Lockdown Longings: 10 Stories of Love and Recollections

By Sucharita Dutta-Asane, Gargi Mehra, Lawrence Houldsworth and 7 more

The recent lockdown has our imaginations spinning new futures – for the world, for our nation, for us – as humankind waits, restlessly, at the cusp, unable to move forward, and thus, visiting the only place that can be explored with certainty: within.
Within days of the countrywide lockdown, we announced a short story contest inviting writers to share stories from self-isolation. The ten stories in this collection are a result of things they discovered within – comfort in old memories, new perspectives for old relationships, a sense of humour in the face of crushing uncertainty, courage to make peace with oneself and an unwavering faith in humanity.
Sucharita Dutta-Asane is an award-winning writer and independent books’ editor based in Pune. She has been editing manuscripts for publishing houses and for individual writers for more than a decade. She teaches a course in Writing and Editing at Symbiosis College of Arts and Commerce and at Flame Liberal Arts University, Pune.
Gargi Mehra is a software professional by day, a writer by night and a mother of two at all times. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in numerous online and print literary magazines.
Lawrence Houldsworth is a trained mathematics teacher and now works in teacher education and training.
Malini Gupta has spent nearly three decades as a development worker. She has experienced an upheaval of her attitudes, values and beliefs in her journey from a student of geography and rural development to a seasoned and well-travelled practitioner of her craft, and she writes of this personal perspective of change.
Kanishq Banka is a Mumbai-based writer and traveller. He has finished his double master’s degree in Sociology and Journalism & Mass Communication. He is presently working on a couple of scripts and on his next novel about a poet from Kashmir.
Rajni Mishra has been writing verses and cooking up stories for as long as she can remember. She has been a patent expert, an innovation strategist and a café floor manager in the past. At present, she works as a product marketer and copywriter to support her writing habit.
Pragya Bhagat is a spoken word poet, an award-winning essayist and author of two books. Her work examines the intersections between mental health, body image and belonging.
Amit Singh studied print journalism at Asian College of Journalism, Chennai. He has worked with the Star Network as a writer. Taking cue from the twin peaks of Neil Gaiman and Varun Grover, he wants to explore all kinds of writing, from short stories to scripts, comic books and novels.
Purva Grover is a journalist, poet, playwright and stage director. She made her debut as an author with The Trees Told Me So, is the founder-editor of The Indian Trumpet, a quarterly digital magazine for Indian expats, and works as assistant editor with a UAE national daily.
Ajay Patri is a graduate of the National Law School of India University (NLSIU), Bangalore, and has experience working in a corporate law firm and a think tank. His works of short fiction have appeared in several journals and short presses in the past, and have been nominated and long-listed for many awards and prizes. He is currently working on his first novel.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Roli Books
• Release date: Jul 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9788194643302

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© of all the stories lies with the respective writers, 2020

Interlude © Sucharita Dutta-Asane; Lovin’ Lockdown © Gargi Mehra; Air 3.0 © Lawrence Houldsworth; Benedict © Malini Gupta; Mitică © Kanishq Banka; The Prognosis © Rajni Mishra; Your Love Affair with Grief © Pragya Bhagat; Gumsum-nag © Amit Singh; The Sparkle, of the Girl, with Tiny Feet and Petite Shoes © Purva Grover; Rose © Ajay Patri

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eISBN: 978-81-946433-0-2

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Contents

1. Interlude by Sucharita Dutta-Asane

2. Lovin’ Lockdown by Gargi Mehra

3. Air 3.0 by Lawrence Houldsworth

4. Benedict by Malini Gupta

5. Mitică by Kanishq Banka

6. The Prognosis by Rajni Mishra

7. Your Love Affair with Grief by Pragya Bhagat

8. Gumsum-nag by Amit Singh

9. The Sparkle, of the Girl, with Tiny Feet and Petite Shoes by Purva Grover

10. Rose by Ajay Patri

About the Contributors

1

Interlude

SUCHARITA DUTTA-ASANE

At seventy-two, life changes suddenly and dramatically for Martin D’Mello. Changes are perhaps thus – swift, unexpected, for the change is actually fractured time. D’Mello, as his friends call him, or Uncle D’Mello to younger customers, is not new to disruptions. This though, is unprecedented. To be stumped by a virus did not feature in his meticulously drawn up list of expectations and anxieties for his advanced age. And so, standing on the long veranda of the house his father had built, he watches traffic dwindle on the street, sound give way to silence, human hubbub replaced by a kind of imposed stupor, as of children forcibly put to bed on holiday afternoons.

A kilometre and a half along the road, on the other edge, stands an old cemetery, its gate-arms wide open. There is nothing in between. The gateways of the two establishments look askance at each other, as if that is the only way left to communicate.

During the day, he feels as if the hush of the cemetery has entered his house. Those who managed his home for him cannot come to work. All he has in the spacious rooms and outside is himself, time immeasurable and a few passing vehicles.

Evenings look different. A car, or two, streaks past, chromium wheels lucent in the falling light, leaving silence in its wake. To Martin, it looks as if the road catches hold of this silence and pulls it to tautness, stretching till it snaps. He doesn’t hear the twang of the breakage, only the lack of all sound. It keeps him awake at nights.

He learnt of a new word in his bookshop the other day. When he thinks of his city as it is these days, suspended in time, in space, in its potential for life, he thinks of the word. He thinks of it as the dusk deepens, turning the trees into amorphous shades. Kenopsia.

Behind the house, a truck rumbles down the flyover. Below, a tiny garage trembles in its aftermath. Its bright blue shutter, painted only a month ago, comes down.

The garage is on its own.

D’Mello reaches the crossing for his weekly vegetables. Across the roundabout, on the left of the road, there used to be a handcart selling evening snacks to software professionals returning home from work. Young men and women, laptop bags slung over their shoulders or hunkering on their backs, would step off their company shuttles and wolf down the savouries as if their life depended on it. The vegetable vendor with her stall behind the handcart would wait for the men and women to eventually saunter into her shop for their daily needs. The city was slowly turning into a ‘readymade’ paradise, he’d noticed: chopped vegetables, pouches of oil, cleaned coriander, methi, spinach, peeled pomegranate, garlic cloves…the list was endless and grew every week.

He stands outside the sparsely stocked vegetable shop and waits for the familiar sight of the buses. At the spot where the snacks’ vendor once sold his ware is a big black patch of dried up oil, water, sweat, spit and animal waste – individually indistinguishable. A bus comes to its usual halt in front of the empty juice bar. It’ll wait for exactly three minutes, he knows – enough time for the men and women to step out of the bus and on to the pavement. Usually there are a dozen getting off at this busy junction. Today, only two women. Perhaps he’s wrong to call them so, they look too young. His mother had a theory for the term ‘woman’: girls turned into women only after they had babies, she would say. It was a term laden with responsibility, with patience and a feeling for which she said she could think of no word…a feeling of losing the ego but also gaining so much more.

The girls are moving silhouettes in the distance. There is nobody else on the road. On either side of the road, trees cut off light from the street lamps, plunging it into discordant shadows. Here, the residential colonies seem to huddle, their gates almost touching, separating walls close together, perimeter trees bunching into one another, gates shut. No one comes out. Watchmen stare at him from their cabins. He wants to stop and tell them that he’s too old to be anything but respectable, the owner of two bookshops. All he wants is to talk with somebody. Where are your children? He asks the vegetable seller. She’s packing up the meagre remnants of her supplies and doesn’t respond.

He decides to discontinue his walks, stay at home.