Come On Inner Peace

by Sachin Garg

  ‘I know,’ I said.

  ‘No, you don’t. Only the young don’t know the charm of being young. You have to be old and dying to really know it. And there’s another thing I want to tell you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You made me understand why it is such a great feeling to be a mother. You made me understand what it means to get and give unconditional love. But probably I am lucky that I don’t have any kids of my own.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked.

  ‘Because if I did, I would be really worried what will happen to them when I die. But with Samar, I know he has a mother who cares for him a lot. So I can die in peace.’

  I held her hand and tried to comfort her. And sitting there, on the floor of the living room, we went to sleep, to wake up next morning and catch the train.

  And as I said good bye to her, standing on the porch, there was only one thing on my mind.

  I won’t let her die.

  Vandana’s train was two hours after ours. I was a bit worried that whether she would actually get on her train or not. But I had locked my flat and kept the key in my pocket. As Navya and I sat in our seats, Vandana waited outside.

  Goodbyes are generally tough. Saying bye to Vandana was difficult on so many levels. I cried, Navya cried and so did Vandana when we said bye. But I knew it was much, much tougher for Vandana than it was for us.

  We were moving to a place we liked with people we loved. But Vandana was going to be alone. It was one thing to face death, and it’s a much, much bigger challenge to face it alone.

  As I closed my eyes, sitting on the window seat of the train, a very scary thought crossed my mind. What if I come back and Vandana is not there. What if, she succumbs to the mental stress of waiting for her death and commits suicide?

  I opened my eyes with a jerk and Vandana was standing right there, smiling at us. The train started moving and Vandana started waving at us. I noticed there was something in her hand. It was a big key. I knew what it was the moment I saw it. And she was deliberately showing it to me, telling me that she was going back to the flat as soon as the train left the platform.

  Vandana took the metro for Rohini, where my flat was. As she entered the flat, she looked around. The same flat had a cheery feeling to it until a few minutes ago. She had never been alone in this flat before. But today, the silence of it was deafening for her. She looked at the walls, and she knew, she wasn’t made for living alone.

  Damn, she could really use a TV in the house at that time. She decided to go straight to the kitchen, and started preparing for baking a cake. She did everything really slow and tried to tire herself as much as she could, so that she would consume as much time as she could and would be tired by the night and would just doze off at night.

  When the cake was done, she took a small bite. It was delicious. For a second, she was ecstatic. But then, the very next second, an unprecedented sadness gripped over her. She had nobody to share the wonderful cake with. How she wished she had Divya with her, who would tell her she was a magician to have baked such an art. How she wished she had Samar, to tell her that it was not a cake, it was edible poetry. How she wished she had Navya, who would love the cake but would not react but the faint smile on her face would be worth a thousand compliments.

  Vandana dreaded the next week. She somehow knew she didn’t have the mental stamina to go through it. She knew it was a matter of time that she would collapse on the floor of the flat. She felt as if she had spent the forty years of her life setting herself up for this. As if she had alienated every possible support from her life, including Samar and Navya now.

  Vandana tried hard but she couldn’t sleep that night. She couldn’t bring herself to think positive. She imagined that Samar also becomes a Meth addict and stays on with Navya in Goa. She thought of Divya, she thought about how she would react on seeing Vandana in such a condition.

  When Vandana went to the washroom in the morning, she realized she had aged more in the last night than last five years combined. Lack of sleep gave her dark circles. She decided to go to the park and came back rather tired. And as she came back and sat on the dining table again, alone, she got convinced that she would never be able to sleep again. There was no reason for the belief, as baselessly as many of her other thoughts, she got convinced.

  But this belief got shattered when she finally dozed off at six in the evening. She didn’t sleep for long. By eleven in the night, she was back to lying down open eyed on her bed. A dry tear rolled down her right cheek. By now, she didn’t know what was worse: The physical weakness, unbearable pain and incessant cough or the mental agony of being so lonely that it was fatal in itself. Or the fear of looking at death in the eye, of wondering every morning, that whether you would see the next one or not.

  On the fourth morning, Vandana did collapse and fall on the floor. Obviously, there was nobody to take care of her and even though she knew this day would come, she hadn’t been able to plan for it in any way, simply because she didn’t know who to call.

  Around five hours later, she woke up with a sharp pain in her head. Even though she had felt unhealthy on the inside for a long time, she was now getting convinced that her end was near. She didn’t have much time left. She was convinced that Samar would come back from Goa to find her ten day rotten body, with flies on it.

  If only she had known things could go this wrong when she had left home at the age of eighteen. Maybe, she was made for a boring life and she hadn’t been able to handle all this excitement. What all she could give up for a head massage from her mother at this point.

  Really, what can be worse than waiting for death, in a flat, alone?

  ‘Yes, This Is Me’

  In the train, Navya wasn’t able to handle her edginess and uneasiness. She wouldn’t sit in one place for long. And then, she wouldn’t sleep all night. She was visibly perturbed all the time. She felt nauseous and claustrophobic in that little space. At every station, no matter what time of the day, she would get down and take a walk. She would look at the open air as if she was a fish who finally left under water and could finally breathe.

  I just prayed that what I was trying to do was possible. Remembering Vandana made me believe that I was on the right path.

  We got down from the train at Panjim and took a bus to Arambol. There is something about the air in Goa. It has the some invisible magnetic that sucks negativity out of you and making everything seem several times prettier and fresher.

  It was as if her eyes were looking for just one thing. I couldn’t wait to reach Woodstock. I could really use the support of my friends at Woodstock, Joseph’s dominance and Imran’s age old wisdom.

  Nobody knew we were coming to Woodstock. Nobody had any idea what had happened after we had left. And out of the blue, we would be standing at their doorstep. But I was sure of one thing. They must have definitely missed us when we were gone.

  Nothing had changed in Woodstock. In the middle there was the open area, where the parties happened. Around the vacant area, there were rooms made of thatch on three sides. There was a restaurant on the fourth side.

  We started with looking for Joseph. When I saw he wasn’t in his office, I knew he would be in his room. Navya and I went to his room, with our bags on our shoulders. Joseph was watching something on TV when we knocked. On seeing us, Joseph was overjoyed. Even though he was still his calm self but could read in his eyes that he was elated.

  Imran’s reaction was much more flamboyant. He jumped and danced and sang a line or two to welcome us. He made sure everybody knew we were back. And he made sure we knew how much he had missed us.

  ‘It seemed you took all the joys of Woodstock with you when you left,’ he said, hugging us.

  ‘I will cook your favourite arabiatta pasta and pepperoni pizza,’ Imran said. He then escorted us to our rooms, as instructed by Joseph. Navya’s room was two rooms away from my room. I felt a bit uneasy about it, even though her room was only a few steps away from my room. I was not comfor
table with letting Navya away of my eye for even a few hours. Navya needed constant attention and even the smallest of lapses could be highly damaging for her.

  I settled my stuff in my room and went for a shower, as we had been in the train for a day. Once I was done, I knocked on Navya’s door. When she didn’t answer to the knock, I assumed she must be having a shower and I went for a walk on the beach and around Woodstock. It was a nostalgic walk down the amnesia lane.

  I came back to Navya’s room around sunset. It seemed the concept of time wasn’t relevant in this place. There were no offices to attend or classes to reach. I knocked on Navya’s room once again.

  She opened the door this time. She stood in front of me. Clearly, she had not taken a shower, probably because she had stopped seeing a point in them. She seemed tired and restless. I pitied her condition too; she was trying so hard to fight her craving off. Thankfully, the party was about to begin at Woodstock. And it turned the mood around completely.

  For the first time, the Woodstock people were partying harder than the guests were. Imran got high till the point where his cooking skills weren’t getting impaired. Joseph was as drunk as he could be, making sure that no one else was sober.

  Navya and I were in the middle of all this. In the beginning I was ecstatic. I hadn’t experienced a happy-high in a long while and there are things you can only do in Goa.

  But then I observed Navya. Nothing had changed for her: Her eyes were unfocussed and her lips were forcefully stretched into a smile. I had been euphoric from my decision to come to Goa. It all melted that moment.

  In the month of July, the Village had few guests, as it was an off season. The next morning, I woke up with a mild hangover. I felt like discussing what was bothering me with someone. And there was only one man I could think of: Imran.

  His cheery and jumpy body adorned a stilted demeanour now. My guess – terrible hangover. But he smiled at me when he saw me. There was something going through his head. I believed I knew what it was.

  ‘What is wrong with Navya?’ he asked me without any preamble, as I sat in the chair in front of him.

  And I began the story. I told him what had happened after Kanika passed away. And about The Ashram and then how I had found Navya again. And in what condition.

  ‘It’s no big deal, Samar. We have dealt with much bigger issues than Meth. I am sure we will get her alright.’

  I looked at him and he must have seen how unsure I was. He pressed my hand to comfort me but I knew we had to push the ‘Sisyphus’ rock up the mountain and let it not roll back.

  ‘I have known some drug heads. And I think drugs might change, the treatment remains the same. And the point is distraction. She should be so engrossed in doing what she loves, that she forgets her addiction.’

  ‘How do we go about it?’

  ‘If she loves painting, we make sure she paints. If she loves singing, we make sure she sings. If she loves running, we make sure she runs. You get the crux, right?’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ I said.

  ‘Also, it’s important that we make sure she is tired by the end of the day. Only then she will sleep well. Or otherwise, she would have tough nights. All drug addicts have sleep issues.’

  I couldn’t agree more. Just then, Navya stepped out of her room.

  Imran was prepared for her. As she walked in, Imran got up from his chair and walked up to her.

  ‘Navya, do you see any change in me since you left?’

  Navya looked at him top to bottom. Imran was a blob of fat, with little hair on his head. He always wore a white vest, with no shirt on, with a sarong, or a lungi at the bottom. He looked like someone whom you wouldn’t want as your cook. But luckily, looks weren’t really a criteria for a cook, as they seldom go in front of the guests.

  ‘Well, I think you have become even more curvaceous than you were before,’ Navya joked.

  ‘Yeah. But I think I could lose a few grams,’ Imran blushed.

  ‘Yeah, you totally could. All you need is some will power and a good trainer.’

  ‘I have plenty of will power and I think you are the best trainer I can ever get,’ Imran said.

  I could see what he was doing there. His plan was to make Navya make him work out. And in the process she would have to work hard too. We knew that Navya will never work out for herself. But she could definitely work out with Imran.

  Imran had always been the sidekick of Woodstock. He would quietly go about his work without being a pain in anybody’s ass. This often made people forget how intelligent he was.

  As Navya smiled and went to her room to change to her track pants and put on a hair band, I felt better about my decision of coming to Woodstock.

  Enjoying a lazy brunch with Joseph, we watched Imran and Navya leave for the beach for a jog. We realized we needed to make a daily schedule for Navya, making sure she is occupied with happy thoughts, surrounding with things she likes to do. This afternoon, she would ‘accidentally’ come across a canvas and some colours. She will brush past books, which we knew she would want to read. She would come across pen and paper which would make her want to write. She would bump into interesting people, with whom she would want to have a conversation.

  When Navya and Imran came back, Imran announced, hardly coherent because he was trying to catch his breath, that courtesy Navya, he needed to lie down for the next seventy two hours. Joseph went after him to tell him that he didn’t have more than two hours before he got back to work.

  That left Navya and me alone. She was sweaty too, from the run. She had her unwound her hair to allow them to dry down. I knew what was next. It was time to revive our walks on the beach. That was how we connected the last time. With her on one of my side, and the sea on the other side, I believed that the world was complete.

  ‘So what went so wrong, Navya? How did it reach where it did? Why did you go so far on this path? Didn’t you realize what atrocious harm you were doing to yourself and everyone who ever loved you?’ I said.

  ‘You won’t understand. When things go as wrong as they had with me, people can do strange things.’

  ‘But tell me what happened. You left Goa with your dad without leaving any way for us to trace you. And the next time I saw you, you were slightly better than a dead body in Urban Pind, with a scumbag who calls himself DJ Vyk.’

  Navya looked down. I think she was contemplating where to begin. The beach must have done her mood a lot of good.

  ‘My dad took me straight to Bhopal from Goa. He locked me up in a room and told me that my studies were done. He loved me and all, but he believed that I was too unstable for college and would end up harming myself. He is my dad and he turned out to be right. I did end up harming myself eventually.

  I ran away from the house at the first chance I got. DJ Vyk was my senior in college and we had been friends when he was in school. And somehow, I had kept in touch with him after school because at the back of my mind I had known that if someday I had to escape to Delhi, his house would be a strong possibility. Well, I did come to Delhi and landed up at his doorstep, without options it was understood that we were going to date. Once when he was gone on one of his tours across the country, I stumbled on his laptop on a boring afternoon. I fiddled with it for an hour but it couldn’t keep me engrossed for a long time.

  That’s when it struck me. I had always believed I was not intelligent enough to be a writer. But I remembered what you had told me. And that you believed I could be a writer. That was when I opened a word document and started typing my mind and eventually carved a story around it. You had planted the thought in my head and that’s when it took shape. I started writing my first book and in less than a month it was done. I sent it to all the publishers I could find on the net and went ahead with the one who replied first. The book came out and it struck a chord with the audience. And even though I knew it was a wrong thing to do, I let fame get into my head.

  DJ Vyk had been a simple guy with simple needs. He was already a bit famous a
nd I got a bit famous too, together we became a crazy duo. I have no idea when we went from vodka to whisky to cigarettes to weed to hash to Meth. It was a gradual progression and I think I knew what I was getting into. But the gravity which pulled me was way too strong. Sometimes I did it for glamour. Sometimes I did it for harming myself. Sometimes I liked the feeling. Sometimes I just wanted to alter my state of mind, or go into complete blankness. And I am not proud of what I did. But you know right, how and for what reasons people inevitably get into such rebounds,’ Navya said.

  I was dreading what was coming next. There was something unsure in her eyes. And she said it, ‘I missed you, Samar.’

  I looked at her, thinking of a suitable response.

  ‘I couldn’t live without you,’ she continued. ‘I needed you in my life. I never thought I could get attached to someone or fall so truly, madly and deeply for anyone. But strangely, without you, the balance in my head was dislodged. And all you wanted was someone else. When I thought I was running away from myself, I was actually running away from you.’

  ‘But nowhere did you realize the magnitude of the puddle you were creating for yourself? You didn’t realize how wrong were going? You didn’t think of so many people who loved you and who would in pained to see you like that? What were you thinking?’ I said.

  ‘I once wrote a few lines about what I was thinking. Do you want me to read them to you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said.

  She brought her phone out of her pocket and started reading.

  ‘You know what is the worst thing in the world?

  You are amidst this crowd, a swarm of people,

  Who think they connect with you,

  Every one of them, in their own way.

  But in reality, you are being ripped apart,

  Connecting with each one of them.

  It is a constant struggle to connect with someone,

  To be heard, to be understood, to be loved, to be accepted.

  And it is done with a glimpse of hope,