The Marriage Fever
Out
of nowhere, it turned chilly. Though everyone felt the unexpected drop in the
temperature, for him it was a bit more than just that. It seemed that in the
month of April, the ghost of winter that just went recently decided to spring
back and shock him like a jack-in-the-box.
Toying
with his pen, he looked outside; the rain was splashing hard against the
windows, making them tremble. Drr drr brrrrrrr, drr drr brrrrrr. The trembling
was quite rhythmic, he noticed, realizing he did it subconsciously. Drr drr
brrrrrr….
With
a bit of difficulty, he dragged his eyes away from the window. He felt
irritated to be transfixed to something as mundane as watching rain splatter against
closed glass panels of a window. But he thought it must be because he was not
feeling like working today at all and his mind was actively looking for a
distraction.
Thinking
about nothing in particular, he opened the cap of his pen and started
scribbling in his work diary. He gazed at the shiny, steely nib of his fountain
pen. Seven months ago, he decided to write only with fountain pens and since
then he never touched a ballpoint or gel pen again. He loved both the fountain
pens he owned; one that he brought to work and another that he kept at home.
Staring at the nib affectionately, he realized he didn’t just love his pens, he
was quite obsessive about them.
The
dark royal blue ink occasionally dripping from the nib, smudging his thumb and
index finger, and the fragrance of raw ink wafting from the paper when he
writes fresh on it - it is kind of exhilarating for him, making his mind spin
in a soothing manner. Maybe it is because he travels back in past to those days
in the fourth standard at Holy Cross when the students were allowed to use only
fountain pens as a rule. Maybe because when he breathes in deeply the aroma of
ink, he finds himself back in the classroom, sitting on the wooden bench, even
if it is quite momentarily.
“You
done with that article?” his team head, who sits behind him on the opposite
cubicle, asked. “Already mailed,” he replied nonchalantly. Everywhere around
him the keyboards were consistently hit. Pitter Patter pitter patter. Again,
before he could have helped it, he noticed there was a rhythm to it too. How
the hell on earth, he thought. Can’t be remotely possible. A dozen teams
working on at least 50 different projects. Coders, designers, and content
writers like him, all working on a set of tasks assigned to them specifically.
How can there be any rhythm? How can there be any sync to the entire thing?
He
looked at the clock. Must sleep early, must get up early, must exercise a bit.
He said to himself. He has been doing it for the past seven months since he
joined this office. Not that he never succeeded. He did sleep early, wake up
early and exercise. But that was a handful of days in all those months. “Doesn’t
really count, does it,” he said to the Van Gogh’s picture that was his
desktop’s background image.
Wishing
the day would pass sooner, he opened Facebook on his phone and started to
browse through the posts. While scrolling down insipidly, he stopped at a post.
Another schoolmate getting married.
These
days, 7 out of 10 times he goes online on social media, especially Facebook, he
sees a wedding post of some classmate, college mate, or a friend. This guy in
particular, whose latest post he just watched, was a rather peculiar one back
in school. He had this weird and annoying habit of grabbing students’ balls in
the morning assembly queue, for no reason at all. He had been warned several
times and once almost got expelled too, but it seems he was just obsessed with
grabbing guys’ balls. Ball Grabber – they had nicknamed him.
What
lucky girl got to marry him, he thought, looking at the picture of the Ball Grabber,
grinning at the camera cladded in a heavily embroidered Sherwani. The girl, in
equally heavy embroidered saree, was standing beside him, trying her best to
smile at the camera. They both were drenched in sweat as if they just came out
of the shower in those clothes. Why they even marry in summers, that too
wearing those clothes. The mere sight of their picture made him feel suffocated
all of a sudden.
He
looked at the AC; a perfect 22 degree Celsius. Must be in my mind, he thought,
loosening his crisply pressed shirt’s collar. He looked back at the picture
again, at the girl. She must be around his age, most probably younger than him.
Of course, if it’s an Indian wedding, chances are, the girl is going to be
younger than the groom. But I am not the groom, he said to himself. Well, the
guy is almost your age. You were together in a couple of grades, remember? He
answered.
The
girl seemed to be stooping by some weight, some kind of unseen burden. Is it
the weight of the society’s expectations she is carrying that made her stoop
that way? Is it the weight of the responsibilities that have been bestowed upon
her at such a young age that she didn’t even ask for but that came nevertheless
as a package for entering the life of a traditional Indian wife? He sipped the metal-tasting
machine-made coffee and put the cup near his snail figurine.
She
is just tired of all the wedding procedure and must be longing for some spare
time to rest for a while. Stop being a philosophical ass all the time, he
answered as the bitter, bad-tasting coffee slinked into his stomach through his
throat. What a waste, he thought of both, the coffee and the institution of the Great Indian Wedding.
The
pitter and patter of keyboards continued, so did the splattering of rain
against the windows. Now both the sounds were working in harmony to create a
third kind of rhythm. It seemed the clock on the wall behind him also decided
to join them with its wearing hands tick toking their way. This, he thought, is
not everyday shit, not at all.
"Auto!"
he shouted, trying to stop an autorickshaw for the umpteenth time, but it
seemed none of the auto drivers was willing to drive anywhere in this downpour,
and the ones that were on the road were already packed with the passengers.
He
never liked rains much. It’s not that he hated it, but unlike most of the
people his age, or any age, was not much enthusiastic about it ever. Yes, it
makes the climate better, he admitted, but apart from that, rains held no joy
in his life. With a screech, an auto finally stopped.
Trying
uselessly to brush some water off his shirt, he entered the auto, which
surprisingly, was all empty. “Laxmi Nagar metro,” he said, and the auto jerked
into action in full blast. To great annoyance, he noticed the dirt smudges
covering his shoes and water droplets all over his chrome watch. Fucking rain,
he thought, trying not to think of his shoes and the watch but without much
success. He is an absolute sucker of shoes and watches. He just can’t explain
this obsession, but it feels so elating whenever he buys a new pair of shoes or
a watch.
It
was not like this always. Now he thinks of it, this obsession started shortly
after he got divorced. When his wife of six years left him for someone else and
he was unable to find anyone to replace the gap that she left not just in his
life, but his home too. As the auto sped against the needle-like streams of
rain, he looked at his watch again. Time has been one thing that has been odd
to him more often than not.
Suddenly,
there was a flashing thunder that echoed for quite some time, followed by an
unusual silence. Even with all the traffic jostling around his auto, it all
seemed to stop for an instant. And then, it was back to normal. Much to his
annoyance, he now realized that even the raindrops were falling against the
canvas roof of the autorickshaw in unison. “What?” he was taken aback by the
strange sound the driver made. "Nothing sir, I have some problem with my
nose. So sometimes my breathing sounds like this." Till he reached the
metro station, the driver kept making those noises at regular, coordinated intervals.
The
moment he entered the station, his phone rang with his favorite Star Wars
theme. “Yes mom,” he picked up the call. “You heard about it?” his mom’s
familiar voice came from the other side, making him miss home like every time.
“Heard what?” he asked, a bit annoyed in the lack of the question’s context.
These days, he feels annoyed at even tiniest of things. His doctor warned him
to maintain his calm otherwise he might have to start taking medicines to
control his blood pressure.
“Mehtaji’s
son married a girl against the wish of his parents and in rage, Mehtaji kicked
him out of the house,” his mom said. “Tinku?” he asked, trying to sound
interested, “Isn’t he 20 or something?” “That’s the thing, why he needed to get
married at such an age, especially when it was time to focus more on his
career.” He didn’t say anything. Since his divorce, he tries to avoid such
conversations, but it seems that the universe smells his conspiracy and keeps
throwing these to him.
“Well,
his life. He is old enough to marry whom he wants,” he said. “It’s not about
that!” his mom sounded a bit offended, “Are parents’ consent on it nothing?” He
had no answer to it. “Can you please talk to him once? Try to persuade him to
return home. Mehta uncle and aunty are really distressed,” she asked, sounding
not so sure, knowing her son better than anyone else. “Ok, I will,” he lied. “Great.
That would be nice,” she said, knowing that he had lied and won’t call Mehtaji
at all.
This
train was too packed. He decided to wait for the next one. It seemed every
day, the number of people was increasing tenfold. Are there more people coming
to the city and settling here than ever before, he thought. People cramped
together in each of the bogies. So much population and still people just love
to get married and breed indefinitely, he thought. Better I got out of it
before it screwed me up good, he found some solace for his bitter memories that
never stopped haunting him.
He
saw a couple. Amid all the chaos, they were trying their best to squeeze out
some moments of love for themselves, holding each other’s hands, smiling,
gazing into each other’s eyes lovingly. All this while people were hitting
people with their elbows, trying to stand stiffly like cactus plants, ignoring
the commotion around them. He noticed the thin line of vermillion on the girl’s forehead. Newly married, must have been a few weeks, or months. Certain memories of
days gone tried desperately to flood his mind, but he knows how to control it
now. He has trained himself for long. He knows how to willingly create a
distraction in a matter of seconds.
As
the train moved ahead, he heard it again. Why, he thought, why today? I have
been hearing it all for ages, since as long as I can recall. Why these random
sounds are drawing my attention suddenly? It was not a joke; he was seriously
pissed off this time. The more he tried not to think of it, the louder the
sound seemed to get. Dudder dudder, durr durr, dudder dudder, durr durr. What
kind of rhythm is this now? Damn, it is giving me a headache. All of a sudden,
he started to feel suffocated, second time in a day.
Though
he was never claustrophobic, it seemed that the train compartment was closing
on him. “Excuse me,” he said trying to keep the crowd away from him. “Can you
please just… just stay a bit away…” This is unreal, he thought, feeling his
heartbeat racing rapidly and sweat drops trickling down his forehead. Are these
people trying to squeeze me to death, he thought fanatically. “Next station is
Indraprastha,” the automated voice of the metro lady boomed out of speakers and
he felt things returning back to normal; the compartment expanding, people
getting farther away from him. He hurried towards the door and got out as soon
as they opened. Panting, he looked at the leaving train.
With
a shock, he saw the couple, the very same couple who were making all those
loving gestures to each other, were staring at him and smiling oddly. It sent a
chill down his spine. Unsure, he tried to look at them but the train had
already passed. Must be mind playing weird tricks, he said to himself. Slowly
walking towards one of the steel benches, he sat on it and waited for arrival
of the next train.
“Next
train in 8 min.” He looked at the glowing electronic sign board. There was a
pigeon sitting up it. It was dancing in a circle, trying to catch his tail with
its beak, just like a dog. In circles. It was going round and round and round.
The train slowly came to halt and he realized he was watching the pigeon for
the last eight minutes.
“There
is something not usual,” he thought, grabbing one of the supports linked to the
roof of the train, “what exactly is going on?”
“Next
station, Praga…”
The
windows blackened, the coaches became empty. Even though he could see people
sitting and standing around him, there was no one anymore.
“Man
of habits, man of materialistic obsession," a voice came somewhere from
the back of his mind.
He
looked at the blackened windowpane and saw his reflection, a much darker
version of himself.
“Man
of everything that he can control with utmost preciseness,’ the voice said.
Was
it the reason he ultimately left her? Wasn’t there absolutely no control that
could have made her stay? Despite her repeatedly cheating on him, he tried to
control it all by painfully ignoring the situation, and what it got him? More
pain, more suffering, more trauma…
He
has always been like this. Either he is crazy about what his heart desires and
does whatever it takes to get it, or he just kicks it out far from his life.
Comic books, video games, bikes, love of his life… There was never a middle
path for him. His existence has always lingered on both the extremities. He
only stopped obsessing over her when his mind finally accepted that she was
gone for good. That's when he began obsessing over watches and shoes – the more
materialistic ones, which won't leave him out of anywhere.
And
this very obsession has prevented him to consider remarrying. Despite his
parents pleading to him numerous times, he has always very stubborn when it
comes to the subject. “I am not falling into this useless spiral of society
again,” that’s what he always tells them.
“What
the hell,” he found himself in a bit shock, “What happened? Is the metro
moving?” he narrowed his eyes and tried to look outside. The train seemed to be
moving but he didn’t feel it.
The
door opened to the ultimate void. He could see the silhouette of people but why
they appeared so ghostly? He slowly touched the arm of a woman who, naturally,
looked at him in an aggressive manner. “Surely they are here,” he thought and exited
the metro. He thought it was just the darkness, but no, it was actually a void.
From where he was standing, there was no ground or sky, just a very solid
nothingness. Trying not to panic, he turned back to enter the metro but too
late, the doors were shut.
“This
is bullshit,” he nervously swiped his sweating forehead with the handkerchief.
Unable to think of anything, he tried moving towards a direction that he hoped
would be the right one.
“Being
a part of the society is inevitable.”
“You
want to live here? You have to follow certain norms.”
“Go
and be a Baba in the mountains? Why
even bother?”
“Everything
happens by a design.”
“Sun
rises from east, sets at west.”
“12
months in a year.”
“There
is a pattern to it all.”
“A
system.”
“A
harmony.”
“Rhythm.”
He
knew the mild tremor was no more an incoming train. It was his own heartbeat.
“What
I am supposed to do?” He pressed his chest hard, hoping to suppress his heart’s
efforts to break out of the ribcage.
“Compromise?
I don’t know how long I am going to live. How can I compromise on this thing!”
This
was killing him. He knew it.
Gradually,
even the memories began to become distant, when he tried to think of them, it
felt like they belonged to a previous life, where he was someone else,
something else.
Tik
tok tik tok, his newly purchased chrome watch, he could see it amid the thick
darkness, all of a sudden.
“What
the…”
It
moves.
It
finds a way.
There
is always a way.
Another
way around.
“Well.”
A gush of wind filled his lungs, uplifting him in the air like a helium
balloon. He felt lightheaded, after a long, long time.
His
black leather shoes came into the vision. And then his well-ironed black
trousers, the black leather belt with its shiny metal buckle, and the bottle
green full sleeved shirt buttoned to the collar and nicely tucked in the
trousers.
“Yes!”
he felt in joy.
“I
won’t close my doors forever! I will find a way around!”
He
felt clear in above, able to work on a plan, to think something, anything.
Gradually,
everything else came back to vision.
As
he boarded the next train, coming into existence one tiny particle at a time,
he felt a mild suffocation, again. Worriedly, he looked around.
“Oh,”
he sighed calmly.
It
was the collar button. He loosened it, just like the way he always leaves it
open. His usual style.
When
a pretty looking girl standing a few paces away smiled at him, he didn’t feel
feverish anymore.
The
yellowish, sickening thoughts, he left them at the previous station. Hopefully.
Fin.
