Reminder of a Haven

{Fiction}

When the letter arrived in the post this morning, I smiled. It was from Riya an ex member of the Haven. It was her marriage invitation. I don’t know if the invite elicited my memories to think about my first day in Raven or my frequent contact to books and movies wanted me to reminisce those old days like it was a rule to remember. But nevertheless I remembered..

‘Raven’ was the brain child of my friend and philanthropist Divya a nurse in her early thirties then, and when I indicated my interest in joining she felt it was a joke at first for I was just twenty five but she accepted and made me promise that I would not come up with some sarcastic joke when I go in for my first meeting. I can just tell one thing not even once did I come up with my witty jokes, how many times I was tempted to make one is another story..

My first meeting was on the last Saturday of the same month and we met at Divya’s house, over pizzas and colas, some even smoked. The only imperative to be a part of the Raven apart from being a women is that, one should not be married. When I looked around I found women ranging of 25 (me) to 35 or even more.

It was not approved for women to stay unmarried in those days, leave off being independent and this forum helps the women to be so, with grace. “We do not advocate you against marriages, we just give you the moral support that you don’t get just because you don’t have a husband, for whatever reason it might be. Here you get the support and guidance and security that you get from a husband except sex.” Finished Divya with a straight face, and some of them giggled and some smirked. She turned to me and said, this is my prep talk to the new members and every time I say the last words they giggle.. Girls..! she rolled her eyes.

It was hard for me to believe that women can gather and speak about things other than gossip, wailing or self-pity. Jasmin was the first women I spoke to there an good-looking looking catholic in her late twenties, and she said ,”I feel confident being here, who needs men” and she turned around and shouted "who needs men" then they all chanted it for 5 times like in a trance, “Here in Haven who needs men!!” Jasmin looked pleased at the response and said, I created that phrase and it just caught on. I bit my tongue and walked away, to avoid doing what I promised I won’t. I wonder at times, if it was now that they started it, the group would have turned into a worldwide Cult kind of organization and tougher to manage and who knows there might have been movies based on it.

There were no ideologies in there, although people boasted of one, some women stayed because they were desperate to get married but depressed that it did not work out and when they met similar women there they felt that they were not alone, some did because they were feminist and suffragettes who wanted an equal rights in everything just because they fight for it… but those were the ones who married and left faster than the others. People left too, especially when they got married and rarely because they did not like the group. Those who left never came back except one. The souvenir allowed was the wedding invites from the ex members.

I felt interested to go there because of my difference of opinion on the whole concept of marriages, I was not for it or I was not against it, but my mind conflicted over it like the way it did with religion and I delved an answer or in simple words I can say that it was just because I was bored and had nothing else to do.

Many things were discussed on that day, like the 20 yrs old stalking Divya or the woman hater manager of Jasmin and so on.. Riya a bank employee who could be around 36 spoke,

“I want to tell you guys something. I have already made up my mind, but I am still saying I don’t want any one to make any kind of jokes”

 “Its about my mother, she is getting married”

Someone chuckled and was about to make a nasty comment, but a look from Divya reprimanded her from continuing.

Riya spoke again, after some time “My father, left us when I was 5 and mother was taking care of me, and when I got a job, I started taking care of her. She is the only one I got in this whole world, and now she wants to be married to a friend of my dad”

“What is her age” asked the one who chuckled, with a look of intensity like what she was about to say depended on the reply.

“She is 61 and he may be 72”

“what did you decide” asked someone else

“Its tomorrow and I am not going”

The wise woman who asked the age was silent, after contemplating and making some serious looks she said “you said you are taking care of her, may be she did not want to be a burden for you, you did not get married because of her right?”

Riya’s face brightened up, like it was a revelation, a revelation mixed with altruistic remorse.

“what if she wants to be happy, wants a companion for herself” Said I

They gave me a stern disapproving look.. I shrugged!

Then she burst out and cried for some fifteen minutes and people consoled her

Today I saw a post script in the invite,

PS: I have invited my mother also..

When I closed the invite, placed it carefully in the cover, and kept it in my cupboard I tried to decipher the reason for her tears, I couldn’t single out one.. there must have been several reasons.. well.. what happened in haven let it stay in Haven!

{fiction}

Soliloquy

'Come back’ oh how much I would love to come back to my first love.. Did I feel the familiar symptoms..  heart beat increasing.. hurrying for no apparent reason.. panicking or even hurried short breaths.. no not at all… all I feel is curiosity, anticipation and even despair.. when at this moment I decide to come back to my first love.. to write.. again..

But will I be remembered after all these many days.. I have been gone an awfully long time when things changed around me.. why would I be etched in your memory? What sort of credit do I have compared to others that makes me stay there?

What is the use in seeking others esteem… people create, to quench their own thirst don’t they? Then why anticipate?

An artist.. a writer.. a performer.. they live survive in the understanding and admiration that flicks on the audience eyes.. without that the thirst will always remain…

How much of truth is there in those words..?

But even if I find the truth what would I write about..

There are hundreds of things to write about but still one topic is hard to find?

Let me write about the current social conditions.. but what is the use in performing autopsy on something long dead and ever decaying? Am I not one of those little birds that sit around the corner and feed on the ashes deluding myself that it is a fruit.. or slumping down without even the strength or ability to think and know that ashes are not meant to be eaten..

Or I could write about my day to day life.. but that would not take more than a page.. the tiring life can be put in an endless loop with my life time as exit scenario and keep it rolling copying from each page and into each page the same old words.. the same old life and the same old actions..

Despair and self-loathing suits well with poetry.. than short story.. I think

I could blend in the truth and fiction plating them up together into long braids until the point of what is reality and what is fiction just vanishes.. and I could sit there and watch my own life in my own words..

Is it possible?

Why not? I could write like this..

“Today as I came home from office yet another tiring day.. I looked unintentionally but as I do every day to the right side of the big highway.. where the Swampland of the state lay neglected with only a dilapidated board saying that the property is taken care of by the government.. just like the way our life’s are taken care of.. hanging helplessly with the iron plates corroded and eaten by the fat ass rust, waiting happily for a big wind to come in the way to fall off with no care to the marsh and blend-in with the earth and soil.

And there at the corner of the Swampland, behind the tree hidden from the normal view but visible to those who seek..  stood a girl just like the day before and the day before. She wore bright saree that glittered in the street light and had I smelled I would have got the wimps of the jasmine flowers in her head. Men if they want her would slow down the vehicle and she would get in.. within a second like she was with them even before they stopped the vehicle. I had seen this for few days now and today involuntarily I looked again… but was met with her gaze.. I averted my eyes in too short a jiffy and kept them to the road.. and at the very second when i crossed her again.. I looked.. and saw in her eyes the look of..”

It is easy once started.. just have to keep going and writing that is all.. 

No its not that easy.. also i may not be politically correct If i go on wiring...also that would be too serious one to come back to writing with.. I could write something hilarious.. a poetry per say? Like the Muddlehead..

What a muddle head was he,

That man who lived in Petushkee!

He walked upto a tram one day

And climbed in very sprightly;

Conductor thought that he would pay,

Instead he said politely:

"Parding your beggon,

Kister Monductor,

I'm off for a week's vacation;

I stop you to beg your cramway tar

As soon as we reach the station."

Conductor got a fright

And didn't sleep that nite.

What a muddle head was he,

That man who lived in Petushkee!

I could write it to suit current times..

The man I met today looked very serious

And told me a story of a divorce that was precarious

When he finished I felt it was hilarious

Coz his wife ran-away with his attorney whom he thought was a genius

Is that hilarious? Is that not? Well that is what is happening now a days..

“Forget reality fiction suits life better” says a friend..

Hmm then I can sit around and write about two lovers who never propose and brood “if only”? A lady sipping her “monsoon coffee” forgetting her real life? Or about “The Dusty cupboards"! Like the way you write..???

 “Shut up.. If u wanna write.. write! stop criticizing my works..” 

So saying I started to walk away cursing my decision to sit through this discussion with a friend who wanted to start writing again.

“Hey I am sorry.. I was just kidding you.. come here” he called me back..

I forgave him at that instant, for he was a good writer.. and after few deep breaths to calm myself I said..

“You talked about many things now.. pull any one of those and start writing…”

He looked at me with a puzzled gaze and asked..

“About what..!!!”

{Fiction}

Phew that was an irritating encounter.. what did you think?

Any way.. I am back too! 

How are you guys.. I missed you all…! :)

Restless

I felt it again today, the constricted feel in my chest.. no amount of water or medicine would make it go away.. it stayed.. and pained.. The restlessness. I felt it when I saw the little girl get into the car with a man in the middle of the night.  She was not so little, might be in her early twenties. She looked like a girl of thirteen, lost in a big fair.. her features still has not lost its innocence, although her eyes and heart had.

Traveling at night was not my option, the darkness scares me, like there was still something lurking behind those dark drapes ready to ambush my heart. But my I.T job demands it and I don’t hesitate now. Nights to be used to be the safest time for me, locked in my house, comforted by my blanket, assured that even the slightest noise would bring my mom to my side.. I slept as a child dreaming and wondering about my own fairy tales. But now, the moment my office cab reaches my street, I search and spot the only house fully lit up and the short plump anxious figure of my mom waiting in the balcony and I feel safe again… but the little girl..!

Am I pitying her? I used to wonder.. I am not sure.. may be I do and may be I don’t.. ! As my philosophical friend calls it being chaste at heart is much tougher than at body, and in his eyes every women are the same.. not so pure..! I half agree with him, the rest half I ignore..

So I sat to contemplate, when did I feel restless before? Well I don’t remember, but I remember the first time I felt so..  I was in my teen and enjoying the first bus ride alone in my life.. I had pleaded my overprotective father for it. I got into the bus from my school, got a seat and was enjoying the view both inside and outside the bus. Faces and places equally fascinate me.  In one of the faces, I saw pain. She was a girl of my age, and probably going back home from school too! Her eyes wandered pleadingly at every women in the bus, but no one saw it. The bus was overcrowded, and just behind her stood a guy too close to her.

At first I did not notice his hands, but the constant movement of those filthy hands made me look harder and I saw his hands move from the girls hip until her arm pit. She pushed them away, pinched it turned to the side, but nothing stopped him, he continued harassing her. I looked away in disgust.. the bile welled up my food pipe, I felt restless for the first time in life. I got down from the bus as soon as possible and got home in a cab. I did not know if any one helped her. But I knew that it left a deep impact in her and in me, and I still cannot forget that day.. even after 10 years..

Was it guilt then? The realization that I didn’t/couldn’t help? Or the personal fear for my own? I am not sure.. or the overwhelming knowledge of bad and evil in the world.. of what lies behind those dark drapes…

 I wish to change and remove the knowledge of good and evil..  but if it leaves me… will I be innocent again..?

As this circle is like life and death.. death always comes after life.. leaves life to heel or bleed.. and then take one away. Knowledge always comes after ignorance as comprehension leaving the scars..!