Keep Off the Grass

by Karan Bajaj

  ‘But…’ I began, when Sarkar interrupted me.

  ‘Look behind you,’ he said urgently. ‘The television.’

  We turned to the small television in the dimly lit restaurant. A minor actor, whom I’d seen playing pivotal roles like the hero’s brother’s friend and the rapist villain’s fifth henchman in Mom’s Bollywood flicks, was being interviewed by a random news channel. He was crying. Literally, not figuratively, real tears. The usual crowd of onlookers, always abundant in India, had gathered around him offering their condolences (and trying to get into the frame of the camera).

  ‘Do you know why that thespian of Indian cinema is crying?’ Sarkar asked.

  Vinod and I shook our heads. It seemed completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand, but it was such a ridiculous sight that I was curious.

  ‘He was an extra in a Bollywood flick which missed getting the Oscar for the best technical editing—or some other equally inconsequential award like that, an award which no one in America even knows exists. But of course, losing out on that award has hurt our national pride,’ Sarkar said.

  ‘So?’ I said.

  ‘Waiter, boss, can you change the channel?’ said Sarkar, not answering my question. The waiter flicked the switch. ‘Look at that movie,’ said Sarkar. A kitschy Hindi film was playing on the screen. An emaciated star son was showering his affection on a small-time actress by tearing her clothes apart. We looked at Sarkar quizzically.

  ‘The film is produced and directed by the great showman of the Indian film industry, who pulls this wonderfully artistic stunt of making a special appearance in all his movies. Alfred Hitchcock is applauding him from his grave for his ingenuity,’ Sarkar said witheringly.

  ‘The point being?’ said Vinod.

  ‘We’re just dying to get a little appreciation from phoren. America and Europe, the mother ships. A crummy award thrown at us by America is the ultimate nod to our national pride,’ said Sarkar caustically. ‘All our ideas come from the West, yet you talk about the “uniqueness” of India’s sights and sounds.’

  ‘Not everything is about your movies,’ said Vinod sourly.

  ‘Really?’ said Sarkar. He pointed to a group of young guys sitting next to us, whose soft faces looked incongruous against their pierced ears and spiked hair. ‘Then why do these jokers want to have “organic food only”—didn’t you just hear them? Do they understand that one breath of the Bangalore air outside will neutralize a lifetime of organic meals? No. Angelina Jolie eats organic food, so Ramachandra wants organic food. Do they really enjoy listening to Coldplay songs on their iPod? Why does Erich Segal’s Love Story sell more than Pran’s Chacha Chaudhary comics? Are they going to meet twenty-five-year-old Jenny from New York when Mommy has already arranged a marriage with nineteen-year-old Lovleen from Bhatinda? Why are we celebrating Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day and now even Halloween for God’s sake?’

  ‘Can you keep your voice down?’ I asked. ‘They aren’t deaf.’

  ‘Your thesis on pop culture is very enlightening,’ said Vinod. ‘But that means nothing in my context. I just like it here man, simple. Not everything in life has to be an anthropological study.’

  Sarkar piped down a bit. ‘Whatever,’ he said. ‘Your hell.’

  ‘I do think you should give it a try, though,’ I said, trying to bring back some rationality to the argument. ‘It’s just a two-month corporate internship. You aren’t signing off to become somebody’s girlfriend in the Singapore Alcatraz.’

  ‘It’s not an internship thing, boss,’ Vinod said. ‘What if the Singapore office gives me a pre-placement offer? What then? Then you will say, ”Work there for just two more years and get some work experience”. And then, “Just wait till you are married so your wife can experience living in a different country”, followed by “Wait till you have kids, they can be Singapore citizens”. And before you know it, your whole life has been spent pining for permanence, belonging neither here nor there.’ He drained his whiskey and asked the waiter for a refill.

  He had a point. Rather uncomfortably, it reminded me of Dad. Wouldn’t he have been happier if he had never chosen to move to the US? His friends back home were happier, he had said in occasional unguarded moments, they had friends and family around them.

  ‘Look,’ said Vinod, sensing perhaps that he had touched a raw nerve. ‘Let’s skip this topic. We won’t get anywhere. In fact, let’s just shut up and drink for a while.’

  ‘And enjoy this uplifting music?’ said Sarkar.

  We laughed. The place topped the list of the most depressing places I had been to. A badly lit tube-light cast a dark, gloomy shadow on the untidily arranged tables in the room. The tablecloths were tattered or stained, and the only others there were the six wannabe rockers at the adjoining table, whose artistic and cultural tastes had already been dissected in detail by Sarkar. Bad disco music blared from the stereo system.

  ‘Remind me again, why are we here?’ I said.

  ‘Because I’m not a banker,’ smiled Vinod. ‘I spent the last rupee of my army savings on the Rajasthan trip. Nowhere in Bangalore, not even in a dhaba, can you find drinks this cheap.’

  ‘I’m here for the organic food,’ quipped Sarkar.

  We steadily worked our way through multi-hued bottles of rum and whiskey. My head throbbed from the mix. I needed to stop, I thought, when Sarkar held out a drink he’d mixed for me.

  ‘Try this one. It gives you the ultimate kick. In villages and small towns all over India, where there is no money to spare on fancy addictions, they mix cheap whiskey with beer for an immediate rush. You are out after just a glass. Bloody efficient.’ Trust Sarkar to know this.

  I took a tentative sip. It was surprisingly sweet and tasty. I drained the glass and took another. The music suddenly changed to a Sufi number. The DJ at the ramshackle establishment seemed to have chosen this night to find a piece of his soul as well.

  ‘Enjoy the song while it lasts,’ said Sarkar. ‘Soon,’ he pointed to the group next to us, ‘one of them will get up and ask the DJ-cum-cook-cum-janitor to play Bryan Adams’s Best Days of My Life. They will all hug each other after that—fancy an American song they can actually understand!’

  ‘So?’ said Vinod, sounding irritated at Sarkar’s unrelenting cynicism. ‘Some people are happy and want to celebrate. Not everybody has had a troubled…’ He stopped. ‘Whatever.’

  A look passed between Sarkar and Vinod. In that moment, I realized they knew things about each other that I didn’t know, and perhaps would never know. My last conscious feeling before things became completely hazy was a stab of envy at what they shared, and how incapable I was of giving myself so completely to….

  *

  The next thing I can recall clearly about that night is sitting in the dark in a fifteen-by-ten prison cell with at least a dozen starving men. My head hurt so much that I wished I could die. Some fresh air would have helped, but all there was to inhale was the stench of broken toilets. Rats scurried about on the floor, which was splattered with a yellow liquid that I was sure was fresh vomit.

  I was told later that I had been so far gone after the lethal whiskey-and-beer cocktail that by the time Sarkar suggested a drive in his friend’s car—‘Let’s go have an ice cream and tea, man’—Vinod had to pretty much carry me to the car. Once there, I had suddenly recovered and fought them hard to sit on the hood. Disjointed bits of conversation came back to me.

  Vinod: ‘Mr America, have you gone nuts? This is a potholed Bangalore road, not America’s smooth highways. One bump and you are gone forever.’

  Sarkar: ‘Let it be, man, he won’t fall off. Physics will save him: since the car has a forward momentum he will be pushed backward, and can’t lose his balance. It’s the ultimate poor man’s Leonardo DiCaprio king-of-the-world, wind-blowing-against-your-face kick—even if this is a second-hand Hyundai and not the Titanic. I have done it many times at IIT.’

  Vinod: ‘Okay, fine, if you know the science and stuff, which I don’
t of course.’

  More recollections: the cool, sharp sensation of the air on my face and the sudden realization—I was on the fucking hood! Loud thumping on the hood to make Sarkar stop. And is that a roadblock coming up ahead? Louder thumping till the car stops. Two cops with beedis, startled in their slack time. Sudden desire to puke. Retching in front of the cops. Quick breath analyser test with some complex contraption. Shocked, stunned faces, how can someone’s blood alcohol be so high? Another sudden realization: I was likely fucked!

  My memory starts to get clearer from there. Sarkar gets out of the car confidently and addresses the cops in hail-fellow-well-met fashion. ‘Sir, don’t trouble him. He’s just a kid who has come from foreign land. How much do you want?’ Knowing smiles are exchanged. ‘Just some chai paani, we know you are college kids. Even we have college-going children, these things happen,’ one cop says, smiling. Things are settled at the princely sum of Rs 500 each.

  The money is about to change hands and we are ready to go, all smiles, just another happy picture for the IIM scrapbook, when all hell breaks loose. A marked police car stops at the roadblock and a senior police official steps out. An immediate, perceptible shift occurs in everybody’s reactions. The police constables distance themselves from us—money hasn’t changed hands yet and they are innocent. They turn harsh and accusatory all of a sudden.

  ‘Sir,’ they tell the officer, pointing to me, ‘just look at his blood-alcohol level. Unbelievable! These kids nowadays, sir, they need to be taught a lesson.’

  Sarkar’s eyes are flashing with excitement. Crazy bastard. A paper bag filled with grass is lying arrogantly unconcealed on the front seat of our car. Vinod gets out and shows his ex-military identification card. I retch again at the wrong time in the wrong place—right on the inspector’s boots.

  ‘Sir,’ the senior official addresses Vinod respectfully, ‘what are you doing with these lowlifes? I respect you, sir, please go home now. Let me deal with them.’

  Vinod refuses to listen. ‘These are my friends. Our sincere apologies, inspector. We were just having a bit of harmless fun and things got out of hand. Please forgive us.’

  The official turns out to be a decorated inspector of the Bangalore police, given to surprise checks to fix the rampant police corruption and drunken driving. Luck is well and truly against us. His eyes fall on the bag on the front seat. He goes over, tears it open and smells it. ‘Bloody youngsters!’ he says in disgust, ‘bloody spoiled youngsters.’ He means Sarkar and me. Vinod has been absolved, of course. ‘Take them to the police station,’ he orders the constables. What? Did I hear him correctly? It’s marijuana, for heaven’s sake, it’s legal in a few countries and a medical curative used in hospitals nearly everywhere else. Are you doing this because I puked on your nicely polished shiny shoes? Unfortunately, no words come out. Just more vomit. This time I target it away from his shoes but it doesn’t help.

  ‘Just take these two away, will you?’ he barks out to the constables.

  Turning to Vinod, he says politely, ‘Sir, why don’t you take the car and leave?’

  But Vinod accompanies us, much to the inspector’s discomfiture. Sarkar remains crazily calm as we’re shunted inside the police van. I’m too hammered to think straight, but I know we’re in a lot of trouble. At the station, the constables, who haven’t said a word to us in the van, take us to the officer on duty.

  ‘Tyagi Sir has asked you to take care of these two,’ one of them says, pointing to Sarkar and me. Vinod looks worried then, and establishes his credentials again. He convinces the officer not to file a case and let him make a couple of calls while Sarkar and I are led to the lockup.

  By now, I am fully in my senses and so is Sarkar, though the bastard still looks okay, almost as though he’s enjoying the adventure. I have horrifying thoughts of being sodomized in the cell. Wasn’t everyone raped in prisons? Fuck, fuck, fuck! I’m almost in tears. Fear of enclosed spaces. The Count of Monte Cristo, Alcatraz, The Shawshank Redemption—all of it flashes through my mind to form bone-chilling, terrifying visions of sexual assault and murder.

  Sarkar’s voice cuts through the darkness. ‘Try this one. I removed the filter,’ he says as he holds out a joint.

  I reach out for it involuntarily when the reality of the situation strikes me with a crushing, almost physical force. The intense panic of the last few hours finally catches up with me. I start to sob with my hand over my mouth, for fear of waking up someone. But I’m having a full-blown panic attack and can’t stop shaking. The thin, starving man curled up by my feet wakes up and looks at me irritably. He scratches his fierce, pockmarked face.

  ‘Abe chikne, naya hai kya? Will you shut up or should I make you shut up?’ he growls, then yawns, releasing a cloud of foul-smelling breath in my direction before turning around and going back to sleep.

  Chikne, doesn’t that mean faggot?

  Oh God, no, not this. You can’t turn my life into a prison fuck-fest! I weep openly now.

  ‘Have you gone nuts?’ Sarkar looks at me, wide-eyed with surprise. ‘What are you crying about?’ I stare at him and the joint in his hand in disbelief.

  I could kill him. My head is spinning with what I’d like to scream out at him. But all I manage is an angry whisper, ‘Oh man, you’re the one that’s nuts! What are you so happy about? We are screwed, royally screwed. How long are we going to be here? Are we both going to be raped and murdered here? What is wrong with you? Don’t you realize the shit we are in? I can’t believe this!’ I run my hand through my hair frantically. How many years of prison do you get for being caught with marijuana? A few hours ago we were role-playing CEOs in an organization process design class in an air-conditioned classroom in business school. A few months ago, I was on the fiftieth floor of a swanky office which overlooked the Hudson river. What the hell happened? It’s over, my future has ended even before it started.

  Sarkar whispers back, ‘Please grow up. We’re here for an hour at the most. Vinod is going to call my father if I’m not mistaken and things will be fine soon.’

  I am stunned at his foolishness. ‘Your father is a businessman. This isn’t about money, Sarkar, we have committed a federal offence, or whatever you call it in India. A senior police inspector has caught us with a carload of marijuana in our possession and he is out to screw us. What will it take for you to realize we are screwed? Our careers end here. Business school is over. Your big talk doesn’t work any more. Man, I can’t believe I let you convince me all these months that Rs 500 solves everything in India.’

  ‘If you’re so worried, you can tell them you had nothing to do with it,’ Sarkar says. ‘I’ll tell them it’s all mine if it comes down to it.’

  I’m so angry I can explode. ‘Do you think I’d ever do that?’ I almost forget to whisper. ‘This isn’t a rerun of Law and Order, or whatever crappy show you get your foolish ideas about America from. I don’t rat on friends. After all we’ve been through, is that all you think of me?’

  Sarkar keeps quiet. I start to cry again. Mom and Dad, what do I tell you? Where did I go so wrong? I regretted that cursed moment when I decided to come to India. Oh Christine, your chance comment screwed me over.

  Fifteen minutes later, the cell door opens. Interrogation, I think—done, fucked. The same constable who had locked us in escorts us outside. ‘Sir, will you have some tea? We are very, very sorry, sir. Please forgive us. It was Inspector Tyagi who told us to… What could we do, sir? I have young children at home, sir.’ He almost dies ‘sir-ing’ us.

  I can’t believe it. What just happened? We are treated like royalty from here on. We are served tea, biscuits and even piping hot omelette and toast. The duty inspector gets up to offer us his seat. Our abandoned car appears parked right outside the station under the ‘No Parking’ sign where even the police can’t park their jeeps. Even Inspector Tyagi calls to speak to Sarkar to apologize. Police officers hang around obsequiously, fawning on every word we utter. I stare in awe.

  ‘N
ot a word to the media or the IIM,’ Sarkar says to the police officials, acting like a bloody inspector-general of police briefing his subordinates.

  ‘Of course, Sarkar sir. How can you even think that way? You’re like our son, sir.’

  We get out. Sarkar drives the car again—this time I elect not to sit on the hood. I don’t think I’ll ever sit on the hood of a car again.

  *

  Vinod took the wheel of the car as I sank into the back seat. The air was thick with tension.

  ‘That was very selfish of you,’ said Vinod, breaking the silence.

  ‘Selfish? Me?’ said Sarkar. ‘I saved you guys.’

  ‘I’m not talking about that,’ said Vinod.

  Sarkar kept quiet.

  ‘The moment you run into trouble, you call him, don’t you? Then you forget all the “Oh, I’m this fucked-up poor little rich boy. I had such a difficult childhood” bull,’ said Vinod. ‘That’s where all your false bravado comes from, doesn’t it? You know Daddy dearest is going to bail you out if it comes to that.’

  ‘Don’t speak about things you don’t understand. Not everything is as linear as it is in the army,’ said Sarkar.

  ‘Why don’t I understand? Just because I don’t have a father?’ said Vinod. ‘I’ve seen enough of the world to know that you’re no Hamlet. There is no Shakespearean tragedy in your life. Do you know what your problem is? Besides the fact that you don’t want to grow up?’

  Sarkar didn’t express any interest in Vinod’s diagnosis.

  ‘You hate being in his shadow. I spoke to him today, and I know when I hear genuine concern. If he didn’t care about anyone but himself, as you claim, why would he stop everything to make those calls today?’ Vinod said.

  ‘He’s worried about his reputation.’

  ‘Like hell he is. Every day there is a failed celebrity son doing something stupid to get attention—just like you. Does anyone care about Puru Raj Kumar or Fardeen Khan or any of those other idiots who are caught snorting cocaine or slitting their wrists?’