Lord's Ordinary Children

By Gitasri Pani

An unconventional meeting between four youths and an elderly couple leads them to a fabulous bonding through a story-house. They feel it as a life-changing and life-enhancing experience.

You may have heard it before, but she will tell you again that you could not speak. You are missing a thing which is not too fundamental to maintain your life, but you cannot live without. Forgetfulness stalks, and the inertia-bug strikes, whether at work, home or anywhere in between in the fast-changing world of ours.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Gitasri Pani is a post-graduate in Political Science, a research scholar from Delhi University. She worked as a researcher, consultant and motivational trainer, having a passion for observing the characters and feeling their souls in and around her.

• Language: English
• Publisher: REVEREND CROWN PUBLICATIONS PVT LTD
• Release date: Apr 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9788194380030

Gitasri Pani

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Gitasri Pani is a post-graduate in Political Science, a research scholar from Delhi University. She worked as a researcher, consultant and motivational trainer, having a passion for observing the characters and feeling their souls in and around her.

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Lord’s

Ordinary

Children

GITASRI PANI

To all beautiful minds, to share and care us in this fast-changing world of ours...

First Published by Reverend Crown Publications in 2020

Copyright Gitasri Pani © 2018

Gitasri Pani asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

ISBN:

E-Book: 978-81-943800-3-0

PaperBack: 978-81-943800-4-7

Hard Bound: 978-81-943800-5-4

FICTION/LITERATURE

No part of this book may be used, reproduced, transmitted, lent or sold in any manner without written permission from the publisher, except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles, reviews, video or blog and social media promotions.

www.reverendcrown.com

Lord’s

Ordinary

Children

GITASRI PANI

Their

Previous Night

In her earliest memories… community was serene; solitary was noise. A few images from the past winked at Priti, she hoped they wink at her again. But in choking desolation, she watched them leave. She sat on a chair, deeply sinking into her thoughts, then read the letter from Siddhi. Guests from Manhattan will reach anytime. Couples, in shared

accommodation with Siddhi, teammates from the same

publishing company, most likely would stay a day or two if they sense a pleasant touch.

I don’t mean they would find there something lofty or life-changing. It should be something… still, Siddhi’s desire, but for her mama it was baffling. Inside a tiny house, to their humble living, how can Priti do it? With the steady diversity of exotic flavours of their land in a culturally homogenised world, the task became challenging. Siddhi’s weary face often hung before her mama’s eyes.

The couples arrived. They were fresh flesh, but the dry tone and cold eyes. They found there a dull-looking house, nothing stimulating in the surrounding. Priti understood that they felt it too uncomfortable to spend there at night. Leave in the morning, surely.

In the living room, Samarth slept on a settee, on the floor on a straw mat lay Priti. Simron and Arthur shared a room and in another, Zafar and Rani. In the intervals, sighs and the footfalls were the only sounds that she heard on the verandah. Priti observed them drinking and smoking, sitting wordlessly, gazing at the sky. Smile-dry? Or soul-dry life? Priti couldn’t think. Her feet drew closer there. She expressed sorry for putting them into inconveniences in their modest living. In the inky black of the night, she couldn’t grasp the emotion on their face. It was her age, so eyes were prone to play the culprit. But under the starry sky, sleepy crescent moonlight, Priti heard their faintly audible sigh. She included, But we are immensely happy for rewarding us for a vibrant life, a complete family, even a night. But it’s our utter selfishness, we know it.

She couldn’t break the ice.

She knows people with storytelling skills are invariably

attractive and high in need of social functions. But what should be the theme? Knowing India from her lips will sink their interest. Spouting off facts and figures would be too boring. They would think it a history book or teaching ethics or behavioural science in a university. Totally a hopeless one, that would be failing.

Priti had not accepted defeat in her life. That way, she is. She hoped to catch their notice not by fables but by the events and experiences that make up an individual life, the conscious part of a community or nation or humankind. To establish a bonding from the mundane to extraordinary. Besides,

everybody has their little quirks; she can manipulate a bit to win.

She is the Lord’s Posh Child, a feeling nesting richly in her head, sparsely filled into Lord’s Ordinary Child. The year, two thousand… something… Month day date, hard to find. Because it was heard and talked much, Achhe Din… Good days are awaiting, captivating to any and every in her country at that time, that something was fourteen. Or such a piece of speech was a nostalgic memento in her head and heart, so a lasting memory.

The intro didn’t rivet their mind, but she strived.

That evening, spring was reigning everywhere in the city. Their car crossed the same street. A small lorry, packed with their old household articles, followed it. The wheels stopped before a house. They entered with their belongings. Inside looked less a house, more an insectarium: spiders, beetles, cockroaches, ants, millipedes, centipedes, grasshoppers, live and corpse. Outside, the narrow-lanes cut by open drain channels, blanketed by the mosquitoes. Then the silent road, no shop, no temple. The night became the worst for long hours of power-cut. The surrounding looked a ghost.

To say it city would be a misnomer, her breath turned heavy.

Samarth put into her hand the car key. Priti knew then it would do the scooter, mostly. Or only. Her movement rare, his to the limit, to the days of his job outdoors, or buy a necessity. He felt her doleful face, slow limbs. Grant me three to four years, this house will make your own, he portrayed a dream, citing a reason. Recession severed the job of the landlord’s son, thus burdened by the bank loan. He went on pushing Samarth to buy that house, paying some amount, the rest on three to four instalments, ready to adjust from the rent. Samarth told, assuring, I would work now harder to arrange the sum. Take it from today, the process is on. Again, what more? If she looked to him like a shadow!

In the midnight, awoke her, Sonu or Siddhi’s call.

Mom, where is my tie, socks, water-bottle?

Those were the things… years before. Priti turned on the bulb, stood in front of the mirror, saw her pigmented cheeks, the lines and wrinkles, dark circles around eyes. She had lost whatever glow was in her face. The receding hairlines, growing grey patches, had gone visibly demonstrative. Age had done on her much. Suddenly!

The dawn came too much late for her, owing to the irregular body clock. Or she failed to detect longer? He tried to wake her up by soft whispers, gentler touch. Served a teacup and then followed their chitchat for an hour. That was their old uniform habit of years, a glittering gold. Anybody of them woke up earlier, competed to extend such a tender touch. She often became the winner! Because to offer her the credit, he was lying on the bed, masking the pillow on the face. However, for days she had been a regular defaulter! Shocked her.

When he went outdoor for a job, she stayed the same loner. Some rare pictures of yesteryears fell into her thought, or she hung herself there. She is there. She is theirs! Bapa’s teachings. Bou’s kitchen. Pratyasa querying… How much time? Bidu’s falling eyelids. Bou’s scream. Priti’s stealthy feet. She put a pea-nut into Bidu’s mouth-hole. Shut up eyelids but munched his lazy teeth? She poured a few granules of sugar into it. Amazing. A smile on lips, then wide-open eyes! She rolled a rubber ball towards him. Pratyasa joined in. Their plates are ready! Bou’s Puri, Chhena Tarkari. Yummy. Grandma’s

Khiri! Her speciality. No cashew, no Kismish. Annapurna leaf! Diffusion-led surrounding. Perfumed air filled the nostrils. Santu and Sumi, Sana Bapa’s children, her cousins. Their daily fighting to sleep near granny. Sumi’s ghost stories. Scary. Santu would walk blind-eye. Ghost can’t find! A grainy picture, black and white. A girl in her teen, with midget granny, engrossed in their world of books still…

Priti’s grandma, grandma’s Priti! Sizzled in her cells an incredible feeling, the paradise scent refilled.

Home: sweet sweet.

Things existed once, to her backward years, then over, existed if a bit at all, would visit never. That fragrance got lost. Their Good Green Earth, a colourful picture book, became dull drab with loosely stitched papers, missing some chapters, or deletion of lines and words, forever memorable.

Some days she woke up from the sleep, felt dawn had just peered through the morning cloud. The city with the supreme engrosses, in deep-driven meditation, trying to come out of the cosmic clock. The life in the street and houses were quiet and still, except for the occasional stamping feet of the joggers and walkers, the last whistling of the guard on the street, his brisk walking, followed by the howling of some street dogs. The early hour devotees’ sluggish voice blaring out from the distant temple, faintly reaching the ear-hole. Nights pranked on her. Those were the events of the part of the city of much health, which she lived years, but still, those bustling sounds murmured closer to ear.

The Temple City, Bhubaneswar.

She had heard from Bapa and elderly adults. The city was in deep slumber. Then woke up how? Ghulam Nagari was forest green. A few Govt buildings housed to a site. The administration lured, persuaded, appealed, pressurised, and even allotted a plot of land to their reluctant employees! Because the city was waiting to grow up to a shape and size. The property was minimal in price, but few willed. Ghulams didn’t feel city-life alluring. Only a few sparser rural pockets and the hub of beasts? The elephant in the day and the tiger in the night!

No community, no life. That they lived, loved living.

Some years she had seen the city growing up. To the gentle massage of time, it grew more prominent, with the influx of populations, expansion of the concrete jungles, the gigantic mansions, housing complexes, the state’s largest slum. The city experienced sunny days more with the hubs of education, by the proliferating growth of technical education. The city got the facelift from all angles. It got a more sophisticated look, grew smarter.

Smart city status!

Her story rolled on it for about thirty years, including a few years to say its twin, but a much more elderly sibling,

Cuttack. There, her life got wired to many struggles. She experienced in it a little sweet and more bitter. Even bitter is better!

Their narrowed eyes at her showed that they felt her words or behaviour going circuitous.

The City is not bashful; the humans dwelling there lively in a temper. Among them, hers! Own and known both. Still, her life there, a stranger’s! Absurd, but real. And there be her fall! She would not seek from it a liberation at all. It was enough to fall in its love, when they grew together, sharing their joys or sorrows. The longer, the fonder, the old love, so gold!

Her explanation puzzled them, or they took it as a scrawly sketch of her but accepted with a certain unease. She can read it on their face, and her speech didn’t experience a pause or halt.

She often savoured from her memory bowl, to feel her full, verified her grey, sourcing out from the same old record. What Bapa had told, the teachers in the school taught, the books wrote, the Netas and Ministers talked. She stood glued to the bookshelves, their only treasure, lasting companions. From childhood to their end of the student career, again few additions dated old. She unfurled a few pages, checked, read and re-read the lines which she had underlined. A few words, she had noted to its side. The old rotten pages, bearing the same dull jacket, bore its testimony.

How life hums in the green field, under the smokescreen of the factory. In the office or on the busier street of the city. Their return goes waited impatiently in the day end, a fortnight or after months, by their friends, relations and the family, to give or get a company. To feel their home a mountain of peace. There be scarcity; there be noise, but dawn would bustle when the same smile returns! When community pervades all aspects of their life, solitary would have no place in it. She had lived such an experience, felt propertied.

However, she can hear the lives bustling on the street and see on the TV, feel one amongst the multitudes she is. But solitary! Terrifying. Go killed. Slowly, but she tried hard to hide the loss- feelings in her eyes. Or she started learning to live with it? No, she didn’t accept her a defeat, she wouldn’t also accept it. That way, she is.

Priti could read some promising notes in the listener’s breaths and face muscle.

She mentioned how she lived, dissolving her emotion to some moments of the day or to a specified period. In Samarth’s presence, her long-time friend, her only human-companion, she gathered her cells to carry on their life with the same glow. But lone moments picked on her. She turned slower. Probably it was for their new location that had not woken up. The road slept hours, the lane hardly came up. Anybody was a stranger. Still, she didn’t want to give life a dull appearance, tried to live by plucking some beauty from the surrounding spot. Hooked to the window, to see and hear the immense footfalls.

Dawn-simulators. A stimulus to her. The old men in old clothes, or the old in look youths, age had done them faster, the herds of labour, peered their feet on that dusty road. After an hour, the gentle bell of cycles, occasionally the shrill pitch of a two-wheeler, she felt it musical to the ear.

Same pictures, in a similar hour, a large and boisterous crowd, the mixed group of cow, goat, pig and buffaloes. Over their head, a hat of dust. Dusk and dust complementing each other in colour. She came down to go silhouetted there, watched till they disappeared. Sun-down and the village road. A fond

memory, old and gold. To a child’s mind, so was impressionable more.

Some intense moments regularly featured.

Gentler sound of footnotes. Human tongues. The man and the woman of a house, farther from hers appeared on the uneven road, dragging their scooter. To drop their child to where stood the school bus. A tedious job. Everyday affairs. Far from the school, from the shops, from the cinema hall, transport is never accessible.

I live here the life of a caged animal, the woman’s querulous tone would go on hitting his ear, but the man, the same deaf and dumb. The boy walking a few steps behind them looked at Priti, grinned, went on poking the gravels on his toe.

Two sparrows nested in a wall-hole chirped the song. For her! Wonderful. Priti fed them rice, peas or breadcrumbs. They bathed in the dust; spray painted her feet fluttering feathers. Splashed on her sari border water from the small puddles. Enjoyable. More because their kin lived as Sonu and Siddhi’s playmates, years before. Then disappeared, as the super cyclone in Orissa took on them a heavy toll. In front of the house, on a Neem tree, two mourning doves took away the silence of the spot. She fed them grains, watched them for hours. Two squirrels from the same tree in intervals became the regular visitors, took from her hand the peanuts. From a distant mango tree, cuckoo spilt the melodious song.

Except for some minimal chore, the rest of the hours became hers. To ruminate the memory, her feeder.

Three years or slightly more time passed. Acche Din had

arrived. People watched or talked about it with mixed

feelings. Then it faded out from the mass mind when it didn’t remain much talked into a topic. Either that trait, Forgetfulness, had clamoured on their mind, or that Inertia-Bug in their cells had gone active. Being Lord’s Ordinary Child, she couldn’t save that much energy or hardly could afford to think on some such things. Demonetisation tumbled down from its belly. Critics talked that was its early child or a premature baby, that often hammered from the mouth of the Opposition Leaderships. Sometimes, she watched on the TV, the reactions of the News Agencies, or of the public. It made her go some days actively forcing on her or pulling into activity. Like many, that kept them busy. Overly.

The days cannot be the same, nor have similar events. Such events or its experiences, Priti lived years, may not appear a day again. But it would go too challenging to find a breath if it turns upside down in a moment. That moment becomes so powerful, the outcomes of the whole life affect, as the life itself loses the meaning, or any possibility, to resurrect.

I may never see my old home again, Priti let out a sigh of despair. Her skin got swept by the listener’s long deep audible breath. Along with the wind began sighing through the trees for the days gone by. She said, "But I lived, loved living

everything. Breathing differently, added, It’s a unique feeling. And I don’t want to reveal."

Curiosity picked them up instantly.

Priti included, Because the spring is still reigning in the city. In the country. Will not leave!

The guests sat by her side till the sky woke up with a dawning smile! Priti served them Tulsi tea. After a lengthy and tiring journey, also a sleep-deprived night, they fell asleep. Then, from the lazy sun to the hazy evening light or the creepy-crawly moon vanishing from the sky left bedecked with the starry winks, Siddhi’s mama papa’s story-house turned into an elegant and engaging week! Amazing and amusing. The narrator and the listener landed on to a surprise ending!

Day 1

The guests woke up before evening and watched their finished plates. Breakfast and lunch-meal, everything native!

Arthur said, green juice, refreshing drink.

Simron said, green-chutney, cool and healing.

Zafar said, sweetened Curd-rice, filling life.

Rani murmured low, It’s life-filling. Childhood memory. Granny’s handmade dish.

They sat on the verandah on a grass mat, Priti joined them quietly. The evening was quiet. The guests were passive. She began with a subtle hint to the memory of her childhood life. To find some manifestations in their thought, emotion and feeling.

***

Priti tumbled upon the earth, luckier! Wars were not on the door. Raj had gone, Swaraj had come. Good days have arrived, formed part of Gokul Sir’s story. Having a rich history, fabulous geography, then a convenient polity, to live the comfort of a democracy.

Good days are waiting. It often featured in Bapa’s speech. Our land may not have enough opportunity, but an opportune time to live with. Even if a humble background can raise her above it. She did not know of her history that Bapa spoke or meant. An elite ancestry, to her credit. Zamindar family, but gone with the wind. Her class, middle, emanated from it. That class, she had neither seen nor felt, never lived. Heard often what they talked, Lord’s Child! But she had felt its sign. To the days, Bapa touched Gaan Mati.

Feet followed him immensely, and anybody’s hands woke up to respect him. From them, veti (gift). Amba Tokei, Panas, Kadali Kandhi. Chhena, Dahi Handi. He is there, Sinu Saant, not an ordinary being. Srinivas Tripathy is still their Lord, after the abolition of the Zamindari. Right. By look even, he differed from any. Looked a king! Large built frame, white, like the office building. As tall to touch the temple tips! And she is Pratigyan Tripathy. The Lord’s Child! Nicknamed Priti. Easy to speak.

Then raising herself above it? She was too little to understand Bapa’s mind. She asked him once, What could it be? He watched her. Couldn’t define or decide? He said after a while, A settled life. Not that demonstrative to the eyes, but to add up glamour a bit.

Glamour! Her eyes widened with surprise, felt hard to grasp what he meant. Enough of education, a job of value to give a decent living? May not expect high of a dignitary, but of dignity still. Incorruptible mind!

Till pre-teen, Bapa talked their class morality. Advised Priti, to follow her values and culture, as her birth happened in a Brahmin family. There is a caste hierarchy. It was, and it would always go strictly!

Many things, stranger, started coming up, to a year added to her life. She was no more a child! She was growing up; she knew it. But grown-up! Overnight? No play outside, stay away from the menfolk’s eyes. No talk with the boys, can take girls as playmates, only? Priti became confused, sometimes failed to identify. Males by trousers, shirt, dhoti, lungi. Females by saree, sindur, chudi. Girl child by a ribbon on the head, frock or Tikili. Sometimes the boys wore the clothes of their elder sisters, the girls, Bhai’s, out of habit, felt comforting, or mothers wanted so for saving money. Or the girls shaved their head for sore or lice. Bou explained some identification marks that exist. Before marriage, the girls carry the surnames of Zeze, Bapa and Bhai. After marriage, their husband’s goes attached, automatically.

And when she doesn’t have to deal with the boys, about it need not think! Warning or advice? But Priti felt it too invasive, rather terrifying. Sometimes felt sick. Horribly. Failing miserably to decide or define. Some days, she didn’t come out, watched the younger children playing in the street. Bou warned, kept a watchful eye. Bou’s warning and reprimand infused in her guilt and gave a culprit-feeling.

Pratigyan was twelve, in class seven, her parents carved out an everyday routine to sermonise her the life she should live. Don’t be closer, don’t go closer to anybody, except Bapa and Bhai. Don’t accept from any a gift. Remember, your friends are like rail-gadi Jatri! She had seen rail-gadi but had not been a Jatri. Then, with whom to sit or eat, have Dosti. Caste Hindus only? She could not comprehend what caste is, and they were how many. Then how to find? Except Paita, in a Brahmin boy. Bored Priti waited until the year ending, anxiously. That happened years to her life. In the summer holiday, they tripped to their village, where lay her history, the full ancestry.

Bapa was working in a Govt. office, had a small living, hard to support a town life. To save a month’s salary, and Bou’s was a change of site, a change in life. For Priti, younger sister Pratyasa, brother Bidu, the youngest of all, a shift from a dull site and routine in life to a warm and welcoming, bustling community life. Shared kitchen, community dining. To enough touch of intimacy. Intimating the greens there, a paradise feeling. An irresistible attraction for the kids.

Priti counted the day, hour and minutes, looked at the sky, wished to change quickly day and night, the earth rotates in too high a speed. The same scenes hung in her eyes. Their footfall into the same site, inviting a gathering from the vicinity. Hugging, kissing, by the elderly-olds, patting by the uncles, aunts, the profuse grins showered by the cousins, relatives competing to pour on their love, then follow a food regime. Delicacy only! Celebrating mood everywhere, hers a celebrity feel!

***

That holiday, that summer, Bou proposed to enrol them in Panthapur school, Bapa agreed in the night. They started the next morning. Joy overwhelmed Priti. Home Sweet Sweet, her Good Green Earth chummy. It began dancing before eyes. Grandma’s handmade dishes, savoury. The community of grandpa grannies’ humoured lips. Cousins’ fabled ghost stories. The immensely extensive playground, to walk up and down the river’s vast stretch of soft porous sand-belly. Drawing footprints, comparing their artistry. Ruchi’s a Rangoli, Jhuli’s hut-wall Jhoti. Priti’s flowers or trees, Bou’s Sari Kani prints. Theirs neat and composed, hers clumsy.

But they made her winner only? Every time! They are her Sangatas, that’s why. The fond memories of a child, on whose face shone a winning smile. Such scenes made her laugh copiously. How they chased the fish trailing in the silvery stream, tossed the shells on the down-brown bed, distinct to the eyes, collected painted and shiny fossils. When clapped at the army of frogs in the bank of a pond, they jumped in and dived. A harmless snake, sinuously moving under the grass, or a gang of dragonflies, in the lower sky, made her feel scary. Sangatas stooped on her body, created a protective shield. They swung, holding the branch of the Banayan tree, under its canopy of the bustling leaves. Heard innumerable birds singing, KichriMichri. Nature’s playground echoed in her ear.

Sizzled in her eyes the Good Green Earth. More, because there lived her lovable companion, a story-teller. Gokul Sir. Like grandpa, tall and fair. Jute-hair! One more attraction, Bou wouldn’t forget to visit her Bapa Ghar. Then the lovelier. She and Pratyasa always accompanied her. The place, they,

anybody, theirs, stayed her fond. Bou’s nobody was there, but there was her Chandra uncle. Aja’s mother was his god-mother, so became Aja’s brother. When Aja died, he remained Bou’s father. He put Pratyasa and Priti on his two shoulders. They sat like two monkeys atop, enjoyed the sky view of the spot, plucked guava, Barakoli, Narang and mango, touched Champa, Tagar, Kaniar, felt the branches and leaves on their finger. Pratyasa often tore the twigs, scarred or scratched the leaves, flowers. He tried to deter her. Told how they are useful, then why should we protect nature. Pratyasa tickled his armpit, neck, didn’t stop!

Hee hee, khi khi. Followed Pratyasa’s laughter.

Pratyasa was smaller, so wilder.

Often, he took only Priti, showed the hill, railroad, entered inside the vast pool there, carrying her in the shoulder, drew the stems near, helped her to pluck lily and lotus, offered to the Lord Siva. With so many people of his house, that

became their Aja ghar. Those days they had everywhere the same celebrity status. Anybody she saw had been a fan of Bou and her daughters’. Whose house, where, whose dish there, was difficult to remember. Invitations after invitations, in a day plentiful.

Bou would meet Milk-sister, as happened before. Such portraits appeared one after the other, like a motion picture. They talked and talked that never stopped about their childhood or shared life or loss. Also, after that! Even life assigned them two places different from each other. Sasu-ghar. A big household, with their unmatched bones and muscles. A tender girl of only twelve years, with strangers! Little Priti’s head caught up the terror, vowed to make her like the fathers. Office-goers. Began searching for an escape door! Next moment she felt her relaxing nerves. Bou told she didn’t suffer. Priti’s grandma was a beautiful soul.

They talked about another brave lady of the period. She was Au-Bau, Bou’s grandmother. She lived with neither the life of a wife nor a mother. Before she became a woman, her husband disappeared. The women of the magic land transformed him into a goat, tied him to a pole in their yard and brought him to human form at night, to fulfil their carnal desire. It was an all women’s land! Their unbelievable talks. To understand it, she was too small. But Au-Bau walked her hope, with bangles and vermillion to his name on the forehead, offered puja in the Siva temple, on the bank of the pond, performing daredevilry, or a rare stunt, collected the lotus and lily, coiled by the venomous snakes. Fasted as many days as possible. Dreamt his escape. In her dream fought several battles with the witches. Believed something miraculous may happen. Waited for his return. Twelve years! But… there happened no such miracle!

Priti stayed stressful. Au-Bau needs to be there, long-lasting, bolder, to live an anchor. For the mother. That way, hers!

Bou lost her mother, tumbling down on the earth! Bou’s survival became impossible. Priti grew anxious for her mother. No, it was more for her own cause. Priti’s breathing turned easier, knowing Au-Bou didn’t give up. Adopting, a ten-year-old boy, helped to lay the foundation on which her history built up. She brought up Aja, Bou’s father. She didn’t let her home flee away from there, caught and set it up! Even after the death of her daughter-in-law. The spirit of a soldier in her made her win battles after battles that life brought. Her only goal became her home wouldn’t suffer the fall. Or without, Priti couldn’t have come to such a world, seen or felt anybody of hers! Priti felt touching the sky. Bou survived. Au-Bou took the child every day to Milk-sister’s mother, who shared her breast-milk. So, Milk-sister. Au-Bau became theirs.

Arakshita Ku Daiva Saha! (God protects those unprotected) Probably from those days, such a faith ruled Bou’s head, or sat in her tongue, anytime, anywhere.

***

A decade after. Cholera in a day devoured Au-Bau and her son! Bou’s earth shrunk, then shattered. Childhood button switched off sooner. So Sasu-ghar. But Bou didn’t become an orphan, God had kept something for her. She had with her Chandra uncle and Milk-sister’s brother. Two Baap-ghar!

Arakshita Ku Daiva Saha. Milk-sis consoled, lightened Bou’s head, sieving out the flavoured granules from their memory bowl. Smile from Bou’s lips flowed. Priti’s more. They talked of us and ours. Ours-more! Priti gathered such pictures.

How the sun there dipped below the horizon; darkness rose. Houses vanished from the spot. In verandas, the thick seams of old or adults. Their day closed. Followed their chitchat an hour, about their days of angst, or the luckless labour. Their hard-days of toil in the land and the severe weather. Or their pleasures, something that occurred to them years before. Recited every day, the same piece of prose.

Nothing newer. Children felt bored. More if they warned the children to sit by their side as dumb rocks. Bou told she yawned louder and longer. Stood to hold the bamboo pole sticking to the roof of the hut. Wheeled around, it talked. Karr… karrr. Told if stop, she poked Budha’s ear. On his Kuchha, poured water. Ha! Ha! Ha! Their laughter. Priti got tempted to show such a stunning portrayal, hers. But lay like a corpse to listen to theirs.

Bou recalled when Milk-sister, as the first girl child there joined the school. Milk-sister was granted one lantern, to practise lesson. But her granny wasn’t in favour, often interfered. Bou had not entered the school. Milk-sister in that background was a glowing silhouette! Bou from her shady verandah, talked, enjoyed Milk-sister singing loud to louder. Line or verse from Primers. But Milk-sister often disappeared. When Budhi took the lantern to the cowshed or made it weak-flamed. Milk-sister’s strained eyes, pained. If its wick died down, Budhi blamed. She raised the wick, ate the oil! A day Bou in the dark followed Budhi, scratched her bum.

Budhi said, Oho oho, the cat clawed. From that day, the wick-flame suffered no weak health or death, in that hour.

Only Alua Alua! Their laughter.

Priti wished to see on their face the same cheer. But their face-light went off when they talked about something serious. Some people reached to take away the Milk-sister. Her dead, dull statue look made Bou scarier. She thought they could be child-snatchers, with their Jhula, as depicted by her father and Chandra uncle. Or the Kapalikas, who take a virgin girl under their magic spell, to add on more power to their witchcraft.

Bou watched them from behind the door. Those people, their number twenty plus, looked terror. Bou’s imaginations. Gora Sainikas! Anybody’s heart would tremble with fear. But brown. So, the soldiers. From the side of a doughty emperor. The Apaharana of the daughter! As she had heard in Pala, or Daskathia, seen once in a puppet show. No, scare-crows. Fat-bellied, sandal-pasted forehead, bald, in the back, hung strands of hair! Or Kumbhakarna! Bhima! Belly ballooned up, eyes on the bowl? They fart and burp! Then laughter and laughter.

Bou was told Milk-sister was to pass the test to go to

Sasu-Ghar. They down pulled her veil, told, sing a song! Milk-sister turned dumb. Her mother slipped into comatose. Bou’s a brilliant-head, a witty fellow, showed her Chhabi Bahi and whispered the song that was her fond. Milk-sister then non-stop, loud, louder more! Damara Kau re Damara Kau. (Raven crows cawing in the mountains)

Parvate Parvate Bobau Thau.

Damara………………

She passed. That day only her study helped!

Budhi fully changed. Praised other girls in the community who read? No, even scolded who played!

So sweet. So much fun! The laughter bustled on their body, flattened them to the floor. Priti’s knees buckled taking her to the level, to watch at the mounting waves on their belly, the ample bosoms like the Ping pong balls.

Laughter burst! Priti saw a striking difference in the mute figures before her.

***

An excellent performance, her narrative is absorbing! Priti felt it encouraging.

Bou felt daughters are better disciplined in a country setting. Bapa had something else in mind. The village is serene; the city is noisy. Priti can better concentrate on study. He can have some savings to send her for higher education in the city. Have enough of living for herself, give them a name and life in society. No, she would add glamour to his life. May not be of a dignitary. Too high to embark upon such a sky. But dignity… thought Priti.

Priti felt proud of her father, who could rely so much on a daughter’s ability. Such a thought was away from his time, hardly got appreciated by any. Priti took it as a challenge, Bapa’s head to hold high.

But behind this, I had a secret desire that I would never reveal, Priti told. She enjoyed the listener’s curious eyes. When she said, "How can I?" Suspense hung in their mind. She added, "It was my craving, but approval is difficult."

The listeners insisted on revealing.

She said, There was someone special for me, from whom I can hear stories and trip my eyes on his small treasury.

They became crazy to know such an iconic figure in her life, and the Circumstances and events of her time. Priti felt her narrative is picking up, her goal is not under defeat. She continued then.

He is Gokul Sir. Bou’s teacher. During her stay at the

village, he became Bou’s daughter’s’ teacher. He never availed a holiday, and school was his Ghar! In the off days, he taught the pupils free of cost. Those days he took Priti and

Pratyasa there. Fed whatever he cooked. Combed her hair, made plaits! Funny. One side up and the other down. Hung from it strands of hair. Pratyasa’s became funnier. Half-done. One side open, another had no ribbon. Gone! How did it look on her! Like a naïve artist, who never was familiar to a

paintbrush. But put his sincere effort, his soul, to see and feel his creation.

He sadly expressed Bou that her daughter didn’t eat his curry. Tomorrow he would try his hand in something extra dainty. Bou told us he is a beautiful soul. A freedom fighter. He lived out of the house, then in jail, for years. He is a bachelor, but wherever he, the home only appeared. In her school, every child’s father. Pratyasa is younger, so excusable. But Priti shouldn’t hurt his emotion, love.

Gokul Sir was a great story-teller. His narrative pitched high in their soul. He talked of the exceptional humans, who

dedicated their life in the liberation struggle, never feared

Lathi-Maad, jail, or death. He stood for them as a great

inspiration. In their Company Natak, Priti became the

Director, assigned roles. Pratyasa became police, Santu, the tax-collector. Bidu and Sumi, always the silent villagers. The Company beat Sumi, but Bidu never. Sumi got the pain of cane and rod. Seeing on her eyes tear-jerks, Priti changed

Sumi’s role, but she didn’t accept the offer, saying, Villagers are better, the Company is heartless rogue.

A day, Priti asked Gokul Sir, Why at all the Freedom Strugglers would offer themselves to suffer?

"Their land is the lord, they are Her children," he gave a

beautiful answer. Stunned her.

So, she is the Lord’s Daughter!

"Lord’s Posh Children, Swadhin Deshrara Santan, the

liberated fellows, he said, You are plus!" Such a feeling

deepened on her, marked an indelible impression on the

head. She is the Lord’s Child, undeniably, having a rightful place in history. The feeling can make one a king. That way, she felt maximum propertied.

Her meal over! On his lips, a streak of laughter.

Basudheiva Kutumbakam, our culture, his inspirational notes, formed in her an impulsion to know her homeland, feel its soul, relate beyond the boundary, border. He said, Books are the only door. She savoured the flavours of his treasure, the pictures of exceptional humans, books and leaflets on their monumental efforts, their struggles. However, she was not fortunate to hear more from such a story-teller. The day they reached Panthapur, she found in Bou’s eyes tears. Grandma said, "Today is his Dasha." Retired, not only from the school but from the earth, settled in the celestial abode. That day Priti felt too lonely.

The listener’s eyes downed below by a shadow. It took off when she told his Mantra recouped her.

She didn’t stop. Couldn’t. She could sleep without food, but never without a book. Sourced from whatever written on a wrapper, or the old Newspapers used by the shopkeeper. Or the few lines on the torn pages of a storybook. The supply was too scarce and to the print world, stayed zero exposure. No books and magazines, only a few textbooks. No TV, no Stereo music, no movie at all. The printed words wherever came before her, she consumed it all. Her hunger was ravenous. Where landed a newlywed bride, Priti went there to befriend her. The bride would have carried with her one or two books as a gift. Married, had the license to read. She would seek a friend in a land stranger to her, surely. And she cannot deny! Some sympathetic friends, sometimes had taken the pain for months, copied the entire book by their own handwriting, to present her as a memory-sheet. Or their own manuscript, prose or verse, where their heart would sit, what their friend can carry in her heart still. Then a copy of verse printed on a lifeless, thin pink paper, to grace the occasion, murmured by Kuni, Muni, Tuni, Rabi, Jhuni, Gaji, or a granny’s tongue, penned by some intimate friends or the near ones, her well-wishers. Lovely. The authors and poets who never came to light but sat in her memory. Also, for anybody who would fall for such things? If it came to their