Get One Bye Two

by Dhiraj Singh

  “Look, we are law abiding citizens and don’t want any trouble. They can keep their car outside. But no honking early in the morning when you both go to work, okay?” one of the men offered truce. And in any truce, there is give and take. What they were giving was far more valuable to the young couple than what they were taking.

  “No honking for sure. Done deal!” The young lady was quick to grab the offer.

  Niraj collected his modest fees from the couple who thanked him profusely. Then the lady asked him a question. “What if they had not fallen for your bait and called your bluff?”

  “I first use my brain and then my body, for the brain consumes less energy than the body.”

  Not too far away from where Niraj was, Rajni was chauffeuring a regular passenger to the railway station. She was in a good mood today. She was happy with the way her business was growing. Lost in her thoughts, she did not at first notice the commotion on the right side of the road, as she crossed by. The passenger had seen it and was intrigued. He asked Rajni to reverse a little. An autorickshaw driver was mercilessly beating a middle-aged man, while the crowd, as usual, stood around like mute spectators.

  Rajni witnessed the spectacle from inside her car. As she saw the fight in front with her eyes wide open, her brain strangely played out another fight in the screen of her mind. She was a mute spectator to the fight in her mind. It was a fight between the same man and woman she had seen in the dream earlier. Something hit her hard. Rajni could not do much about the fight in her mind, but she decided to not remain a mute spectator to the fight in front of her. She stepped out of the car, went towards the auto driver and suddenly bent down. She picked up her slippers and rained a few hits on the stunned auto driver’s face. The driver did not try to resist the hits. He knew the mute crowd in India loved to watch a brawl between two men, but when a woman got involved, the same people transformed into the most violent beings on earth. Some people called it the ‘Draupadi guilt syndrome.’ But Rajni did not know what kind of syndrome had affected her that day. She was not the kind of person to jump into the middle of a fight and beat a man with her slippers. She did not have much time to ponder over her act, as her passenger was getting late. She rushed towards the railway station.

  12

  Anil had shifted to Delhi. He wanted to be physically far away from the memories of Ahmedabad. He also wanted to be mentally far away from the memories of his teaching days. He wanted to be spiritually close to something that he had started enjoying of late – cooking. Anil had never been fond of spending time in the kitchen earlier with his wife Romi around, but something seemed to have changed within him.

  What had not changed was his serendipitous companionship with his co-passengers from the plane crash, Umar and Niraj. He had a conference call with both of them every fortnight or so. Deep inside, Anil believed that if Niraj and Umar were fine and alive, he too would be alive and kicking. He believed what the sadhu had said. Anil hoped and prayed that their three splits, if they existed in reality, were safe from all dangers. It was only six months since the crash. Anil hoped the next six months would pass soon and safely.

  Anil opened a restaurant called Tandoori Adda near Hauz Khas. He employed a few cooks from his hometown in Kanpur and a few waiters from Ahmedabad. He had managed to find a great location in the prime Hauz Khas area, thanks to his student, who was working with a leading real estate consultancy in Delhi. The cuisine at his restaurant was traditional North Indian food, cooked in a healthy manner, in large clean tandoors and grills. For the predominant North Indian residents of Delhi, especially those near Hauz Khas, this was a godsend. For finally, they could eat the food they liked without the thick layers of oil, which their hearts did not like.

  Business took off quickly and Anil was a busy man soon. He forgot his past and had no time to think of his future. Slowly, he even stopped calling Umar and Niraj, who were also busy in their own careers.

  Lina’s restaurant was also running briskly. She still did most of the shopping for her restaurant herself. She worked hard, even on Sundays.

  Though Lina’s driver did not come on Sundays, she drove herself as she had to work. Her brother Maru often pulled her leg and said that she was exploiting herself and going against the government’s labour guidelines by working on all days of the week.

  One late Sunday morning, Lina drove all the way from Gurgaon to the Lajpat Nagar market and did her shopping. She was returning to Gurgaon around lunch time.

  Lina often did the bookkeeping herself at the end of every session in the restaurant. She knew she would be in time for bookkeeping that day too. What she did not know was that her driver had forgotten to fill diesel in her car the day before. She had not looked checked the fuel meter. As she was crossing Hauz Khas, her car stuttered to a stop. Lina immediately knew that her car had run out of diesel.

  “Maru, where are you?” Lina called Maru, who lived in Greater Kailash, not too far away from where she was stranded.

  “Hi Lina! I am enjoying a Ramaan Khanna special movie plus combo meal, as usual. Remember, it’s Sunday?”

  Since Maru was a big fan of Ramaan Khanna, he had started a Delhi chapter for all the fans of the actor in the city. Maru’s entrepreneurial instincts led him to combine his passion with business. Food was his biggest passion. And he was already doing business in it. Ramaan was his second biggest passion. So it was natural for Maru to combine both his passions. He negotiated a franchisee agreement for Delhi with Ramaan’s chain of restaurants.

  Maru had personally spent a month in Mumbai finalising this deal with Ramaan. Maru was proud of the trademark wrist goggles that Ramaan had presented to him during the signing of the deal, though he could never wear the goggles in one single motion like his hero did on the big screen.

  Ramaan had liked Maru’s idea of having a screen at the restaurant to show his movies every Sunday along with a special combo meal. Ramaan had given his approval, without any commercial considerations, to screen the movies produced by him every Sunday in the franchised restaurant in Delhi. Ramaan knew that a happy stomach created happier memories. And he wanted his fans in Delhi to carry happy memories of him.

  Maru did not miss the Sunday special package. As usual, he was enjoying himself that day when Lina called.

  “Oh yes, I forgot. Ramaan ka chamcha,” said Lina. She related more to her culinary utensils than the modern day fans and crazy followers of movie stars.

  Lina then called another friend who promised to go to a gas station and get her a few bottles of diesel. Lina knew this would take at least half an hour, but she had no other choice. She parked her car on the side of the road and decided to take a quick walk around the neighbourhood. It was a cloudy day. The light, cool breeze made the afternoon walk a pleasant one. The breeze also brought with it the aroma of some delicious food being cooked somewhere nearby.

  Lina’s keen nose of a chef made her follow in the direction of the tantalising aroma. She came to the entrance of a small, standalone, single-floor building, beautifully pained in red and white, with the name Tandoori Adda splashed in bright yellow colours in front of the building. She had heard about the newly-opened restaurant from some of her friends in the business and wanted to step in, and maybe even have a quick bite. As she entered the main entrance, which was manned by a burly guard in a white outfit, she got a call on her phone. She assumed it was her friend who was bringing the diesel.

  As she took out her phone from her purse, she was surprised to see that the call was from Maru. She took the call and turned around, walking out of the entrance door of the restaurant, as the burly guard held it open with a wide smile on his face.

  Anil, who was sitting near the cash counter of the restaurant, saw Lina turn around and walk back towards the road. He felt he knew her. He rushed towards the door to try and see her face, but she had turned the corner of the road by then.

  “That’s great news indeed, Maru,” Lina congratulated her brother on the phone.

  “Yes,
this is indeed a great deal. A turning point for me. Free dinner tonight to all the guests at your restaurant, from my side!”

  Maru was upbeat and enthusiastic on the phone.

  He deserved to be happy. Maru had just struck a deal for a pan-India franchisee with one of America’s leading Mexican food chains. The Indian palate was very similar to that of a Mexican, and Maru knew he had hit a goldmine.

  “Do you know if you drill a hole from India and keep going vertically down across the globe, you will reach Mexico on the other side. This is indeed karma!” Maru went on, unmindful of the climax scene from Ramaan’s blockbuster movie being screened in his restaurant.

  “Maybe Mexico is a split of India,” said Lina instantly. And then she realised that she had no idea what she meant or even what a split meant.

  “Well, whatever! Right now, I am going to have a banana split and celebrate.”

  Maru loved his business, but he loved his food more.

  Lina was happy for her brother. That evening, she happily talked to every guest and offered them a discount on the special menu for dinner. Her banking background did not allow her to give anything for free. She believed things were not valued enough if they were given away for free. And Lina wanted her brother’s achievement and his generosity to be valued. The special menu that day included tandoori fish pizza and tandoori chicken risotto. Lina’s chefs were surprised by her choice and even more surprised by her skills in making the special dishes that night.

  Meanwhile, Anil introduced chicken tandoori pizza in his restaurant menu that night. It was an instant hit.

  13

  It was the eight month after the plane crash. It had been raining heavily across all of North India. Drainage was simply non-existent. There were ponds of water everywhere, providing a perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes. There was news of rising dengue fever in all parts of Delhi and Gurgaon.

  Lina and Maru were healthy people with strong immunity. So their family doctor was surprised when both of them were afflicted with dengue fever at the same time. Lina was suffering from chills and a very painful headache. She also had high fever.

  Maru called her on the phone.

  “Lina, you must have bit me sometime. That’s why I have dengue like you.”

  “Shut up Maru! My whole body is paining a lot. I feel as though elephants are pressing on my back and joints.”

  “And you know what? Now I can no longer wink at you. Because every time I move my eyes, they start paining a lot.”

  Maru was in slightly better spirits than Lina.

  “You seem to be quite excited by your dengue, Maru.”

  “Not really. But in a way, yes! My hero, Ramaan Khanna, has been afflicted with chikungunya. The same mosquitoes that did this to us must have done that to him too.”

  “Good for you! If you both die, it would at least be through the same medium. I am too tired now. I have to drink papaya leaves juice. Talk to you later. Bye.”

  “Bye Lina, and take care.”

  There was no one to take care of Rajni at home. She did not want to disturb the peace of her family at the village and she did not want to disturb the business of her drivers working in her company. She had been down with malaria from the time she had come back from Coorg. Rajni had taken a family from Kolkata to a resort in the coffee plantations of Coorg and had stayed there in the staff quarters for two nights. With nothing else to do, she had sauntered deep inside the forests near the resort, where she was bitten by several insects and mosquitoes. She did not bother about the bites, though she was disgusted by the bloodsucking leeches in the forest.

  As she lay alone in her bed in Bangalore, she felt she had to differentiate the friends from the foes properly. The leeches were her friends as they sucked out the impure blood. But the mosquitoes injected in her impure and infected blood from some other body. She had never been so down. She had very high fever and was alternating between sweating and having chills. Her doctor was very concerned with her condition. The parasites had invaded her liver and were rapidly destroying her blood cells. Rajni was sincerely taking her quinine medicines on time. But she did not know that time was running out for her. She was admitted to the emergency room of a nearby hospital that morning. The doctors feared a kidney failure. They told the neighbour who had brought Rajni to the hospital to inform her parents to come to Bangalore at the earliest, if they wanted to see her for the last time.

  Maru and Lina touched each other’s hands as they lay on the stretchers in the hospital. Both of them were bleeding badly, and their platelet levels had fallen alarmingly a few hours after they had last spoken on the phone. The doctors admitted them in the emergency care. They had very little hope of survival for them, especially Lina whose condition was worse than Maru’s.

  Umar had a flight to Goa from Delhi early that morning. He was looking forward to having some fun in the sea. Umar was a good swimmer and loved water sports and adventure activities. As soon as he had landed in Goa and checked into a five-star resort in the South Goa beach, he changed into his swimming trunks and went running towards the beach. The sea was rough that day. The monsoons had hit Goa too, and the fishermen were hurriedly returning to safer shores. The lifeguard at the beach cautioned Umar against going deep into the sea. But Umar was not afraid of the sea. He was not afraid of anything after the plane crash. He took a few long steps and then dived into the high waves, swimming his way to the relatively calmer sea a few hundred feet away from the coastline.

  Anil had always wanted to learn swimming. His resolve strengthened after the crash, when the plane landed in a pond on the plateau. As his business was stable, he had some free time in the late afternoons. He thought of putting those free hours to good use. So he joined a swimming class in the nearby club. The water in the pool there was four feet deep on one side and eight feet on the other side of the pool.

  Anil had been attending the classes for the past one week and was feeling fairly comfortable making a few laps on his own. He was reassured by the presence of the young and enthusiastic coach, who was always running around the pool, keeping an eye on all the students. Anil had been a good teacher all his life and he was determined to be a better student.

  Today, as he reached the pool, he was informed that the coach had fallen sick and was not going to come in that day. Anil was in a dilemma, but he decided to do a few quick laps in the shallow end all by himself. The lifeguard too was not around that day. All the other students had returned home. It was like a surprise holiday in school. But Anil did not like holidays. Holidays made him feel bored. Especially after Romi had left him.

  Niraj Roy got a hysterical call from one of his clients that day. She was the mother of a teenager and lived in a quiet society near Jayanagar in Bangalore. The society members had engaged the services of Niraj’s company for providing special security to them during a picnic they had planned on the river banks of a famous tourist spot, a few kilometres down the river stream from a reservoir. Niraj had wanted to visit this place for some time. So he decided to go with the group himself, along with another staff of his company.

  “Please help! Where are you? Please help! My son is drowning!” the desperate mother pleaded on the phone. Niraj was taking a walk alone, some distance away from the group of picnickers. As soon as Niraj heard the mother, he ran towards the group. On the way, he shouted for his staff member, who was taking a light afternoon nap under the shade of a nearby tree.

  The teenager was standing on a rock in the middle of the river and the water around him was rising rapidly. He was shouting for help, but no one knew what to do. The water had been released from the dam after the sirens were activated by the workers. The trapped teenager had a hearing problem and did not hear the siren clearly. He kept sitting on the rock in the middle of the river. No one noticed him because he was hidden from view of those on the river banks. When the water started to rise suddenly, the boy got scared. He then stood up on the rock and started to shout in panic.

  The f
orce of the large volume of water was so strong that it immediately washed away Niraj’s employee, who had stepped inside the river along with Niraj. Niraj was a much better and stronger swimmer and he managed to get to the rock somehow. He caught hold of the boy’s hands and pulled him into the river. Then there was a sudden, strong surge of wave in the river. Niraj and the boy started to drift downstream, with their heads bobbing in and out of the river.

  Anil was not happy with his laps in the shallow end of the pool. He dared himself to go towards the deeper end. Just as he reached the deepest part of the pool, he experienced an excruciating cramp in both his legs. He started to drown. His first thought at that moment was, “Water is the medium… I wonder where Umar and Niraj are.”

  Meanwhile, Umar was also fighting for his life at the sea in Goa. He was caught in a rip current, something he had never experienced before. He had never learnt how to tackle a rip current.

  As Niraj struggled to keep afloat in the river with the teenager holding on to his hand, he heard him shout, “Sir, my life is in your hands. Please save me!” The last few moments of the plane crash flashed in front of Niraj’s eyes. On the riverbanks, the mother sat on the ground, her eyes closed. She prayed to God, for whom she had been fasting a day every week for the last thirty years and to whom she had never missed making an offering every Monday morning for the past twenty years after marriage. “Oh Lord. You have your own ways and plans. But my life’s plans revolve around my son only. My only son. Please save him.”

  The river suddenly became calmer and Niraj managed to hold on to a rock near the other end of the river bank. Gradually, he pulled himself and the teenage boy on to the rock. They waved to the group waiting for them on the other side. The mother opened her eyes. Her faith in her Lord strengthened even more.