Unlocking Familiarity

No one comes now from the time this corona came. There is nothing particular to do. Just get up, eat whatever is leftover or cook whatever little is available. Talk with my fellow mates. When the whole world is going crazy after disease and all, somehow this slow business has given me the chance to heal my charred mutilated aging body. No need to put on the mask or tons of make-up to hide my scars and age. Plenty of time to daydream: lots of uneasy memories trying to invade like my clients used to do. And I try to discard them like the flies are chased off in sweets shops. But still, they keep coming like some viral diseases. I look at my hordes of make-up items: eyeshadow, lipstick, powder, rouge, and kajal. That day also I had put them on like every other day. It was a regular day when I was waiting for some rich clients who will pay my charge and pay tips too. He sounded eager while we talked on the phone. He kept calling while I was busy catering to other clients. I am very professional. I learnt it from my clients only. They do their task and pay and leave. This fellow came while the sun was about to set. I thought he won't turn up because of impending rain and was going to wash off my make-up. Thank god I didn't do it. He would have said no right away after seeing my real face. Taking uneasy steps into my room, he took a seat on the plastic chair kept beside my wooden bed. I threw my time-tested well-practised smile. He seemed not much impressed. Sitting on the chair, he took out his car keys, cigarette box, wallet, some packed lunch, and mobile and placed them on the side table.

"Be careful with your belongings. Don't come back looking for them if you don't find them. It is not my responsibility to take care"

"It's alright. I won't forget to collect once I leave", replied he. This day had not been rewarding enough and I wanted to be done with him as soon as possible so that I could entertain someone else for few more bucks. I only stepped towards him to complete the task and he was just there I got the sense that he didn't want to offend me and so he stayed still, motionless. Somehow I could see my own mirror image in him. It felt like the table had turned. He was me and I was his client. I went back to take my shower while he lit his cigarette. When I came back, he was still there looking at my photographs hung on the wall.

"Is it you", he questioned me childlike. It was the first time I was without make-up before my client. Anyway, he was not my client anymore. He had already paid through PAYTM and I could have risked myself coming before him without make-up. Who cares if there is no repeat? I don't mind. He does not seem to be rich anyway. How much he bargained before we agreed to meet!

"It's me while I was twenty " I kept drying my wet hair with towels. Put on my old clothes which I do when I go to sleep. They are comfortable.

So what's your age now? he asked carelessly while scanning my dressing table.

I am not going into personal details. Are you not getting late? If you wanna stay further, you will have to pay.

'I have not eaten. Have carried my food. You got some plates?'. I stopped in the midst of tying my hair and fished out a melanin dish and steel spoon. He started pouring out greasy Chinese Manchurian noodles on the dish while I tied my hair in a bun.

You wanna take a bite" his mouthful of words was almost familiar. Even though I was hungry and taking a shower somehow always adds to my hunger. I devoured on Manchurians.

"Look here. She is my girlfriend.": This beautiful lady was beaming from his mobile phone. I could not help smiling back.

We met while we joined college. It is so tough to find girls in these engineering colleges. She only came to me to get her chemistry equations right. We kept meeting in classes, and canteens and started going out for occasional dinners on Sundays. The canteen food was awful. She had struggled a lot to be allowed to join this course. Her father wanted to marry her off to some industrial family and now she was with me. It felt like she was the only good thing about my engineering days. Made me curious about life beyond a career. Now I could have seen how this dryness of engineering is gonna reduce some burden of everyday human life. My mother even liked her. My mother does not like anyone so easily. So you can think how good she is.

I started growing bored of his talks. What I have done to trigger such talks! There was darkness all over and rumblings of clouds could have been heard clearly.

She was the most meritorious student I ever came across. My father agreed to our marriage because she won the gold medal in our college. Even after marriage, she kept behaving as if we are college time lovers...

Don't know what happened to me. Perhaps it was the effect of rain falling on the roof. His talks started making sense to me. I delved deep in them, sometimes even prodded to continue when he fell silent for a while. Perhaps he wanted to gauge my interest or wanted to know whether I was still awake. Of course, I was wide awake now: not only my ears but all senses just doing the function of listening while he went about his childhood friends, his village in the midst of the dense forest, his first touch and his first betrayal, first drop of tears and last rites of his grandma. I started living his life while he narrated it: going to school holding the little finger of his father, a sense of excitement when looking first time at the innards of frogs, fishing in the village ponds, raising his hand for knowing the answer in the class and being rewarded by the teacher, being appreciated by the girls …..

Was it raindrops caressing my back? I moved my hand and here he was, breathing in my tangled hair. I did not know when my hair got untied and was now spread all over my back, his face too. His face was like the moon behind clouds and raindrops falling over his forehead in the shape of sweat drops. He crossed his palm on my wrinkled face, and its pressure smoothened the lines. I was young again. His face shone in the lightening of clouds. Is he not the one I know for ages. And he replied, "of course". He made love to my cracked heels while narrating how he solved his first calculus problem. My naked eyelids got moist from my wet hair and his unfinished lessons brought the rebuke of his favourite teacher. My bare arms were around him and he had never seen his mother without her dozens of glass bangles.

Did he make love to me or to the familiarity which grew between us? Was it his conspiracy to talk his way towards forming a bond between us? Did I fall into the trap? Was I cheated? How can I be cheated? He did pay afterwards. More than I asked for. I wondered if at all I was capable to offer the comfort of familiarity. He did take something away from me without my permission. I can't articulate what it was but now I feel incomplete even after putting on my make-up and all. I wanna go back to him. I wanna welcome him back. And if he does not come back, at least he should take back my expectations and familiarity and unsaid feelings which he only gave me. Was it that he could not make love to me until he developed some sense of familiarity and so he shared so much with me, chatted so much with me! I bet he gets off on all of this. Was it that I got something that I had not bargained for in the first place! The buzzing of flies brought me back to my present. I ran to collect dried clothes. It was gonna rain again.