…and then there was Ansh.
Just when you think that things cannot get any worse, life, like a twisted Santa Claus, pops out of the chimney and flings some new horror at you. It’s almost like a challenge. You think that’s bad? Take this, loser!
Loser. A wonderfully pessimistic song by the post-grunge rock band -3 Doors Down. And also a song that fully reflected Anshuman’s state of being that pleasant evening.
You’re getting closer…to pushing me off of life’s little edge…
Anshuman, or Ansh as he was called by friends and family, turned up the volume of his MP3 player. He wanted to fill his head with the loud strummings of the lead guitarist…
...cause I’m a loser…sooner or later you know I’ll be dead…
And yet he could not block the voices in his head.
“Mom: You flunked the exam? How? You had bunked the exam? (faints)”
“Dad: You hit a pedestrian while driving the car? Was he hurt? What’s this, a hospital bill? May I see your driver’s license (sound of a driver’s license being torn to pieces)”
“Divya: Oh, actually, Vinay proposed to me last night...and I cant wait forever…(retreating footsteps)”
“Vinay: Loser!!! (maniacal laughter)”
You’re getting closer…you’re holding the rope and I’m taking the fall…cause I’m a loser…
The song ended like all rock songs do – abruptly. Ansh shifted in his seat and looked around in the large A/C Volvo bus. Over forty-five seats and nearly half occupied by the massive family members of his massive family. Most were fast asleep though the kids appeared to be knocked out from excessive screaming and wailing. Finally, there was some peace in the bus. He turned back to the window and decided that all in all it had been a pretty bad week. He had flunked an exam, lost his driver’s license, got dumped by his girlfriend and had somehow managed to sprain his right foot that morning before leaving for this family vacation. Family vacation. That usually meant his family rushing off to some place or the other, with oldies falling ill, children vomiting in the bus, cousins gossiping, uncles boozing, aunties shopping and Ansh sitting forlornly in some convenient corner and wondering if normal people exist only in fiction.
Presently, the lights were switched on inside the bus. They were entering the ghats. Ansh groaned. It was time for his family to lose their heavy afternoon lunch. He gingerly touched his swollen right foot and grimaced. But currently that was the least of his worries.
He would not admit it to anyone but he missed Divya like hell. After their disastrous phone conversation the previous night, he had desperately tried to get in touch with her. He consoled himself by dreaming up plausible excuses for her inability to return his calls but now his patience was running thin. How had things ever reached to such a state that she couldn’t find the time to even reply to a message? And Vinay? After everything that had happened between them, she chose Vinay?
Ansh stared at his battered cell phone and willed it to beep. His only consolation was that for the past half hour he had almost no network connectivity. Maybe her message had arrived and was just waiting to leap into his phone, maybe she would call him up and say April fool or whatever-month-it-was fool, maybe Vinay was a cousin brother who loved to play practical jokes on his sister’s boyfriends or maybe he, Ansh, was a complete and absolute asshole. The general consensus was for the last option.
A humorless smile appeared on his lips. He noticed that most of his family was up and decided to close his eyes and at least pretend to be asleep.
He woke up with a jerk and realized that they had stopped moving.
“Come young man,” said a particularly enthusiastic Uncle ,”the fun is about to begin.”
Fun? Ansh laughed loudly…sure, fun. The uncle mistook his laughter to be an effect of his own infectious joy and moved ahead to further spread his charm. Ansh looked out the window into the gloomy darkness beyond and wondered if his family was actually stupid enough to want to vacation in the middle of nowhere. He could faintly make out the shapes of knobbly trees and foliage when a fine spray of rain began pouring down the window obscuring his vision even further. Rain. What difference did it make? He painfully hobbled out of the bus and was promptly saddled with two heavy suitcases by an industrious aunt and was instructed to take it to their rooms. Rooms? He then noticed some of his cousins walking along a path hidden in the overgrown foliage. There was no point in explaining his swollen foot to anyone. Dragging the two suitcases behind him, he moved down the path that would hopefully lead to a hotel of some kind and not a settlement of cannibals.
It was nearly midnight. Ansh stared at his phone. Limited Network, Emergency Calls Only. This was a bloody emergency! Divya, the queen of his nocturnal fantasies had now become the bane of his existence. And yet he longed to hear those cute baby lips spell out his name, that husky voice cooing in his ears, those expressive eyes looking at him-within him…his romantic musings were interrupted by a particularly pungent belch from an Uncle sleeping somewhere in the dark room. This was more than Ansh could bear. Sprained ankle or no sprained ankle, he put on a sweater and left the room in search of some mental peace, solitude and better network coverage.
One of the aunties had mentioned a pond nearby. Hopefully, it would be something more than a marshy pool with dead fishes floating on the surface. The thin sweater provided Ansh inadequate protection from the bitingly cold night air. He walked on towards the outer perimeter of the hotel hoping he would see the pond before actually falling into it. The night air was suffused with certain strong emotional currents, some veiled motives, some unchained desires. All of this was lost on Ansh who was still busy fiddling with his phone. He looked up and realized that he had reached onto a cliff of some sort. And beyond the cliff…was a pond. The sight of the still waters, rippling now and then as a wayward current of air passed over the surface, completed a hidden patter deep in Ansh’s emotional consciousness. His cell phone beeped. Divya. Two words. Good bye.
Ansh looked at the cell phone. It was a gift from Divya. He opened the back of the cell and took out the ‘sim’ card which he carefully placed in his pocket. And then in one fluid motion with a joy that was of both emotional and physical release, he swung his hand and flung the cell into the lake.
He failed to hear a splash. Instead he heard a sharp scream…
Oops?
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