Of deprivation

On a false night

She called him in the dead of the night. "Here. Right now!" she said. "What? Why? It is three in the morning," he replied. "I want you here in 15," she retorted. He cleared his eyes drooping heavy with sleep. "Damn! How does she expect me to meet her now?" he thought. Last night's heavy dose of sleeping pills put him to sleep so deep that days of insomnia seemed to take leave.


He put on his trousers, torn and faded; reminding him of borrowing a new pair from his friend. He spent the last few months of his life living off his friend's pocket, and paying his huge visa bills with his savings. He could lose his wallet and not fear losing sleep!


He drank a bottle of water before he stepped out. It felt like the Sun left his heat with the Moon. The night temperature hovered around 32 degrees. After a day in the Sun doing market research, he now has the night to travel 10 miles. But how...


He locked the door to his 2-room apartment for which he pays a useless 3000 every month. Now left with how-to-travel question, he began walking cursing his shirt wet from sweat. He walked into a treeless street in the night's dead silence. He walked and waited for her call; his phone felt lighter with zero balance, and enjoyed a healthy battery for over a week. He walked past a 24/7 restaurant that flaunted a shiny board of 'all night pizza'. He walked in and took a glass of water. But he wanted more along his long walk to her place. "Pennyless," he recalled. Attempting to forget his misery, he decided to walk on singing Sinatra's 'Strangers in the night...'. 


"Excuse me, Sir," asked a blind old woman. It sent him creeps but replied, "Yes, how can I help you?" He suddenly felt the exchange of words like a role reversal of his job. "I need some water," asked the blind woman. He walked in to the restaurant, handed her a glass of water. And then bought a bottle of coke for himself. 


Heavy breeze began to blow across the street. Trees swayed with a whistling sound. He leaned on her friend's door and knocked on it several times while he waited for her to open it. "What the hell are you doing here at this time of the night?" she opened and yelled at him. "What? You called me a while ago, remember?" 
"When did I?" she replied.
"Half-an hour ago. I thought it was something urgent so here I am. And you say what and why and when?" he asked in frustration.
"No. You called me a while ago from a pay phone. Twice. I gave you directions too. And why did you even ask me the way here? You've visited me several times. Just when I asked you this, you disconnected the line," she said.
"No. I didn't. I didn't even call. And when did I visit you...ever? What are you talking about? Look into my pockets. I have not a single penny. How would I have called you at all?" he said in a fit of anger. "Look. Why are we arguing over this? I am drop dead drowsy. I need to get some sleep. Can you please tell me the reason you called me?" he asked calming his nerves.
"I did not call you and how in the world did you buy coke if you had no money" she asked.
"Look at this. This is your number," he showed her his call records.
"What? Wait. How do you know I had coke?"


The breeze got heavier and closed the door behind them.

Split Day

Rea-l-ity Sp-l-it…

It amazes me how the day transforms itself in to the night.  It almost makes me take a pen and write The day isn’t 24 hours long. The day is when there is light and darkness is what I call night. And night is when the soul-self is at song. I could count myself as one fine example of a differential  day-user:  day drags on and on with the dirt filled drop of sweat trickling down my forehead until it splits itself at the eyelash, into many more tiny drops of hope. And on days that spell bad, it gently combines itself into another huge drop of tear; tears of the eye.  There is an overwhelming feeling in this. It keeps me off track of counting the number of times this has happened. And/But when it does, it only reminds me that there is night.  When the Sun sets, almost splitting the defined day into an almost twelve hour halves, I so eagerly wait for the coolness to set in, the coolness defined by the psychological mindset that whatever happened through the day is only the derivative of the night before.

And why? Just as I begin to put the day to rest, my mental activity begins to wakeup.  Funny it may sound, but it so comfortably tires me without any physical activity. Just mental. There is comfort of the soft-pillow that hugs my arms and the eyes do their bit, their movement trying to clear the mind off the day. Because what follows is the attempt to beat fear and raise hope.

I have been and still a victim of certain phobias, wishing to battle them head on, first in the mind and then let ting the future do the talking. Then there is an entirely new world called dream, of which I have no control. Science plays its symphony in the head creating characters that are faceless and stories with plots that seem baseless. It still feels like a superbly scripted play because in this there are no interruptions. I never wakeup with fear. That was taken care of while the eyes did their active bit.

The process of the night ends on an abrupt call of the day, like the blink of the eye in sleep. And I wonder, sometimes, whether time took a quick leap blanking my mind off a few hours. Two pieces of the same day and the same mind that feel so disconnected. And in such a lovely way…!

Paradox? Let me just treat this as a cool Reality Split. Split at the L in both. Different yet so identical. Wink!