Half a Night, Half a Rainy Day

“Be mindful of the steps,” she said to me while dragging me up the stairs to her second-floor flat.

“You didn’t need to bring me here, I’d have been fine,” I said in a humble protest while continuing to be dragged.

“Yeah, right. Sit on the steps while I open the door,” she said to me. There was a hint of sarcasm in her voice which I didn’t like but the next part of her reply which expressed concern made up for it.

It was a bit strange to be honest, to be winding up at her place for the night. It was our reunion of school friends and I had overdone the whole “letting it go for one-night thing”. I was pretty sure that I’d have to spend the night at one of my friends’ place, but of all people I did not expect it to be her.

We roamed about in the same circle of friends in the yester years but we had never really interacted much with each other. At best you could describe us as “acquaintances”. In-fact most of the people who had turned up for the reunion could be described just as my “acquaintances”. I genuinely believe that because I have close ties with two or three people in the group, I get invited to this sort of thing. They like me but I don’t think it would matter to them if I didn’t exist.

As we entered the flat, I immediately made way to the couch in the living room and laid my body on it. It was kind of convenient and I was quite happy to realize that a cushion on the sofa was perfect to serve my purpose as pillow for the night.

Meanwhile, it seemed like she made a call to someone. I wondered if she had something sinister in mind like killing me or something, but I was too tired and drunk to further fall prey to my rather bizarre imagination. I actually like the fact that my imagination is a little screwed up than most people, it is one of the things that makes my life interesting

“It was great to see the guys after a long time, right?” she asked me.

“Yeah, but I doubt I’ll remember much of the night come tomorrow morning,” I replied, rather happily.

“Right; me telling you to freshen up before dozing off would not bear any fruits, would it?” she inquired.

I answered with a simple nod of the head.

She said, “Hmm, I hope you don’t mind but I have a little work to do here and so the lights will remain switched on for sometime.”

I gestured with my hand it would not be a problem.

The next time my eyes opened, the lights were still switched on. However, with a little effort I saw that work was replaced with television.

“What are you doing up so late?” I asked her, followed by a futile attempt to decipher the time from my wristwatch.

“Can’t get any sleep,” she answered.

“It’s around 3,” she continued to answer my unasked query.

“Where’s the bathroom?” I asked her getting up from the sofa.

“Up ahead in the left,” she replied.

As I made my way towards the bathroom, I stumbled onto a bucket kept at the end of the sofa and could not help myself a chuckle.

“Just amused by the way you think ahead,” I answered to the questioning look she threw my way.

She also let a smile slip at the corner of her lips.

After I made my way back to the sofa from the bathroom, she asked, “Everything alright?”

“Yeah; where is the water kept?” I asked her.

“Let me get it for you,” she said getting up from her chair.

She returned with a bottle of water and a glass. I told her she didn’t need to bother with the glass.

“What are you watching?” I asked after quenching my thirst and not able to make out what was going on in the tv screen.

“Just surfing through the channels; any idea if anything good goes on at this hour?” she asked.

“What do you have in mind?” I asked her.

“Anything worth watching; you have immense knowledge in the area it would seem,” she replied.

I switched through a couple of channels and then presented to her with great pride a comedy channel showing reruns of “Friends”.

“I like to stay up at night, rather than stay awake during the day,” I said to her.

“Why? Are you one of those people thinks that staying up during the night is more peaceful and interesting?” she asked a little curious.

“I don’t know about that. I just think it’s my subconscious way of justifying my rather lonely life to me, rather than straight out dealing with the fact,” I answered her.

Now, this surprised her; I could tell by the expression on her face.

There was a little moment of my silence and then she finally asked, “What do you mean by that?”

“I just think if I stay up all night, I’d have to eventually sleep during the day, which would take away any chance of feeling lonely during the day; and then I can justify to myself at night being companionless given the fact that generally people sleep during the night and not feel bad about my lack of social skills affecting the way I lead my life,” I concluded.

“Don’t try to go deep into the matter,” I continued, seeing that she still had a bewildered look on her face.

“Hmm,” was all she said and turned her focus back on the television set.

“But you do have friends,” she said after a little while, turning her attention back to me.

“We are friends, right?” she asked a little tentatively.

“Yeah, but would you characterize us as close?” I asked her.

She didn’t reply. She was about to say something but then stopped after seeing me open my chatter-hole again.

“I’m not saying you guys are not my friends or anything; or blaming anyone for that matter. In-fact, I’m pretty open with my problem of social ineptitude,” I blabbered on.

“Or there is a case that I’m a pretentious prick who doesn’t do much to keep in touch with his friends and makes up things in his mind to make his life interesting. Of the two, I find the former more comforting,” I completed.

“I think you have had too much to drink,” she said dryly.

A wry smile was all I could muster as a reply.

“So what is going on in your life?” I asked her trying to be as cheerful as possible.

She gave me a weird look. I guess the transition wasn’t smooth enough.

We sat in silence for a little while and then she in a very lady-like manner asked if I needed anything and when I said I didn’t, she retired to her bedroom, I would presume. After a while, I also gave in to my drooping eyes and dozed off.

I woke up late in the afternoon to the sweet smell that emanates after the rain hits the land. I found her glued to a laptop screen at the table with a cup of tea at her side. After hearing me getting up from the sofa, she said, “Good morning, rather afternoon” with a cheeky smile at the end.

I saw on the clock that it was almost 1 in the afternoon and saw outside the window that the clouds were belting it out quite heavy after days of promise to actually do so.

“Relax, I’m not kicking you out till the rain lets up,” she said.

“Want some tea?” she asked.

“Are you having some?” I inquired. I didn’t want to impose.

She nodded to which I also nodded.

“Does your laptop have any battery left?” she asked me from inside her kitchen.

“Yeah, why?” I asked back.

“Would you mind? I have some work to do but my screen just blacks out everytime I turn it on,” she asked me.

I replied, “Yeah, sure.”

I was happy to be of some service to her after she had let me stay the night.

“Do you eat ‘khichdi’?” she asked me.

“It does not seem that the rain is going to let up anytime soon, so you have to have lunch here,” she continued.

“Yeah, it will be fine,” I answered, rather surprised. I did not perceive her as one of those who cooked their own food.

“Do you want something to eat, in the meanwhile?” she asked.

“This will do just fine after I freshen up,” I said to her picking up an apple kept on the table.

“And take out the laptop when you need it, there is no password,” I said to her before entering the bathroom.

After I returned from a much needed bath, I saw that she was working on my laptop. Not wanting to disturb her, I picked up the newspaper kept on a stool and started going through it, sat upon the sofa.

“Huh, I’m finally done,” she sighed, getting up from the front of the laptop screen after sometime.

“Set out the lunch?” she asked me.

I replied, “Yeah, sure.”

The food was pretty decent. We were eating in silence until she finally said, “Quite the movie collection you have in your laptop.”

“Thanks, consequence of lots of free time and unlimited internet data,” I replied. I am very proud of my movie collection. You will find classics like ‘The Apartment’, ‘Apocalypse Now-War Drama’ to independent movies like ‘The Color Wheel’, ‘Garage’ which I’m pretty sure most people do not have any idea about.

“But why mostly English movies?” she asked.

“Because I think the people of our generation have a hard-on for anything western and I’m as much as a facilitator as well as a victim of that stream of thinking,” I replied.

She gave me a bewildered look. I seemed to have an ability to bring about that look on her face quite consistently.

“Care to elaborate further?” she asked me.

“Only because you asked; you will always find today’s youth saying that we’re backward, we are not as forward thinking as other countries and all that shit. Of course, we need to advance our thinking in some aspects but that does not mean everything is wrong with our culture. It is different but that does not necessarily mean that it is not right, nowadays we have lost the ability to appreciate the different perspectives on a thing. We are so fascinated by the western culture, that we think the way things go on over there is the only correct way. Personally, I don’t think there is any correct point of view on a particular thing,” I finished.

“So why falling prey to the stereotypical thinking?” she asked me.

“Because at the end of the day, we are all hypocrites,” I replied.

“You have some pretty weird thoughts going in that head of yours, huh?” she concluded.

“Tell me about it,” I added sarcastically.

“So what’s going on your life? You didn’t say last night,” I asked her.

“You kind of have a way of leaving me speechless, you know,” she said.

I couldn’t help a smile.

“Well, the internship is going alright, let’s see what happens next,” she said.

“And on the personal front? Any boyfriend?” I asked.

“Or girlfriend?” I added with a pause.

“You go first,” she said. “One can find hardly anything that goes on in your life through your social media accounts,” she finished.

By this time we had finished with lunch and had moved to the couch. She set the tv on a music channel.

“No girlfriend, no boyfriend; I am relieved that the arranged marriage thing stills goes on in the country, otherwise I don’t think I will have a girl to marry,” I told her.

“Why? You can’t be that bad,’ she said.

“I don’t know, I don’t feel comfortable interacting with most people, not to mention women,” I replied.

“And on the social networking thing, that’s because nothing worthwhile sharing occurs in my life. I lead a very boring existence and I’m not very keen on sharing personal things with people on the virtual media,” I finished.

“And here I thought I would blame your social ineptitude to the existence of the virtual world,” she said with a pity-like smile.

“Hard luck; although in the virtual world, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” I replied back.

“Why?” she asked.

“Well, you wouldn’t initiate the conversation and I certainly wouldn’t,” I replied.

“I sometimes go offline when people I know come online because I’m afraid they might want to talk with me,” I finished.

“You have some serious issues; well I have a, you could say a boyfriend,” she replied.

“For someone who isn’t that fond of conversations, you seem pretty comfortable with me, eh?” she continued.

“Doesn’t it make you feel special?” I asked her with a smile on my face.

“Of course, my love,” she said trying to do a Scottish accent, although I couldn’t understand the reason behind it.

With that she stood up and made her way towards the kitchen. She returned with a couple of glasses and a bottle of Coke.

“Let’s move into more intimate subjects. What are you most afraid of?” she asked, while filling up the glasses to the brim.

“In terms of environment; water and almost every animal, and in societal forms, I would have to say dying alone,” I told her.

“What about you?” I asked her.

“Dying alone surely ranks high up in the list,” she said.

“You don’t have to worry about that,” I told her.

“How can be so sure?” she asked.

“I’m pretty sure,” I replied, sipping the last of the coke left in the glass.

At this point of time, the rain had almost let up.

“What’s the ‘motmpk’ folder in your laptop?” she suddenly asked.

“It’s personal,” I said.

Her facial expression was like so, spill.

I guess, we were talking about personal things so I said, “It’s just some short stories I write for myself.”

“I think I’ll be making my way now, the rain has almost stopped now and there is no sense in risking it in case, it comes back again,” I said to her.

“Alright, but ever feel like need a pair of ears, don’t hesitate,” she said.

“Thanks, and thanks for the hospitality. Let me know how it goes with the ‘you could say a boyfriend’,” I said to her, putting on my socks

“Why?” she asked.

“Well, I might like to try my luck,” I said cheekily.

“Alright, will let you know if anything opens up,” she replied, equally cheeky.

“And by the way, falling asleep on the shoulders thing might be slightly risky,” she said in an advisory tone, before closing the door on my face

I guess, she knew what ‘motmpk” was all about after all.

In case you people are wondering what ‘motmpk’ is; it is a folder containing short stories I write. The content of those stories being my fantasy encounters with women.

Walking down the empty road in the blistering rain, I hoped that this had not been one of those fantasy encounters concocted up by imagination. I couldn’t be sure, after all I had just been woken up a few moments ago in my verandah as a result of rain droplets falling on my face.