The proud child
The young boy was standing next to me waiting for the
flight from New Delhi to arrive. May be he is waiting for someone important. His impatient fidgeting betrayed the smile on his face, maybe he was
getting late for an appointment!
Noticing me he turned and smiled.
“It’s a pity all flights are delayed. There must be a
heavy fog in Delhi today". I casually commented. "Is some one
important coming"? I just could not stop asking him.
"Yes, my mom", he very replied. "This is
the first time she is coming to the place I am working and the flight had to be
late. And that too being her first air travel ever"! There was a sign of
disappointment on his face.
"Oh, don’t worry. The fear of flight goes away
within minutes. Once you begin to see the beautiful land below you just
cannot be scared anymore!
He laughed and said-
"My mother and scared, that she would never be. It’s
just she always traveled by train to save for me, so I could be
comfortable. Today I can afford to make her travel in comfort. It’s such a
wonderful feeling!
“Yes I understand. You mom must be very proud of you”!
“Oh no, you got it wrong. It is me who is proud of
my mother”.
“That is very beautiful thing to say. You must be feeling
the same for your father too”.
He stopped smiling and looked straight into my eyes. I
had a feeling of stepping into an ugly zone!
"It is a very special day for me and I will not
spoil it by answering you with anything but the truth.
I have never known my father, never seen him. He is just
a name in hundreds of school forms we filled".
He smiled again and continued –
"I am not prejudiced against him. He was the sperm
provider for my creation and half of me is comes from him. It is said
tenderness of a mother brings a child into this world but the strength of a
father makes a man out of him. But it was my mother all the way for me. She
stood against the world for me. Gave me everything I wanted, taught me
everything that I need to know. Mom did not just make a man out of me, she
brought out the human in me.”
The arrival gate was getting crowded with people pushing
their trolleys. He rushed towards them but stopping halfway returned to
apologize.
“In my excitement I almost forgot my decency to say
goodbye to you.”And he went away to receive his mother.
I stood looking at him as some old memories came back to
me.
The Girl and The Woman
1974 was the year.
Our boarding
school was then in a temporary building meant for a different purpose. On one
side of the building around the courtyard were the class rooms with the
parallel side had our dormitories. Arms joining these two sides were for
stores, N.C.C. offices that opened only on Friday afternoons. In the corner,
facing our classroom was a locked room. It probably was meant for lodging
purposes as it had an attached bathroom.
Apart from regular classes our class rooms were used for extracurricular activities in afternoon and preparation classes in the evening.
It was in one of
our evening self-study period we saw her.
Dressed in a flared pair of jeans, a short top and a cowboy hat she looked like a heroine of a western movie. Dragging a huge bag behind her she confidently walked up to the corner room. Ours was an all boys’ military school. The only glimpses of girls we got were of the local school students in their moldy uniforms during our monthly permitted outing to town. Presence of a girl was a rare occasion. She was someone who has just stepped out of a movie magazine, someone who can make us dream all night.
Leaving my classmates to peep at her through the glass
panes I walked up to her and offered to unlock the door. Once inside the dimly
lit room she sat on the corner of the dusty bed. Introducing herself she talked
to me continuously and I stood looking at her in awe.
“So hot it’s here, and look at the room, it’s dusty,
isn’t it? I was told by the supervisor he will have the room ready for me, and
see! What a uselessly naughty fellow that one. I don’t like to complain but a
promise is a promise ..................................................”
I was standing there transfixed, looking at the young
beautiful face! She must have been twenty, may be eighteen and looked so young,
so full. Probably she was from a well to do family as dresses and mannerism
suggested. She loved being independent and wanted to do what she loves. Here
she will be the teacher at our kindergarten section.
The Voyeur
We became good friends.
The frequency of occasional after dinner visit to her
room, apart from the ones on Sundays and holidays increased. Slowly the number
of visitors too increased and the older students too became regular visitors.
The atmosphere in her small room would become suffocating with them talking
with subtle sexual intonations and suggestive innuendos. She was aware but she
welcomed, smiled and listened to them all.
Her room was visible from our dorms. With the slightest
sound of her door opening, faces would appear in all our dorm windows. She was
a novelty to us. To all us kids who have just began to enjoy the beauty of
a female body leafing through dirty magazines, a mere glimpse of her would fill
our nightly dream.
The glass panes on the door to her room were covered with
thin blinds from inside. To our prying eyes that privacy was just not
enough. One late evening after the dormitory light out time I found these kids
peeping through the glass door. One could see a very hazy silhouette of her
changing into a night gown. I felt pity for these stupid kids with no
ingenuity! They could see almost nothing! All one got to do is to tilt the
glass ventilator above the door and that would act like a mirror.
And voila - you get the clearest picture.
I stood on my toes and did exactly that to show them.
Before I could remove my hand from the ventilator the door opened. All the kids
instantly vanished. I was there alone with her looking at me. It took me few
seconds to realize that I too should run.
But that would not undo anything. If she complains to the
merciless monster of a headmaster tomorrow, it would be my funeral. I stepped
into her room trying to say– "I am sorry – I was.., it was just.........”
She turned her back to me and stood resting her hand on
the small desk on the opposite wall. I could hear her heavy breathings. She was
fuming and I was still babbling, trying to say sorry.
In a very tired voice she spoke up.
"What do you think I am? Am I something out of Playboy magazines? What do you all want from me, titillation for your wet
dreams"?
Then all of a sudden she flared up and turned to me.
Ripping her night gown apart she shouted in a broken voice- “What did you want
to see? Is this is all you were looking for?”
My down cast eyes would no more stay looking at the
floor. All those heavenly things taunting us in dreams were right in front. Who
wants to feel sorry and apologize? I want to keep looking at her for eternity
till I drained dry!
“Get out, I don’t want to see you ever “She yelled.
I ran to my room and got into my bed. Even with my eyes tightly shut montage of her images was forming everywhere in my mind. As I lay down on my bed with every ounce of my energy spent her pictures in front my eyes slowly began to cringe to a corner. By morning the ecstasy of seeing beautiful nude real women turned into a nightmarish disgust.
I was a lecherous voyeur and the most despicable
person. A sick feeling came all over me. I loathed myself. I was sick,
sicker than a leper!
Next morning I went and tightly closed the ventilator.
The MOTHER
I never had the courage to face her again. Never went to
her room again, except for once.
I missed going to her room. I still saw her from my dorm
window and the line of admiring visitors. But strangely I was not jealous any
more. I realized I was simply in love the dreams she used to bring about and not
her. But there was something that disturbed me now.
Our school mess was supervised by a gentleman known for
his Rasputin image. He was married, short and rotund and no handsome prince
from any fairy tale, but he had his way. It was his visits now that began to
itch. I went and knocked on her door one day. May be I wanted to absolve my
sins.
I could not dare to enter her room and standing at her
door I asked.
“He is not a nice person. Why does he come to your room”?
Sardonically she smiled at me and said-
“If I close my door no one can come inside. Not even
you".
And she closed the door. May be she did not understand
what I meant. Or maybe I did not understand what she said.
Few months later there were lot of changes in her. The
way she looked, the way she walked had changed. She again became the center of
our after-lunch gossips. Every thirteen year old kid began to give his
learned opinion about signs of pregnancy.
It did not take us by surprise when one evening when she
was visited by her parents. From our classroom we could clearly hear the
heated arguments in her room.
“You don’t understand what I am saying!” she was telling
them.
“This is my body and only I have the right to control it.
What has happened was my choice.”
"The life that is forming inside me is my
creation. It is not a shame, not a result of a sin. It is something I got
from very beautiful moments I shared with somebody and I am not letting it go.
I will cherish it for my entire life".......................
"What about society? If a society does not
understand me then I do not want to be part of it.”
Her parents went away later that night. We understood our
suspicion was correct. She is going to be a mother. For the next few months we
saw a life coming into existence inside her. She stood tall, never tried to
hide it.
One Sunday afternoon she left the school. It was time to
bring this life into the world.
Standing in the airport arrival gate I saw the mother and
the son walking toward the taxi stand, holding each other close. I saw the
mother from my school days in this mother. I wished I could see her face.
As if connected by something unknown, she turning back
looked at me and smiled.
I respectfully bowed to her and proceeded to receive my
guest.
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