It was 4:45 p.m. He told me to wait here. Forty-six minutes passed by after the scheduled time. Bhagavantam was not here yet. Would he come today? Would he come any day at all?

I lit up a cigarette, Virginia brand. It was turning black as it burned. A bus far off was sighted. It was approaching like a full-blown stray dog. It spilled out a dozen passengers per custom, a common practice whenever a tree was nearby and then proceeded to its next stop. Bhagavantam was not in that group.

A gang of lepers went across the street like a net preparing to catch fish, singing. There was no use though. “I haven’t got no change.”

Would he be coming in the next bus? The number 13 from the other side?

Across from me, there was a house, an incarnation of pneumonia. On the walls, wet, surrealist spots, as if one was inhaling the wet lungs desperately into the sunlight and attempting to dry them up in the sun! Stripes, behind the walls, like the beams of hope shaking the water in the air, the banana plant, bold and innocent. Stupid plant.

Bhagavantam would show up without notice. Even when he had told, he would not tell from where. Even when I had known where he had been coming from, I would not come on time. Even after he had come, what could I say to me?

On the street, short and dark people, folded inwards, were walking at snails’ pace and like prisoners. At a distance, the mute ocean was roaring meaninglessly. The half-smoked cigarette butts were soaked in the rain, formed into soft lumps like bile.

I leaned on the lamppost and pulled out the old letter from my coat pocket. It was the letter Bhagavantam had written fifteen years back, the color of rust. “I know your fears and suspicions. If you feel you cannot take it any more, and it is of no use, leave them and come to me running. The doors of my home are always open to you.”

Poor thing. Bhagavantam stayed away from the changes in the world and became outdated.

I decided to go into the hotel and wait there for him. The road was visible through the window. From what direction he would appear?

You see that. To me, it was disgusting. The manager was abominable, the waiters were scary; I was suspicious of them too. The manager’s face looked as if it was rubbed by pieces of glass. I hated it.

I hated the people who would come in, chomp through the junk, which he would have made and serve, and go away like the snakes that had swallowed frogs.

I would enjoy this hatred thus started off. As this and hatred came up in layers as the nervous energy caused by the third peg of gin spread through the entire body. Here, at this table, I would sit. I could see the traffic on the street through the window. Inside, I could hear the chitchat from these insects too.

Tradition had been built into the very name, Bhagavantam. His dated ways—the small pigtail, squeaky moccasins, round, gold ornaments hanging from his earlobes, dry loincloth would be audible and visible in this name. I sitting in this hotel and waiting for him was a huge paradox.

“Why, so much of independence for us? We are utterly stupid. Speak of our character! Ours is total faqir mentality.”

“The man is hefty and practices yoga yet suffers from massive attacks of constipation.”

“My line of destiny is filled with breaks.”

“Can’t raise even a paisa of loan.”

“I keep yawning while at work.”

“My little sees caterpillars and crush …”

“It seems they beat up the referee on the mid-field …”

“He did not notice it, they say. As he was cleaning his gun, the bullet … through the heart …”

“I am not sure how my boy’s knee was broken. Actually now it is the lord of wealth is ruling … “

“He’s gone crazy, it seems. He chopped off his wife and children and …”

“God only knows why he was not promoted. Maybe the effect of the planet Sani

The thoughts kept chewing me up. The waiter brought coffee. That was not coffee, just wheat-colored and hot drink. All the bad words beset my head like flies.

“What is your name?” I struggled to ask and with the face of one looking forward to learning a great secret.

“Unnithan.”

Unnithan, Unnithan! Coconut trees, the boats moving heavily and slowly in the back waters … Vellivodham … shimmering dark, curly hair, cloves, cardamom, kopra … sweet aroma! …

“Go,” I said.

“Ha?” he said.

“This has come to end today—either he or I should. This is meaningless, I know. You go in and think. Just as this coffee has no meaning, there is no meaning for Unnithan’s existence. Done, the end.”

Unnithan tried to fix his lungi, which was folded up to his knees, turned around and went away, cursing in Malayalam his stupidity in assuming that he had seen all the tourist attractions in the entire India.

Bhagavantam did not come. He did not come by bus. He would not take a rickshaw and he would not walk.

Somebody was on the ground. “Possibly convulsions, he is frothing at the mouth. Pour buckets of water,” somebody said. People gathered around. For them, a free show, entertainment, fun. My body cringes. Thank God, it could have been me! Oh, no, it is a kind of thrill.

Humidity, sweat, bugs.

Salty wind now and then.

Grease.

Heat.

In the sky above, the evening the Sun god was chewing red pan and spitting as he passed.

He bent his leg, leaned on the wall, and kept picking the filth under his nails.

“Unnithan!” I called him affectionately. Unni!

He came looking scared. I told him to bring me another cup of coffee in a beseeching tone. He disappeared into the hell in the backyard, like a piece that had showed up in a dream and slipped away.

For Bhagavantam, how long is going to be this struggle, this wait? How many hours? How many years?

“After cleansing the slate of my heart, the consciousness …”—I was thinking. A fit of laughter came from the utmost depth inside in a huge wave. I pricked on my left wrist hard. That was a sign, a warning sign telling me, “Stop the drama, remove the make up, and think.”

Unni was coming back from raurava hell like Mephistopheles. He came with a steaming cup of coffee, came close to me, put it on my table and was about to turn around. I stared into his eyes, stopped him with forcibly with that look, and told him, “You do not exist. You are only an illusion. You have no existence. Did you read Hume? Do you know what Locke said? Kirk Gart, if I think you exist, and if you think I am talking to you, and while I think that you think on those lines …”

Unnithan’s lungi was flying in the wind like a masthead … “Oh, no!” …

A sidelong look from the right eye started drawing a line at the third staff in the left end of the pnuemonia house, cut through main road, rubbed past the manager’s bald head, and was absorbed in the shining froth in the cup, Unnithan had placed on my table.

Coffee on the table! Coffee! This is not coffee. Simply brown color that is hot.

The number 13 bus arrived. After it stopped, it allowed a few to get off the bus—one Markovich face, another face wide as that of a Ulysses, one Terlyn armor, one stethoscope, and one Arjuna in refuge. Bhagavantam was not one of them. Would be coming by number 7 bus from the other side?

Unni was whispering something in the manager’s ear. Manager turned his face to the other side—the face that was rubbed with glass bits. Two husky dogs under the two eyelids—two buffalo-like dogs which lay in the middle of the road lazily and yawning—were howling quietly. Had he closed the eyes, they would be two wings of big owls. He droved the dogs on to me.

That was the moment. It was a great revelation—it was as if the lightning rods around were shining like open swords, thunderbolts were racing forward like the devil’s chariot, the generous God would make his grand appearance and was willing to grant my wish, and somebody peeled the banana called ‘the world’ and put in my palm …

The revelation lasting a split second. The manager covered the dogs with the owl’s wings.

There was no point to wasting time, dangerous. I got up and went to the counter.

“Here, I am paying for four cups of coffee in advance.” No need to fear. You may call the mental hospital, if you like. Nobody escaped from there. Everything was in order there. Unnithan was my long lost friend. What are you nurturing in your eyes—Alsatian? Dalmatian? Or dachshund?”

I returned to my table. Why would I want a response?

Unnithan was standing there leaning on the wall, like a single introvert coconut tree, crooked in eight places, and standing amidst a row of several coconuts, which stood up straight and daintily. The cluster of trees was looking cynical and as a collection of punctuation marks bundled together in one place.

“Unni, can you break apart the semicolon and exclamation marks, and come here?”

He came.

“Bring the third cup, please.”

He went in, sprinkling each mark on the floor like one of the Hemingway’s sentence—it was neat, brisk, and without overtones.

Maybe, on his way, Bhagavantam had an accident and his bones were broken …

A gang of four students, who seemed to be hesitating between the nebulous childhood and the cleverness of the adulthood, came in, merrily.

The pulled the chairs, which were arranged four-ways neatly, into several angles, and sat down leaning back and with legs stretched.

Unnithan brought the third cup of coffee. Coffee? That was not coffee. Simply hot-colored, wheat thought.

… What did Benji fellow said today?

… Tony Curtin playing in Saraswati theatre. Elizabeth Taylor.

… Sujatha sits in the high-class row like a classy lady but you know she has two lovers …

… Don’t talk chaff …

Probably, Bhagavantam would not come. I counted ten and got up. As I was going out, I stopped at the words stated above and said in a sad voice. Mix them all up. Then link one to that like a chain and think. You will understand, no doubt. After that, everything will be easy.

I stopped at the counter and said, “I had three cups. I paid for four. That is fair in this world. You may refund the change next time we meet in the purgatory No time now. Please, tell Unnithan also. Bye, bye.” I came away.

Sprinkles of stars in the sky. Bhagavantam would not come. He would not come by number 7 bus from that side or by number 13 bus from this side. Just my foolishness.

(End)

(Translated by Malathi Nidadavolu and published on thulika.net, April 2009.)