The Felling

THE FELLING

The headlights of my car blinked wildly in the middle of a foggy night and I thought my head couldn’t bear it anymore. The thoughts were quicker than the blood that rushed down my palms and temple. The attempt to patch up things was suicidal. The process to wrap up endless arguments was fatal. And here I was, bleeding from head to toe due to the accidental crash of my car against an advertisement board. I could perfectly make out the smirk on the face of the ad that said, ‘You made me … but I destroyed you.’

Last hour I was happy, drinking away to everyone’s health. I bore every obstacle in my way and paved my eternal fame all these 26 years. I drove every lane that said you can’t drive around here. I made sure the lights of my headlights reach out to every minute object entrapped in a foggy night like this. Yet today I stand as a failure – to all those people who trusted me and to all those pure feelings that completed me. I became the greatest fall of man after the fictitious Adam and his eternally faithful Eve. As I push my hands hard against the gear, trying to pull it off in a reverse …. My burning thoughts become clear, powerful and they come back in a reverse of some inflicted reverie.

I had a wonderful childhood with friends and pests all over, a motherless and a bleak youth and an eternity of pain in my professional days. My dreams would give way to strange versions of my mother’s accidental death until I wake up and go for my college. My days would snap by in the hunt of the truest realization of the recurring dream. And I would take refuge around a stupid friend’s original version of being in pain for lifetime, or by simply eating away roadside munchies every now and then.

Not forgetting, I underwent what scholars of love in today’s age say as bad communication …. Resulting in a historic fallout. Twelve years of juvenile love and the sudden entry of a prodigious woman who took my dreams and broke it against the floor and later showing deceiving eyes of false innocence beneath. Satan allured me to taste the fruit of the forbidden tree when I just thought my girl wasn’t much of a comfort and an advisor to me. The omen bore the signs of a charming girl and allured me everyday to listen to the chirps of a daydreaming mockery of domestic hardships. And the fool in me fell deeper and deeper for the chaos to occur.

Mother told me Jenny wasn’t using me like people often do it to themselves and that she would come to me when the time was right. But me the fool thought it was right for me to steer my own ship since she wasn’t here helping me and already became an angel to the coward we call God. Jenny waited for me but I already had fallen prey to that black widow spider. The teeth of gluttony took me inside along with the other 3-4 guys who went inside in search of salvation but never came out. My eyes were as blinding bold as are the headlights of my car today. And my heart would bleed inside the same way as I am dripping today. But I falsified the pain by thinking who cares, I would heal myself tomorrow. The silence of the night reminded me of the many uncomfortable nights we spent together alone and speaking of nothing but daydreaming mockery of domestic hardships.

Nicole became the true friend who was more than a friend to me and my palms itched when she proudly portrayed her sexual experiences. My only secret pledge to her was that I don’t wanna destroy her image of a true human being before me. I always found her a cozy friend and not a human being carrying a pair of breasts and a hungry vagina beneath. But she took some minutes everyday to destroy me and send me back home demoralized. She made sure that she was the only thing I ever had in those lonely days so that her master – Satan’s aim of felling me was ever made sure.

And then in my 24^th year I realized that though Jenny was still there for me to take her but she was more than plaintiff for a self made man like me. I’ve taken chances in the past which fared me well and I wanted to take this last chance of letting her go. Nicole wasn’t the simple friend for me anymore. She did things for me and helped me from drowning and her efforts needed to be paid back. So I took a step ahead and told her exactly what was needed to be told. She held up the telephone, crying out of surprise. That was it….. for some months or so. Jenny was hurt beyond expectation and she felt her friend’s statement on futile long distance relationships was true. I killed two birds in the bush with my indecision.

7 months after that I had a message from one of them. Nicole. She explained to me that she missed her best friend like anything all these months and wanted him back whether in the shape of a friend or a lover. I took 2 months to clean up the mess and brought her back to her true self. I assured her that everything was more than okay to feel this way and that we must trust each other from now on and take the decisions. The month of January was elevating for me, for I was promoted to the post of Regional Creative Director of an ad agency for a shit of an ad that spoke of the first non brass Tupperware in India. She accompanied me like an angel beside a god of wonders to every party within the advertising circuit. And look at today …..

Last week, when things were going strong Nicole called me up again. ‘Hi. How is life going? Listen I’m really sorry but I have to tell you this. He is back in my life again, and I think God has written him perfectly made for me in his script. You showed me true friendship and you showed me true love and I could learn the two no better from any other person. But he has let go of all his past malpractices and has finally succeeded in becoming the regional head of Judiciary of Karnataka. He has undergone a lot of hardships to achieve his goal and I think I should choose him again, though you may call me a fool. You may call me a deceiver and that I played with you but my life is pretty cheap and I won’t let you ruin your life for me. I’m getting married this Sunday against all odds. I want you to be His man of honor. And just don’t hate me and come over if you still love me. And I still believe you have the power to sweep our fragile love story under the rug. ’

She was saving me? From becoming a part of her upside down life? But I thought we instilled faith in ourselves already to remain faithful no matter whatever comes…. I thought we saved ourselves already.

I thought for the last time maybe she would change her mind … So I caressed my hair and pat my shoulders and went to her marriage ceremony with the aim of crashing it completely. Like revealing her sexual life or something more painful to her father. I knew I had to gamble for my profit and her loss.

But a single look of her smile and her hands hung upon her would be husband and I changed my plans. I went past the drowning crowd and greeted her husband with the best warmth I ever traveled and collected in my life. Saw the bright light in her eyes to see me agreeing to her plans and I couldn’t say anything more than, ‘I lost it’. Everyone else thought this to be a statement representing my clients or my bets on some corporate market scenario.

‘Sir, would you like some French wine and scotch?’

‘Yes. Obviously today,’ was my reply.

I drank to everyone’s health and in the end I was so drunk that I let go of all my pains – my mum, jenny and Nicole after all. The wedding people arranged a cab for me but I reluctantly went in my car in order to enjoy the loneliness of the roads and the night.

That was the time when I met the screeching truck at the middle of a road and I went headlong into one of my advertising banners. The thoughts came back as I sat cold in one December with my body draped in blood.

I won’t die today because that coward above us called God would want me to see the end of my dreams before he would destine my end. Some person will come anytime now to get me out of my car and hand me over to some specialist hospital. But this was almost the perfect end to my life and I so desire to preserve this moment in the memoirs of my puny life.

‘Thou shall not die. Yet thou shall not live.’

Tathagata Ray

12/5/2009 4:57 PM.

PANG

There is pang at the bottom of all these dreams, all these affections people shower on …. And on …. This is death in disguise of life …. Once hurt …. There is yet another blow coming your way. So if anyone says that he/she is happy, then the person actually doesn’t know where he is heading to… In the next fraction of a second thee person can lose his parents, his beloved or even himself ….

When one can’t find reasons much of a reason to push one further … he denies living further and with a trickle of tear down his cheek and a gun at his temple he completes his life …. And heads back for the heavenly home from where he had descended to his mother’s laps …. The sensation of pang is the most strongly remembered. But then there’s music …

No Kenny Chesney or Lonestar can deduce the meaning of certain pangs in life … whenever I try remembering the very song from this Bollywood flick called Taare Zameen Par called Ma, I can’t but cry for the loss I’ve undergone … I had an option not to go to Delhi for some stupid graduation degree and could have stayed at home with my mother …. And that ways, I could have had my mother for another 3 years before she vanished under the burning pyre forever. Her roasted, white bones that day are the only vision I carry of my mother nowadays, that’s pang. She could have survived that day, only if people in my household read that she was hiding some strange pain within, like I read and never falter.

When I hear this song called Stupid Boy by Keith Urban, I remember the golden days I had with my girl of my life back school. My decision to come to Delhi for graduation destroyed her trust in me and she became cold to me. Rest is history. Even now, I want to see her face and say thank you for all she did to me and that I miss her badly.

There is this song called 20 Good Reasons by a less popular band called Thirsty Merc, which hit me hard on the first day and the first time I heard the song. The song speaks about me, in some regard. If I had the courage, I would have gone and asked my best friend where my fault was …. She had no right to set her sail away from me, when she brought me from ashes previously. We were both at fault …. And none of us would admit it face to face.

Iris is such a song which deserves a special place in my life forever, because I lost someone here too. A school friend whose life was destroyed partly due to me. We were young and therefore we perhaps underestimated our causes for each other and her blue eyes set before mine forever. That’s pang when one comes to know suddenly that all these years he was in love with her. I hated myself more after that. And when I finally found her reincarnation after 3 long years, I was again happy. Not knowing, what awaited me again?

Pang is so sudden and is always accompanied by music in the lives of people like us. Who are incapable of winning anything or can’t keep the cup high even if he has won ….

Pang is irreversible …. Pang is unbanishable … Pang is sarcastic and Pang becomes stronger and stronger day after day ….

It is not just a sensation …. It’s a lifetime ….

SECOND HOME COMING

The moment I got a glimpse of those very eyes I was double guilty. I wish I wasn’t given the responsibility to organize this event with them. It was difficult to judge God that day. Whether he gave me a second chance or whether he was parodying my perplexed life. But the moment I saw those lucid eyes of the being before me, I was teleported back some six years when I made a mistake ... A grave mistake.... I didn’t listen to my heart then.

I was in the sixth grade when I and Noyo became good friends. I was too young and my heart too insignificantly immature to decipher signs. Classes after classes, the lengthy school bus journeys – all fared well to find me a friend who completed me. We would never stop talking, although thrown out of class for the same innocent crime. Teachers marching past these two jerks who wouldn’t find joy in education; students running past with comments like ‘Haha ! The love birds are guilty again!’ I fought hard to show the entire school that I wasn’t in love. So did she; although no one was ready to believe it.

We didn’t care. Soon a girl of fourteen came into my life. She migrated from the neighbouring school and the guys fell flat for her straightaway; including me. Wanted myself to be the cherry of those mole embedded cheeks. My vowel. Noyo and I worked hard in between major periods to manoeuvre how to win her. And finally with her help, I did win her. And she was the happiest person in the triumph, my friend in need. If she had not been there I wouldn’t even have dared to take those bold steps.

I soon found my girlfriend and went straight into merriment with the person who played Aphrodite in all this. Two years passed and our relationship grew bolder, stronger, and deeper. Chris had to make his entry into this story. A guy fascinated by the lyrics of Deep Purple or the masculinity of Dire Straits. A guy raised under orphaned circumstances – belonging to one of the few remaining Anglo families of North Kolkata.

He was deeply petrified by the blue sparkling eyes of my friend, my mentor. He couldn’t make any immediate mark or impression – being a backbencher and we being relatively ahead of him in the class. But he always wanted to speak his mind before this girl. And he knew whom to conquer before he could even try conquering this girl.

On September 2004, I got a call from an unknown number. ‘Heya! Chris here ... I want to met you now, can I come to the park near your house where we can talk?’ I thought he wanted an academic help from me and I responded in a very Anglo manner,”Yea man, come fast. And get some chicken fries from your grandpa’s restaurant.” We met. I ate down to the last bit of chicken before taking any steps in guiding him educationally. But the things he told me and the potry of his talk won me very easily. At first I was shocked, but later I was relishing this happiness. I was finally happy for the person I respected more than myself.

The act was fixed to be carried out the next day only. I was eagerly anticipating Noyo to take her seat beside me, so that I can fire at her ears straightaway. The whole act was carried out neat and clean. I wished I don’t get beaten that day, for I tried to accustom myself to such mighty blows from my girlfriend otherwise. She was happy finally. They were both made to talk, though her blue eyes were heavily fixed on me. The guy took two months only to win the girl all around. And soon the two would walk down the alleys of our school church hand in hand. I peeked inside for the first two days and finally fell glad. For I never shared such intimacy with my girlfriend, for she was ever busy in attending classes and those dancing classes after school.

But then I started crumbling. I started decaying. Not that I was unhappy with my love. She and I made our relationship special in other weird ways. But that idiot took my friend away from me. Missed those funny bus journeys back home (for she took the other bus), missed sitting around with her (for I was made to sit in between the dopers and flunkers of my class, the backbenchers) and most importantly missed doing her assignments and projects. Her blue eyes, like the red sun set before my eyes. And I was out in the cold and darkness. She would go to watch movies with him when she knew how eagerly we used to wait for Fridays to arrive previously. Her entire family would know that she was having a long walk with me, although she held his hands and passed their time n those parks where very rare people came.

But time gave me a trial and she had to come to me to seek help in those vernacular assignments. Chris never spoke our language, thus it gave me an opportunity to hold those divine eyes even if for a few minutes. I made her assignment over night and planned to go to her house on a surprise visit like old times.

The door was locked from inside and I couldn’t go straight inside. Made my way back over the fence and peeped inside from the bedroom ventilator, just to check whether someone was inside or not.

That is when I hurt myself the most. Saw the guys torso, perspiring and making movements over my temple of azure serenity. I could hear only Noyo’s voice, “Oh god! I wish we resisted ourselves from doing this ... Though I trust you more than my best friend.” I tripped, fell and hurt my back. Went back home and tried not to remember the cursed visit. But I could not ... And my sleep was threatened with a vision of this fading blue light. Next day I met her at school and handed over the assignment.She placed a kiss in my ears and thanked me. She wanted to say something more. She was happy as a child. But I remained inert and took my place. I guess her blue eyes read my pain and my entire brain cried like a hurricane. All day I stayed numb with the pain and took the school bus back home. I didn’t come to school for days. Didn’t speak to my girlfriend for days and contemplated attaining redemption.

That moment I was assured how silly a boy I was, not trusting my very heart. The whole world saw what I asked from those eyes but I falsified the feeling every time. I cried and cried. Didn’t take enough food and my parents thought my girlfriend ditched me. I was engulfed in a frenzy of strife within the corners of my heart. Thought of leaving the city, lest I might just die out. But my better side encouraged me to say what longed to be spoken. And soon I was convinced.

Went next day to school ... Neat and clean ... Gelled up my hair like Chris would and told myself, “This is your chance. You may die but don’t come undone.” But she was nowhere. The seats were vacant and Chris took his seat along with the other backbenchers. I searched for my Iris. I was a bit angry to have been forced into a condition of continuously changing my seating location. But I pretended like my old days and waited for my friend to come and take her seat.

Soon after the fifth period I could see the girls of my class flocking around a senior lady teacher. On eavesdropping the conversation, I realised of which I was solely to blame. Noyo had tried committing suicide last night under the influence of a mental disturbance. She almost killed herself with eight sleeping pills when her parents heard her choking and swooning from the next room. Soon she was admitted to some local hospital and she survived her end. Although the event broke her into pieces and she was medically declared fit to be admitted to some mental asylum for her and her family’s sake.

Now I know why the teachers and the students passed those heavy glances at me. Her parents felt it unimportant to inform me of such incidents though previously even a slight bruise would make her mother call me up. I soon became a sinner and wanted to destroy Chris and guys of his kind. My hatred for him surpassed my love for her and after an initial pushing around I came to know that he told no to their relationship over the phone because she was a Hindu and he was a Christian. Bloody him and his half naked Jesus Christ. I just couldn’t hate myself anymore and wanted to get out of all this. I lost my direction. I lost my life that day. After two months I cracked the Delhi University entrance and shifted my base. I just couldn’t cry anymore. I knew that throughout these years I was in love ... and just didn’t know it in the beginning ... or perhaps I ignored it continuously.

My girlfriend was still there. She was disturbed by my abrupt departure. And I hid the reason from her evermore. Two years passed since then ... And last I heard Noyo’s family to have left the city for some unknown town in the same state.

In December 2008 I thought I saw those blue eyes again, although of a whitish tint this time ... and that giant pain hidden beneath. This was another human being whom God threw at my door of perpetual pain. She had her own story to tell. Soon we became the worst of leg pullers ... The bestest of friends. And I felt that my Noyo was back. And I cried all over again. Chris was here no more, but his replica was here... Ruining this girl’s life in the best possible ways.

When I found solace in my new Noyo ... he had to derive a design to part us. I at once came to know what God wanted from me. Either to revamp this world or suffer the sins of being born a man. I just couldn’t let these things take control over me and neither could I trust my heart. Should I help this new being out of her misery? Or should I run away from these situations? God, what do you want from my life? A commercial movie comprising of song, dance, fights, heroes and antiheroes?

But I would risk my life for my old Noyo to save this new being from desolation, no matter how bad I might feel at times. But I would be me this time and would stake my entire life in search of redemption. I hope these emotions don’t arrive before her ever... For she might fade away under the dubious dexterity of such filmy stories. But I’ll help her anyhow ... Whether she insults me more or not ... Since I’ve lost the only friend I ever had in my life and won’t aspire the loss of another. Love has its worth, and friendship its own. I won’t mind if both the worlds unite someday. But I’ll make sure I’ll make sure neither of them crash again. I’ll make sure to save Noyo all over again. No matter how holy shit the plan of mine seems but I’ll stop the river of tears that flow down such peerless and rare eyes of truth.

Don’t blame me Noyo ... I’m doing this all for you ... and your irreplaceable importance in my life... I won’t let you fade and neither ignore your second home coming... my arms are wide open to receive you all over again.

Tathagata Ray

17^th March, 2009

The city lights petrified my eyes on that evening and I was awake finally, walking my way down roads from my university to meet my special human being. I was partly lost and partly confused. I took the longer roads at every turn. She had come to meet me from my hometown 1500 kms away for the festivals. Her parents always thought it was a better idea to spend the vacations at Mumbai. But her persuasions finally convinced them to come to Delhi.

I waited all day long to get a glimpse of her radiance and couldn’t concentrate on the daily happenings of my class. Left the class with a big smile on my face and with a heavy inclination in my heart. “This is it”, I kept on telling myself as I increased my pace on the road. Hurried off to my room to let go of my casual clothes and put on something really befitting the meeting. The ipod kept on repeating the same song called Wherever you will go. I got ready finally and left for university main gate to receive her with the chords of my heart.

Then something happened, would never know why it happened or whether it would fare me good someday or not.

As I was scrolling through the loads of smses in my cell phone that spoke of good luck and best wishes, a certain message struck me a heavy blow. My only friend on this planet ran away from my vicinity some days back when she realized that I’m massively evil and didn’t have the slightest respect for her. It was a mere misunderstanding, but we are so stubborn at times. The same message struck me before when it beeped all of a sudden minutes before I was supposed to perform a love track on the stage. The pang it sent down my bones that evening spoke that she would never see my face again in our lifetime. I knew instantly while walking down the road what I lost and can never win back and I was filled with this pain across my inner self. I came to the conclusion that my greatest loss after losing ma abruptly was she. I realized that love is just not one person at one place. It takes shapes in different relationships. And sometimes it exceeds what it requires to be. And the payback is so immense.

So people would conclude that I fell in love with her? Actually I fall in love with every person who completes me. I never see love as that between only two people. And to all the people who hate me for the reason, a big yes to the fact that I loved her the best amongst all now. And maybe this was the reason of my falling apart now. I realized that it was impossible to live without her, even if she makes no effort on her side to amend the situation.

As I reached the main gate I was flooded with a lot of doubts … Saw my girl’s face as she laughed back at me and reached her arms out when I came near. She explained to me that her parents have left her to stay with me for some 2-3 hours while they buy things for the family back home. I should have been at the top of the world, but I was trying to come out of the abyss I was being sucked into. We went straight inside the university and sipped away some cold coffee while expressing how badly we missed each other all these 2 years. But it was mere pretension on my part. Because I’m already suffering something more grave than that …. The loss of a very important human being forever from myself. Everything was mere dramatics that evening – right from the dialogues to the expression in my eyes. At first I was super exited but now it was mere go away please. I tried all these days to be happy just for this meeting, and that sms ruined it all again.

I thought more and more about my friend while she was trying to convince me to come home for the break. I became numb to her statements in a while and wanted to be left alone. She perhaps read the trouble. And she asked me what bothered me – a certain question whose answer none of us had. She enquired about my friend next, and I stared at her eyes as if she was speaking in a foreign language. I had no answer, had to say no clue. She said, that’s what is disturbing you, isn’t it? I was taken back more. I never expected her to read my eyes, because I was pretending at my best level. “Give me her number, I’ll tell her not to screw up your life like she did to hers…” was her next sentence. It was more of hatred and pain than ignorance that engulfed me now. And I wanted to burn down everyone who saw my friend as my destroyer. It’s not a matter of choice to f*ck up one’s life. None want to live in hell. And being disturbed in love doesn’t make one infidel. She just had some bad series of events. And she believes I gave her pain continuously, while her holy spirits were the guardians of hell.

I had to evade the enquiry made by my girl. “Chuck it” was my only answer. “What chuck it? She thinks she knows you already? What right in this world has she to come between us? I’m telling you she may be educated but she’s a b*tch”, she said. I couldn’t take any more, “So you think you are the only being who knows me? Where were you when I lost my mother last May? What were you when you left me alone for almost a year? And you think you know me? You don’t even remember my birthday! Should I trust you? Alone? Do you realize what pain are you capable of causing in me? And she is lot more to me right now than you.” I saw tears forming in her eyes but I didn’t stop cursing her. “And if you go by the normal worldly conclusion that I’ve fallen in love with her, then yes I have … because I have realized what she means to me. Have you ever felt the absence of me in your life before? I have … for you previously and for her now … You shall see it as love I know … and therefore I’m so happy that I’m in love, yes I am. For you, for her people and for the world who hate friendship – I am in f*cking love.

I didn’t wait to listen to what she had to say. I think she said go to hell before she boarded the auto and left for her stay place. I stood midway between the road and the marketplace, expecting my golden days to come back. With my ma and my friend. But they are history now. So will be the tears that are flowing down my cheeks today. Tomorrow I’ll be happy again, or else I’ll try again….

Am I the fool in the end? I let go of two human beings just like that? Have I no courage to stop them from going? But as Shakespeare once wrote, “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances”. This is a fool’s life we usually lead, the consequences are almost the same….