Potato Chips

by Anshuman Mohan

  The end of the session was looming over our heads now. Soon, we would be promoted to class eight and be shuffled into different sections. We vowed to be the best of friends anyway. No matter what happened, we decided that we would meet every day during the lunch break.

  At home, the lectures had already started—‘You must do better in class eight’, ‘Everything will become more difficult, you must pay more attention to studies’, ‘You can quit riding if you like’… My parents were looking for a tuition teacher for me. Maths and Science were the priorities—god knows why, though, because my best scores were in those subjects. A Hindi masterjee was also needed, they had decided.

  ‘Why is he absent?’

  ‘I dunno. Must have caught fever or something.’

  It wasn’t like Rohan to be absent. He was easily the fittest among us and had been fine the previous day. He was fully convinced of the crappiness of the anti-exam he had written for Doon and had been avidly making plans for his future at St Xavier’s. We shrugged it off—he was probably attending a family function or something—and went back to our usual school stuff. The day was like any other. Pleasant, cool weather and boring periods.

  After a late lunch at home, I sat down to my Maths homework. Suddenly, the phone rang. The piercing voice of Rohan’s mother sounded from the other end of the line.

  ‘Aman? Rohan hasn’t reached home yet. Is he at your place?’

  ‘Huh? He was absent from school. Why would he come here?’

  ‘What?’ There was panic in her voice. ‘What do you mean he was not in school? He left home at the usual time! The driver dropped him off and was parked there all day. He waited till four o’clock and then called me up.’ Her words were coming in a rush now. Without waiting for an answer from me, she hung up.

  Rohan had been missing since eight in the morning!

  I called Sameer. He was shocked too. We tried to figure out the reason for an antic like this. There could only be one—Doon. I remembered with a jolt that he was supposed to have received his results the previous day. Rohan would do something like this only if he was being forced to go. Aunty must have pulled some strings and sidled him in.

  Summoning every ounce of courage I had, I dialled Rohan’s mum’s mobile number.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Aunty, this is Aman.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Is there any news?’

  ‘No. Not yet. I’ve sent people everywhere. Relatives, friends, neighbours… everywhere that he could have gone!’

  Taking advantage of her less-than-hostile-for-once tone, I asked my question—‘Aunty, has Rohan got admission into Doon?’

  ‘Yes,’ came the curt reply.

  ‘Please, Aunty, don’t send him. He doesn’t want to go,’ I pleaded.

  ‘Mind your own business!’ she said sharply and hung up again. It seemed to be her signature move.

  Sameer and I spoke again, for about the tenth time in thirty minutes. I told him about the admission. He was really alarmed now. How could his mother be so inconsiderate? So insensitive to his wishes? Rohan really needed us—his friends—with him.

  ‘Where the hell can a class seven student spend ten hours without being noticed?’

  ‘Or being looked at suspiciously,’ Sameer added.

  We thought and thought and thought, exploring every possibility that occurred to us, rejecting each one of them.

  ‘Dude, put yourself in his shoes. Where d’you think you’d go if you had to spend so much time outside?’ Sameer said.

  ‘I’d go to the amusement park…

  ’ ‘Hmm, lemme see… I guess I’d go to the movies.’

  ‘Hut!’

  I dismissed the suggestion. The movies matched Rohan’s personality all right, but not his condition. On further thought, however, I realized that Sameer had a point. I vaguely remembered Rohan once saying something along the lines of ‘What better place to hide than in a movie hall?’ during some random conversation.

  ‘You know what? You’re right!’ I said to Sameer. ‘Wanna give Aunty the hint?’

  ‘No… He needs us right now. Lets go there ourselves.’

  There was no driver today, so I dragged my mother along for our expedition. We took a taxi, picked Sameer up and then headed to the Inox theatre at Forum, the shopping mall close to school. That’s where we usually went to watch movies.

  We hurried over to the ticket counter and explained why we were there. The lady selling the tickets was very helpful. She might have thought we were up to some mischief if Mum hadn’t been there, but her presence gave weight to our story. The lady looked up her files and marked out the single tickets that had been sold for the shows running at the moment. There were only about ten for each hall. Grabbing a printout of the single-seaters of a sci-fi movie, we rushed into the hall. An usher came with us, flashing a red torchlight and directing us to the single-seaters. It could be a long search—Rohan could easily have changed from one screen to another without being noticed. Besides, there was also the possibility that we’d miscalculated altogether and he wasn’t here at all.

  It was oddly funny, though, tiptoeing through the rows like a ballerina, then flashing a light on someone’s face, only to find some grey, wrinkly chap instead of Rohan. After a few such misses, Sameer suddenly called out— ‘Over here!’

  Three hundred pairs of eyes looked at him and then at us as my mother and I ran towards him. And sure enough, it was Rohan, just sitting there, staring at a bunch of robotic humanoids on the screen. There was something horribly pitiful about the sight, and I could feel my heart twist.

  We pulled Rohan out. He followed us like a lamb, not resisting at all. He did not say a word and we asked him nothing. Sameer guided him down the escalators and we walked out of the mall. We hailed a taxi and pushed him in.

  ‘Chalo,’ I said to the driver. ‘Kahin bhi.’

  Despite all his antics and his devil-may-care attitude, Rohan had always been scared of being away from his friends and family. When Sameer’s parents had separated from the rest of the family, Rohan had often wondered out loud, almost pensively, how awful it must be for him, how insecure and uncomfortable he must be feeling. I guess it had a lot to do with his upbringing—most of his day-to-day care had been left to servants by his parents, and he hardly knew them at all. And so he clung more fiercely than most people to everything else that was familiar. It was his fear of being sent away, far away from everything that he knew and loved, that had been messing him up for the last few months. He had fought tooth and nail against it—he had battled his parents every step of the way, engaged in his stupid ‘non-cooperation movement’, screwed up his exam on purpose. And yet, his fear was about to be realized. And I could see the admission of defeat in his vacant gaze, his slumped shoulders.

  For the first time ever, I saw Rohan break down. He put his head down on my mother’s lap and wept like a baby, clutching her pallu in his fist and sobbing incoherently— ‘Aunty, mujhe nahin jana hain! Sameer, Aman, I don’t wanna go!’ Mum hugged him hard, tears filling her eyes.

  Reluctantly, very reluctantly, I called Rohan’s mother to let her know we had found him.

  When I told Rohan that his mother was coming to my house to pick him up, up, he wiped off his tears and raised his chin in defiance. ‘What’s the use of crying in front of blind people?’ he muttered through clenched teeth.

  I was truly shocked by his mother’s attitude. On the phone, she had sounded really annoyed about Rohan’s behaviour instead of showing any signs of regret or any concern for the feelings that had provoked such an action. Rohan’s parents were hurting him as badly as Karan had hurt Ankit. In fact, it was worse—Ankit hadn’t been betrayed by someone he had trusted. And while the police would keep looking for Karan and punish him if he was found, nobody would punish Rohan’s parents.

  Eighteen

  The Last Bell

  Fifteen minutes later, we were home. I was feeling totally defeated, like a batsman who had been bowled out
for a duck. Mum went into hostess mode. ‘Coffee!’ she declared and rushed off to the kitchen. Sameer and I stared at each other, uncomfortable with Rohan’s tears and the colourful adjectives he was using to describe his parents.

  The doorbell rang. Rohan turned to look at us, his eyes like those of a caged animal. His hand gripped Sameer’s tightly as I walked to the door and opened it.

  ‘Surprise!’

  I heard Rohan’s whimper of relief when he realized that it wasn’t his parents at the door but two strangers.

  ‘Shubho! Sir?’ I mumbled. They looked giddy with excitement.

  Ignoring my gloomy expression, they shouted ‘Hooray!’ Then they lifted me up on their shoulders and ran around the room with cries of ‘Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!’ Finally, they deposited me on the sofa.

  I stared at them in stupefaction. The two of them were acting like they were high, and I hadn’t a clue why. ‘Not good timing, folks,’ I muttered. Rohan and Sameer were staring in amazement, their mouths hanging open.

  Reluctantly, I performed introductions. Pleasantries were exchanged. Then Rohan went back to being miserable, Sameer gave me a ‘Do I have to ask?’ look and Shubho and Tapan Sir went back to Durga-puja-celebration mode. Something had happened. Something big.

  Seeing my puzzled expression, Tapan Sir pulled out a letter from his pocket and handed it to me.

  ‘YES!’ I found myself yelling as I read it. ‘Yes, man, yes!’ I said and hugged the two of them.

  All that worrying, all those phone calls and that all-important trip to my old friend Pradyuman’s house—it had all paid off. Shubho had been taken in as part of the AITA’s Aid Scholarship programme. He was now a proud life-member of the most important tennis authority in India.

  Sameer and Rohan, however, were still in the dark. Judging by their expressions, they thought I had joined ranks with Crazy 1 and Crazy 2.

  Leaving explanations to Tapan Sir and Shubho, I ran to the next room to call Pradyuman’s father and thank him. When I came back to the drawing room, the four of them were sitting together and chatting away despite the language barriers. Tapan Sir was practising his Hinglish on Sameer and Rohan.

  This was the scene that Rohan’s parents walked into—I had not shut the door after Tapan Sir and Shubho’s arrival. They walked across the room to Rohan without a word to anyone. Then Rohan’s dad rapped him hard on the head. A hush fell on the gathering. It was showtime.

  ‘Oi!’ Tapan Sir’s voice broke the silence. ‘Bacche ko kyun marta hai?’

  ‘Shut up. It’s none of your business,’ Rohan’s father said curtly.

  ‘It is my business when someone hits a kid in front of me,’ Tapan Sir said, staring defiantly at Rohan’s dad.

  ‘Who are you to tell me what to do with my son, huh?’

  ‘I am a father.’

  Tapan Sir’s voice was quiet, but the strength of emotion behind the words made itself heard in every corner of the room. The rest of us stared at the scene in stunned silence.

  ‘I don’t speak to chhote log like you,’ Uncle blustered.

  ‘Sirjee, bacche ko marna kya bade aadmi ka kaam hai?’

  I don’t think anyone had ever spoken to Uncle like that. I felt like cheering for Tapan Sir.

  ‘Do you know who I am?’ Uncle roared.

  ‘A bad parent.’

  I looked at Rohan’s mother to see what her reaction to the situation was. I was surprised to see that instead of springing to her husband’s defence, Aunty was staring intently at Rohan. Though he was looking defiant as he watched his dad being taken to task by Tapan Sir, his face was marked with tear stains. Aunty’s face was impassive. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

  Uncle was still raging. ‘Get the hell out of here, you fool!’ he yelled at Tapan Sir.

  ‘No, Mr Kapoor, he will not get out.’ Unnoticed by us, Mum had come back into the room. ‘This is not your home. You can’t dictate who comes and who goes.’ Her voice was filled with indignation. ‘Tapan is as much a guest in our house as you are. Actually, he is a much more welcome one.’

  Uncle looked stumped by this surprise attack.

  ‘How dare you speak to me like that!’ he shouted. ‘You—you are responsible for my son’s disobedience. It is YOUR son and his low-class friends who’ve been leading him astray!’

  ‘No!’ Shubho, who had been quiet since Rohan’s parents had arrived, spoke now. ‘Don’t say a word against Aman. You know nothing about him.’ His face was red and his fists were clenched by his side. He looked like a volcano about to erupt.

  ‘Yes, Mr Kapoor.’ Mum moved to stand between me and Shubho and put her hands on our shoulders, drawing us close to her. ‘You have no right to say anything against my son or his friends. You think they are a bad influence on your son? You should look at yourself in the mirror. Kids look to their parents for role models—what kind are you? A man who is willing to sacrifice his son’s happiness for his own ambitions! What example are you setting for Rohan?’

  I had always thought of Mum as Ma Saraswati’s avatar— she had suddenly turned into Ma Durga!

  ‘I don’t have to put up with this nonsense,’ Uncle growled. ‘Sonal’—he turned to Rohan’s mother—‘get Rohan. We’re leaving right now. We’ll go home and start packing. The sooner we get him away from these people, the better.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What?’ Uncle stared at Aunty.

  ‘No, Prakash. Just look at our son…’

  We were all stunned by what was happening. Even Rohan was staring at his mother, the surly expression on his face replaced by wonder.

  ‘What are you saying, Sonal?’ Uncle looked totally shocked. ‘We have been planning this for years! And now you’re saying… what are you saying?’

  ‘I’m saying that… I want to hear their story,’ Aunty said, pointing at Shubho and Tapan Sir. ‘Who are you people?’ she asked them with the most genuine expression I had ever seen on her face.

  And so, in a mix of broken English, Hindi and Bengali, Tapan Sir proceeded to tell them the story. His voice cracked when he reached the bit about Shubho being thrown out of the club. Shubho stepped in and continued, his voice no less tearful.

  A strange silence had filled the room by the time they finished.

  Breaking the silence and confirming our worst fears, Rohan’s father spoke: ‘But this doesn’t change anything, Sonal. Perhaps these kids aren’t too bad after all, but this is our son’s future we’re talking about. We can’t just throw it all away. Rohan has to go…’ He pulled Aunty away to a corner and they continued the conversation in whispers.

  The burst of hope that had lit up Rohan’s face for a few moments died out.

  The sound of the phone ringing in the next room startled us. Aditi scampered off to answer it. She rushed back in two minutes later, her face brimming with excitement.

  ‘That was Anoushka Didi. The police caught Karan!’ she shouted.

  ‘What?’ Mum cried out.

  Sameer, Rohan and I leapt up and high-fived. ‘YESSSS!’ we all screamed together.

  ‘What? What is this all about?’ Rohan’s parents looked bewildered,

  Another round of explanations followed. At the end of it, Rohan’s dad said to his mum, ‘We really don’t know much about our son’s life, do we?’

  ‘No, I guess not,’ Aunty said with a strained smile.

  Uncle let out a sigh, his brows furrowed. ‘I guess… I guess it’s time we got to know him better.’

  We waited with bated breath for his next words.

  ‘We can’t really do that if we send him away to Doon now, can we?’

  ‘Dad…’ Rohan’s voice was tentative.

  ‘Haan, beta?’

  ‘Do you mean that?’

  ‘I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I do.’

  Everyone jumped up with a whoop of delight. Rohan ran into his father’s outstretched arms, tears running down his face again. But this time, they were tears of joy.

  ‘But on o
ne condition,’ Uncle said sternly. Oh no, I groaned. What now? ‘Your marks had better improve. Else no amount of drama-shama is going to stop me from packing you off to Doon.’

  We burst into laughter. Uncle’s threat didn’t sound particularly sincere. But I hoped that Rohan would take it seriously—it would be great fun watching him study as diligently as Sameer and Sriniwasan!

  ‘Come on, we’re going for a drive,’ said Uncle. ‘What hospital is Ankit in?’

  We trooped down the stairs and to the car. Uncle surprised us yet again by taking the keys from the uniformed chauffeur. We piled into the car.

  ‘Aren’t you coming, beta?’ Uncle asked Shubho, who was standing a few steps away, looking shy. At Uncle’s words, he grinned broadly and jumped right in.

  Thank god, I thought, Uncle wasn’t asking for Karan’s prison cell number!

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  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank my parents, for putting up with my eccentricities. My sister, Antara, for not watching the telly while I worked on the computer in the same room. And ooh, Dad again, for getting me my laptop and sparing Antara the torture!

  Nanaji, Nanima, Dadima and my enormous joint family are the most supportive and encouraging people on earth. Thanks, you guys, for being there!

  I thank my schools—Akshar, for making me who I am, and St Xavier’s, for giving me confidence in my abilities.

  I thank Mr A. Singh and my other buddies at St Xavier’s, for believing me when I first told them about Potato Chips. I thank Ms S. Chakraborty, for being the first person to not demand a free copy of the book!