It’s a ploy. What’s other than that? It’s a ploy of giving advice irritatingly. There is no electricity, but Sarah lay down in a corner and picking some things in the floor.
It’s terrible. Shit.
‘Whom do you say shit, your mother? Have I told you anything bad? It's been 3 days and your Father is still not here. He is doing work for the county. Hoof! What he gets by doing that?’
‘Would you kindly shut your mouth?’
‘Why, why should I. What is there I will keep mum?’
‘What you’ll get chanting such bullshit?’
‘What I get and what not should I give you the reply. You’re always sitting in the house. You don’t feel shame for that.’
‘Where is job?’
‘Be a porter, or pull a rickshaw, whatever. Otherwise go away from my eyes.’
‘Shit.’
The boy was in his late twenties. So long, with lower having a loose apparel and on top a printed shirt, at one end of this long veranda he was listening to the radio in less volume. He should go away, but not for ever. He needed a smoke. In the shirts pocket was a bundle of handmade Filipino smokes, but that did not taste good, smoke failed to come as much at puffing, simply not heated by the maker as needed. At puffing the cheeks sunk. More so, he had now the bucks earned from giving private lessons, and he needed that to spend.
Now, trousers on, not ironed, blue in colour, the boy opened the door to go out and heard his mother say, ‘It’s peace now. Peace, my God!’
Let name this boy, suppose he was Bitoy, tall as 5’6”, but in comparison his face was smaller than that should be. Parting hair made him look a foolish person. Whether he was intelligent or not, not tested. He was an unemployed graduate and the elder son. They were three siblings; the sister was the eldest, married.
The path was a lane. It was a big field beyond a high wall, beyond the field was marshy land, and after that the rail tracks. To have a shortcut, people broke at a place of the wall.
The path in the lane was not narrow but to some extent wide, now looked bare. After walking some distance at the left was a boundary wall of a factory that went with the lane for a considerable distance. When the factory ran, Bitoy’s father was the leader of the trade union of that factory. If it were running, Bitoy would have the job of a clerk. The factory locked out. Some shops went on to close under shutters. Many men stayed missing forever. On the late afternoon, walking through this lane, when houses shut inside, a sudden frightening told in his blood and that stormed into him anarchy. Was he facing great anarchy? Before, getting the reply asked to himself, he could hear beatings of drums and the music of bagpipes coming from the main road and also of DJ. He forgot that there was the football final of Alok’s club. That guy was his younger brother.
Alok was on top of a matador van. Beside him, was a Shield wrapped in wreaths. Wet with sweat was his jersey still on him, and it was number 10 certainly. He was in akimbo and on the football was his right foot. The pose was certainly heroic. Boys were madly dancing before the snail-paced van, crackers blast, drums beating on and the clarinet heard playing a patriotic song.
Bitoy took a glimpse of Alok. Whether Alok found him he did not know. Men of upper echelon when give their presence, but not daily, they do it on stage. They look at the gathering as a sum number of people present, not knowing them ever. Bitoy just saw the long pageant to vanish with music going away from his ears and where he stood at a side of the main road there behind him was a tea-shop also selling smokes, to get access to it was a flat wooden piece on the open drain, connecting the main road and the shop. A cigarette and tea in a burnt-clay cup seemed not bad.
The shopkeeper said, ‘In every matter there is an exhibition of excesses. Why, did we not play football in our young age? Should they blast fire crackers so much that may make you deaf, and the music that grows heartbeats?’
‘If your father were alive, he would say, heart palpitates.’
‘My father was not a graduate, but certainly he was materialistic. He could get my elder sister married from the earning of this teashop, and buy a shelter for us. What can we do, nothing, just vaunting.’
Looking at the road, Bitoy became owlish. A bus stopped that probably was stuck with the jam. It also left. He could see, Suzie, his elder sister was on the other side of the road, holding a big suitcase. Generally, she did not come ever with such a big suitcase. He muttered within, for how many days she would stay, when they were in a great crisis? Bitoy offered a queer smile at his sister.
Suzie’s suitcase was at Bitoy while walking down the lane. Suzie suddenly gave a run towards the factory gate. She jumped to cull some wild flowers from the wall, tucked them in her bun of hair, and elated in joy, saying, ‘How do I look? If I do try, it is a fact that I may become an actor in the film. Isn’t it?’
‘Why don’t you try?’
‘Now, I will definitely try,’ leaving a sigh said Suzie.
‘The suitcase looks bigger than any that you previously brought with you. It’s very big. Would you be here for some months?’
Suzie stopped walking.
Bitoy so stopped, and watched. Tears began to assemble at her eyes.
Bitoy said, ‘You haven’t given me any reply. Is there any trouble?’
‘Keep on right now. Rather, have you seen Julius Caesar, the hero that his appearance before public, after defeating and killing Pompeii?’
‘I can’t follow you.’
‘Why, does Alak not look as that?’
Bitoy with a long face said, ‘He is the hero of the anarchy. So bad and rustic are those guys…’
‘Boys dancing before the matador in the beats of drums were all out. It seemed they took to drink since the morning as like as Babin, your brother-in-law.’
‘How that guy is right now? It past many days he did not call us.’
‘How could he do that? I have now left him.’
‘Pooh!’
‘Yes, my God!’
‘Is it dear sister?’
Bitoy found a black piece of paper get poured with much grimmer darkness.
End
Thank you for reading ❤️
