Footprints in the sand

He walked on the pavement by the park early in the morning… the fog made the scenario even more beautiful. He overheard a couple passing by complaining about the weather and how the fog had ruined their flight to Delhi. It wasn’t the first time he had heard someone complain about the fogs. In the village where he had spent his childhood, fogs were pretty much a common occurrence and he typically heard the farmers complain about the fog ruining their crops. He had to admit the chill that surrounded him when he walked though the fog wasn’t one of his favorite sensations. But that was before his operation. Then he could just feel the coolness, and hear the complaints. But now he could actually see the beauty of the dreaded thing. And he couldn’t understand why more people couldn’t take time to appreciate the beauty of winter’s first dew.

For Aarush, life consisted of two eras. Three, actually. He wasn’t blind from childhood. He had a normal life. He went to school everyday, albeit with a swollen face which straightened up on sight of his friends. He played games, he went for movies, and he went to the park. But all that was before his 7^th birthday. A freak incident with firecrackers involving a daredevil stunt with his best friend Ishan had brought permanent darkness in his life. He could not bring himself to leave his old school though and with special permission continued attending classes. That’s when everything changed. Ishan broke all contact with him. He found that he could not cope with his old world without his vision. Soon his grades started falling apart. His friends had a different world now, a world where they could see everything, a world he could not be a part of. He no longer played games. He started to withdraw in his shell with an enormous inferiority complex. Slowly, as hard as he wished against it, he started forgetting how his friends looked like, how the park looked like, how a cricket ball felt in one’s hands. It was as though his brain was shutting down the visual department so that there was more space for memory and other senses. He was sent to a special school for children like him. And thus, a new era began.

That was 14 years ago. Now he was operated with cornea replacement and he had come back to the visual world. All the sights he had forgotten had come back to him and now he wanted to memorize all of them. And yet, despite his return he still couldn’t think of himself as a part of the “visual” world. He had made real close friends when he was at the school for blind and he could sense that those were his real friends. And he still couldn’t get rid of the bias he had in his mind about the people who could see. His old friends were part of that world and he couldn’t forget the feeling of betrayal when they had abandoned him when he needed them the most. He could not forget the mean tricks some kids played on him taking advantage of his disability just to have a laugh at his expense. And most of all he could not forget the tone of sympathy some of them adapted around him, the tone that kept screaming that they were conferring a huge favor on him by being his friends. He still couldn’t get past those issues. And today was the first day of his college where he would go back the visual world. He planned to stay as far from everyone as he could manage.

He sat on third desk from the right on the first row- right in front of the professor. He knew enough about the visual world to guess that no one would bother accompanying him on this spot. Except for geeks. And geeks mind their own business. So he had nothing to complain about them.

“Excuse me? Is this seat taken?”

He didn’t have much of a choice. He glanced at the girl who was easing herself next to him. She had a slight built and had a tired quality around her. Maybe it was because she had dark circles around her eyes or the sluggishness in her movements but she looked older than the giggling girls in the class. Her general mannerisms belied the tiredness he saw in her. She kept constantly chatting with him throughout the time and he was glad when the professor entered the class though 15 minutes late. The enthusiasm he had when the professor want shared by others though and by the time the class was half way through he actually had started to prefer his seat neighbour’s questions. Unfortunately she wasn’t done.

As soon as the class was done she was back to her chatty self and he found her to be gyrating on his nerves.

“Hey I m Nidhi by the way,” she belatedly introduced herself.

“Ishan.” He couldn’t explain yet why he lied about his name to her. But he felt she had an overwhelming quality around her. And he didn’t like the way she asked personal questions about him. He wasn’t really comfortable with divulging his school name, his previous address or his previous life. It was something he wanted to keep separated from his new environment, as if it was too precious to be shared with others.

“Oh.”

She didn’t look too happy with the answer. Had she noticed his real name written on his notebook? Good if it was. That would be a good hint for her. Maybe now she would consider leaving him alone. He started to walk away.

“Hey so wanna catch up a cup of coffee at the canteen?”

God this girl was unbelievable!!

“Nah I have classes to attend.”

“Fine I will go with you.”

Jeez!

“No its alright. You don’t have to. I can manage to find my way around.” He gave her an uncomfortable smile.

“nah. I will do whatever you wanna do.”

Wtf?!

“Why?” he blurted before he could stop himself.

“So we get to know each other, y’know, spend some time together.. new city and all”

“I have been in pune all my life. Nothing new about it. So..” he just shrugged.

“That’s so not true!”

“Excuse me?”

Her face mirrored his own astonishment. How did she know he wasn’t from Pune? What was with this girl?

“Well, you obviously don’t know a lot of people around here… so umm… I assumed…”

“Yeah listen, u r weird. I want you to quit bothering me okay? Just… stay away.”

She looked hurt. But he didn’t turn around to actually see her reaction to his words. He just kept walking away.

The next day she sat next to him again.

“Hi. Can you believe the first lecture is physics? Unbelievable!”

He could think of someone else who was unbelievable.

“What’s up with you? Are you like stalking me for some reason?”

To his utter bewilderment she laughed. Definitely unbelievable.

“I can imagine why you say that. But no nothing like that. You just remind me of someone I know.”

Huh?

“May I ask who?”

Why did you ask that???

“Just… someone.”

“As in someone u knew closely?”

“Yeah. Very closely.”

Aww man!!! This was so not what he needed right now. Some crazy chick getting reminded of someone “close” to her when she saw him.

“Why don’t you just go to him then?”

“Coz bhaiyya is way away in Goa and I can’t go there. I mean I could but it would involve too much effort.”

“I remind you of your brother?”

There was the annoying laugh again.

“Yeah. What did you think?”

He thought she was crazy. But he has already told her that. Seriously what was with that girl?

“Hey wanna catch a movie the day after?”

“No.”

“C’mon man it will be fun!”

“I have plans.”

“With whom?”

“How is it any of your business?”

“C’mon man, you are my bro now!”

When did she decide that?

“Umm… alrighty… sis… lemme ask you a favour. Give me some alone time ok?”

“Alright.”

She left without another word. Now even he had started to feel genuinely sorry for ticking her off like that. But the truth was he was still uncomfortable with people. And that included her. People who didn’t stick to you when you need them the most were the most untrustworthy of them all. And she belonged to the world where selfishness was default emotion in everyone. For now, however, he felt every bit rude and selfish as the world he belonged to now. Maybe he would cut her some slack. He decided he will accept the invitation to the movie. Maybe even surprise her with the tickets. He went to the movie theatre for some advance booking.

The multiplex was a world of its own. Colors he couldn’t even start getting adjusted to, shopping arenas, food stalls… and above all the crowd. It was totally different from what he saw at college. He had to look around to find the queue for the tickets. He saw someone familiar in the queue. Sure enough, it was her.

“Hey what are you doing here?”

He could feel his cheeks go red. His skin started to feel hot. He looked in general direction of the crowd.

“I kinda came to buy tickets. Y’know… for the movie.”

This time the giggle was positively girly.

“That’s so sweet! Don’t bother though. I already bought them.”

And again the annoying feeling started creeping on him again. He clearly remembered declining her offer. And yet she had the audacity to buy tickets for him. As if she was so sure he would relent. He felt manipulated. And soon unexplainable anger started building up in him. Anger not necessarily directed at her but people in general. People who thought who could use him, manipulate him.

From nowhere a memory came back to him. This memory was different from the others. Different because it wasn’t as bright as it was now. He was staring into dark space because everything was dark to him then. He could not see anything. But he could hear a tin rattling every time he moved. He could hear giggles coming from somewhere nearby. But even as he pleaded for someone to come and help him no one did. He was manipulated into coming to this unfamiliar place since they said they wanted to play a game with him. He felt a creep descending on him when he couldn’t hear the giggles any more. It took a long time for him to realize that he was the game. And they had left as soon as they were bored of it. He was admitted to a special school the next week.

And even if what was happening now wasn’t the same humiliation he felt back then he was rudely reminded that people could get scheming. The hurt look she had on her face had manipulated him into trusting her. The same way the pleading sounds of his friends when they said they wanted to play a new game and they wanted him to be a part of it.

Unable to express his anger in words he started going away or else he feared he would physically attack her.

“Hey what happened?”

“Goddamned you! Just get out of my life okay? I have had enough of this drama. The only reason I stayed back with you was because I felt sorry for you. And y’know what? If you just don’t get frickin’ out of my life I won’t feel so sorry for you and I might physically hurt you. So just get lost ok?”

“Aarush wait for a second… you don’t understand… please let me explain”

Her words trailed when she saw him stop abruptly. With his body rigid like he had a spasm of some sort he turned to her.

“What did you just call me?”

“See I can explain everything…”

“How long have you known me? Really.”

“For more than 3 months.”

“Since I was at my institute for the blind.”

“The thing is…”

“Yes or no?”

“Yes”

“Why are you following me around?”

She stared at him saying nothing.

“Listen… I swear to god… if you play dumb now…”

“Because you have my brother’s eyes.”

The last sentence rung into his ears. She continued her story when he didn’t say anything for a long time.

“Ishan bhaiyya always felt guilty about being the cause of your blindness. In fact, the Diwali he celebrated with you was the last he ever celebrated. We moved from Kolkata to Goa when I was 10. That would be just after your accident because he felt too guilty. He had lost confidence. He refused to meet anyone for the fear he might harm them as he had harmed his best friend. Over the years his confidence slowly started rebuilding and we thought he was over his guilt. But when he was diagnosed with fatal aneurysm a year ago, that’s when I realized he hadn’t really gotten over it. All of us were gloomy but he was happy that he could return to you what he had “borrowed” from you. That’s when we had come to see you at your institute. You didn’t recognize him when he spoke to you. You took him for a fellow student at the institute.”

She paused as though giving him time to digest what she had just told him.

“Before leaving for Kolkata though, he had promised me some quality time. We were going to spend an entire day together; go to an amusement park, catch up on a movie we both wanted to watch and then just chat into the night. That day never came. I thought maybe I could get a fraction of that from you. I thought, if I get to watch a movie with you, it would be something similar to watching a movie with bhaiyya. After all… you do have his eyes…”

He just stared at the ground. Now many pieces fell into pieces. Why she looked older than her age… her reaction when he said his name was Ishan… he hadn’t realized then that he had just blurted out the name of the last person he had spoken to at the institute. That was his old best friend. He couldn’t believe that in all these years of wallowing in self pity he hadn’t realized that he was turning into the very thing he hated. A selfish person.

When he looked up, she was gone.

*****

He sat in the window seat of the bus to Goa. He looked out to see a beautiful scenery. He saw a vast stretch of sand. Two kids were playing a game. One would leave footprints in them and the other tried to follow the footprints. But try as me might, the second kid always destroyed the first set and made footprints of his own. He was about to do the same thing. Leave his own footprints where his best friend’s were once. But at the same time he would try not to destroy the old ones. Ishan had given him back what he had “borrowed.” But he gave it back with interest. He had given him a sister. He felt two tickets to the movie theatre in his pocket. He was going to bring her back.