. I rummaged through the drawer. She was surprised to see that I had stacked protection in it last night.
‘So you planned this all along? You’re a naughty kid.’
Kid. She called me a (grimace) kid. I wanted to retaliate with a ‘fuckin’ granny’ or two. She was just twenty-nine. Five years is negligible, one would think.
Anyway, I didn’t need an invitation anymore. Got into the bed, and after she helped undress me (and herself, I guess), got into her as well. Granny wasn’t into foreplay. And I wasn’t into sex. It showed.
‘You suck at this.’
‘I know.’
‘But you aren’t virgin.’
It was a question. Was it a question? It was. Anyway, I assumed it was.
‘Find out yourself’, I managed to mumble, as I frantically kissed every bit of her face - and the rest of her - as if I would run out of kisses that night. My eyes were wide open but I wasn’t looking anywhere.
I was surveying a territory unknown to me. The terrain was smooth, and while I ran myself through it, I figured out where and how it rose and fell. I had no clue where I was going, or what I was doing. For all you know, I was probably driving through the wrong lane, making the wrong turns and probably even halting arbitrarily. I was like this unpredictable rickshaw, murdering the streets, getting into places I shouldn’t be, going either too slow or too fast. I’m trying to figure out the right word to describe what I was doing. I can’t, so I’ll make it up.
Explofuckingration. Erratic and erotic.
Five minutes into it and she realized two things. Firstly, this wasn’t an opening innings. I had played a knock or two before, and it was evident that I wasn’t seasoned yet. Secondly, she figured out that she’d have to help me out if anything had to happen. Maybe she was a navigator after all. Her touch improved things a bit. In fact, a lot.
It - the experience - was awesome, and so was she, and when the moment of fulfillment arrived, a sigh of contentment left my lips. She, however, was more vocal. It was some relief though. Excruciatingly fun while it lasted. What was that song again? Pain and pleasure?
‘This has been the best night I’ve ever had’, I lied to her.
‘Never mind’, she snapped back.
What the …? What was that? What went wrong? I just had to find out what suddenly happened. Maybe it was me. Maybe I used her or something. Maybe I wasn’t good enough. Yeah, that must be it. I apologized, this time meaning and measuring every word I said.
‘I’m sorry. I know I wasn’t good.’
‘No, it’s not that.’
‘Then?’.
Silence. Pin - drop - silence. So much so, that I could hear the both of us breathing. And maybe the folks in the other room too.
‘Sam, tell me something honestly.’
‘What?’. My heart was beating now as if I was in the middle of an EAI interview and someone was going to ask me the exact latency value of RV 5.4.
‘Why did you fuck me if you love someone else?’
Love? What? Where did that come from? On second thoughts, I’d rather she asked me about the latency. Atleast I could make something up. Here, I was, defenseless, a Karna struggling with the screwed wheel of his chariot. No response to the fatal arrow flying in.
‘I couldn’t resist. You’re fucking gorgeous. I’m ugly and starved. I don’t land too many women, you know.’
‘I hate this about you.’
‘What?’
‘You’re outrageously honest.’
‘Would you rather I be dishonest?’
‘No.’
Then, as an afterthought, ‘yeah, sometimes.’
‘Okay. Here you go. I love you.’
‘G’night Sam.’
Finality. Finito. What the hell? And why was I suddenly trying to befriend her more than ever?
‘This is it?’
She draped the quilt over her glorious body, still clad in lingerie. For a moment, I was wondering if I should suggest that it made more sense to get the clothes on and lose the quilt. Not worth it. Life’s a lot easier when you don’t argue with a woman. I slipped into my regular-fits and slept beside her, looking at her, as she was lying looking the other way. Once in bed, I usually sleep in no time. That night was no different. I thought I was dozing off when she turned to look at me, and she smiled. Those lovely, luscious inviting lips. I wasn’t getting hard again, though. I’m not a camel, you see. I simply grinned back, reciprocating her killer smile with my boring one.
‘I’ll tell you a secret, Sam.’
I was all ears.
‘When you smile, but you mean it for someone else, it hurts the most.’
Christ. That is so true. I thought about the other girl. How many times has she smiled at me, although it wasn’t meant for me? I thought about the ‘ex’. I thought about the girl I just made love to, albeit loveless. I thought about myself, a meandering dot in the middle of this complex three-dimensional structure of two L-boards, love and lust. The lust bit, fortunately or unfortunately, was over.
And they say, love makes the world go round.
It sure does, in damned circles of nothingness.
October 31, 2007 at 2:15 pm · Filed under fiction
The bottle fell to meet the sound of shattering glass on the destined chunk of tar. She had her head in her hands. Tears rolled down her cheeks onto the road, as she saw him walk away.
- - -
He glanced at the digital clock on the Xplod. 23:57. The dazed pair of eyes focused back on the road, or atleast attempted to. His fingers had lost both, the warmth and the grip. It was as if dead, insensitive skin rested on a circular mould covered in leather. The wheel itself swayed from left to right, very pendulum-like. He was quickly losing control over its movement, yet the feet rarely left the accelerator. The alcohol was taking full effect, as J’s sunken eyes continued to flicker.
‘Fucking bitch’, he heard himself saying, as he gulped down another mouthful of the cursed scotch.
As he approached the railway bridge, he tapped the brake. The Corsa slowed down, momentarily, before the right limb arbitrarily pressed itself against the pedal. 40kph. Now 50kph. He turned through the narrow path under the bridge, not attempting to slow down in any manner, as the screeching sound of pre-fatality filled the neighborhood. Like a furious meander of a deathly stream, he twisted and turned the vehicle around the narrow paths before entering the slums.
The eyes flickered again, trying to stay open, like a lamp struggling on its last drop of oil. But as he sped forward, the liquor emerged victorious. For one fleeting instant the eyes were shut in deep thought and regret - in submission to the might of intoxication. It was as if time refused to tick forward - a void - a sudden enigmatic emptiness of silence.
The old woman.
It happened instantaneously. It was painless. She hardly suffered a moment of pain. It was over in a moment. He hit the brakes as a reflex reaction, and the metal wagon of murder came to a halt just outside her hut. Her corpse came flying down to meet him, landing on the bonnet. The abrupt thud, an omen of finality. Fatality. The soul had entered the after-life.
His eyes were shielded from the sight before him by the trembling fingers and a palm that had broken into cold sweat. They had regained their grip as a result of fear more than sobriety. He slowly moved them away, until they covered the face no more, although the eyes were still shut. He slowly opened them.
The corpse looked back at him, in the eye. The body was lifeless, there was blood all over but not a hint of agony, and he could still hear her screaming. From the windscreen, she was still looking at her assassin, an inquiring look stuck on the stiff face.
- - -
She was now sprinting, but she was late. He was taken. Handcuffed, he looked at her rushing to meet him. He shrugged his shoulders. It was too late. Everything was too late. He still yearned for the drink, and tried to reach it. The officer intervened, as the assassin writhed in anger. But the law-enforcers had seen enough. The seargant walked to the pavement and picked it up. With one last look of disgust at the scotch, he chucked it.
The bottle fell to meet the sound of shattering glass on the destined chunk of tar. She had her head in her hands. Tears rolled down her cheeks onto the road, as she saw him walk away.
October 25, 2007 at 2:39 am · Filed under fiction
At seventy-three, Manjunath’s index finger was incredibly still, as he extended it to pat his charioteer. The touch was both firm and gentle - and mysteriously, the muddy fingernail communicated his intent to pull over. The rickshaw came to a halt at the sidewalk, as the veteran courier climbed out with caution, carrying the watertight bag over his shoulder. The smell of the fresh monsoon leftovers greeted him, bringing a dry smile to his exhausted face, while he rummaged through his pockets for change. It was horribly dark, and with the power out, the only light came from a divine source reflecting the full face of the moon.
Nazeer Pasha was far from honest. The khaki-clad driver lit a matchstick near the meter to read the fare, and doubled it.
“Saab, Chaalis”
It was way too dark, and Manjunath couldn’t read his lips, although he sensed the speech. Moving a step sideways to allow the light into the rickshaw and its driver’s face, he asked his charioteer to repeat the last words.
“Chaalis”.
The deaf undertaker paid the fare and walked towards the lake. Tonight was a one-man show, and he had only the corpse for company.
- - -
He was no ordinary cop. Thirty years in the service brought his aim to near-supernatural accuracy, and any criminal who offered the question was either silenced or rendered incapable of doubt. A recent promotion landed him in the Office for Counter-terrorism, an ad-hoc initiative setup by the district authorities to expose potential terrorism within urban Bangalore. Raman’s recruitment was hyped by the media to the extreme, although it was an obvious choice. His name was synonymous with the highest level of ruthlessness that the city had to offer, and it wasn’t always about the kill, but about his presence and visibility, even on Page 3. The force came under heavy criticism, but made deep inroads into the dormant underworld, a proactive step to combat crime. As Director at OCT, many felt that Raman’s encounters were a thing of the past.
What they didn’t know, of course, was that he still gave the bullet to organized crime in the city. Madhusudan Raman had merely switched focus, not roles. A bureaucrat by day, a freelance sniper by night.
- - -
Manjunath had grown up in the area, he’d been at the heart of the action all the way through the Cantonment’s rise and fall. He’d seen the Union Jack replaced with the tri-color that made him swell with pride, and with times changing, his versatility at handling funerals only increased. Now past his best years, Manjunath had retired to die a peaceful, natural death, until his latest ‘employer’ introduced him to opportunity, a job that he could have as long as he evaded fatality. It wasn’t legal, it wasn’t easy, and it had tremendous risk attached to it, but it offered his fragile frame a means of living. It was livelihood, a way of life that didn’t require his lost capability of hearing. He had nodded his head frantically at the proposition, his palms folded in gratitude, as the employer remunerated him with half the value for the job.
Today was his last job for the employer, but the confidence and enthusiasm had peaked as it always had, and he got around to working on the corpse like clockwork, fantasizing of the other half of the pay-packet that waited at the end of his task.
- - -
He knew his way into the premises, an opening through the fence that guarded the lazy lake from the busy roads. Mustering up the strength, he threw the bag ahead and climbed over the parapet, coming face to face with the huge cemetery that lay ahead. The graveyard itself was unique - it had many graves but never needed diggers. It accommodated over hundreds of the dead, yet it always seemed empty, ready to conceal more corpses under its skin. A dump of bodies in the heart of the city, yet it remained invisible to almost everyone, except for one single soul - the undertaker responsible for setting up this burial ground - a world of souls, suspended and submerged underwater, a mortuary better known to the city as the Ulsoor Lake.
Manjunath gave one last look at the watertight sleeping bag, and a sadistic smile followed. He never regretted that today would be his last task ever.
- - -
Raman’s freelance assignments had one issue - disposal. Police encounters were a different ball-game, but private killings required a lot of physical effort to hide the body in a safe place. With the real-estate boom, practically every little land worthy of occupation was used up, and that left the sniper with few areas to lose his kill.
Until he recalled Manjunath, who came up with the idea of turning the city’s most popular waterbody into a necropolis.
“The lake, sir. In the whole wide universe, no one would have thought of this.”
Raman had his doubts, but he also trusted the aged transporter - a veteran of many corpses. However, it was with a touch of reluctance that the cop agreed to the idea.
But it worked wonders.
It was absolutely impossible to imagine where these bodies would be lost. Every week, people from the city would arbitrarily vanish without a trace, and the body would never be recovered. Manjunath would seal the corpse in a watertight case to prevent human rot from contaminating the lake. And the space underwater was immense - it would last them a lifetime. The plan had worked well - flawless - until last week.
Tears rolled down the old man’s face as he sealed the most recent corpse in the fiery orange case. He couldn’t lift the body anymore, but the weight of the dead wasn’t the concern. It was the weight of feelings that had grasped him, on first encountering the dead body of his only son, and then sealing him with the same fate as the rest of Bangalore’s crime community. He refused to believe that Harish would’ve ever gone against the law - and when he questioned Raman about it a few weeks after the dust settled, the latter’s reply shocked him.
“When you’re hunting, many stray animals get killed.”
“Did you know?”
“What?”
Manjunath looked at the floor, as his hands went to the pockets.
“He was my only son.”
“Harish? Oh my God, I’m so ” -
But the apology never made it to the lips. He still held the knife in his hands, although they were stained with blood. The cop’s body fell flat on its back, the face frozen in fright as it was during it’s final moment before mortality. A mixture of saliva and blood trickled out of the mouth that was wide open, as it flowed through the cheeks till it reached the cement tiles at the Raman residence. Manjunath had brought the bag with him, and quickly got to work, not noticing that the fallen cop clenched his fist, the final movement that Madhusudan Raman made before being sealed to his fate.
- - -
The night had reached its core, and life around the lake was as still as the water itself. Manjunath guided the wooden raft strategically to a point where he’d made lesser dumps - this was a body that required isolation. He pushed it as it fell into the lifeless water, sinking down waywardly until it hit the lake’s bed. The latest bag to enter the huge pond, but it was unique from all the other corpses in its vicinity. One single factor separated it from the rest of the bodies submerged in the Ulsoor lake.
The body within that case still had life.
It has been one week since. Raman continues to attempt an escape from mortality, in vain.
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