by Smith, Skye
"So what are you doing about it?" asked Maya.
"We have already done something," replied the nun. "We just returned from blocking the truck with signs and we asked the drivers to dump their cargo.
"And did they, the drivers I mean, dump the cargo?" asked Maya.
"No, they got the police to help them get through our blockade. But they are no longer ignorant."
"So the TV and newspapers were there?
The nun hung her head. "No, the police kept them away."
"How long ago was this?" Maya asked.
"Not more than fifteen minutes. The highway is very close to here."
"So go and stop them again. It is a long slow highway south of here." Maya spoke as she thought it.
"But the bus is old. We will never catch them."
Marique smiled mischievously at Maya, and Maya returned the smile. "Will," Marique yelled. "Give me the car keys."
Will looked up from where he was showing a young monk how he had fixed the wires. "Huh?" Maya grabbed the keys from him as she moved to the driver's door. Marique was yelling to the nun to grab some friends and pile into the back of the van.
"Go have breakfast, Will," Marique said and kissed him on the cheek. "We'll be back in an hour or so."
The first nuns were loading themselves into the back. Will looked at the pile of stuff sitting on the ground, and at the line of nuns climbing into the van. "Hey!" he yelled. "What gives?"
"You are a woman, and yet he allows you to drive his car?" asked the first nun of Maya. "Are you a good driver?"
"She drives slower than my grandmother," called Marique, and she grabbed the keys out of Maya's hand and claimed the drivers seat. " Will, close the rear doors." She waited for Will's two slaps on the side of the van to say that the doors were latched. "Hang on everyone, here we go."
Monks went flying for cover when they saw a woman driver, and especially a woman driver who was spitting gravel in a tight donut to clear the gate.
When they were across the parking lot, Marique whizzed out into traffic and chirped the tires in two gears. "Someone tell me where to turn!" She yelled out to the nuns in the back. A bald head poked out from the back to be next to hers and said, "Right at that traffic circle."
Everyone screamed as Marique took her at her word and went the shortest way right, the wrong way around the circle.
"Marique, you are on the wrong side of the road." Maya screamed.
Marique yelled "merde!" about six times as she careened over to drive on the left. "Oh yeah, right, I mean left."
Luckily there were no more turns. They were on the highway, and now Marique had her foot to the floor and all ninety diesel horses were straining to rush them along after the truck. For ten minutes they passed everything in sight. Maybe it was luck and maybe it was all the nuns praying with their eyes closed in the back, but there was a long train ahead that was crossing the highway, and stuck in a traffic jam of ox carts at the crossing was a big truck.
As they closed on it, one of the nuns opened her eyes and told them it was the right truck, and then shut them tight again as Marique leaned on the horn and overtook the entire line of traffic. Three things then happened at the same time. The last train coach cleared the crossing, the oncoming traffic started moving across the tracks, and Marique stood on the brakes and did a four wheel drift that ended with the van directly behind the truck.
The truck passed all the slower traffic and was now picking up speed with nothing but open highway ahead of it. Marique kept darting out to try and pass it, but now there was no break in the oncoming traffic. For a mile or more they were in and out of the other lane trying to get passed. Maya stopped watching. It was too frightening.
Finally Marique saw her chance, double clutched down two gears and had that diesel engine screaming as they overtook the truck. Now in front, she swung the van back and forth to block the truck in, and slowly came to a stop.
The two truck drivers watched a half dozen nuns pile out of the back of the crazy van that had just passed them and then blocked their way. They shrugged and climbed out of the cab to see what they wanted. It was probably the same bunch that had tried to block them in town. What were a few nuns going to do?
Talk, that's what the nuns did. They tried to reason and shame the drivers. Maya stood in front of the license plate so the men wouldn't remember it. Marique sat shaking in the driver's seat, shaking and trying not to puke as her adrenaline levels subsided.
One of the nuns came back to tell them that it was no go. The drivers had told them straight out that they were being paid to deliver this load, and that their company had a bond on the cargo. The cargo was going to be delivered to the south.
"Well," replied Maya, "even if you talked the drivers into not delivering it, someone else would. As long as the cargo exists, it is a danger to women. Women somewhere. If not Tamilnadu, then somewhere else. The only real solution is to destroy the cargo. That would stop this load, and fill the newspapers with the news, and get journalists looking into it."
"Oh, we could not destroy the cargo," the nun looked at her like she was crazy. "That is against the law. That is destruction of property. That is vandalism. We are pacifists. No, that we cannot do."
"Hold on," Marique had joined them. "You mean I broke a thousand traffic laws to get you 'ere, and now you aren't going to do anything?"
"We have done what we could. We tried to convince them. They have refused." They all looked around at the two drivers and the five nuns speaking to them in front of the truck cab. The men were shrugging their shoulders and looking at each other. They were ready to mount up and roll.
"Merde," muttered Marique, and grabbed her purse and started walking towards the two men, while searching through her purse for something. She walked right up to the two men and without slowing down, pepper sprayed them both in the eyes. The effect on the two unsuspecting men was immediate. They screamed in pain and put their hands to their eyes and started to stagger around.
"Push them off the side of the road so they don't get run over," Marique told the nuns. The nuns would not touch them. They were men. Luckily Maya had run forward, and she heard Marique’s logic, and did a sweep kick first under one set of legs and then under the other, and both men fell to the ground. At least they were no longer a danger to themselves.
Meanwhile Marique climbed up into the cab. The motor was still idling with the keys in the ignition. She searched behind the passenger seat. There was a multi tier set of metal dishes that all Indian truckers carried their lunch in. She flipped it open and looked in each of the dishes. There it was. Plain white rice. She leaped back down to the road and walked quickly up to the nuns, who where opening water bottles getting ready to wash their eyes.
"No," she yelled. "No liquids until we have mopped it up, otherwise it will spread the burn and make it worse." She handed the dish of white rice to one of the nuns and told her to use the rice like a sponge. That the pepper spray would stick to it, just keep turning it to use fresh clean rice. One of the nuns translated to everyone and to the two drivers, who were now pleading for help from the pain.
The original nun was standing beside Maya, scolding her. "Your friend has done a terrible thing. We are non-violent. This is against all our teachings."
Marique responded with, "Well, you didn't do eet. I did eet. And let me tell you we 'ave done a lot worse than this to save women and children. Now get your nuns to the back of that truck and start unloading those pills."
When they opened the back doors of the big truck, the enormity of the task of unloading the cargo made them all gasp. One of the nuns did a rough calculation that there were sixteen hundred cardboard boxes to unload.
Maya looked around. They were blocking traffic. It was only a matter of time before the police would arrive to see what was going on. There was a side road just ahead. A side road that went nowhere. It just ended. Probably a turn off created when the road was last paved, like, ready for some future road, maybe, sometime
. She walked back to the cab of the truck and told Marique to clear the road ahead, and get the van out of the way. Then she swung herself into the cab.
She watched as some nuns guided the drivers off the highway, and as the van zipped ahead to park under the next shade tree. Then she sucked up her courage, released the park brake, pushed on the clutch pedal and jammed the gear lever it into what she hoped was first. It was. With a roar and a whine of over-revving engine, she leaped and bumped that truck until it was just past the side road.
After about six tries she found reverse, and then leant on the horn and cranked the wheel and backed the truck into the side road. It took her two tries to straighten it out, all the while with highway traffic leaning on their horns in panic. Once straight and into the side road, she jumped down from the cab. The nuns were already at the rear ready to start unloading boxes. Maya waved them away.
She paced the length of the truck and then paced the same distance forward from the abrupt end of the side road. At that point she told the nuns to stand and stay out of the way. Then she scramble back up into the cab, slammed it into reverse, roared the motor and rushed backwards until the cab reached the gaggle of nuns and then stood on the brakes. She had braked too late. She felt the entire rig shudder as the rear most wheels went over the embankment.
With the park brake set, she went to see the damage. The rear of the truck was at a crazy angle. The nuns followed her to the back. There, at the bottom of the embankment, was most of the load of boxes all piled high and split open with their packages spewing out from split seams.
With the floor of the truck now at such a slope, they didn't need to carry the remaining boxes out of the truck, they simply slid them out. The nuns were happy at their work, making the rubbish pile of boxes even bigger. Marique came and stood by her and watched the nuns work. "Now what?"
"Got a match?" Maya replied.
"No, but I have these," Marique replied. She held up the driver's cell phones. "We should pull the truck forward before we torch this lot. No sense making the arson worse than it is. We can leave their phones in the cab."
Without the weight of its cargo, Maya was able, on the fourth try, to drive the truck back up onto the road bed and she pulled it forward as close to the highway, and as far from the pile of split boxes as she could. She looked in the rear view mirror waiting for the telltale smoke. There was none. Effing pacifists. She slammed her hands on the steering wheel in frustration, but that just hurt her hands.
Lowering herself down to the road, she noticed a fuel can strapped to the back of the cab. She grabbed it and marched back to the huge pile of cardboard boxes. Marique was in the center of four arguing nuns. The other two nuns were still seeing to the drivers, who probably thought that their truck had been stolen. The drivers would be getting their sight back soon. Time to get out of here.
Her path skirted the gaggle of women and went directly to the pile of boxes. This close it was a very big pile. It would make a very big fire. She emptied the fuel over the closest boxes and then stood back. In her pocket was a book of paper matches from a restaurant on the coast. She was about to strike it, when a nun pulled at her arm.
"No, let me. I do not mind going to prison for a worthy crime, for something I believe in. Let me."
Maya gave her the matches, and told her to use the first to light the whole book, and then throw the whole book onto the closest box and then run. Don't even think about watching, just run. She herself backed away to where Marique and the other nuns were watching.
"Run," Maya yelled, but there was no need. The fuel was diesel, not gasoline. Rather than exploding with a whump, it burned with a quickly creeping flame. Now they all ran. The combination of fuel and cardboard burned hot, very hot, scortching hot. The flames and belching smoke rose higher and higher.
Maya looked around to the sound of a beeping horn. It was Marique in the van. She and the nuns climbed back into the van and then they went to pick up the last two, who were still nursing the drivers.
Halfway back to town, a fleet of fire trucks and police cars whooshed by all noise and flashing lights and attitude. Maya slowed down and pulled over to give them room. No, Marique wasn't driving. The nuns had taken a vote. They would never sit in a car with Marique driving, not ever again.
* * * * *
* * * * *
MAYA'S AURA - Goa to Nepal by Skye Smith
Chapter 11 - Really Fleeing North
There is nothing that wastes the body like worry, and one who has any faith in God should be ashamed to worry about anything whatsoever. - Mahatma Gandhi
"We'll tell you later," Marique told him. "For now just throw the stuff in the van and let's get out of here."
Will shrugged to the two men he had been talking to when the girls drove up, but he did as he was told as soon as all the nuns were out of his way. It took him less than fifteen minutes. That gave the girls time to have a quick wash. When they got back to the van, they were with one of the nuns that had stolen them for the morning. The nun was loaded down with lunch boxes.
The girls gave the nun a hug. The nun's last words were "We must tell what we have done, but we will hide for a few hours to give you time to get across the state line." One last hug with tears this time and the nun ran away to hide with her friends.
Marique sat on the beer cooler so that Maya could have the window and wave to a group of nuns that were standing by the gate. Will was dying of curiosity, but his questions could wait until they were out on the open highway away from this city and its traffic.
"Okay, you two," he said, "before we head out of Nagpur, is there anything else you wanted to see? There are other temples, tiger game reserves. Tell me now."
"Just go," said Maya. "Get us far away from here and hurry." She sat back and watched the colors whiz by. Whatever else India was or was not, it was always colorful. A riot of color. Bicycles weaved by them ridden by the petty bureaucrats that kept India going. Motorcycles swooped by with women on the back in rainbows of saris, all riding sidesaddle. Three-wheeled vehicles of every size and description josled in and out of the traffic.
The air con was a blessing. Without it, they would have been riding with the windows open in the full blast of noise and pollution. The bus beside them was pumping filthy diesel smoke directly at her closed window. "Get me to Dharamsala. I don't want to see any more Indian cities or any more temples." Maya was depressed and she didn't mind who knew it.
"What's up, love?" Will said. He listened in disbelief as Marique told them the story of the truck and the cargo. With each passing sentence he watched more carefully for police cars.
"So let me get this straight," he said, "We are already on the run and trying to sneak north, and so you two go and hijack a truck with a valuable cargo and then burn the cargo. And you did it in this van, with these license plates?"
"Uh, yeah, sorry," said Maya. She looked anything but.
"Well I am not sorry," said Marique, catching Maya's look. "It was something that 'ad to be done. There was no one else around to do it, so we did it. Well, we and six nuns."
"And you never thought to ask my help? I'm hurt."
"You couldn't share the van with the nuns. They wouldn't have gotten in with you. Besides, someone had to watch our stuff."
"So why is Maya so depressed? I can understand her being worried or even frightened, but why depressed?"
"Because," Maya moped, "I came to India to find out about my aura. Nobody is telling me anything, they just want to use me for their own purposes."
"She 'ad some trouble with the Buddhist big wigs. Now she doesn't trust them."
* * * * *
They made good time on the road to Jansi, that was, until they were close enough to see the giant fort in the distance. Marique was sitting on the beer cooler between the front seats reading a tourist pamphlet. She was telling them about the Rani Lakshmi Bai, the rebel queen, when Will had to hit the brakes. Luckily the brakes worked well in this van. Luckily Will shot his left
hand out in front of Marique to hold her back from going through the windshield.
Marique pulled herself up from where she had fallen between the front seats when the beer cooler had dived for the gear shift lever. "Merde, ow!" She rubbed a bruised hip.
"Are you okay," Maya asked. She had grabbed at her friend, too.
"Ow, I sat on the effing hand brake, and Will's hand almost ripped my nipple off. No, I am not okay." She pushed herself backwards and then rolled into the back to get her legs untangled. "I think I'll just lie back 'ere for a while."
Will said his sorries, and let Maya take care of her while he got out to see what was going on with the traffic jam on what should be an open road through farms. "It's probably an accident," he said, opening the door. Lock yourselves in. I'll go check it out."
It was an accident but one that could only happen in India. There was a rail level crossing about ten trucks ahead. It was the kind with the long bar that swung down to stop traffic and swung up again once the trains were through. This one was broken in the down position. He walked over to where some truck drivers were looking at the damage and discussing the situation.
"You can see how it has happened," said one driver. "The man in charge of the crossing gate has tried to open it without unlocking this end. The gears in the winch have been stripped. We must be finding this fool and get him to open the road."
Will looked at the pole gate on the other side of the double tracks. It was fully open standing straight up. On this side, the pole was down and the end was broken. He tested the weight. He could lift it by himself, which was surprising for such a solid looking pole. He looked to the pivot end. The pole was counterweighted by concrete blocks.
He turned to the circle of drivers and pointed to the pivot end, "All the fool has to do is add some more blocks to the counterweight and the pole will open."
"He will be running for the hills," said one of the drivers. "He will be afraid that we will be beating him. Also, he will have sold the spare blocks on the black market."