“So,” The yellow grimaced when I finished. “Are you absolutely sure about this? You’re not confusing a hallucination with…?” That was something I’d thought about a hundred times. A hallucination…Absolutely no way! She was looking right at me! The memory of those dying eyes sent a shiver through my spine.
“Well?”
I nodded furiously.
“Go in and see for yourself. It’s no hallucination.”
The yellow looked first at the door and then at me. I heard a faint ‘Hmm’. “Go on…I thought Yellows weren’t scared of anything.”
“I think it’d be better if we went together.”
I couldn’t help laughing. Yes…It’s be a lot better to have someone to look around with. And I badly wanted to look around. Considering the disgusting state of the woman’s room, I half expected an equally dirty apartment. But I should have known better. From the bright living room with soft carpeting and comfy couch to the hyper modern office room, the apartment was dust free and cobweb free. And the sheets in the rest of the bedrooms emitted the faint whiff of scented detergent.
The people in the house were crowded in the woman’s room. The doctor was bustling around, busy as a bee, using his stethoscopes and a syringe at regular intervals. The others stood simply watching.
“Can you hurry on and tell me what’s happening? I have an impor…” The voice that broke the very hospital-like silence was Simon’s. The yellow nudged me significantly.
“See what I mean?”
“Definitely.”
I replied, keeping my gaze fixed on him. Hmmm…I was no doctor but I had the perfect prescription for ungrateful, horrible creatures like him. A nosefull of fist and a backfull of kicks seemed just right. Cure him of this nasty habit in the future.
The doctor was thinking along the same lines as well. His kindly eyes narrowed into gimlets as he faced Simon.
“I cannot guarantee that you’re mother’d be here when you come back during your lunch break.”
Simon remained unfazed. “I’m not interested in your guarantees or warrantees. But I am very interested in my clients and they would not appreciate waiting around while I sob over my mother’s sickbed. Just do your job and collect your payment from Lisa.”
Oh man! Enough’s enough! It was about time he got what was coming to him. I took my sweet time and clenched my fists hard. Stamped my feet a couple of times too just to get the strength of the hit perfect. After that it was time for action.
WHAM!!!!!
A good old fashioned hit right in the middle of the nose. As the wrestlers say, KO!!!! His yell was music to my ears. Simon swung around here and there looking for his attacker.
“What happened?”
The startled servant girl asked. Dan simply nodded his head disbelievingly. The doctor was the only one who remained clear-headed. I could tell he was used to people like Simon.
“If you can’t keep silent, I advise you to leave the room.”
He said coldly, holding a syringe upright in his hand.
“But…”
“I don’t care if it’s your apartment. This here is my patient and I’d be neglecting my duty as a doctor if I allowed you to wreck havoc while I treat her.”
Simon glared at the doctor for a while. I thought a fight would break out but maybe Simon thought he’d rather not mess with a man holding a syringe. He stamped out of the room and slammed the door behind him.
“HA!!!!!!”
I jumped at unexpected noise. But it was only the yellow cheering.
“You’re excellent, you know that?”
He laughed.
“I don’t know about th…”
Suddenly, the woman started to breath hard. Her chest rose and fell painfully as her mouth opened and close. “Oh dear…”
The doctor murmured helplessly.
I shivered slightly feeling the smell of death creeping into the room. The air was growing chilly as warmth slowly escaped the woman’s body. The slight ticking sound of a golden wall clock grew louder every minute.
“Doctor…”
Dan’s voice was low. “Is there nothing you can do?”
For a while, the doctor didn’t reply. I could see a small lump go down his throat as his eyes filled with tears.
“No…” His voice was barely audible, as if he’d rather give anything in the world to trade that no for a yes. “If she had been in the hospital a few days ago…I could have bought her more time. She could have lived for a few more months but…”
His voice trailed away as a sob escaped his lips.
“She was almost dead when I came in…Barely breathing….But still…I thought…”
“I thought she was dead. She could barely speak when she called me to ask for water and when I came to give her water she was…”
The servant said rapidly, her eyes on the dead woman. “That’s why I thought there’s no need to call a doctor.” Both Dan and the doctor turned around to face her.
“If you had called a bit earlier…I could have...Maybe I could have…”
The woman heaved in a long breath. Her chest puffed up to its maximum. Her eyes rolled around just as blood started leaking out of the side of her lips. Dan joined his hands in prayer, just as the doctor kneeled down by the woman. Only the servant girl stood unbothered. In fact, she looked so unbothered that it got on my nerves.
“Can’t you at least ACT a bit awkward? Damn!” I murmured. Apparently, the yellow found my remarks quite amusing.
“I’ve been around this house for a while.” He said chuckling. “And she never reacts to anything.” “Is that even possible?”
The yellow shrugged.
“I guess so.”
I was all ready to go out at that point. Forgive me, but I’m not really the kind of character to stick around when a person’s dying. And I got halfway to the door too. “Hey Viola! Over here! Look!”
Viola? I turned around simply to tell the yellow what I thought of his kiddiness but… What I saw was totally enough to wipe out that thought from my head. “But dying people are not supposed to…” The woman’s chest was slowly coming down and I was kind of sure that breath was going to be her last. It was turning the air bitter. With the bitter air came an even bitter sight. A blue head – a dark gloomy blue head- poked out. Two hands flapped out like bird wings. And then she jumped up landing neatly on her legs.
The temperature in the room dropped about ten degrees. The yellow tugged at my hand.
“Ummm…Maybe we should…”
“Shhh…” I hissed at him. Oh come one! Move? Right when I needed to ask some questions? No way! The blue pranced around and around the woman’s bed like some sort of super model as her breath grew fainter and fainter. And then all of a sudden it stopped. The doctor sighed and slowly took her hand, a single tear hanging on to his eyelid.
“She’s gone.”
“Oh!” The exclamation came from the servant girl. “I’ll call the master.”
Dan snorted in disgust. “I don’t know why you bother. Maybe he’ll be too busy to come down again. He’s a busy man after all.”
Apparently, the servant girl thought this remark beneath her attention. She simply threw him a dirty look and trotted out of the room.
The doctor wasn’t listening. He was still holding the woman’s hand. Tears were streaming down his eyes.
“Goodbye…Goodbye Aunt Susan.” His lips quivered. “I wish I could have stopped this…I…But I…”
He swallowed a huge lump that rose to his throat.
“BUT I’M NOT YOUR SON. I HAD NO RIGHT TO TAKE YOU TO A HOSPITAL.” Dan bit his lip hard, blinking rapidly. He made as if to move towards the doctor but stopped himself. I thought that was a good decision. It was too private a moment for consolations and condolences.
“That’s what he told me…That’s what……”
“Poor man!” The yellow said. “He’s the family doc and he’’s too fond of the old dear.”
“Oh!” I watched as
he kissed the woman’s forehead. It was, without a doubt, the way her son should have reacted. Why couldn’t he have saved her if he loved her so much? Wasn’t he allowed to do that if he was fond of her? Well…Humans worked in odd ways. Maybe there was some sort of wall around them that prevented friends and acquaintances from getting too close and helping.
I don’t know about the yellow, but I wasn’t really in the mood to stick around and wait for Simon. So, I made it towards the door again when an unfamiliar voice hailed me.
“Hello there Violet…”
I turned around swiftly. The blue, colder than ever was floating towards me. “I thought you didn’t want to leave.”
“I…” It wasn’t like me to fumble for words but the musical voice of the blue kind of made me uneasy.
“I thought you badly wanted to investigate the mystery that’s been haunting you since morning.”
“I…”
“I was the one who talked to you.”
“WHAT!!!!!!”
I admit my reaction was a bit too loud and a bit too fast. But really, what she said was not possible. She wasn’t even there in the morning. The woman hadn’t even released her then.
“I know it sound ridiculous and impossible. It’s true I wasn’t released till this morning. You know why?” “No!”
And I wasn’t sure I wanted to know either.
“She was withholding too much…Blinking back her own tears…Trying too hard not to sob…Fearing inside that something like that would curse her son forever…” My eyes flicked towards the woman for the briefest of moments. Her dry face…Her chapped lips…I wondered what it must be like to not cry even when you desperately wanted to. How suffocating it must feel to be denied that relief.
“That’s ridiculous! If that no good son of hers deserved anything it was a curse to make the rest of his life hell!”
The unthinking yellow as usual, burst in. “And I was looking forward to it too. After all the things I saw him do.”
The blue laughed.
“Try suggesting that to a mother. Sometimes selfless affection can be your worst enemy.” I nodded, once again staring at the woman. It was one of those things humans glorified too much – a ridiculous concept called sacrifice. It was great, no doubt, giving up things for the ones you loved. But from what I understood about humans, people with goodness ends up giving up everything and getting nothing. People like Shiva’s Mom and the dead woman. And the others around them end up preying on their generous souls, using them till they cannot help anymore.
“She made me a prisoner inside her body, never released me. It would have been fun because she had a buffet of emotions to feed upon but REALLY! Keeping me locked in for years was too much!!!!!!” The blue smiled. “When I saw you outside, I couldn’t resist playing a prank on you. When she was dead I was free to leave.” Well, I was kind of relieved that the creepy incident had a simple explanation. But that didn’t exactly inspire me to stick around. In fact, I was out of the window the minute the blue stopped talking. No more Simon scenes for me, thank you. I’d rather wait it out till the romantic lunch of the Nandan-Anasuya pair.
CHAPTER 7
The Cuisine International was an Anasuya kind of place – all frilly curtains and fancy flower vases. Obviously designed by a professional architect for the elite of the elite. And that, of couse meant the place was often empty (Not everyone can bear a huge bill!). I waited about in a wood paneled lobby right next to the glass doors of the restaurant, waiting for the pair of the evening to show up. I had intended to go through Nandan’s room during the lunch but I changed my mind at the last second. My excuse? I couldn’t resist a little drama and an argument is likely to yield twice the amount of info I could find in a boring diary.
But it was not them who showed up first. It was a familiar man in the wheelchair with his faithful sidekick. I knew they would come and I was kind of waiting for them to show up too. Jacob was smiling just like the cheerful soul he is but Dan looked a little disgruntled.
“Do we really have to wait around? Let’s just have lunch and…”
Jacob didn’t reply till they passed through the glass door. I went with them. “No, Dan. We wait till they come.”
The restaurant was divided into four huge cabins. The section we were standing was labeled ‘GENERAL’, which was pretty much a nicer way of saying ‘Nothing Special’’. Just like the name suggested out section was nothing to brag about. It was nicely decorated and all with silver cushion chairs and shiney tables but everything about it felt generic. But the other sections, which I could see though the glass walls were another story.
The best undoubtedly was the ‘KIDS ZONE’. There were kinds of cool posters on the walls – a kid with muscles and a girl with a backpack. There was a board game area, a toy shelf and an activity table. The tables and chairs were in a snappy orange and purple and the menus had these hand drawn pictures of a green goat (Did they really get a kid to do that?).
The next best would go to the section they labeled ‘Family Room’. Compared to the ‘KIDS ZONE’ it was a rather tame affair. The chairs and tables were made of wood, intricately carved at the legs and there were packets of scented tissues and napkins on the tables. Indoor plants stood at all corners like green sentries. Next to them stood bookshelves and magazine racks. From where I stood, I could make out a few ladies magazines, comic books and business publications.
The last and my least favourite something they called ‘COUPLES CORNER’. It wasn’t exactly bad but something about it irked me. Too mushy for my taste. The whole place was in a violent shade of pink. There were the dark pink table cloths and whole place was in a violent shade of pink. There were the dark pink table cloths and
VIBGYOR the delicate flower vases full of pink roses. And the heart shaped balloons floating around everywhere. Forgive me, but all that didn’t feel romantic. Just a cheap way to show off. Just right for Nandan and Anasuya.
Dan rolled Jacob’s wheelchair to a table next to the ‘COUPLE’S CORNER’ and sat down. For a while, the two of them didn’t speak. Dan flicked through the pages of the menu while Jacob hummed a tune to himself.
“Shall we order?”
Dan asked after a glance at his watch.
“Why not?” Jacob’s eyes twinkled. “It’’s not intelligent to quarrel with food.”
Dan pressed down on a silver button on the table. Music sounded from far away. Just as it stopped, a man in a black suit, sporting white gloves walked in elegantly through the restaurant door.
“May I help you Sirs?”
He bowed respectfully and asked.
Both men placed their orders just as the glass doors swung open again. I looked up, expecting Nandan and Anasuya but it wasn’t them. It was Shivani. She was dressed in a neat orange silk sari, her hair plaited to one side. There were light traces of makeup on her face and it suited her perfectly. Single gold chain hung on her neck. It was missing a locket. Four orange glass bangles clanged against one another as she walked.
It wasn’t long before her eyes fell on the single occupied table in the room. “Er…Er…Hi.”
She said awkwardly.
“Shivani??”
Jacob murmured before Dan even opened his mouth. “I didn’t think you liked places like this.” Shivani smiled softly.
“No. I don’t. I’m here to meet somebody.”
Of course! I should have guessed the moment I saw her. If Anasuya called Jacob was it too much a stretch to imagine she would have called Shiva too? Shiva took a seat on the table to their right. She drummed her hands on the table as Shiva took a seat on the table to their right. She drummed her hands on the table asVIBGYOR she waited.
Jacob and Dan, meanwhile, were talking in whispers.
“Could Shivani be…” Dan asked, his eyes almost popping out of his head. “She couldn’t, could she?”
“We saw her in the park. It was next to the auditorium where Anasuya’s engagement was to take place. We saw her again about the time
the engagement ended…” Dan shook his head rapidly. “No…That’s…”
Just then, the doors opened again. The speakers of the restaurant coughed a few times and started to sing. I love you…I love you…I’m so in love with you…
The moonbeam of my night. That’s you…That’s you…
Without you my springs become winters…My flowers freeze and fade… You’re my warmth…You’re my light…
I’m so in love with you…With you…With you…Just with you…
Rather cheesy song if you ask me, the kind only star-eyed lovers can enjoy. But the voice… Jacob was staring at the floor. His face was pale as death.
“Now that’s going too far!”
Dan jumped out of his chair, as Anasuya and Nandan entered.
Anasuya looked as if she could have passed as a film star. She had taken the time to look her best. The sparkling skirt of her white gown trailed the floor in a magnificent train. Her hair loose, cascaded down her back like a waterfall.
Nandan, dashing in a white suit, made a perfect match for her. He beamed as he walked forward holding her hand.
Neither of them, I think, expected to be confronted by an angry Dan. To say, he was mad on the behalf of his friend was an understatement. He was furious. “Now!!!!!!!!” He exclaimed loudly as they walked towards them. “I don’t care what the hell kind of game you’re playing but that song…How dare you!!!!!” The two of them looked startled but only for about a second. Anasuya recovered first. It didn’t take her that long to come up with a retort.
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“I can’t choose a good song for our…” Her eyes darted towards Jacob for a brief moment. “Our special lunch??? Do I need your friend’s consent for that?” I wasn’t sure that was the best thing to tell an angry man. Especially to someone like Dan who looked like he wouldn’t hesitate to throw a few punches around. “This is the first time I’m seen you face to face and let me tell you one thing. It’s a pretty good thing that a double faced thing like you left Jacob.”” Dan gritted his teeth and glared at Nandan.”Be careful. If you happen to lose your cash or your pretty face, you’ll lose this lady too.”
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