AMNESIA

AMNESIA

His palm lay still on the velvety emerald table, the thumb supported the cue which was held firmly by his other forelimb. Eyes traversed past the white cue ball, the object ball and the dark pocket at the corner, one at a time, the three of them were making a sharp angle. the shot was not going to be an easy one. A fine lock of hair hung over his creased forehead reaching just below his eyebrow. He blew it off and retook the aim.

The cue hit white ball. It rolled forward to hit the object at the precise spot driving it straight into the pocket.

"Super shot, to end a near flawless game" I thought.

He made an unpretentious triumphant gesture with his hand, picked up the sleek goblet kept on the polished chocolate wooden table edge and finished off the remaining vodka in one gulp. He changed his formals and put on a milky 'kurta-pyjama'.

As he was about to go to bed, his eyes caught up the various CD's scattered on the table beside his laptop. They were lying there since many days and he had ignored them everyday. But today he decided to arrange them.

" Spiderman, V for Vendetta, Gladiator..."

he muttered as he arranged them one by one into a stack.

"...Basic Instinct." he looked at the sensual picture of Sharon Stone on the CD cover for a

second, smiled a little and put the stack in the closet.

Before turning off the light he read me. I was hanging on the wall right in front of his bed.

"Woods are lovely dark and deep,

but I have promises to keep,

and miles to before i sleep

and miles to go before i sleep."

“Yeah, yeah..miles to go before i sleep"

he reiterated with a sigh, shook his head and went to sleep.

I am an ordinary cardboard wall hanging, with the famous words of Robert frost written

in gold in a calligraphic fashion, on a once jet black paper. but now i have become dull,

and my corners have wilted. And perhaps even the words written on me have lost its significance. And this has become a daily routine of Himanshu after he has started living alone. before that he shared a flat with one of his friend, who got married six months ago.

I know Himanshu since a long time, its almost ten years now. He had bought me from an Archie store, when he was in college. And since then he has been reading me everyday before going to sleep. the way he reads me keeps changing though, sometimes with a lot of passion and energy , sometimes depressed, sometimes helpless and sometimes it just a glimpse. The frequency of glimpse has increased ever since he has joined his job. But I think we still share a bond, and I feel like I have become an inseparable part of his soul. I can see what he sees .I can feel what he feels. i know everything about him, and sometimes I feel I know more about him than he himself does.

Himanshu is an academic genius. He was brilliant in his college, got placed in a top consultancy firm and now he is brilliant at his job. He will finish of his official projects with such ease and elegance, that his colleagues can not help but envy him. His boss is always happy with him. But he is also considered as an emotional fool. In fact he was teased by a nickname, 'mother' by his friends in his college. The reason was that, once in his college he had started crying on seeing a documentary on Mother Teresa.

It is Saturday. A weekend ahead and no job to do. Tomorrow there is a party in the evening at a fancy restaurant in the newly opened Sahara mall. And Himanshu is left with almost nothing to do on the mundane morning. He lay on his cozy sofa surfing through the numerous channels on TV, all of them almost alike and equally boring. Suddenly though, he saw a gruesome news of farmer's suicide in Andhra Pradesh. The soul cause of the suicide was poverty.

He had left behind his two little kids and his wife, whom a reporter was interviewing, his kids clinging to their mother, helpless. The anguish and frustration of the lady came out of her mouth in a steady pour. She was crying out loud, and cursing the government, the media, the people of India... everyone.

"It is the fifth suicide in past two months in this area and the government has till now

not taken any step to check the crisis situation."

"Next we take you to the coverage of the wedding ceremony of the most gorgeous couple

of bollywood, Aishwarya and Abhishek. But only after a short break. Stay tuned."

the newsreader recited like a trained parrot in his stereotypical irritating voice.

"Fuck you." he said switching off the television with his remote.

He got off the sofa and took out a bottle of orange juice from the refrigerator.

It was tasteless. The leathery morose face of the indigent lady was still hovering

in front off his eyes. She was blaming everyone, he remembered.

" Am I also responsible for her state." he wondered.

Then suddenly he was reminded of a quotation he had read in an article last week.

“If you are not a part of the solution, then you are part of the problem."

It made him more dejected.

"Forget it" he mumbled after a while shaking his head.

He took another sip of the juice, it was almost still the same, tasteless. Perhaps even

slightly bitter this time. The whole day he could not concentrate on anything. He tried

billiards, he tried a novel, he tried a movie, all useless.

The bell rang at five in the evening. One of his colleagues who was quite older than him

had come to pay a casual visit. And it was not difficult for him to make out that Himanshu was not all correct.

"Feeling lonely... feeling down." he asked.

"Yes."

"Trouble in your work?"

"yeah....." He muttered in a low voice.

"Actually no... Its just some other..some different stuff."

"Don’t worry... it happens with everybody at your age..even the best of guys..

things sometimes get you down... but you will recover.."He preached.

"Yeah..yeah.." Himanshu kept muttering.

“I am a little pissed off.. perhaps need to clear my head."

" Try and get over it. Do something.. get drunk..

get married.. whatever.. And do not think too much.you will be all right, i know."

I was wondering how could getting drunk or marrying be a solution to any of the miseries.

After his friend left he took out his car and went to the Noriman point.He liked sitting there facing the sea. He saw waves colliding with the rocks which had been smoothed by the water. All the irregularities had been corroded and what were left were shining and polished flawless surfaces. He sat there for a long time, baffled. He wanted to do something more earthly, more concrete. Something more worthy than advising the Indian Tobacco company, on how they could capture more market in the rural sector, or suggesting the Honda group if launching their new car in India at this point of time would be a good idea.

"Babuji, would you like to have some-coconut water."

An under-nourished old man in tattered vests asked him.

"Ya" he said after a while.

He took the coconut and offered a fifty rupee note to the man.

"Keep the change". His voice reflected frustration more than generosity.

The twinkle in the old man’s eyes was hardly of any help.

He came back home late in the night. He flung open the window of his room trying to invite a non existent wind, hoping perhaps that it would blow off all the ideas in his head and scrape off all the filth and smoothen everything like the waves had done to the rocks. He flung himself on his bed and read me again.

"Woods are lovely dark and deep

But I have promises to keep,

And mile to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep."

"But in which direction do I have to go. And where am I going."

He asked himself. But there was no answer.

I wonder sometimes if I have made a difference in his life. I think if I would not have been there Himanshu would have been different. he would have been less confused. He would not have thought if he is going in the right direction. He would have been more ‘practical’, so to say ,in the language of humans. But more than that I wonder if he would ever get an answer to the questions he poses before himself.

I think I make him more miserable.

It’s amazing what a sleep can do to you.

The next day Himanshu woke up late. And he was all fine. Just an eight hour sleep had done it. All the ideas in head had vanished. Abosolutely clean. I think it is a common 'human being syndrome.' And all humans suffer from it.

Amnesia, it is called . You forget things. You forget everything.

In the evening Himanshu went to the party and had a good time with his friends. Good food, costly wine, nice music. It looked a perfect world, only perhaps too artificial.

"What the hell are you doing here kid?" Himanshu's friend asked a child who was

trying to clean the car parked outside the mall.

"Just cleaning it sir." he replied.

"Hey! don’t you dare touch my car with your filthy hands you sick bastard."

"Sorry sir, I just need some money for my books."

"Get lost I say." his friend roared.

“Why were you so rude to him." Himanshu asked his friend, clearly disturbed.

“You don’t know these guys... they are thieves. They will steal the tape recorder,

or may be drain out the petrol, you never know."

"But he might have been saying the truth." he poked again.

“Oh! Come on. I know these guys too well. They are the scum of the earth."

The guy looked no different than the farmer's son Himanshu had seen yesterday.

And once again all the thoughts that troubled him came back.

He wanted to get over it.

He set the billiards table and took aim. But all the shots lost their target. The vodka had lost its punch as well. Everything he tried to do appeared so shallow, so dull, so unfulfilling. It was like a song without music, like smoking without inhaling, like college without girls, like sex without orgasm.

He lay on his bed and read me again.

"And miles to go before i sleep." he muttered.

He was staring straight at the ceiling, his brain blank.

A void surrounded him. He was going crazy.

Suddenly a tiny bright orange moth caught his attention. It was entangled in a cobweb in a corner, fluttering its wings trying to free itself. A spider approached it slowly and then its legs started moving in a synchronized motion. Like a skilled craftsmen the spider weaved around the moth and chocked it to death.

Abruptly Himanshu got up from his bed, took a duster, and smacked it twice.

The spider was dead. He threw the duster, and fell on the easy chair.

“What the hell am I doing? Killing a spider." he thought pulling his hair, his jaws

clenched tight , his body stiff and his brain blocked.

The phone rang.

"Hello"

"Hello beta, how are you." his mother asked.

"I am OK mom, I am OK."

But his voice was sullen enough to suggest otherwise.

"What's the matter son? Not feeling well?”

"Just tired of work. That’s all."

He woke up early in the morning got ready and went to office.

"Amnesia" I thought.

Himanshu has come home after a week today. And he has brought a beautiful guest with him, his wife. He had gone to his home town to get married to this lovely lady his mother had selected for him.

"I hope this is for the better." I said.

His wife changed the whole look of the house. The billiards table was replaced by a dining table. The vodka bottles have been replaces by orange squash. There are no cobwebs anymore. The 'Basic Instinct' CD was thrown into the dustbin and so was I.

Yes, one day, his wife brought a beautiful scenery with a beautiful house, and trees around it and a rising sun in background, and hung it where I was. And I like a tattered used tissue paper was tossed into the dustbin.

"I hope it is for the better. And I hope it will end his miseries."

I thought.