Random Ramblings

Palmira Haswell met Anne Bellenger at the dirty coffee place next to the barber’s shop with the cheap neon sign. Palmira Haswell was wearing a black skirt with a navy blue blouse and her hair was done in a neat pony tail. She looked about twenty, although her real age was probably over twenty-eight. Anne Bellenger was a redhead with very attractive features. Her rather huge breasts made her face look like a small heart shaped pendant with a pout. She worked as a model and her ad photos were frequently splashed between the classifieds in the popular Russian Newspaper in Warsaw. She had apparently earned a great deal of money on her last modeling trip to United States and returned back rich, and pregnant. The story went like this - She had a husband in California that she did not want to live with anymore, mainly because she did not want to live in the US anymore. She frequently traveled between Los Angeles, Paris, London and Warsaw (her hometown) on account of her various modeling a...

I would never know why that night, after I accidentally found Anya’s passports, I returned to her bedroom and slept by her side the rest of the night. Man’s behavior defies reason at times. Perhaps I did not want to wake her up and argue in the middle of the night. Perhaps I was scared she might reveal something that I wasn’t prepared for. Perhaps I was just too tired. When I woke up, Anya was sitting by the bed, her wavy golden hair falling over the white sheet like a dreamy waterfall. The high window let in the morning light through the drapes, enough for the stark room to absorb some warmth and color. It took me a few seconds to recollect what had happened the night before as I tried to simultaneously decipher Anya’s focused look, directed at me. A gentle rustle with a book being pushed towards me resulted in me getting up and sitting up very straight on the bed; in a second I was prepared by instincts to be on my safeguard. She did not move a bit, stuck to her posture as i...

Anya, the Artemis Pungent smell of acetone mixed with the air readily as the spilled nail polish remover soaked the white linen bed sheet. The room was dressed in white. Stern, as snow that never melts. Regal, as pearls born from deep sea secrets. Silent, as sheets draping the dead. The carpet on the floor was white and plush, exuding an aura of luxury not at ease with the otherwise austere room. A large frame hung on one of the walls displaying a black and white photo of colorful flowers. "Shit" exclaimed Anya, before realizing that acetone evaporates quickly. She decided to drop the sheets at the cleaners tomorrow. She glanced at the spilled nail polish one more time, deeply annoyed that her clean white bedroom dressed like a bride, was no longer crispy clean. The room next to the bedroom was the study, which actually could be called the dark room. Heavy drapes the color of blue almost as dark as black keep sunlight away through the day. The walls adorned a few ...

I n the realm of emotions, fear has a special position. Lelin dadu’s voice triggered in Neera that same fear; except that it was still covered in suspicion. Before Neera could answer Lelin dadu she was thinking many questions. Why would he want to see her so early (when it was still dark outside) in the morning? Why did his voice sound different? He was probably awake for a while waiting for the alarm to strike. What made him so impatient? Those questions would be answered in a few minutes. Neera opened the door to the stiff figure of dadu, standing slightly crooked, his eyes almost completely hidden inside the circles of wrinkles. “My child” he started. His voice sounded like the dry susurrus of unhealthy branches. But he could speak no more and stopped. Instead he drew a long breath. His eyes were trying to avoid Neera’s. “Dadu, is something wrong? Why don’t you come in and sit?” Neera asked sensing something was wrong. He did not enter through the door. He kept standin...

I n the evening Neera tried calling Jeff twice and each time got disconnected. No lines open perhaps. The village got crappy network but she was glad that there was any. The eager anticipation of hearing Jeff’s voice was replaced by the nervous resentment of not getting him over the phone when she wanted to. By this time Jeff would be usually up and ready for his daily commute to work, unless he had been staying up most of the night. Jealousy and suspicion are time-tested aides of bad relationships, more so when distance separates minds and insecurity misconstrues emotions. “This is the last time” said Neera as she dialed the number again. Perhaps she thought she will be third time lucky. “Hey Nee”, Jeff’s voice on the other side said. “I’ve been dying to talk to you!”. Neera could hardly control herself. “I wanted to tell you about...” her sentence was cut short by Jeff. “Neeeee ! Its real early here and I’m trying to get some sleep. Got back home real late last night...

It surprised me to see how quickly Neera adjusted to the village living. Old memories, like old habits, die hard. They reside somewhere within us, forsaken like childhood toys, forgotten like best friends from kindergarten, forbidden like innocent mistakes made during adolescence. In our attempt to evolve living the same life, refreshed several times, we bury the old under the new; yet, scrape the top just a little and they spill out, like fresh blood under a scarcely healed wound. Today is only the second day of her stay and Neera is already trotting the village path in her Abercrombie attire and Nike shoes. The village school that she remembered from her last visit had transformed completely, from a two-room mud-house into an eight-room brick-and-mortar box-house, complete with real wooden furniture. Right behind the school there used to be the only grocery store of the village, now replaced by a row of tidy shops, twelve in all. Neera saw one of the shopkeepers holding a cell...

Neera is in no way related to Lelin dadu by blood. She happens to be the eldest daughter of late Banshidhar, Lelin dadu’s best friend from childhood. Banshi was a few years younger to Lelin and even as a kid had dreams of making it big in life. That is why he moved to Kolkata after finishing high school, and started his own small business. He married late and all his children were brought up in modern ways, unaccustomed to village life and people. Since Banshidhar passed away ten years ago, Neera hadn’t since returned to the village, and had almost no recollection of Lelin dadu. Neera’s New York is as different from the village of two-lakes, as is Brooklyn Bridge from the makeshift bamboo lake-crossing that threatens to snap if more than two persons or one cow walks over it at a time. Unlike two-lakes, New York has running water and wide roads bereft of potholes. The many heroes of the city, the Lelin dadus , vein through city’s gushing life-forces, but their songs of glory are ov...

It has been twenty years since you left. Twenty years that I have not seen you. Honest to God, I don’t completely remember your face now. Only that smile, those hazel eyes, and your green striped shirt that later, someone stole from your clothesline on a summer afternoon. That summer remember, we stole mangoes from whichever garden we could, and attempted to cook chutney. And the aftermath – burnt coils of the electric heater and a blackened saucepan. I wonder why even after all these years, a gentle sprinkle of your memories, unleashes a strong flow of emotions that occupy those corners of my mind that normally don’t exist in my everyday life. I don’t like it. I don’t like that you come so close to me but only in a dream. I can neither touch you nor make you go away. You tease me like a freshly popped champagne bottle spilling out froth. That froth that burns my fingertips, but never wets them enough. And slowly, precipitates away into nothing. You are not “nothing” in my life. Y...

Today is Special. That was the first thought that struck him as he lay in his bed, woken up by the 5:00 am arati . Like every morning, the chants of the medieval mantras , the beating of the khols and the tinkling of the manjiraas , had together spun a magical weave into his dreams, even before he himself got out of them and embraced the risen world. The distance between the temple where the morning arati was going on, and his house was about one average-sized pond long, which, for you educated lot means about 50 metres or so. Every morning, he wakes up and slowly walks to the hand-pump in his front-yard, brushes his teeth and gargles loudly, frightening the sparrows gathered around the water source. And then on most days, he solemnly looks around, not particularly at anything. By the time the temple crowd disperses after the arati session, he wanders into the vegetable garden. He checks for new coconuts on the palm tree, young lady’s-fingers hanging upside-down on the rough-ste...

June 21st 2007 5:40pm Savannah, GA Shyla’s little ranch home was tucked away behind the row of weeping willows. More dreary looking houses and an abandoned truck rusting by the street, made the scenery look even sadder. It was hard to imagine that inside one of those old withdrawn houses, a newborn was trying to see the world with twinkle eyes in all amazement. Eric had parked on the street and was now walking towards the little ranch home. He had not noticed the adjoining houses, nor that the driveway ended into a worm-infested narrow mud pathway leading towards the house. He could see nothing, as his insides couldn ’t bear another iota of sensory impulse. Or perhaps, he, standing at this moment, still and alone, on grounds completely alien, was shielded from everything outside of his own chosen senses. He felt strangely calm, as if he had just come walking out alive from the dead. As he stood in front of the large wooden door now, loud heartbeats thumped against his ringing hea...

Jan 1st, 2007 -11:00am -Savannah, GA Rumble- rumble ….. Sshhh… Again, rumble - rumble. Shyla’s heart skipped two beats! Was that her baby moving? This was the first time that the baby had moved. Shyla felt her tummy with her hands. Her face was still; her hands glued to the small belly. Something powerful went between her fingers. The movement of life, felt intensely alien at first; but the second shudder turned her fears into an awakening understood only by those who have experienced it. A little bump appeared at one end and then tumbled across to the other side of her belly. “Ma!” cried Shyla. Her mother came running into the room from the kitchen where she had been preparing lunch. “Ma, it’s the baby moving”. The two women sat close to each other, their faces flushing with excitement. For half an hour they followed every little movement, with eager eyes, un-relinquished enthusiasm and squeals of laughter. ****** Four months ago, Liz had welcomed her daughter ...

-June 21st, 2007 -2:00pm -Somewhere between Atlanta and Savannah, GA Eric Cohen stopped the car and let his head out through the window. Not a single car could be seen within a mile’s radius. The Sun’s brutal rays fell sharply over his balding head. He was blinded for the split second before he puked, for the third time. Puking felt good momentarily. But then Eric was too high to enjoy the release fully. His head was like a dead washing machine not even trying to start itself. He sat back straight on his seat wiping his mouth with Kleenex. As he put his hands on the wheel again, the churn in his stomach returned. Nothing had prepared him for this. Nothing. Not even the strongest joint he had ever fixed in his life. Three minutes passed. Three very long minutes. Eric wanted to start the engine. He really did. And intermittently between the clouded nirvanas, he thought that he actually could . He had been feeling this way for weeks now. And especially when he was high on m...