THE MANAGER NIM

29. VARMA KALAI

*Italics - the conversation in Korean

-

At the moment anyone could knock down Joe with a feather as he continues to stare at your elbow punch ravaging that guy's lower jaw. Your sudden attack came as a bolt from the blue and caught that guy off guard.

But in a swish, he reverts and pounces back with a clenched fist. Before his fist could crash against your face, you seize his hand in a flash and flips him over onto the ground.

Like a wounded tiger he fiercely charges back at you in fury, this time grasping a sleek knife in hand. The knife glimmers in sunlight as his hand hoists up in the air to attack you. 

But instead of moving away, you position your feet sternly over the ground and the moment the knife proceeds towards your eye, your head sways to your left, simultaneously your left arm snatches his armed hand in a firm hold.

The index and middle finger of your right hand collide together and strike the median nerve over his inner wrist concurrently, which causes his whole arm to fall dead in a paralyzed state.

Utterly baffled by your impenetrable moves he stands there howling with twisting pain. He further tries to attack you with his right arm while hollering in agony as the burning pain sears through his shoulder. Post-haste you crouch down, clenching a pound of flesh over his belly part and twist it viciously. Like a scarecrow unleashed from the pole, he descends onto the ground in a completely paralyzed state.

You quickly trot away and scoop the little kid in your hands and stride towards Joe who is standing in a stupefied state.

"Call 911, quick!" huffing for oxygen, you whisper yell at him.

-

"Patbingsu, three servings. Would you like to order anything else, sir?"

"No, that's it", Joe replies with his infamous poker face while swiping his card.

As Joe settles in his seat, placing the huge tray which contains three servings of the traditional Korean ice cream, without wasting a minute the little girl begins to dig into the delicate layers of shaved ice, red bean paste and condensed milk.

"This is what you've asked for right?" You softly enquire the kid to slowly kick start a conversation but to your dismay, she blankly stares at your face. 

Relaxing from his firm posture Joe slowly leans towards the kid, "You like it?", he tenderly asks her in Korean.

"I love it!" A pure smile flashes across her flawless face.

That exact moment something shimmers across Joe's features, something you've never seen, something which notifies that even this cold stone statue has a soft side and then he proceeds to look up at you with a coy smile to boast his success.

You stab the ice cream quite roughly, emphasising the declaration of your defeat. "Her parents are on their way, right?" You ask him while examining the ingredients of that eatable heaven. 

"Yeah! They will be here soon but, you could've just handed over her to the police they would've taken care of her." His tone says how genuinely confused he is.

"I could've but, I wanted to treat her with something she likes so that she won't remember this day as dreadful as it is in future. And hey! I almost got stabbed to death by that kidnapper, I need at least a sincere 'gomavo' from her parents to boost my moral sense man!" You explode like a little cracker and look up at him.

Joe holds your gaze for a minute, but instead of the usual icy hostility, it is filled with amiable warmth.

"And what was that?" Curiosity sears through his words.

"What?" You break the gaze and keenly scoop a bite of your Patbingsu.

"The trick you used there to fight off that kidnapper guy, what's that?" He continues to stare right into your eyes.

"Huh? Trick? Oh, that! Hey, that's not a trick you dumbo!" You drop the scoop back. "That's a type of martial art."

"Martial art?"

"Yeah, I've been taught Adimurai since I was hmm...six years old, it is one of the oldest martial art forms in existence." The haughtiness in your words exposed your proud self.

"Adi… what?" Confusion oozed out of his face.

"Adimurai - roughly translates into the technique of striking or hitting. As my dad is from the southern part of India he made it mandatory for me and my sibling to learn this art form and the one I used today is called Varma Kalai, a particular technique from this martial art form." 

"And how does that work?" His enthusiasm bubbles up with every question he asks.

"Well basically Adimurai is kinda similar to Muay Thai, Jujitsu, Karate and Taekwondo but Varma Kalai is all about hitting the hidden pressure points in one's body at the right time, it's quite dangerous to practise though. The severity of this form can even cause death." You lick the back of your spoon while explaining casually.

All his features go on a pause as his brain stutters for a moment and slowly wraps itself around the things you said now.

"And how did you know this kid was getting kidnapped?" He comes up with another question, earning a soft sigh from you.

"She signalled using hand gestures that she is being dragged without her consent, I noticed it and observed that guy's behaviour. Bro was sus, so I attacked."

"The signal is performed by holding your hand up with your thumb tucked into your palm, then folding your fingers down, symbolically trapping your thumb in your fingers. It was intentionally designed as a single continuous hand movement, rather than a sign held in one position, that could be made easily visible..'
Do they have separate hand gestures for these things? Man, I've been living legit under a rock it seems!" He reads out from Wikipedia and feebly murmurs to himself.

Three of you continue to eat your ice creams in silence for a while until the little kid starts to scratch her face quite roughly.

"Is there anything on your face?" Joe examines her face gently.

"No uncle, but sometimes I weirdly feel like bugs swarming over my face even though there is nothing," She says while dusting off her clean face.

"Those might be the ghosts of the bugs you've killed before." He says while thrusting a scoop of ice cream into his mouth.

You take her in your embrace as tears start to well up in her cute Bambi eyes, and try to console her, "look what you did, you scared her dumb stupid!" You yell at him.

"She scared me by calling me uncle, eye for an eye!" He replies as usual with a stone carved poker face.

You can't help but stifle a smile.

"What would've you done if that guy overpowered you and stabbed you for real with his knife?" He asks you abruptly as you continue to feed her the ice cream.

"I would've died without guilt that I didn't do anything to stop a kidnapper." You rise from your seat and proceed to collect some tissues to wipe off the ice cream spilt in her shirt, his vague gaze follows you.

"Is that aunty an angel?" That little girl asks adorably as she misreads your name in Korean alphabets while inspecting the identity card that you left over the table.

"She is definitely an aunty.." 

He retracts his gaze from the counter you're standing across and shift towards her endearing face,

"and might be an angel too!" His lips faintly curve in a feeble smile.