Outside, the rain was raging and ravaging nonstop. He absently fingered the diaries and considered going through them to take his mind off the rain. The constant grey, gloom and grind of relief work was beginning to get to him. He tore his eyes away from the window and lifted the topmost diary when a stash of black and white photographs slipped out. He now noticed that each of the other two diaries had something wedged between them too. He pulled them out, lit his lighter and settled against the pillows.
While loose sheets contained recipes jotted down in a hurry, the photos were a throwback to the life that the old man and his wife had lived – of expecting their first child, of Sundays spent at the Marina and of Deepavalis amidst grandchildren. For a second, Rakesh wondered what it would be like to live a full life – to have hoped, loved and lost but then he realised he would never know for he had removed himself from the game. He had distanced himself from Meenakshi to avoid hurt and pain and it now hit him like the heat of a Guntur chilly – that in trying to insulate himself, he would never get to experience the highs and lows of a life fully lived – that he would in fact go numb!
He snapped the diaries shut and looked out of the window. And through that haze of grey, it was clear to him what he had to do. He would risk his head and heart and ask for her hand yet again. This time, he would offer her his love and hopefully she would accept. He closed his eyes imagining the moment, a small smile of hope beginning to play at the corners of his mouth. Butt naked, Rakesh Ramakrishnan began to imagine many more things until he could think no more because sheer exhaustion had nudged him to sleep.
Two streets away, as the rescue term shepherded a boatful of residents from 7 Main through the cross streets, their flashlights picked out a large Gulmohar that had fallen across the road. They turned around and took the longer, circuitous route to the Manimangalam Road Junction, forgetting to pick up the young man who said he would be waiting in the terrace.
When Rakesh awoke on the morning of December second, his grogginess lasted but a few seconds.
‘Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh shit!’ he swore as he pulled his clothes on and rushed out to the terrace. It was almost eleven. He had slept for more than twelve hours straight, a first for him!
He stood on tiptoe and looked in every direction but no boat or human was visible. With a sinking heart, Rakesh realised that 5 Main had been flushed out last evening itself. No reason why a rescue team would come this way again. Still, he stood in the terrace for a good half hour before returning to the room. Once inside, he crossed it and peered at the staircase leading down. More steps had gone under water. There was no telling how much longer it would take for the water to reach the top of the stairs. So he returned to the room, stuffed the diaries into his hoodie and track pockets and slipped into the icy cold water, holding his breath.
Due to the time of the day, there was some light filtering in through the windows which made it easier for Rakesh to navigate the house. He swam towards the door but it had been jammed shut. Turning around, he searched for another exit and thought he spotted one off the hall where a considerable amount of light was streaming in. Upon reaching it, he found French doors opening out to a mini portico that faced the back of the house. He entered it without a thought and immediately his limbs went limp. Snails, leeches and worms were writhing up the walls, swollen and slimy. Carcasses of frogs floated in front of him and before he knew it, he retched into the water. He clung to the grill of the french door feeling dizzy and light headed and remained in that position for a full minute before tracing his way up the stairs. Back in the room, he went straight to the bathroom to rinse his mouth and slumped on the bed, defeated.
A few streets away, at the Manimangalam Road Junction Meenakshi and Krishna got off a bus and walked straight towards the ADGP to explain their situation.
The ADGP took Krishna aside and asked in a low voice, ‘How can you be sure he’s still there?’
‘Where else could he have gone sir?’ Krishna enquired in a voice that he feared didn’t sound like his.
The senior officer swore under his breath.
‘What do you want me to do?’ he asked looking at Meenakshi’s distraught face from the corner of his eyes.
‘Allow us to search for him.’
‘What if the two of you go missing too?’
‘Then we’ll go with backup sir.’
‘I can’t spare my men. Nor any of the boats.’ he said plainly.
‘But sir, your men have broken for lunch,’ Krishna pointed out.
The ADGP looked at his team that had regrouped inside one of the trucks.
‘What are you suggesting?’ he asked.
‘If you could just spare us a boat, sir … I know to row.’
‘Apadiya?’
‘Yes sir. I’ve been rowing for a year now,’ said Krishna with the faintest note of pride.
The ADGP now turned to face Meenakshi.
‘I can spare one kayak and two lifejackets.’
‘That’ll do, sir,’ replied Krishna, dragging his sister towards the kayak before the man changed his mind.
Once inside the kayak, Meenakshi finally broke her silence. ‘The street signs have gone down under. How will we know when we come to Fifth Main?’
‘The next street is First Main. Start counting,’ he said steering the kayak away from trucks and people.
A few minutes later, Krishna wondered if it had been a good idea to bring his sister along. She was fidgeting so much that the kayak faced real threat of turning over. ‘Are you sure you heard it right?’ she asked, her eyes darting at every cream and yellow coloured house they passed. Her brother mumbled back something. Paddling a kayak through strong currents and filth wasn’t easy. By the time they crossed 3 Main, Meenakshi had taken to cupping her hands and calling out Rakesh’s name.
Back at the yellow house, Rakesh was out in the terrace dangling a ladder made out of two bedsheets over the ledge. It dropped to about ten feet above the water. Just as he crouched to fasten its one end to an iron ring on the wall, he thought he heard his name being called. He continued to tighten the knot suspecting he had turned delusional. But he heard his name being called out once more! And in Meenakshi’s voice no less! Fantastic, he said to himself getting up. Just the time to lose one’s mind.
But then, right before his eyes the bow of a kayak pulled into 5th Main and in it sat both Krishna and Meenakshi!
‘Meeenu…’ he bellowed through the rain.
The brother–sister duo turned to look at him stunned.
‘Wait!’ he called out, scrambling onto the top of the wall and letting himself down the makeshift ladder. When he reached its end, he just let go and covered the rest of the distance in an enormous dive.
Krishna hauled him into the boat even as Meenu remained seated. Once everyone was settled, she stretched out to where Rakesh sat in the middle and gave him one tight slap.
‘What was that for?’ he gasped.
‘For everything,’ she said, anger and relief coursing through her nerves simultaneously.
He looked to Krishna for help but the boy stared back like a bloody Loris.
’I am sorry,’ he said meeting her straight in the eyes.
‘For what?’ she asked through gritted teeth.
‘For everything! Like you said,’ he shouted through the rain. And then suddenly everyone went quiet on the kayak.
‘Actually not for everything,’ Rakesh mumbled mere seconds later.
‘What?’ asked Meenakshi surprised.
Rakesh suddenly stood up nearly tipping the kayak over.
‘Will you please sit’, called out Krishna from the back.
‘I said I am not sorry for everything,’ stated Rakesh calmly. ‘I want to marry you and I am not sorry about that.’
And now Meenu looked stunned. Sure she had known the man cared for her but more recently, he had pushed her away. It had made her question if he cared for her the way she did for him. And here he was proposing marriage. Did love never cease
to amaze?
Rakesh who saw Meenu’s bewildered expression knew she thought him out of his mind to extend a second marriage proposal.
‘I know I am proposing again,’ he began to say. ‘But look I have tried … I’ve really tried to keep it cool and casual but you know it’s become…’
‘Hot and steamy?’ quipped Meenu that set her brother at the other end coughing and sputtering for air.
‘It’s gotten serious, at least for me and … and I fear that I’ll never be able to shake it off.’
‘The seriousness or steaminess,’ enquired Meenu in all earnestness.
‘No! The sambhar coursing through my veins,’ replied Rakesh. ‘What the hell are you blithering about, Rakesh?’ asked Meenu.
‘Maybe he’s gone soft in the head,’ replied Krishna. ‘You never know … all that time in the rain,’ he elaborated further.
Digging deep for a last ounce of patience, Rakesh turned to Meenakshi and said, ‘All I am saying is I can’t seem to shake off the sambhar mafia’s hold over me. This summer in fact, I had bought into their fantasy…’
‘Which is…?’ enquired Krishna unable to keep out of the conversation taking place three feet away.
‘Have them find a girl,’ Rakesh replied. ‘I thought I was steady and ready to be snapped up. But then you fell out of nowhere into my life.’
‘Into your lap actually,’ corrected Meenu.
‘Exactly! And since then I haven’t been able to think straight.’
‘Rejection tends to do that,’ Krishna said in a dry voice.
And now the two did look daggers at him.
‘Obviously,’ continued Rakesh, ‘I tried to move on after the said rejection but then you walked into my life again and I was so smitten that I decided to risk heartbreak and rejection to show you the man I was. But look where it landed me?’
‘Err … where?’ asked Meenu.
‘Back where I was this summer! In fact in a more wretched place.’
‘Whatever do you mean?’ she asked beginning to worry if Rakesh had really gone soft in the head.
‘In addition to wanting to marry you, I am now hopelessly and irretrievably in love with you.’
‘You are in love with me?’ she asked blinking her big brown eyes.
‘Yes.’
‘You want to marry me?’
‘Yes!’ said Rakesh a bit nervously.
‘Then who’s stopping you?’ she demanded.
‘Ahem … erm … you?’
‘What? Rakesh Ramakrishnan, I have never flung myself at a man like I have at you!’
‘But you turned me down the first time!’ ‘What did you expect?’ asked an exasperated Meenakshi.
‘A “Yes”,’ he wagered.
‘I didn’t even know you!’
‘True.’
‘Besides, not every single girl is in want of a husband.’
‘No?’ asked both men.
‘No. But these past few days have made me realise how much I want you in my life,’ she said.
‘They have?’ asked Rakesh, his voice a bare whisper now.
She nodded and rose to her feet.
‘The kayak!’ croaked Krishna from behind.
‘I don’t think marriage is such a bad idea, not with you.’
‘You don’t?’ asked Rakesh truly surprised.
‘But if I marry you, you’ll have to cook for me,’ she said her eyes twinkling again.
‘Done,’ said Rakesh without blinking an eye.
‘Especially your coffee meringues.’
His grin broadened.
‘I lurrrve your coffee meringues.’
‘Only my meringues?’ asked Rakesh his dark eyes skimming her lips.
‘Rakesh Ramakrishnan,’ a voice bellowed from behind both of them. ‘Are you forcing my sister to talk dirty?’
The couple now grinned back at him but finally sat down holding hands.
‘Hands can be used to pick up a paddle too,’ taunted Krishna.
But his brother-in-law-to-be had tugged at his sister and drawn her into a tight embrace.
‘I am never going to let you go,’ he murmured into her ears and then started kissing her.
‘Dey!’ gasped Krishna. ‘That’s my bloody sister,’ he shouted poking Rakesh at the ribs with a paddle. ‘Can’t you two wait till we get home? Oh God! Oh no! Oh no!’
Epilogue 1
‘Oh yes!’
‘Oh yes, what?’ asked Girish, looking up at his wife who had her ear to the wall they shared with their daughter’s room.
‘The girl’s finally done it,’ squealed Padu’ma with delight.
‘Done what?’
‘Found her man!’
‘Oh, I see.’
‘Oh you never saw?’ she scoffed.
‘What?’ he asked his wife patiently.
‘What a good match he was for her.’
‘Aaah … but that was for Meenu to decide.’
‘What rubbish! Someone’s got to light the match first.’
‘You do say the most amusing things you know,’ said Girish returning to his book.
‘Well if it weren’t for that professor saab, I wouldn’t have caught your attention back in college.’
‘That’s true,’ he admitted, his eyes twinkling just as his daughter’s.
Epilogue 2
Between November and December 2015, a persistent low pressure system around the Bay of Bengal made sure Chennai and its neighbouring regions such as Puducherry and Cuddalore was slammed by heavy rainfall and consequent flooding. While the city received a little more than 1,200 mm of rainfall in November (three times its monthly average), on December 1 and 2, it recorded close to 350 mm of rain, nearly two times its monthly average! Not surpringly, the city experienced its wettest 24 hours in a century.
While weather experts accorded the heavy rainfall to record warm seas, a strong El Niño effect and a super powered northeast monsoon, the subsequent inundation was ascribed to blocked culverts, incomplete stormwater drains and the release of excess water from the city’s reservoirs without ample planning and warning.
Nobody in a hundred years had seen such devastation; such fury. Nobody foresaw the kind of help that poured in either. From the neighbour next door to the stranger overseas, from the A-list celebrity to uniformed rescue personnel, every one jumped in to help and hold each other. For the first time in a long time, in fact: People opened up their homes and not just their hearts to strangers; those with a phone and a fudgy net connection collated data through tonnes that was streaming in to give direction to relief and rescue operations.
Citizen journalists caught on camera the immense struggles and efforts of the local people much before the national media got wind of it.
Individuals and companies worked together and overnight to come up with software that helped mark flooded roads, subways and flyovers making the city navigable for those who had to be out there.
People out of the city felt frustrated for not being there to help their near and dear ones. Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp became the start and end point for any kind of information. Multiplex cinmea halls offered RO treated water to anyone with an empty container. The rich and the famous got out of their homes to get their hands dirty. Multiple trusts had to be formed to consolidate the funds that poured in from overseas. Schools, colleges, IT parks and wedding halls doubled up as large kitchens, shelters and relief collection centres. Mobile medical camps were set up on the MRTS train platforms. Telecom companies slashed calling rates, overlooked delay in bill payments and provided free data and top ups.
All kinds of government servants – from the police to engineers at the electricity board worked through the nights without a thought to shifts and overtime.
The army, navy, air force, NDRF (National Disaster Response Force), fire and rescue services, police and coastal security worked shoulder to shoulder so that Chennai’s people didn’t go under water.
For all this and more, my lifelong admiration. O
ur parents, children, friends and pets made it because of the help and humanity extended by countless crusaders. Thank you.
About the Author
Lakshmy Ramanathan joined Daily News & Analysis and The Times of India dailies to report on all things fun and serious. She now spends her time writing books and running behind her seven-year-old who has an insatiable appetite for tales and treats. She is also the author of For Bumpier Times: An Indian Mother’s Guide to 101 Pregnancy & Childcare Practices.
She can be reached at [email protected].
Acknowledgements
To Swami and Sivaraman for pushing me to write and breathing down my neck till I did.
To Susamma and Ranjini for accepting my multiple final drafts. I am not sure I would have.
To Gautam aka Goofy for fielding my endless doubts on football clubs and cricket maidans.
To R. Vasundara for being my express english to hindi translator.
To my father – my rock.
Thank you Diya Kar and Prerna Gill for getting as excited about the story as I was writing it.
A lot of you were also begged and bulldozed to interview with me. Thank you!
Thank you, Dr Soumya Anandan; Chandrasekaran Duraiswamy, Marketing and Communications expert; Lakshmi Kumaraswami, Media and Communications professional; A. Prathap, Special photographer, The Times of India, Chennai; C. Sylendra Babu, Additional Director General of Police (ADGP), Prisons, Tamil Nadu, Former ADGP, Coastal Security Group, Tamil Nadu; N. Priya, Deputy Director, (HQ) Fire and Rescue Services, Chennai; Sunil Nair, Resident Editor, The Times of India, Mumbai, former Resident Editor of The Times of India, Chennai; Vivek Narayanan, Special correspondent, The Hindu, Chennai; P. Venkatram, Senior Oarsman and Treasurer, Tamil Nadu Rowing Association; Aparna Ramalingam, Business Journalist; Krishnamurthy Ramasubbu, Deputy Editor, Dinamalar; Abhinav Singh, Media and Public Relations manager; V. Ayyappan, Deputy Metro Editor, The Times of India, Chennai; and Archita U. Wagle, Chief Copy Editor, The Times of India, Mumbai.
After the Storm Page 17