Apocalypse

It was 11:30 PM last week when I just reached home driving through this bustling city lit with the halogen lights. I opened the car door when my mobile beeped. An sms from her - "Come over my place, let's spend some moments." A slightly tired me turned my car and drove an hour through the road to knock her door.

She welcomed me with drowsy eyes and her trademark charming smile. Stepping inside I closed the door behind.

The drawing room was lit with three amber colored lamps each fitted on three walls; a bottle of Grey Goose, a bottle of Glenlivet and two big glasses were neatly stationed on the center table. The classic thumri "Yaad piya ki aaye..." in it's original rendition by Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali was getting played. Windows and balcony door were open through which humid august breeze coming in. She, dressed in a royal blue colored spaghetti, stationed herself in a mustard color leather couch that was absolutely below one of the amber colored wall lamp. Bathed under that lamp light she appeared as a magical drink of some ancient times that could be taken by a person who wants a temporary, deliberate obsession with nostalgia just to have a change of mood from the daily life. And the room appeared as if placed in a sunset lit warm glass coffin where all things were lying in leisure for years. Entire room had a feeling of quirky laziness that was making the senses almost numb.

Initiation never required preamble these days. I said - "I think it was ail of age."

She poured Grey Goose in one glass, Glenlivet in another. The glug of those liquids and the clinkers of ice dropping inside the glass broke the brief silence that prevailed after I uttered those words. She offered me Glenlivet and replied - "But at the end of the day it was arrogance and nothing else. Ail or pinnacle or... Don't know; I don't know what it was."

I said - "I remember he was in search of a fetish face to put his heart out on the screen. He wanted to make a movie on the inner feelings of the heart of an artist which would be his last movie and he will bid good bye to the movie world. Right?"

She nodded. I continued - "I think he was searching for a certain fetish-like face that is not over-expressive. And more importantly he wanted a new face in his last movie to create a hard hitting statement of extreme pride both to himself and the people that he's still capable of giving birth to new lives. I was actually a little late to get to know about the three day audition program for this film; by the time I told you, you were already aware of it and in preparation of it. How did it go on after that and why he had chosen a woman to portray himself of what he is?"

She took a deep sigh and said - "After three years of modelling at that time I did want to get into silver screen but that audition was one of the rare chances for me to make it big in debut. Although I was not taking it as a way that I have to do it, may be because some of the recent failures of not been able to give myself a break in movies and failing in couple of auditions was playing at the back of my mind, yet I was treating it not less than an important break for my career. After the auditions I waited for the results half in anxiety, half in disappointment. But I think sometimes good things happen when we expect it the least; this proved true to me for that audition. My first question was also that why did he want a female to portray him but got no direct answer at that time; only thing he said was that I will get this reply in due course of the shoot of the film.

"When he was explaining me the script he told me this - 'It's an atmospheric mood piece. It's difficult to capture an artist's spirits in any story, so I decided to make this movie that will rely on the ambiances rather than twists and turns of a plot.

" 'A film maker wanders from place to place, in the rushes of elite cities, in the crooked streets of slums, in lonely, scenic hill tops, in the high-brow conversations of superfluous people, to find subjects for her films. She makes films on these subjects where sometimes subject remained same but it's face is different. In the making of films she always wants that people soak her works in deepest of their lives and understand them and relate with the sentiments which she tries to portray through these subjects. And in this journey she falls in love with few of her creations that touches her intimately and stays closest to her heart. And this journey reaches a stage where she finds that the creations that stayed closest to her heart were never acknowledged and accepted by people and finally she realizes that this world has not enough compassion for artist's creations and not worthy of her work; she better propagate her thoughts in some other world. She prepares a final speech for this world and starts to throw them in the streets of all those places from where she derived subjects for her films so that people finds and reads them and understand her legacy. She then takes a seclusion to lonely hill station where she ends her life in a dark room lit only by a candle.'

"As I listened to the narration of the script I was amused by the fact that I will be the central character of this movie. After a moment of silence, he forthrightly told me the date when we needed to began the shoot.

"Within few days I understood that the idea of this script was indeed his own inner feeling towards the world; not too later he acknowledged this also. This happened when one of the cameraman was suggesting to shoot one of the scene in sunset whereas he was bent upon in shooting it in sunrise; at first he gave a soul stirring, aesthetic explanation of the difference between sunset and sunrise and why he wanted to shoot it in sunrise. In spite of his explanations the cameraman kept insisting to shoot it in sunset by making him understand the color difference and it's potential effects on the mood of the scene. He then charged the cameraman up arrogantly that he should not try to overpower an artist's imagination when he's not the one who can understand what this artist is trying to achieve.

"At night on the dinner table when I said that I have a feeling that this story is somewhere connected to him; he without any expression acknowledged that this movie was indeed his journey till today. And then with a stony face he rightly declared that he don't care even if this fact of this movie comes out in the media before it's made."

By then the track was "Yaad naa baalam..." also in it's original rendition by Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali. I decreased the volume of the music slightly to restrict the ambiance from getting louder as the night had fell more silent. I coughed to clear by throat and started- "As far as I feel it was one or two days after this incident only that I received your mail where you were saying how mysterious the artist's world can be; he was a media shy person who got uncomfortable in spotlight but how at times he desired to be out in the world flamboyantly, without caring for he worldly glares, to dedicate his life to the teaching of art if this world wishes from him so. I guess that was where you got a glimpse of the reason why he wanted a female to play his character in the movie because he knew he was complex at the core for the world to understand and he harbors both rigidity and softness inside himself."

Again that glug of vodka in her glass and poured orange juice to mix with it; it looked like a watery thin blood getting mixed in a clean fluid. A short sip and she replied- "Oh no, that mail had a different backdrop. There was a scene where I needed to roam through the streets of the bustling evening of the city and camera showed different lives inside the households of that city - a lonely old man recalling his youth of vintage days, an elite businessman going through the balance sheets with a glass scotch beside him still untouched, a newly wed couple making out love passionately in blue light in their drawing room, a group of young college boys and girls partying and raising toast before they bid good bye to their college days. He looked quiet serene after the shot which suggested that it was accomplished well. After the dinner we were sitting in his room on 21st floor of the hotel when a service boy brought a few flowers and few affectionate notes that the public left for him while shooting that scene on the streets. He, for few minutes, adored those flowers to the utmost with his cheeks as a lady does upon receiving them from her lover. And the next moment he opened the window and threw them on air from the 21st floor with an expression of rage. I was bemused at this extremity of his reactions but at the next moment my heart throbbed to see the beautiful flower beads floating in air, each one separate from each other.

"He then sat on that window; entire city was glittering with scattered specks of light. noise of the traffic was not so continuous. He said- 'I don't need these affections any more. I understood the irony, although lately, that people want me to read their lives and depict them to the masses so that this world holds compassion for them.'

"He banged his fist on the frame of the window by saying - 'Who are the other masses when they themselves are the only one.'

"His voice then calmed when he started to elaborate this- 'Creativity is absurd, creativity is a profound desire of an artist to make his audience inebriated. And here I find myself merely a smoke who originates from the burning desire but goes no where and vanishes in air. Since few years a fear is creeping me; fear that how much my viewers understood the depths that I wanted to give them? And if they have not understood will I need to bid adieu to this world half understood?

" 'A few years ago I was in a hill station - a rain forest. On a day that started with drizzles we were able to complete few portions of our shoot. By the evening rains came down heavily with thunderstorms and soon the electricity went away. By that time we were in our hotel; people had formed small groups chit chatting in different rooms. Only light in that pitch darkness were the frequent lightnings in the sky giving us glimpses, through a mesh of rain drops, of, sometimes, hill tops and sometimes only the fading away threads of the after-lightning flashes in the sky. Just when a delicate thought crossed my mind that how strong can be the walls of our hotel against that torrential rain lashing it, one of person from the group I was part of that night started out a discussion on the love affair between Sahir Ludhyanvi and Amrita Pritam. The few ethereal, passionate anecdotes of that affair that he was sharing began to create an ambiance of fluffed out candles at the mercy of life. He said whenever they met, they always met without uttering a word with him smoking and throwing away his cigarette butts; she used to collect them and later smoke them with the hope that after his death the smoke from her cigarettes would meet him in the other world.This particular description ran down a chill of fear through my spinal cord... I scared and questioned myself that will I also be a half understood, inarticulated love affair; will my works also remain like those cigarette butts for people?

" 'People on this earth, I see, loves to view this world through red glasses that excites them, maddens them and in one of the sunset of this earth they'll lose themselves like those flower petals that sailed out of this window today. It's not a good sight to see but it's not frightening to me either because they are never worth this world. But also in all these years I have become an obsessive dreamer of a wish that I go out and explain what my works say, what art is while the world watches me with it's own arrogance.'

"That night returning to my room I didn't sleep for hours remaining half inebriated by his words and half baffled by his revelations."

I said- "Unbelievable !!! Is he a creature of this earth? I think due to these complexities of his inside he considered a part of his inner self as a woman."

She nodded and replied- "I too think so. But beyond these also I had seen him due to which I never asked him why he had chosen a female to portray himself in the film. He had an uncanny caresses for world although most of the times it was wrapped in sometimes in misanthropy, sometimes in arrogance. Once in a sunny afternoon when the crew is having a brief rest I saw him after a butterfly with spurt. It was a strange sight - he caught hold of a butterfly and then set it free and came back to relax in his chair wearing a relaxed smile. I couldn't quiet grasp the doings of his neither I understood his smile. All I could visualized at that warm moment was a bright sunny day and his eccentric fondle for a living creature.

"He only liked the smell and the dark sepia color of alcohol in the glass but never liked consuming it. In those days I heard he became a compulsive pursuer of human misfortunes; and he was never moved by them but only grew more conscious not to express anything. There were many theories prevailing that time about his transformation as a person, as a film maker; some said it were the agonies of an artist whose last few films failed in the eyes of his viewers, some said it were the ails of an ageing film maker in his twilight days and some said it was a mindlessness of an intellectual whose is realizing a loneliness in this world due to his own sins."

The music track by that time had been taken over by Begum Akhtar's thumri "Ab ke saawan ghar aajaa...". I put off one of the amber lamp to make the room little more dark. Sound of a speedy bike outside interrupted me just when I was about to speak. When it faded away, I said- "Was he aware of those theories about him? What do you think can possibly be the best theory to describe his state?"

She adjusted herself in a more cozy posture and replied- "I feel he was aware but I was too new at that time to ponder on any theory to reason out his state."

"So what do you think today?"

"I think it was a mix of first and second. There was no doubt at that time few of his last films had failed but it was difficult to believe he was transformed into a misanthropist due to that. During a lunch break of a day's shoot when I asked him why is he retiring after this film, he smiled and, to an extent, gave reason for this transformation in his own words- 'Everybody has to go some day; this is my time now.'

"I asked- 'Not a while longer? Don't you feel to make a few more films before you retire? I know this can be a never ending itching temptation but still?'

"He replied- 'I do not want to waste my work on this comatose world. For all these years I walked through an illusion; a severe illusion of affection and connection that was lousy and blitzed I came to know today. Since last few years I have heard many talks about me - my senses have been coerced by a self-deceptive conceit, I am at the twilight of my career, I had also been made a case study as a classic example of rise-and-fall; everybody seems to have an explanation for myself. As I turn the pages of my journey I find that the movies that were most intimate to me had never touched...' He paused and then resumed- '...they were never accepted them.'

" 'I remember a few years ago I made a film where a boy, as he grew up to become a man, gradually became nostalgic for his childhood days. His nostalgia soared to an a state that began to make him disconnected from the real world and obsessive wisher to re-live those days. And from this state he resorts to alcoholism to lose his senses to create an imaginary world of his childhood days around himself and experience it virtually. The response to it was the "forgettable weirdness" tag by my audience and "a befuddled artistry that seems search for a meaning in it's own tale" tag by critics. A few days later I came across an article in Sunday times. I was touched upon by his wisdom in understanding my legacy. I remember one of his line-"You had carved out human hearts in it's raw form; you had brought about the inner loneliness and dark spots of people and everybody of us has this; everybody of us decides not to pronounce them in world but somewhere inside they do wish to glorify these. People get uncomfortable by those of your movies that present their inner themselves in larger-than-life form. Forgive them sir, they do deserve to be forgiven."

" 'Touched by that I had sent a personal note of thanks to him at the newspaper's office but strangely it returned to me undelivered. But I neither tried to find out why; I didn't want to fade away his respectful thoughts by finding out the real him. But today I am no more able to forgive people, I do not want to waste my work on this falsely altruistic world. If this is the twilight of me let it come and let it take me away as the sand on the shore when the sea wave goes back.' "

We both got turned into inanimated objects by this mesmerizing anecdote. To get back to the senses both of us took a sip from their glasses.

I said- "I didn't get that; what was he trying to say by that?"

She replied- "I think he was talking to self, it was beyond my understanding also."

I then said- "But the transcendence to such heights of the person from who was so media shy inspite of being from glamor world his is incredible..."

And she gestured to pause me on the line from Bade Ghulam Ali track - "baalam mohe chhod ke na jaa, main tose binati karat hoon..." and then she signalled me to continue. I couldn't quiet get her; I finished my toast bottom's up and looked up at the clock; it was 2:30 AM. As I got up to bring a bottle of chilled water from the refrigerator, I felt a mysterious bliss of a life-time as if I go into the balcony and strip apart the muteness of that night scream for my new found independence.

Grabbing the bottle I came back and sat down to prepare another charm of Glenlivet. And I continued while she prepared for herself another glass of Grey Goose to dive deeper into this esoteric moment.

"As far as I had seen him he always gave a gentle smile in front of camera flashes giving an impression of an ocean of forthcoming mysteries; he rarely spoke on the microphones hel by frenzied reporters. Actually he always harbored a wish that his works touches the wisdom of a refined class of people that becomes the subject of talks for them as intense as the burnt oak colored furniture appears under neon lights. At the same time he expected the entire world to realize and recognize the art work that he poured in every of his film. Although the later expectation never surfaced until lately since a few years but I heard stories of his self alienation owing to this from which he got rid only with time."

But by this time the conversation was getting drab and ceasing to be amusing. I dropped 3 big ice-cubes in my glass, poured 60 ml of Glenlivet. To give time to ice to melt with the warmth of scotch I got up to take a stroll of the room. Head was giddy with cockeyed arrogance; I clenched my fists and I closed my eyes and for a moment a swarm of red lamps dazzled. I opened my eyes with a sudden exhalation and walked back to my couch; ice had melted by then and I drank down the chilled liquid to calm down the breaths.

Easing on the couch I asked - "That was the premiere day... Right?"

She began - "Yes, it was the thursday premiere night and next day was it's release at box office. But what happened that day was getting scripted as we were reaching the end of shooting; he too realized that which he spoke of quite frankly the next morning. As we were approaching the end of shooting an awkward reluctance was strikingly visible in him; it felt to me as if he was in a precarious state of mind of his desolation; he appeared, most of the time, unsure of what he is upto; seemed lost in a cobweb of thousand desires lunacy of which will get melt one day when he will bath under thousand moons.

"On thursday night he didn't came to the premiere show neither he responded to the numerous calls that were made to him that night before beginning the show. The premiere show began and ended without him but left a snoopiness with everyone of his absence. I decided to visit him on the way back home; it was around 01:00 AM when I reached his home and found that the door was not locked from inside. I pushed it and stepped in.

"The drawing room was head-heavily smoky and lit with a green color night lamp; air was dense suggestive of intense exhalation of cigarette smokes; he was lying partly unconcious clearly suggesting under a heavy dose of alcohol on a couch wearing olive green colored t-shirt and black colored lower raised up to knee level; there were two scotch bottles with lower halves broken by falling from the table and the liquid from the third bottle, lying horizontally on the floor beside the couch, had flown to the entire room which seemed to have caused by the stroke of his palm after he fell unconcious and an innumerable number of cigarette butts were seen on the floor, some floating in the liquid and some dried, sucked out.

"The chilling sensation of a scare ran down my spine and a world of sorrow clenched me when I encountered the scene. When I touched his hand he woke up and greeted me in an inebriated, husky, entangled voice and murky eyes . In a flash he pulled me to sit on his lap and was moved his palms on my face; his eyes was reflecting an utter deprivation of strength and filled with innocent tears; he kept repeating the words "It was not me who made this movie" in a desperately pleading tone.

"I didn't see the clock when we fell asleep in that posture with his head resting in between my neck and heart hugged by my arms. I woke up first in the morning, he was still aslept and the dawn was beginning to kiss the earth. Another inevitable scare waited me in the morning when I saw that the door of the home was left opened since past night; with much efforts I came out from his embrace and closed the door immediately. I went into the balcony, the morning coolness was driving me into a ruefulness that arises coming out from the wrap of the warm sheet of the first one-night stand. And suddenly he arrived with two hot cups of espresso; he pulled two easy chairs and for few minutes we sat muted.

"He broke the ice in the lightness of morning's fresh air with these- 'My obsession too grew larger than life like my films. I made movies and I continued to do so as I continued to receive admirations from critics and people. My thoughts explored wider panoramas and I shoved my cerebration in rather emphatic ways. As I look back to that moment I feel the obsession began from there only; somewhere amidst all these I was seduced by an idea to hunt for columns/pages that critcized my work and when did I binge on an uncalled for keenness to find such groups of people who didn't fall in taste of my movies. I galloped sleepless nights studying on such people's expectations, I brought in journals, papers that claimed my movies distasteful and not worth enough to watch. And the more I led myself to believe with every movie that I conquered at least a handful of such people, with terrible unease I seemed to find new flavors of distaste and odds against me. This marked the beginning of a kind of mental malaise in me and shaped an obsessesive world for me - a world where that was hallucinogenic, a world where I labelled people as dunce who don't want to understand my might, a world where the arguements, judgements and opinions were entirely mine. With years that passed I grew mawkish at heart and misanthropist from mind.

" 'This movie was a burst out of this obsession. The day when I shared the anecdote of my note of thanks that returned to me undelivered, I felt a random ache, a void of his absence, a fear that I will have to live without any words from him ever and an impromptu hope that I might again listen from him. The next day those mingled feelings went away but left scars that continued to put me in dilemma about every thing of myself and this world. In the following days these scars and my aim to complete the movie fought hard to gain the upper hand; and I continued to get tormented amidst all these. But the fear of never receiving any words from that man ever again continued to soar in an unbounded manner. It continued to heighten and unfortunately on thursday I was getting devastated by that fear, an irresistable compunction was drilling the convulsions of my heart. I needed something to heave my pain and somebody to groan.'

"He freezed for a moment; sun had risen full by that time. He looked up in a surrendered expression of despair and utterred with still head- 'I might never get those words.' "

Both of our glasses were as filled up as before the start of this revelation. She put a finger at the corner of her eyes to confirm that it was not wet. She got up from her couch for the first time in that night, placed her glass on the table and appeared reluctant to finish it. She went up to the player where ghazal singer just rendered the line "bikhre hue maazi ke auraaq chunoge tum..."

She said - "After that day he left film making. He read and heard that his movie made public touched with tears; when I told him about the brilliant box office reception of his movie he gave an expressionless smile. He no more used to meet anybody, except me, and limited himself to watching his works repeatedly. His moroseness was making him a life-less creature as if available only for post-mortem or medical studies. Owing to my busyness the frequency of my visits to him alse getting lessoned and whenever I visited he always appeared in spirits of forlornness since centuries. Dim yellow and white lights had taken the place of chandeliers. Only respite to his senses it appeared were the sunrise and sunset because whenever I used to visit him he, with a serene face and pleasing eyes, talked about those a little more than anything else. The news to the world by that time was that the hyper-depression swept away one of the most admired and successful artist that once again gave birth to the enormous number of stories about fierce and unfair competition of glamor world.

"On one fine evening when I went to visit him, on my way back home, after a gap of a fortnight I found his flat locked. There was a bunch of white lilies kept beside attached to it a green card on which written "Good bye" with blue ink addressed to me."

She paused for few seconds absolutely frozen and took a deep, laborious sigh and then continued - "I didn't try to find out why he went away, where did he go. A few months ago I heard he started making movies again, he is working on a small film with no stars; this time not for any world, not for any class of people and not for anybody but only for himself. His white lilies dried up but his good bye note on green card is still there with me. He's an artist, he has a penchant of his own and may be that's why he had chosen green color to bid good bye - conveying hope of a new beginning.

"Now I am waiting for his film to see how that hope looks like."

She spoke standing behind me a little far away where the music player was there. I put my glass down on the table, turned up to her and said-

"Few months ago on one such evening when we met in this home of yours, I noticed a letter from him placed beneath that black lady statue. While you were in the kitchen making food arrangements, I desired a number of times to glance at the letter in your absence but I resisted myself thinking that you will tell me someday about it but you never and neither I dared to ask you ever. Today with all my courage I am saying that I wish to read that letter but with your acquiesce."

She wore a casual smile for a moment, opened a drawer to take out the letter and handed over to me with a resigned body language by saying - "I didn't pronounce anything about this letter to you solely for the reason that I didn't want the media, this world to know that the artist in him is trying to relive. Let this world know the artist in him once again from his own work rather than through a private letter written to me. Apart from this you will find nothing in this letter that is hidden to you."

I opened the letter and it read as follows-

"____________,

Hope you loved the white lilies. I went away without telling you; I am sorry for this. But I couldn't find any reason to let you know. May be if I told you, you would have hindered me with numerous questions for which I had no answer at that time.

After that night I felt my life froze and came to a stand still as if the water on which I was floating had suddenly transformed into a pale blue ice. As the days were passing the smell of that night grew so inviolable that I wished to spend the nights of remaining years of my life like that way only as the flame of a diminishing candle gets put off as the candle finishes. But the world, you and everything kept on moving. And I let that night be the only owner of the odour and the savor of that night -an inimitable night; there's no need to make the remaining life the owner of it's expectation. And I realized that the night showed me an endearing moment of life and will never burn out that will always stay for me, within me. Even if I can't return to that night ever, the moment will always be mine.

You will be glad to know that I began movie making again with a hope that I might once again start getting words like the one from the never found columnist; but this time not from many, I will be blissful even if I get few or one. And when I will get none I will write to you.

This small world will bring us to meet each other someday somewhere but not in any premiere because I have grown slightly more media shy.

_______"

That lady dark

A dementia, clandestine and enigmatic, acquired over the years bled secretly that night.

She sulks all day long with clueless, deadpan gaze sometimes stuck for long on things around. She hums random pensive melodies from the dusty times- sometimes in a sweet voice and sometimes in a heavy, husky voice. She, quite often, dumps herself down on the floor, legs parted as if resigned from the consciousness of her sexuality, rubbing her first finger vertically on the mosaic floor for hours. At times, she lights a candle at dusk, places it on the parapet wall of balcony and sobs before it until her breath runs out when she undulates the flame by moving her first finger through it. She spends her nights sleepless, watching the street lights, with her drowsy eyes, until they are put off in the morning; she waves her head sideways as if she has bereaved herself of anything to survive through the relics of her life. She looks at me not with scorn but with a casually forgiven vision which often makes me seek the clarification that whom she seems to have forgiven - me or herself? She lives in my home like a dead person walking around; she had grown numb to her living; she likes dim lights. She terrifies me when, sometimes, I find her watching herself curiously in the mirror of the bathroom under a red lamp.

Watching her day by day is killing me from inside. Many times I thought of slashing her throat and then ending myself to conclude my protracted, punitive saga in one shot but I am still not able to come out from the grip of pity for her and the courage to lose sight of her. Air is morbid and stagnant as if from ages, days are getting spent in never ending entangled thoughts of remorse and dilemma, nights are flagrant with frequent wake ups from sleep to find her weeping and looking at the ceiling.

It was a summer's evening when I opened the door to her knock; sweat settled between my fingers and dripping down from my head through the back of ears. She, an averagely tall, wheatish complexioned lady in her late twenties with bright, placid eyes, gave her introduction, with a mingled expression of conscious ambiguity and suppressed fear, as an art journalist from a famous lifestyle magazine. Her purpose of meeting me was regarding her plan to bring out a retrospective book on me and my painting. Standing at the age of early sixties with more than thirty years of career as a well acclaimed painter, I was naturally enlivened by the thoughts of her project and pondered on the more honor and fame it can potentially bring to me. But at the same time I was equally wary of lending portions of my personal life along with my work to an unknown person. It was after much debates and self talks that I convinced myself for her work.

On an afternoon when the first rains had brought a mild respite to the city from the clutches of sweltering heat, sitting at my dingy home on 23rd floor amidst color palettes, dry and wet, with noise of rain outside which had obscured the visibility of the city, I started baring the layers of my life to her -

"My father never liked any forms of art, so was my mother. But the only difference was my mother never discouraged any forms of creativity but my father did. His belief was - 'Artistry makes a man fall in trap of a habit of romanticizing his life which erodes the degree of strength that a man should at least possess to survive in this world.' I was never destined to be a painter but somehow the passion continued to grow; my mother honed it by admitting me to a painting school and then I carried thereon.  

"There's a difference between one who practices art as a hobby and one who practices art as a living. It's the difference in the extent to which emotions are at stake. When I began to primarily fall under the second category I started feeling an emotional conflict with the usual world although, at the same time, I tried to stay in harmony with it. I paraded a gentle disagreement between the visual interpretation and the hidden interpretation of paintings favoring the later but more often I found myself caught in a switch between them. And more often I found myself taking side of persons, rather than on my convictions, with whom I used to spend good evenings with bared heart talks. I reacted joyously to my admirations but tried to remain settled to the criticisms although I was hyper-sensitive from inside for my creations. And sometimes it was the abrupt echoes of criticisms in my head that my completion of paintings made me feel about myself, in my unconsciousness, like a handful of sand that is slipping away gushingly. Those were distressed moments when I made innumerable sideways moves lying on bed, in pursuit of sleep, stretched all the curtains and with tiresome hands sealed them to thesides of the windows so that room becomes pitch dark and denies the intrusion of any sprinkles of light. And, at times, when this didn't work I stared at the upwards with a forfeited inside imploring for a soul who would listen, the whole night, to my avalanche of schmaltz and interpret them in a consoling way to me in the morning. And on few occasions when all these things failed, I resorted to the dreary act of masturbation as a tranquilizer for my mystical anxieties.

"Shades of ephemeral diffidence, demure arrogance like a candle used to kindle in daily load shedding, sudden exotic demands for maudlin succors was shaping me up into a new being. But at the same time I grew fond of myself too - I loved my solitude, I embraced myself in front of the mirror crisscrossing my arms, I smiled, in night's dead silence, on my life that is still remaining, I rubbed my cheeks and my palms over the blank canvas balmy with the warmth of hanging light. My inside was an erratic smoke that kept entering pitch dark tunnels and kept coming out to a purple world leaving pale spots at both the places. I remember once I stopped painting with colors and completely switched to the black and white painting because somebody had passed the statement on few of my paintings that I don't know the difference between sunset and sunrise, both appears identical. It was after heavy persuasion by my sister, who was eight years younger than me, that I again began to put colors in my palette."

I was facing the diminishing rains during my narrative but I could sense her gaze, from the corner of her eyes, stuck on me since long. She slowly brought her eyes down as if withdrawing herself to tackle a silent burp of her conscience inside her. I smiled without looking away from rains and said-

"I know it's ludicrous but it was me."

"It was mysterious actually." She replied.

I looked at her; her eyes were down. She was motionless like an inanimate object. She was dressed in a milky white three-quarter shirt tucked in a mauve colored, cleanly ironed  skirt long till knees. I felt guilty of the dinginess of my home.

I smiled at her and said - "Yes it is."

With her subsequent meets with me, city fell under the grip of rainy season. Over the next few days her manuscript continued to accumulate finesse of my paintings, my insight about them and various anecdotes of the canvas. Those days were making my long borne insipid life interesting; I used to spend my afternoons indolently awaiting for her evening visits. But when she used to visit in afternoons, a tingle about her kept knocking my thoughts and vanishing away through out the evening till late night. To stay conscious about my personal life renditions, I used to keep jotting down the conversations of everyday with her in my own notebook. But at the same time the thought came in my mind that how does it matter if I don't keep an account of mine? How much it will make a difference if she exaggerates my personal life and make it notorious? Most of the time I was too coward to reply scared of the after effects and so I never halted my jotting down work.

Outside was too dark that afternoon and the sky was laden with thunderous clouds about to pour down at any moment. Sitting in my couch at my home that was illuminated partially by a small fluorescent lamp and partially by the obscured outside light, I was notably restive but extremely fermented from inside by discovering the stark similarity of this ambiance with that chilling night - same dimness inside, rain beams lashing the window glasses noisily, that itchy sensation to go through each other, those ripples of horror about that sensuality arbitrarily but secretly glancing out from converged brows and wrinkled foreheads. I gulped down enough amount of cold water to calm down myself before beginning my next chapter of narrative -

"My wife was then a model, endorsing the top brands and brandishing her looks in various magazines, when I met her, and indeed continued to be so even after marriage. Not the love at first sight but her sagacity to feel the deep rooted feelings in the artistry and my svelte interpretations about the intricacies behind the same that led to our gradual attraction towards each other. Our marriage had created an interesting world with moods of excitement for our newly fused world and specks of those absurdities which, traditionally, is always associated our worlds - that world from which we made our living. It was a neat life where conflicts in interests rarely crossed our marital world and never snatched each others independence towards individual creativity.

"She used to be as madly flirtatious and romantic with me as she used to be whimsical with herself. A sweet, gentle smile and eyes deliberately making big were the signs when she became whimsical; lazy winking of eyes with same sweet, gentle smile and surrendered body language were suggestive of her former mood. As a woman she was strong willed in her own world, sharp in her convictions and melodramatic about the idea of life. But I used to be stunned with the keen way she sometimes ran the painting brush to fill colors in some portions of my paintings; those were the magical moments - she used to be absolutely unaware of her surroundings, unaware of her facial expressions and unaware of who and where she is. She used to hug me extremely tightly instantly finishing coloring the canvas.

"Painting, I feel, magnetizes most of the people. Discovering the person whom you know is a painter urges you automatically to create your own portrait of life; she was no different. Her quixotic ideas knew no bounds when one evening..."

And I stopped; I was not sure of revealing that. She was expressionless yet eager to know what was that on which I stopped. I hesitated, looked around the entire room, blinked my eyes a number of times unnecessarily. She was patient as if she knew I will start from there where I stopped and I did-

"Her quixotic ideas knew no bounds when one evening, coming back early from her work, with glaring eyes and excited voice she asked me- 'Today night make a portrait of me' and with a hush, sensual voice she uttered 'Nude'. My libidos sparked so instantaneously that I felt it pricked me in my chest. That night, after the clock struck midnight, she sat on the window undressed completely. The street lights and the faint moonlight made her look like a distant terrain of smooth curves protruded with much pride and flamboyance. And her posture was suggestive of a woman who dares to flaunt her gender in the darkness of night for the people who secretly gets out of their home at night in an iconoclastic mood.

"It took that entire night to complete that portrait laden with uneasy temptations. She was enamored by the first look of it in the morning, she stared at it for long and she went to the window as if allowing the morning light to purify her. I tried to put a blanket on her but she denied; after few minutes she closed the window and took me immediately to bed with the blanket wrapped around us; her gestures indicating an intense desire of to be loved. We made."

When I finished I felt I came to senses. She was looking at the floor with disconcert also with a tinge of despise. After a few minutes of deafening silence I was perplexed to find her rushed out of my home with a flash. It was so weird and spontaneous that I remained seated at my place for an hour absorbed in that act of her with the exit door wide open.

For a week she didn't come and I was distressed by that. I couldn't find a possible explanation for her act. Finally when she came back I grew by that time too coward to ask the reason and she too didn't uttered anything about it but both were conscious of the layer that was holding us back to converse freely. To clear the air, I asked her to tell something about herself. She grabbed it immediately to have a gentle deviation from the compulsive routine work for which she used to come-

"I am a hatred; from heart to mind to thoughts to wishes I am wrapped with hatred."

A dead silence prevailed for few minutes; she got up and stood resting herself to the sliding door of the balcony; she unbuttoned the second button of her shirt expressing an uneasiness by the humidity of the season. And she continued-

"I was eight years of age when my parents separated. On a chilling winter dawn when the morning light was about to break into a crimson horizon, my mother had taken me along with her from the home never to return; I didn't see my father for the last time. My father had lost all interests in my mother is what she said as a result of which he searched for a young body and soul. It pushed our world into a never ending somberness and began to bring waves of torments day by day. She wiped off from her mind every memory of good times she had with my father by repeatedly epitomizing him as a betrayer of her trust, a carnivore who hollowed her by sucking blood and flesh all through those years. Many times I saw her revealing an awful expression through still eyes and distorted lips as if her body was quivering by the percept of a pungent odor oozing from her body.

"A reminiscence still today puts me in a dark scowl - she didn't have dinner that night. Night was touching the midnight and sound of traffic although infrequent was still sailing in. I sat to study in the bedroom when I saw her putting off the light of drawing room and lighting a candle. I was startled; a quick shivering thought raced through my mind is she trying to burn down herself? I rushed through the door of the bedroom, stood at a distance from her and saw her crumbling some old, dried rose petals on a piece of paper. She poured a glass of raw scotch on it and set it on fire. Entire room was flared up, haunted with red glow; appeared as if somebody had spitted red venom to the walls and her face through that flame showed a deluge of intense disdain. Both of us stood motionless - me flabbergasted and she with an unavenged injury."


She quickly turned to face outside and after few minutes turned back to face the inside again. A mild but sharp current ran along my body when she unbuttoned the third button of her shirt; a considerable view of her cleft left a stir of cold excitement in every beat of my heart so strong that I could feel the it punching against my chest. The clock already struck 9 of night; fluorescent light of the tube was not able to reach the place properly where she was standing. An irrepressible inquietude was provoking me to move towards her but I was still to identify whether it was an incitation and if it was then why. She kept standing there and started again-

"Do you know I love nights; why because I love darkness. Darkness brings out surge of emotions that are intimate to night - emotions that are delightfully tempting and mysteriously disturbing due to it's ineffability. I love the height of that temptation when it transforms into intractability; I love all the more to see each such intractability remaining unfulfilled and this view gives me immense pleasure, it's like watching the annihilation of a soul's mood-of-the-time crushed by an unknown force. I would love to paint that soul, in colors, after each such annihilation to see how wild it can get when stripped off from each such emotions."

This weird revelation of her inner self left me frozen and terrified; so much so that I was still under hypnotism when she came and stood in front of me, brought herself down to match her head to the level my head was in such a conscious manner that my eyes could get a clear and easy glance of her hanging assets, she pressed her lips on my head for quiet long and went away. After minutes passed away that I came back to senses and realized the happenings. That night passed in solving the riddle about her that she left with her words; I rolled sideways in the bed being edgy, scary and still under the effect of that hypnotism.

In the subsequent months we grew more casual in our mannerisms while confronting each other. We started meeting out of my home in the open world - in cafes, restaurants, evening lawns; in these meetings her manuscript got fat with my experiences with different people of art and culture, my early days in the city. But amidst these her incitations hadn't ceased away although now those were not as sharp as it used to be earlier; still the capricious provocations and abrupt withdrawal of it caused a sharp pique inside me. Many times I was led to believe that she was trying to play that game with me which she revealed that frightful night. The easing away of strict formalities between us led an increase in our frequency of touching each other.

In these months I discovered how much aversion and scorn she harbors for human beings of this earth. In her talks she often regarded herself as a prisoner whose limbs are chained and other people are peeling her skin off by running their nails on her body. Once she took me to her place where she used to live; it was a one bhk flat, neat and clean but holding a huge collection of books. Being late and having no energy left that night to return home, we had the dinner at her place and pulled out a couple of chairs to the small verandah attached with her bedroom. The single bed was covered with a bed sheet of pitch black color with white polka dots, walls were of dull yellow color and shelves were packed with books. Sitting beside me, dressed in a sea green colored fitting top and a black track pant, in the verandah she lit a cigarette. She asked me about my marital life, of course for her manuscript and not for casual curiosity. I started-

"We were busy - busy with each other, busy with our individual lives, busy with our profession, busy with our passions until our first and the only child, a daughter, was born three years after our marriage. She, like many other children, brought to us dreams, pride and warmth to our hearts. It happened to us that we became so busy in her upbringing along with our daily lives that our flirtatious romanticism with each other went out of window all of a sudden. I knew and I was able to understand that this course oflife was inevitable, I was able to understand the changed time, I was able to understand that it's time to face the real sun and the moon lit nights were over, I was able to understand our duties but what I failed was the acceptance. And in a year of our daughter's birth, when my sister came in the town by virtue of her job I never imagined in dreams that it would bring such a ferocious storm that won't spare anybody.

"My refusal to accept that changing time gave birth to a notion that my wife is loosing interest in me grew as strong as my sublime warmth and florid care towards that little angel. Those fanciful, wild nights started fading away very soon, ardent moments of melodramatic abstractions about each others profession's philosophy that used to adorn our sleepless nights vanished in a flash. Those were replaced by tired nights busy with cares towards our daughter, amused moments over her new naughty activities. It was not that only she got busy with these, it was both of us to whom our adorable daughter kept on toes. My continuous perception of each others withdrawal reached an oppressive stage where I was feeling like Magdeburg hemispheres containing a vacuum that couldn't be to pulled apart by two tremendous opposing forces - one of reality and the other of my chimericalness. And in this continuum my sister, ten years younger to me, sneaked in.

"The natural human instinct of adorability towards our little angel brought her down to our place quiet frequently being in the same city. Carrying herself easily, her humble charm made her mingle with us easily. And it's when she started to get mesmerized by my paintings that I felt my chimericalness, secretly, was getting won. I was unknown when it started to win but I felt it's first sign of incision when she, for the first time, eloquently described my painting that I recently finished at that time and related it by her ignorance of the painter in me. And that first incision had given the first vent to a scary ooze of an umbrage between me and my wife that got spilled, in the form of black aqua, to our world."

I stopped, picked myself up from the chair and went to the balcony railing. The city was lit with countless lights but the dominating colors were yellow, blue and red. Winking at the farthest illuminated road I fumed all of a sudden-

"Why do people become so insensitive towards the artists and it's inside? It's pity that this world doesn't allow the art world and it's people to live peacefully."  


She came beside me and replied-

"Throughout my childhood I never got a chance to vent out my moments of anguish, I never yelled or exploded out of my anger. I, most of the times, either wept hidden from the world till I get a sored lower skin of eyes with saline water or continued to scorch myself by sentimental self talks to put myself deliberately in the desert of loneliness. I had grown up watching my mother tangled up in expressions of lost soul and tempers of stodginess as a result I could never find a moment to think of a person who can think of me. It was a cloudy winter day when I was melancholic right from morning reason for which I too was not able to understand. Unable to carry the burden of melancholy of the whole day I began to sob uncontrollably at night after dinner. My mother came to me and wiped my tears; it was moment of first and only eternal bliss for me. She hugged me and I smelled the fragrance of the scent of her body.

"She rested her chin on my head and told me- 'I sensed this world with belief that I am a victim of all odds of this world. In childhood such was this feeling that when I was even denied of a chocolate I grew furious from inside and sunk slowly into a conviction that I will always be deprived of what I want in life. I don't remember the exact incident but it was when my aspirations to enter in my chosen field of profession confronted a heavy resistance from my father that I violently challenged his resistance and went ahead at my own will. I don't know from where a deluge of courage and fire filled my senses but I knew it was temporary out of whims. And after entering in my professional world when my whims were shattered and crushed to powder that I allowed myself to build my own philosophies. And I built and built and understood several facts and the most valuable among those is that it's our job at every moment to make a living for ourselves; there always remains few battles in our lives that even the most intimate persons of our lives can't help us to fight. Take this battle ahead, it's yours. I am already in fight with mine.'

"That night we both slept hugging each other."

She came more close to me and the lips were left most minimum distance in between. She kept her feet on mine and in a flash she went to the room giving me a quick tight hug. And by that time these acts of her had began to irritate me instead of arousing my sensation. My thoughts again started whirling around what she's trying to achieve? Is she really serious in bringing out a retrospective of my works or is she harboring a dire intention with me? What was she wanting from me by always leaving me breathless by her haunting experiences and suddenly flaunting her sexuality over me but leaving it tempting at the apex of my sensation like a hungry beast left drooling? I could see her sleeping in that single bed; she instructed me to place myself on the sofa in the drawing room. But my rage was becoming uncontrollable; I wanted to shake her violently and ask about her intentions. But I dared not to and I spent the night sitting and sleeping in the chair.

Days passed by and her manuscript got heavier. And I found that more I tried to shield myself from her more she grew sharp in her efforts in not sparing me from thinking of her. More than a year passed on and it was winter time when I thought I was getting accustomed to her provocations and felt I was managing well to hold myself back from getting moved by her revelations when she came up with this on a december afternoon-

"I asked few times but I never got to know what made my parents separated and never did I insist my mother much to reveal it. Once, when I casually asked out of my natural curiosity with the hope that she might tell me she talked so abstractly that I couldn't find out what exactly she was trying to say; it was the last time I ever asked- 'The bond I shared with your father was always a tantalizing affair for me. We had enjoyed our marriage, we shared moments of joy, we grew wild to each other and we melted again to each other like kids but among all these I could locate an aloofness that peeped through him frequently. Neither I could ever find out the reason for this nor I dared to ask him but that aloofness was so sharply visible at times that it used to gave me spine chilling sensations for nothing. In all those years that we remained united that aloofness, I think, got passed to me and now that I am separated that same aloofness in higher degree grips me all day long. I pray that he suffers with agonies and more aloofness till he lives; I wish I could see him going around vagrantly carrying convulsive throes that parches him. Few weeks ago I thought of going to his place and with a knife cut his...' She stopped suddenly. She got up and relaxed on the sofa and spoke again - 'I repent for never asking him the reason of his sudden aloofness that used to peep; may be I could not have done anything to it but I was and I am very much sure that something mysteriously wrong must have kindled that aloofness that resulted in this disaster. And that made me a pallid soul who would unconsciously rot herself out in her thoughts of aversions for the rest of life.'

"Next day the clock had struck 11:30 at night when my mother was still not home from work. I had my dinner and slept. It was around 3:00 in the morning that I heard the sound of opening the lock and creak of opening the door. I was assured that my mother had arrived late from work and I fell asleep immediately. Around after an hour when I couldn't find her beside me I was scared and startled; and I could hear a consciously hidden whine of a female. I got up from my bed and with utmost carefulness went to peer into the drawing room and the scene I witnessed frozen me from top to bottom. In the blue glim of the room on the sofa my mother was copulating with a man not known to me; I immediately rushed back to my bed and felt as if a javelin had been ran through my body. Tears broke out from my eyes by the horror of what I watched and I kept the pillow on my mouth to check the sound of sobbing to reach even to any invisible soul beside me. And the sleep came and I woke up the next day with a scourged inside and the world outside appeared to have turned into an arid land. Although it's still unknown to me whether my mother is aware of what I had seen that day but I sensed that she felt a noticeable change in me; and the change was that her association with aversion was passed on to me."

I was not able to utter anything and I noticed her for the first time touching the corner of her eyes with her first finger to check if it was wet. I remember it was. I was not sure shall I comfort her or not, I was blank of anything to clear off the muteness, I was hesitant to even go near her and sit beside her but I dared to do the last one. And I gave a light hug to her but she didn't put her arms around me; they were intact on her lap. When I removed my arms from around her she gave a bumpy smile to me, drank water and left my home telling that next day she will listen to me as her manuscript was pending long to get updated. Although her revelation had shaken me yet I was feeling considerably light and relieved that night and slept well.

She arrived the next day evening wearing a sharp smile in lips and with a bottle of scotch for which she stated the reason that she was feeling quiet light and juvenile after she spoke her heart out yesterday. I remember she told that she was feeling as if some object that was pricked since long had been removed and she wanted to make this moment more lighter with some celebration with the clinkering of glasses. I too was in warmer side and hence didn't desist from the idea. With the first glass I began my story that was long been stuck-

"It's difficult to tell why I was not able to accept the change that our child had brought to our lives; I tried to keep myself busy only with my paintings after the household chores to avoid any distractions, I revisited my old paintings and compared with my contemporary ones to find any change but nothing significant was evident, I tried to create that old melodious warmth with my wife to which I must say she responded well but the a fear of loosing myself gripped me back as soon as those moments got over. I, a number of times, thought of discussing this with my sister but felt too shy in doing this. May be I was not shy but I was more inclined to talk about painting's fantasies with her as a result of which I never got time to discuss myself with her. And once it used to get over and she went away from her I used to curse myself for not having discussed the prevalent torment through which I was going then.

"By the time my wife had grown waspish about my acts and frequent disagreements had began to surface on it, I and my sister had already drawn hallucinatory but secret lines of connection between us that were steadily moving to a higher degree of alluring intimacy because by that time I had resigned to my succumbing inside. Today when I look back at it I understand it was fear - a fear of an ageing artist of losing, when pushed to reality, the landscape that was filled with hues of addiction of love kindles between him and his partner; a fear that I will not be able to feel the life with same juvenileness as the prevalant course of life will make my moral fibre grow old and hence I will not be able to paint my canvas with same warmth.

"I don't know whether the distancing from my wife brought about the sentimental connect with my sister or this connect distanced me from my wife. Me and my sister mostly met and talked late in the evening once my wife returned home from work, in restaurants and cafes from where we used to land up at her place and from her place I used to bid good bye for the day. Her striking blitheness always transported me to my early times of marriage and on one such day acting upon her long dragged request when I portrayed her on the canvas sitting at her home she left a mark of her lipstick on my cheeks with all the world's joyousness; my eyes moistened. And that moment made us realize that we began to value our relationship beyond the boundaries of being mere brother and sister but on the other hand this sparked an intense battle between me and my wife drawn on the lines of ego.

"My wife was bent upon to make me put an end to the bond I have developed with my sister for the goodwill of our family in the process of which she started to grow hostile of her arrivals, threw awkward taunts indicating the illicitness of our relation and scorchingly spurned my paintings; and I was adamant to prove myself right in doing all these with the hope that my wife will understand the reason that had pushed me in this trap. And this battle rose to such an extent where my wife started relaying my affair to all our family members in retaliation to which I grew wilful in alleging her of possessing a habit of placing mindless distrust and misconceptions on most of my acts. Our arrogant contumaciousness continued to soar where a subconscious repugnance towards my family began to dawn at my inside. And slowly I resigned to the belief that things reached the stage of irrepairable condition which made me immune to the prevalent chaos and I fell calm like a human under a sedative effect. But I woke up from the sedative effect when I realized that this mud throwing game had pushed my sister in a quicksand of a solitary confinement stripped off from her usual wings of charm and this sparked another trail of turmoil but this time with an air of compunction.”

With 4 pegs down the reminiscences were blazing inside like a fresh bonfire. With heavy head I went up to the french door of the verandah, rested my back there. She appeared to take too much interest in that dat’s narration with eyes lit up and stiff jaws, sitting cross legged and holding the glass tightly in her right hand. The winter and the florescent light was unable to calm the heat I my body was feeling. I continued again-

“My frantic efforts to reaffirm the bond with my sister contributed to the growing distance and worsening of complexities between me and my wife. The relation with my sister was marked by broken strings of talks and strained impulsiveness. By then I reached the stage where my desperation was urging to cling to the bond between me and my sister at the expense of what existed between me and my wife. To shield our little daughter from all these she was sent to my wife’s grandparent’s place in winter vacation in the same city.

“On one such day when our child was not there and my wife was at work I brought my sister at my place to reconcile things between us. Ongoing torments had transformed her into a pallid, secluded being like a tree whose bark had been scratched off easily due to it’s dryness. We wailed on our misfortunes groping for the answer to what happened with us, our existence was in jeopardy as we had twisted the sanctity of the established relationship. The crossroad was cursed and hazy – continuing to tread on the same path will be blasphemous and going to back to our “should be” destiny will make rest of our lives murky, disconnected with unbearable pang haunting our hearts.

“Suddenly the rains poured down heavily lashing on the window panes and it brought about more dolorous expressions on out face. We felt a kind of dead end for us; in the dim light of the room it appeared as two coward souls waiting for some miracle to happen that swallows their life without making them aware. Outside was growing darker and darker, rains seemed knowing no bounds to pour that day and inside more we talked to find out ways more we seem to endlessly sink in sentimental dejection; all things appeared to crumble in front of our eyes. Unable to carry the imagination of terrors of separation I hugged her in a flash and we both broke into enormous tears. But a heavy lightning in the sky and deafening thunder brought an itchy sensation in both of us to go through each other. A sensual urgency was visible on her face and withing myself I could feel a ripple of horror about that sensuality was arbitrarily but secretly glancing out from my converged brows and wrinkled forheads. In no mood to resist myself from offering her the bliss of fulfillment of her wish amidst all the horrors I allowed the heat of our bare bodies to exchange themselves. With the heightened excitement and unstoppable recklessness we were about to draw sword of coition when miraculously senses prevailed with feeling of no repentance even if we are snatched away from each other.

“Rains diminished by then and when she was about to depart my wife along with our daughter was at our door from work. Drips of sweat at my sister’s neck was enough for my wife to fell in trap of the wild imagination. Her fumes knew no bounds and that night she spilled out venom at her– ‘It pained me a lot, I hope it didn’t as much to you because, I think, it pains less when same blood meets.’ For a moment the earth spun around me and fell with a bang on the ground before me; she was dazed and disappeared in a flash. In a wretched distress I too went away.

"I drank and drank down that evening with no bounds and returned back home late at night hollow headed with zig-zag drunken walks; I headed straight to my room, locked myself up and tried to settle down the huge storm of unrest that was blowing inside. To vent it out I filled up the palette of colors, took up the brushes and readied the canvas. I painted and painted in a non stop way but with blank mind. That night I didn't know when I fell asleep but I woke up the next morning to find myself alone in this home - my wife and my daughter left me forever. And when I looked at the canvas I found that I painted a male hand masturbating and female hand holding a knife in front of it."

After a brief silence and a deep sigh I spoke-

"After few days I received a letter from my sister- 'You will always remain my most adorable brother for whom I will harbor an immense respect as a painter. I knew the path that we were choosing will ultimately bring us an utter, endless ache to our hearts, I knew that the relationship we were sharing will always fall in an umbra that is beyond human understanding but still I have submitted myself to you because I recognized the fear that was overpowering your heart and to drive away which you needed a force. If we meet ever in this birth or next I, with utmost impatience, would like to meet you to know whether I was able to drive away your fear or not.' "

Both of us turned dumb; it was broken when the glass fell down unknowingly from my hand on the floor and I started weeping uncontrollably. She came close to me with a firm face, took my face in her hands and brought her lips near to mine. At the verge of touching she moved her head sideways as if to cease herself but within seconds she faced me and pressed hers hard on mine. Biting, kissing with thirst began but suddenly she snatched herself away from me and went out to the veranda, rested her arms on the parapet wall and head down in between them as if gasping for breath. I was flummoxed but before I could understand anything more she came back running and jumped on my lap kissing and running her tongue throughout my face wildly. And in flash she took me to my bedroom, undressed herself and me in a rush. She appeared to be in alarmingly bestial mood and I too showed no restraint in the hope of getting lighter by disgorging on her the grief laden inside. Her wuthering moans when touching my ears was heightening the prurience and we swam in the warm air of coition bliss in that cold night; I fell to a sound, relieved sleep.

Dawn didn't yet break out when my eyes opened for a moment the next day; I found her dressed up neatly sitting in front of me on a chair with a sharp smile, stiff big eyes. Sleep didn't go away entirely from my eyes; I remember I didn't like that smile of her at the first glance when I saw through the misty curtains of my half opened eyes; it was giving me ice chills of an underlying conspiracy to my muggy bare body. She got up, placed her vanity bag on her shoulders and carrying the same smile spoke-

"A revenge tastes best when the blood is same and comforts most to the soul when somebody who is our own helps to achieve it. And yes, it was not at all painful because the same blood collided. This revenge was the purpose of my life and it’s over now. So good bye DAD !!!" 


She disappeared like a magic.

I kept glued to the posture with which I listened to her words and I was counting minutes when the ceiling will drop down on me and crush me into pieces. I felt the knife that was held by the female hand that night on my canvas drove through my stomach cutting all my flesh of inside. I still can't give words to that feeling of the whirling distress and stabbing twinge. Standing in front of the mirror I yelled at myself till my vocal chord got tired of emitting more sound and ruptured; the flames of her revenge that night charred me into a seared soul bruise of which still oozes volcanoes of pain.

I am spending forlorn, drabbed times of my life these days; everything from eating to sleeping to talking gives me blisters caused by as if somebody throws a saucepan of hot, boiling water to me. It’s only few months ago that I brought her to my place when I received a phone call from a man. I rushed to the place mentioned by him on phone to discover my daughter there at his refuge. I discovered her in condition of blabbing broken string of talks, her movements and behaviour were completely out of sync with the normalcy although she was able to recognize people. I got to know that the man was her college friend who stood by her side since long but knows not much than I had known before that night. And he was the first one to notice this awkward behavior of her few weeks back then which was growing sharper day by day and when she underwent medical examination the reports suggested of her suffering from Major Depressive Disorder that is caused by preexisting vulnerability, or diathesis, is activated by stressful life events. He told me that since when she began that project of retrospective she had handed him over my contact details and told him to contact me if anything ever happens to her; moreover I got to know that he was not aware of the relation I hold with her. When I was about to leave taking her along for the rest of my life, he asked me-

“She had taken a promise from me once that if I ever get to meet you by any reason I won’t ask the relation between you and her. Today I want to break that promise and want to ask you that you stand in what relation to her?”


I glanced back blankly to him and replied-

“Let’s respect her.”

What human mind can conceive will always remain beyond the understanding of human race – bustlings of fear, sparks of vengeance, contentment in abhorrence and insights to all the deformed contraptions of human mind will always remain shrouded by unknown shadows. I will never get a chance to know which soul is gratified by this revenge – my daughter’s or my wife’s? I will never get a chance to ask that can the reply to an infelicity resulting from the umbra of human fear be such a contrived, vile accomplishment?

But above all I will never get a chance to know why had she insisted none other than me to look after her in this condition – does she want to give me an opportunity for reparation or does she want a greater punshment for me by making a father witness her daughter slowly sinking in an ocean of irrevocable emotional instability brought  about by her own perversity?