How to Prepare for the End of the World & Other Stories

By Ateesh Kropha

When the news came out that the Alpha Centauri supernova was imminent, the first thing people did was rush to the gas stations. It was not clear as to where they wanted to go on a full tank, but since everyone was getting in line, it seemed like the right thing to do. Soon people started breaking lines and ramming their cars into each other to get ahead. One thing led to the other and riots broke out everywhere. People pillaged malls, supermarkets, window shops, banks, jewellery stores, pharmacies - you name it.

Except for Haroon. For Haroon, this was the day he had been looking forward to all his life and he was ready...

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

While an unpublished manuscript for a debut novel gathered dust, Ateesh Kropha instead began anonymously posting short stories online under the pen name 'Wrongwriter' to seek feedback and work on his craft. Over two years and 50+ stories later, he has built a readership of 10,000+ followers.

This is a curated collection of his best stories in one place, along with some new unpublished ones.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ateesh Kropha
• Release date: Apr 14, 2021
• ISBN: 9788195011957

Ateesh Kropha

I have been writing ever since I can remember. First a diary, then lots of letters, then a blog, some magazines and finally a book in 2018. Well, a manuscript to be precise. It never got published. I got rejected by some agents and publishers. Most never responded.Later, I got busy with other things and the manuscript gathered dust in some remote folder on my laptop I was too scared to open. Then in early 2019, it hit me. Why would anyone read my book?I asked myself - "When was the last time you read a book that wasn't recommended or wasn't from an author you knew?" NEVER.But even more importantly, was I even a decent writer?So, on April Fool's Day, 2019, I decided to begin posting short stories anonymously on Instagram to get feedback, understand my audience and work on my craft. Two days later, on the 3rd of April 2019, I posted my first story. Five people liked it. It was a beginning.I posted another story. And then, one more. Soon, interested readers began to follow the account and came along for the ride. I began feeling responsible for delivering original and honest stories that made them think, question their world view, and maybe even feel human. It was a symbiotic relationship.I used the pen name ‘Wrongwriter’ and stayed anonymous for two years. Anonymous because I wanted honest feedback. For the most part of those two years, even my close family members and friends were not aware I was writing publicly.‘WrongWriter’ - I chose this name when I thought about my motivation to write. In fiction, justice can be served. You can right some of the wrongs that happen in real life. That's how the name came up. Now, we are a 10,000+ strong community of avid readers.If you liked this book and would like to stay up-to-date with my latest works then join me on Instagram at www.instagram.com/wrongwriter.Or, write to me at [e-mail] with your feedback or comments in general. I always reply.My next short story will be available for purchase on the 1st of June, 2021.Best,Ateesh Kropha,New Delhi.

Book preview

"There is a divine purpose behind everything - and therefore a divine presence in everything."

Neale Donald Walsch

Jenny loved marigolds. Not just any marigold. The variety she planted every winter was the Marigold Golden Gate. Considerably larger than the regular varieties that grew in the roundabouts of New Delhi. I remember her gleefully looking at every blooming flower in spring, as we drove past the painstakingly manicured gardens on our way to work every day. This was the first Sunday since Jenny passed away, and blooming marigolds in spring were the only thing I was looking forward to now.

How about brunch? Shekhar said, as we waited at a red light intersection, a few metres away from Jenny’s cemetery we had just visited. It's on me.

I hate roses, I said off-topic.

I know a place where they don't serve roses. Can we go now? Shekhar said, being his usual sarcastic self.

A little girl in ragged clothes skipped past the car in front of us and headed straight for my window. I made the cardinal mistake of locking eyes with her and she chose to come to me rather than Shekhar, who was at the driver's seat.

There you go, Shekhar said. Roses served on a platter. Right at your window.

Can you please ask her to leave?

Shekhar rolled down the windows, instead.

How much? he asked.

One hundred.

For one?

One hundred for a bouquet of ten.

Shekhar took out a ten-rupee note and exchanged it for a flower.

That's cheap for a rose!

Shekhar smelt the red velvety petals.

It's fresh. I wonder, where they get them from.

You can forget brunch now, I said.

Shekhar rolled up the windows again.

Come on! What's wrong with them? Almost everyone gets roses to the cemetery.

Jenny liked marigolds. She would always get marigolds for me.

She got flowers for you?

Yes.

I was suddenly hit by bittersweet memories. The bitterness of having never given Jenny any flowers. And the sweetness of recalling her cheerful face hidden behind a bouquet of golden orange marigolds. I was never going to get another one of those from Jenny again. Never.

Since Shekhar continued to persist, I agreed to head for brunch.

Have you ever wondered why flowers get associated with love? Shekhar asked.

Because they are beautiful? I said.

There are many things that are beautiful.

They smell good?

There are many things that smell good.

I give up. You tell me, I said. I wasn't really in the mood to indulge in his musings.

It takes months of planning, care and attention, for a flower to bloom. Only when you've done things the right way, do they finally open up and reveal their best selves to you. The flower is a symbol of honest intentions.

That was it. I told Shekhar to shut up for the rest of the brunch. As if I wasn't missing Jenny enough already, he had to drop those words. As soon as I was done, I got off the table and left the restaurant. Shekhar's eyeballs followed me all the way out the door. The rest of his body was frozen at the table.

This is the third time I have paid for your meal in the last one week, Shekhar said, as he took the wheel at the driver's seat. I slammed the door shut and looked out the window in the opposite direction.

He kickstarted the engine and swerved the car out of the parking lot. A few minutes later, we were back at the same red light. I placed my elbow at the window's edge, rested my forehead on my palm and shut my eyes. It didn't take me long to drift away. All I could see was walking through infinite fields of marigolds, no matter which way I turned.

Then Shekhar nudged me. I opened my tired eyes to see him staring wide-eyed at something in the distance. I straightened my tilted neck and craned forward. Walking towards me was the same little girl whom we had bumped into earlier at the red light. In her hand, close to her chest, was a bouquet of golden marigolds. She skipped all the cars in between and walked straight to me.

I rolled down the window. Around the bouquet, was the same white coloured ribbon I had tied earlier today for Jenny. I turned to Shekhar in a flash - overwhelmed by the situation.

Shekhar was calm. A hint of a smile on his face.

They must be from Jenny, he said.

I took the flowers back from the girl and gave her whatever I had. All the way back home, I held them close, smiling ear to ear while Shekhar laughed in the background.

Jenny still sent me flowers.

THE END

The Elephant In The Room

"There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed."

Mahatma Gandhi

Vinayiki was becoming a mother for the first time. But when Anand, her master, left for Pondicherry, he did not know that.

Vinayiki’s parents worked for the temple in Malapuzha, Kerala. In the festive season, they would be elaborately decorated with beautiful golden plated caparisons, bells and necklaces over their heads. Men, mounted on top, would hold silk parasols up high, swaying white tuffs and peacock feather fans to the rhythm of the music. For the rest of the year, they carried logs of wood from the nearby forest to the warehouses owned by the temple administration. Sometimes, they were also summoned for wedding celebrations.

But education took Anand to a different place. He began to see things that his father was blind to. He had always thought of Vinayiki as family. Not as an elephant that needed to be chained and trained to follow instructions under the fear of an iron bullhook stabbing its skull. He knew, she could feel emotions, have old memories and care for others. Whenever Anand was around, they were inseparable.

At twenty-six years of age, and when Vinayiki was fourteen, Anand’s government job took him to Pondicherry. After his father passed away, his mother decided to leave Malapuzha and join Anand in Pondicherry. Anand had no interest in keeping the elephants as prisoners in his father’s farm. So, he took this opportunity to let them all go, including Vinayiki.

Vinayiki roamed the jungles near Malapuzha along with her herd, and every now and then she would get this urge to return to the village to see if she could find any familiar faces. Every time she would be greeted with electric fences at the edge of the village. Sometimes they worked and she would run away, in typical Vinayiki fashion, with her trunk up in the air and loud grunting sounds. Sometimes when there was no electricity, she would just bring the whole fence down.

One day, while walking the outskirts of the jungle, Vinayiki bumped into a pineapple. It looked just like the one Anand had hidden years ago into the ground in her village – while playing a game of hide and seek with her. It had that same orange-yellow tinge, with small pyramid-like mounds all over and a hard green scaly crown on top. She felt it with her trunk. The sweet smell of its core tickled her brain. She looked around, wondering if Anand had returned and was teasing her again. When she couldn’t find him, she looked at the pineapple one more time.

Moments later, a piercing explosion broke the tranquil surroundings of the forest. Vinayiki’s herd rushed towards the source. Two men rushed in from the bushes. Vinayiki lay on the floor, while bits and pieces of pineapple lay scattered on the ground. The smell of gunpowder filled the air. Vinayiki tried lifting her head but she couldn’t. Blood trickled down the sides of her mouth and a broken disfigured jaw hung limply from her face.

That’s not a boar, one man nervously said to the other from behind a tree. Sweat dripped down their dark suntanned bodies in the jungle heat, as they both sat on their haunches and looked.

I can see, the other man said with deadbeat eyes.

How many did you put inside the fruit?

Five.

You should thank the lord that animals can’t talk.

Is it still alive?

Firecrackers don’t kill elephants. It has fainted.

But how will it eat? It will die.

You can count on that.

Amma used to say that when you kill elephants, they come and visit you in your dreams.

Your Amma is right, Bala. And they talk.

They talk?!

Yes. Make sure you lock the room from the inside.

"Sahodaran, it’s a dream. What’s the point of locking doors?"

It’s YOUR dream. Of course, you can, he said in a matter of fact kind of way.

Just as the argument was getting louder, the matriarch of the elephant herd rushed towards them with her ears wide apart. The two men scrambled down the hilly forest terrain towards the village. Their slippers came off, but neither bothered to stop and pick it up.

When Vinayiki woke up again, the herd was gone. She was all by herself. Her jaw began to hurt again and she wasn’t able to eat. Alone, restless and hungry, Vinayiki stumbled downhill towards the village. Towards Anand. He could fix her up, make her whole again – she thought.

When she reached the edge of the village in the middle of the night, the electric fence had been tied again. Vinayiki ran into the fence like a battering ram, the fastest she had ever run. One of the poles came flying off the ground like an uprooted cricket stump. Two others on either side flung in the air as well.

She counted her good fortune and headed straight back to Anand’s farmhouse through the familiar alleys of the village under the moonlight. But there was no one there at the farm. No people. No elephants. No lights. No chickens running around the compound. No dogs barking. She gave out a loud cry of despair. A couple of porch lights turned on in the farm compound. She could hear sounds of men gathering down the alley with fire torches. Wild elephants destroyed the crops and were not welcome.

Vinayiki groaned in pain but waited. When she saw the crowd, she raised her trunk, just like how her parents would acknowledge the crowd during temple festivities and wedding ceremonies. But instead of treats, she was welcomed with stones. Vinayiki turned around and ran. Within minutes, she vanished into the darkness of the night, somewhere along the edge of the forest. No one cared to chase her, as long as she knew her place in the world.

Vinayiki returned to the village a week later, during the day. She had lost one-fifth of her body weight, and her spine had begun to pop out of her back. Her jaw looked even more disfigured than before, after having attempted to eat. But the pain was unbearable. She slowly pushed through the fence again. It hurt even more but she had reached a new threshold now. As she circled the periphery of the village many times over, different people saw her at different times of the day. Among them were the workers at the temple, people whose weddings Vinayiki and her family had attended in person, the two men who had placed the pineapple filled with firecrackers in the forest. They all looked at her and pitied her condition. They threw some morsels of leftover food, but she couldn’t eat.

A week passed by and Vinayiki spent most of her time in the shallow waters of the river that flowed near the village. The cold flowing water gave her some comfort. She would dip her jaw into it, and spend the whole day completely still. Sometimes she would change positions to take shade under the trees that lined the banks.

On the fourteenth day since her return, she heard a familiar voice from far away. It was Anand. News had reached Anand about her condition. She could see him running towards her through the tall grass, along the edge of the river, shouting her name. She was too weak to express her elation, even though she felt it in every bone of her