INNOCENCE LOST (Rewriting)

8 :MANIPULATION:

I treaded along the edge of the field. A rocky path separated the greens from the stones. People jogged along the perimeter, sneakers on their legs, track pants and sweatshirts. A group of elderly ladies started a brisk walk-more the momentum, more the gossip. They huffed and puffed after ten minutes, took a break for twenty. One drank an energy drink, shared it with two others. Couples secluded some corner benches. Hands entwined, they whispered and giggled, like when we were teenagers and discovering the laws of nature. The time when each bump on a person's body would be a world by itself. I checked my watch-6.15, it read. A middle-aged gentleman practised pranayama, hummed like a bee opening his eyes each time a young girl ran past, breasts bouncing. The sun had come out mightier than yesterday, fifteen or twenty more minutes and its rays would engulf the field making any activity tiresome. I sat on a sequestered patch of green, denying the opportunity of a budding romance. A boy and a girl loitered around eying the same, mumbled and went away with a dejected look. Sometimes taunting is fun.

I took out my pen and diary, words transformed into sentences, danced on solitary pages. They mirrored my smile as I recollected events of yester weak. Siddhartha's confession stormed my understanding of him-a catastrophe that unleashed havoc. It was like the waves during a tsunami that floods life away, yet a single blade of grass claims its existence-creation within chaos. I pondered on the days that followed. How he waited at the gate before leaving. I had no idea why he did what he did until it became a natural progression. I would pack his tiffin and walk him till the parkway, he at the front and me behind. We wouldn't talk, no goodbyes or a lone wave. He would just turn around, a single glance and then drive away.

Days back I took him to the front yard, at the corner where I shared stories each morning, where I giggled like a young school girl from the past. This plot which lay naked months before exploded with life. Two zinnia's-one yellow and another red, smiled bright. They cried in loneliness, only had themselves, so I brought companions-unnamed, unidentified ones, those by the roadside who needed shelter. I observed how he stood still, brooding, as if whispering dark secrets from yesteryears.

"What are you looking at?" I couldn't help ask.

He didn't answer, squatted and caressed the petals. "Baba", he only said.

All these months we had but one presence-silence, rather an emptiness wherein profound tenebrosity, no hope or love existed. Until..until..the cat came out of the bag. I would be lying if I said we communicated better, understood each other but, unlike previous times, we made terms with this silence. It had an aspect of peace, a tinge of it, a very tiny bit of mutual understanding where we needn't just share the bed and body but also the space within.

Yet, unanswered questions piled up, one on top of the other. And as time passed, the need to know became more and more severe.

Was Mister Kaur the only reason behind Siddhartha's strained relationship with his mother? What did the Chatterjee's hide? And above all, who killed my father-in-law?

I headed home where chores awaited, the clock fast approached seven. Mamoni's mornings started with hysteria, she would scream and see blind till I stepped inside. No matter the number of times she rationalised her concern, it left a bitter aftertaste. Her odd intrusiveness spiked my fury. "I was a disgrace, never living up to her expectations. Until.." I remembered Siddhartha say. Which mother could do that to her child-I wondered.

"Don't you know I worry a lot?" she rushed into the porch, hands on her chest-an exaggeration. In reality, she feared the truth.

"Why is that?" I asked.

"You have never been to the city! You hardly know its ways, there is danger out there!"

"Sometimes the danger is more inside than outside, Mamoni." And you're well aware of it.