The Golden Gun

“Ok.” Was the only answer I would get whenever I put forth a request for a new toy, or a new book or a new anything. But this ‘Ok’ never defined a clear yes or a no. It just left me expecting for a near miracle of finding it kept on the table on a fine weekday when I arrived from school.

This time, the request was a simple toy gun. Like any society with a horde of children, every month had a new game season. The gaming season looked like football in the rains, marbles in the summer, tops in the winter or a simple hide & seek which sustained almost all year round.

But this season brought a new game, cops & robbers. I don’t remember if anyone specifically became a cop or a robber because those days everyone wanted to be the cop and just about shoot anyone else playing the game.

It was great fun but yeah, I did have a problem. And the problem was that I did not have a gun. And when you do not have the right equipment in such games, you are really not left with much option but be the bad guy. I was forced to be the robber and I hated the thought of it. Every play had me be the first one to be killed again and again.

It was a disturbing feeling and the thought of playing a robber was killing me.

I needed a gun but the bigger task was I had to go and ask for it.

In those days, fathers played the role of the superior beings who floated around the house looking occupied and serious. When home, they could be found sitting on a particular chair with usually a newspaper or a book in their hand. And disturbing them at this time felt like opening a cage while not knowing what beast lay inside.

Yet, there were the mothers who played the role of the peacekeeper in most households. She could pass on the message with ease while she laid the cup of tea on the table for him. And with a similar effortlessness, she could get the deed done.

But this time, things did not seem as usual. I could feel the cold rift in the house. Mom was upset. Daddy had refused to accompany her to Hyderabad for a marriage.

I could not wait for this wintry weather to subside. This marriage was for a day while my game season would last a month. The gun seemed more important at this point.

“Mom, I need a gun.”

 “For?” she asked.

Now since she seemed interested in my question, I told her in detail about who has what kind of gun.

“And even Ajju has this silver gun. And it has a red button on the side which glows when he fires. He says that it’s a laser beam. So it is supposed to be faster than all the guns.”

“So?” was the mono syllable that she spoke.

“And I don’t even have a gun.”

Although she was busy in her cooking for the evening, and a delicious smell of biryani was emerging from the vessel, she lifted her head and looked at me and said, “Ok. I’ll tell your daddy.”

Daddy was sitting on his chair as usual while, I was sitting across on the floor doing my homework. Although the problem was easy to solve using Pythagoras theorem, my eyes were fixed upon the movements of my mother from the kitchen to the living room.

He finished his tea. The evening had passed. I was anxious.

I finally got up from where I was sitting.

“Where to?” daddy spoke from behind his newspaper.

“Water” was the only word I could come up with. I quietly walked to the kitchen, took a glass of water and said, “Mom, the gun!”

“I’ll tell him. Go now and study or he will get angry.”

In a minute I was back in place and to my problem.

Those days, our dinner used to happen at 8 pm and so I was seated on the dinner table by then. The biryani smelled great. I needed the gun. The biryani tasted really great. The tasteful biryani was distracting.

Just then mom placed a glass of water next to daddy’s plate. “He needs a gun.” She spoke.

“Doesn’t he have enough toys?”

“They are old now and most are broken. All the other children are playing with guns. Buy him one too.”

“Hmm..” was the only thing which came out of his mouth.

I wondered if that was a burp to praise the biryani or he actually agreed to buy the gun. Anyways, I had to wait.

I woke up in the night as I was thirsty and walked up to the kitchen. While passing by the bedroom door of my parents I heard voices.

“The company is shutting down. I will have to find a new job.”

“It’s ok. I have saved some money. We can sustain ourselves for some time until you find a new job.”

The words threw me into a dilemma; should I be acknowledging the fact that my daddy was losing his job and forget my new gun or should I just behave that I am oblivious to it and keep demanding the gun.

My moral values turned out to be a little stronger than the cunning in me.

I did not ask for the gun anymore.

Now, since I could not ask my parents for it, did not mean I did not need it. I started thinking of every possible alternative, but they all seemed like no options at all.

I gave up.

It was a bright and beautiful Friday in the month of April and the last day of school. On my way back while walking slowly on the pavement and observing the traffic move away with ease, I was lost once again into the thoughts of not having a gun and how the next two months will pass.

I could see hazy pictures in my thoughts of me being chased by all the boys of my society while they screamed, “Here is the robber. Catch him.”

I tripped.

While I lay on the pavement wondering about the broken chain of thoughts, I realised that my fall was caused by a small piece of metal jutting out of the ground. I stared at it for a while and then stretched my hand and held what looked like a handle.

It was a gun.

With some scratches here and there, yet it was gleaming under the hot sun. It looked gorgeous. The grip was steely and it had a short barrel. The muzzle was smaller than what I had seen in movies. I held it in my hand and nervously pressed the trigger. It made a popping sound.

“Maybe, its empty”, I said to myself.

While looking around to make sure that no one was watching me, I quietly slid the gun into my bag and ran until I reached home.

Still bearing some guilt of possessing something which did not belong to me, I wondered how I could make it look different so no one would recognise it.

It was evening, and the rightful owner of the remote control, my daddy, was switching channels. That is how it used to be in every household in those days. The father would decide the program to watch and we had no other choice. Post the series of long advertisements, the movie began, Star Movies presented Bond 007 in The Man with the Golden Gun.

A flash ran in my head that instant. “I have to colour my gun” I said to myself in a whisper.

I sat down with my box of sketch pens and for the next few hours I tried every possible colour in my box on the gun. But it just wouldn’t last. If you have ever tried sketch pens on a piece of metal then you would know why. It can be wiped out easily. And I wanted something permanent. In those days there were no permanent markers.

I slept with a multitude of colours on my hands that night.

It was the first day of my summer holidays and I woke up rubbing my eyes with a little surprise that my hands were still stained with colour. I wished if somehow I could get colour my gun too.

Daddy was not there on the breakfast table. “Where is daddy?” I asked my mom while biting on an omelette.

“He has gone down to repair his bike.”

“Can I go down now”, I asked her casually.

“Yeah! Finish you breakfast and go. And do ask your daddy if he needs some tea.”

I gulped down the omelette and ran down.

Daddy was sitting on the ground and seemed busy doing something to the wheel of his motorcycle.

I was curious and so I bent down to see. He had a piece of cloth and he was applying some kind of liquid to the wheel and it had a golden colour and made the wheel look shinier.

“What is this daddy?” I asked curiously.

Without looking at me, he answered “It is a kind of colour which saves your wheel from getting spoiled in the rain.”

“But it is not raining.”

Daddy turned to look at me. “Yes. But it will rain in a couple of months so I am preparing for it.”

“Can it be applied on anything?”

“It can be applied to any metal”, he said.

An idea popped in my head.

I ran up again and straight to my room. I pulled out the gun from under the pillow where I had left it last night. While running back towards the door I was stopped by my mom.

“Take this tea for your daddy.”

I slid the gun into my belt and took the cup from my mom’s hand.

When I reached down, daddy was almost finished with his work. I kept the tea on the seat of the motorcycle and pulled the gun out from my belt.

“Can this colour be applied on this gun?”

Daddy took the gun from my hand and looked at it innocuously from both the sides. He smiled, which was quite a rare site, “Yes. Shouldn’t be a problem.”

I was happy and would have definitely jumped had it not been my father standing in front of me.

He sipped on his tea. I was so anxious that the time seemed to slow down. The tea was just not getting over. The movement of the tea cup to his lips seemed to take forever.

“Ok. Let’s see your gun”, he said while putting down the cup of tea.

I handed it over to him. He took a fresh piece of cloth, dipped it into the small bottle containing the golden liquid and slowly pressed it onto the metal surface of the gun.

The golden colour shined and gleamed.

After he had painted the gun, he kept it in the Sun. “Let the paint dry”, he said and left to go home.

I sat there for a while and waited. The gun glittered like a piece of gold. Although I had never seen a piece of gold, but that is what I believed.

Finally I touched the surface and it had dried up. I held the gun in my hand. It was ready. It was my gun. I did not have to play a robber anymore.

The door bell rang and mom opened the door. Daddy entered and right behind him I entered too with the gun neatly tucked into my belt. I went straight into my room.

“What is he upto?”

“It seems he has figured out a gun for himself.”

“Is it? Who got it for him?”

“Nah! It is a gas lighter. He must have found it somewhere… You still upset with me?”

“It’s ok.”

“Me and another colleague of mine are planning to start a business. We already have some clients ready to come on board.”

“That is great news.”

“So, maybe we can even plan a trip for that wedding.”

I heard them laugh and giggle.

I slept the whole afternoon and woke up in the evening when the boys called out from below.

I washed my face, combed my hair, changed my clothes and neatly tucked my gun into the belt and ran down.

“So, you play the robber” said the boys.

“No. I have my own gun.”

They looked surprised and shocked. They took it from me and admired the beauty of it.

“It is a golden gun” said one of the boys, “So, you will be one of the cops. But what will we call you?”

And I said, “Bond. James Bond.”