Part I

While climbing the stairs to the terrace she thought of something interesting. An expanse of broken housetops would greet her with guarded warmth. And she would wait there. She could have taken a book, or a magazine or something, had she known how to read. But sounds made much more sense. Loud sounds when they inhabited the terrain, a part of her head died. She couldn’t understand it, why it felt numb. But she was witnessing something original. And that was more important than everything else. Original could have been dull. Like revolution was prosaic, and so was poetry. But they all spoke of beautiful white flowers. She understood a few small things; like strong men and women could try hard and yet lose. She stood on her terrace.

Gunfire erupted somewhere nearby. An old man was crawling on the ground. He wouldn’t have approved of her presence. She looked at him lying dead in the distance. Her father would have asked her to go inside. But that only happened in the movies nowadays. She deserved her share of blood, if only to see. So she waited for people to die, so she could see what really happened. How did they die? What happened right after? What did the killer do right after? Her curiosity gone suddenly, a wave of revulsion and grief broke itself against the walls of that house. She couldn’t cry properly. The loud sounds again started somewhere and she felt numb.

She would have liked to look inside her mind. She would have liked to bury herself deep inside her mind and drown out those sounds and forget all that blood. But then in some time she would feel lonely and thirsty. And she would come out again curious. Everyone she had loved had loved her back. They just went away somewhere and left her in that old broken house to wait. Blood stained the streets and walls of that city and she waited for it to dry. Her beautiful face had learnt lines and wrinkles. And she had crossed the stage of counting details. She knew there was a long journey ahead. Slowly her mind would come apart and she would sleep.

A little more thought

A very old man sat in the armchair staring at the evening. He was so old he could have died and yet not known. I went and sat besides him on a stool. And I suddenly felt like telling him everything. For once in my life I felt like pouring my heart out and crying. His face wrinkled and impassive he just looked at me. After you have lived every bit of of your life and are waiting to cease you don't need words. Words, the thoughts behind them, they seem like far-away leisures. I had tried so hard for so long to understand. He seemed distant. Some men experience a lot. Some experience little but that little has a far greater impact. You feel more from little, you learn more. I closed my eyes, they felt heavy. It would rain that night and he would shiver. His house was older than him. Did I ever lie to myself? No, I never did that. But maybe I couldn't see the truth for a long time. It took me time and reflection, and suddenly one day god knows what the reason, I saw a little. The old man was looking at me smiling slightly.

"I get tired of waiting." He spoke in a voice I seemed to have heard long back. "Those women in the village, they will start singing." I had heard the women sing late in the evening. I carried my bitterness around, they were singing now. For some more time I waited with him. Then I left. One day when I am very old, I will end up like that, desolate.