HEARTFULLY ENTANGLED - CHAPTER 6 - THE PAST
6 - THE PAST
The following morning, I bathed in a public washroom, got ready, left my backpack in a small restaurant for safety where I had my breakfast and boarded a local train to reach my music academy.
The train was not crowded as it was the month of May. The school and college students who filled the local trains during mornings were absent. I settled into a window seat, my thoughts travelling back to Diya.
I wondered how she was doing. I came away as she wanted me to go away, but I wished to witness the healthy Diya, who jumped, played, clapped, smiled and laughed. At least once. For my own satisfaction. For my own peace. A selfishness!
But I knew it would take a few weeks for her to return to normal.
I knew I wouldn't be able to visit her home. Not only after weeks, but also forever!
I sighed, running my fingers through my hair, thinking how to see her without her knowledge.
When is her college reopening? Is there any chance to see her outside her college from a distance? Or she seems to read a lot of books. What about just wearing a mask and going to her home like a commerce student to sell books? But the fuck! I don't know proper English. I am a person who pronounces perfect as ferfect, station as taysan, rubber as lubber, and her favourite subject psychology as..... Damn! Let me not even think about it. She will find I was not a student, but an uneducated fellow in disguise. What to do?
My thoughts were interrupted, as the cry of a baby reached my ears. I shifted my eyes to the opposite seat, where a mom was sitting, holding her one year baby in her arms, her hands caressing the baby to comfort.
But the baby didn't seem to stop crying. Her mom's worry was clearly visible in her face as she kissed her cheeks, pointed her fingers outside the window to divert the child. But the baby refused to follow her fingers.
Her mom shifted the baby in her arms, her worry intensifying on her face as she wiped the baby's tears and then reached for a towel from her luggage. She covered her chest with the towel, pressing the baby's face against her chest and her hands moved to unzip her maternal kurti.
I dragged my eyes away, my mom's memories, my family's memories, flashing in my mind. I didn't want to remember them, only to get my morning painful. I wanted to divert my mind. But I couldn't. Though music had the power to divert my mind from any temporary problems, when it was about my family, music failed to do it. Only alcohol could do it.
While the baby's cry faded away in her mom's embrace, my own cries during my childhood echoed in my mind, a strong, deep ache rising within me.
I was born in a lower middle class family. My dad was a daily wage in a cotton mill and my mom was a daily wage in a fireworks company, in our native Sivakasi, which is the firecracker capital of our India.
I didn't know whether my mom and dad were happy together or not. I was just a child to understand what marriage was or what happiness was. Though I don't remember those days clearly, I vaguely remember that their days passed in chasing bread and butter, and nights in fighting. Fight! Loud and sharp enough to startle me in the middle of the night from my sleep and to cry without knowing what was happening around me. As soon as I cried, they would stop yelling at each other and my mom would lay down near me, sniffing and caressing me to stop my cry.
The next morning they would become silent and normal in my eyes and they would leave for their jobs, after leaving me in a nearby govt playschool. This was going on like a routine. I was used to it.
But suddenly one day, when I was just 5 years old, my mom didn't return from her fireworks company. Some said, she had an illegal relationship with the manager of the company. Some said, they had seen her and the manager kissing in the company, on the same day, before she vanished. Some said, she betrayed my dad and eloped with him. There was a bigger chaos in front of our hut.
What did those words mean? Illegal relationship? Betrayal? Eloped?
I couldn't understand anything at the age of 5. All I could understand was, she left me.
It hurt.
I cried, my teary eyes searching for her in every passing face there. But I couldn't find her face anywhere nearby. I wanted her to return and to wipe my tears. I wanted someone to say they were playing with me and she would return soon. But no one said it.
She never returned.
I didn't know what my dad felt about it. But the perception about my mom led him to doubt me. The doubt whether I was born to him or to someone else! He started looking at me with doubts and sneering gazes. But I was too young to understand those sneering gazes and I was foolishly smiling at him or crying at him, telling him to bring mom back. But he always used to release myself from him and walked away.
He didn't throw me away, but he didn't love me or care for me, either. He just ignored me, stopped talking with me and left me alone in our own home.
I couldn't understand the words behind his actions. I was always walking behind him like a fool, seeking his warmth, missing my mom.
A few weeks passed like that, and then his family convinced him for a second marriage. He, too, accepted it.
Within the next six months, he was married again and everyone told me that my step-mom would be in the place of my mom. I too looked at her as my other mom, as I was still a child who could believe everything, who couldn't understand anything, and who could accept the changes.
But, after a few years, I started understanding neither my dad nor my step-mom looked at me as their son. They were parents for their own son, my step-brother. But not for me!
At first, I tried to believe whatever I faced from them was not true. I tried to convince myself that I was overthinking. I thought, "Maybe, I am naughty. If I help them in their household works, if I be a good boy, they would accept me, too. They would love me, too. They would feed me, too. They would laugh with me, too."
I tried to be in the best version of myself, just because I wanted them to accept me, too, in their little family.
But I was wrong.
When I excitedly asked my step-mom for the first time in my age of 10, "Ma, shall I cut vegetables for you?"
She just sneered at me and pushed me away.
I sighed with disappointment, but I tried it again after some days,
"Ma, shall I help, folding clothes?"
"Ma, shall I help with cooking?"
"Ma, shall I help with cleaning?
"Appa, do you want help in anything?"
"Thambi (younger bro), shall we play?"
But every time, I was ignored and with days passed, my step-mom started pushing me away more forcefully in a way I stumbled down to her pushes, and she started finding reasons to burn my upper arms and legs with hot ladles. If I scored low marks in my primary school, if I sit in my brother's cradle, if I try to eat the food before them, she pressed the hot ladle against my skin, making me scream.
Soon, I understood they didn't care for me even a little. I was nothing but an annoyance to them. They didn't know where to send me, they didn't want to spend even a penny to bring me up either, and they wanted me to run away on my own without being able to be inside the cage. That was the reason for ignoring me and to hurt me physically.
But, where could I run away? I was just 10. I was clueless where to run away.
But I didn't try to be lovely to her or to my dad or to my step-brother anymore, only to be pushed away.
I stopped trying.
I stopped calling her, ma.
I stopped calling my dad, appa.
I stopped approaching my step-brother to play.
I stopped seeking love from them, which they could never give me.
I didn't hate them. Hate was not possible within a ten year old child.
But I distanced myself from them in our own home. I spoke with them, only to answer their questions, if anything. I didn't have good friends in school either, as most of the people in my town looked at me as an illegal child and restricted their children to be friendly with me.
'Like mom, like son.' This is what they thought. I would not have any morals to be friendly with me, they thought. I too stopped expecting anything from the people. From the age of 11.
I started leaving home earlier without even having breakfast and had my lunch in the school which govt schools provided for free, and roaming outside aimlessly in the evenings and used to come back home, only to have porridge and sleep.
After growing up a little more, at the age of 14, I joined a nearby book store to work part time during the evenings.
I planned to save some money, inform my dad, thank him for feeding me with porridge in all those years and thought of going away somewhere alone. To survive on my own!
But nothing goes as we planned.
When I was in the beginning of my 9th standard, I myself unknowingly gave a perfect occasion to them, to throw me out.
It was my first ever salary day. I received a salary of Rs. 850. I was so happy as if I achieved something, and thought of buying myself a pair of good slippers as my slippers were worn out and I had many stitches on my slippers.
I kept the currency notes safely in my bag with a smile on my face and resumed working in the book store. On that day, some of the new books arrived from the publishers. I unboxed the packages one by one and arranged them on the shelves. When I unboxed a particular box, my eyes widened. It was a package of adult magazines with the half nude pictures of models on the cover pages.
On seeing them, my heart skipped a beat.
What was it? Why were they not wearing proper dresses? Did women look like that inside clothes?
Curiosity peeked in me and my hands slowly moved towards the magazines, swallowing hard.
Was it wrong to touch it? Why did I feel wrong to touch it, yet my hands moved towards them with shivers?
But before I could touch the magazines, the owner stopped me, shut the package immediately and told me, "You arrange the other books. I will take care of these."
I nodded helplessly, but my eyes followed him as he lifted the adult magazine package, kept it over a shelf and settled himself in his chair.
I tried to focus on arranging the books, but the way he shut the package immediately, the way he tried to hide it from me, could only increase my curiosity.
I never dared to do things like a thief. But that day, the more I resisted myself, the stronger temptation grew inside me to see what was inside the book.
So, when the owner was busy with a customer, I picked one of the adult magazines and kept it in my bag like a thief, thinking of placing it back in the same place the next day.
When my duty was over, I walked to a footwear shop, bought a pair of slippers which cost 100 rupees and wore them happily. I had the remaining 750. I wanted to save it for myself, but I didn't know why, my dad's worn out belt and my step-mom's old clothes flashed in my mind. Without a second thought, I bought a new belt, a saree and a shirt for my step-brother.
I knew I wouldn't be able to gift them lovingly, but I thought to keep it on the chair so that they would ask me about it. When they asked, I thought to answer them, I received the salary and I just bought it as a part of being inside the home with them, having their food.
I packed all the things I bought inside my bag and walked to my home. When I reached my home, I found my dad and step-mom conversing something inside the hut.
If I went inside the hut now, it was impossible to see what was in the adult magazine.
Thinking about this, I stopped myself outside the hut.
I thought to see what was inside the magazine before entering the hut and stood under a tree. I pulled that magazine out of my bag and opened it.
The moment I opened the book, my hands trembled slightly. My heart pounded as I leafed through the pages, which revealed the pictures of nude or half nude models of both genders in almost every page.
I was stunned.
My body reacted in the ways I couldn't understand completely. A strange pleasing chill ran through my spine. My inners became tight.
I didn't know why, I liked whatever my body reacted. My trembling hands turned the pages, every page pulling me into a world, something strange, something new, something pleasing.
The world around me faded as I watched every page with my widened eyes.
Suddenly, a pair of hands grabbed the book from me. I startled, turning to the person.
It was my step mom.
She glanced at the magazine for a fleeting second, and then turned to me, her eyes holding a venom.
I felt as if I was caught in the hands of a devil.
Was she going to press the hot ladle against my skin?
I shook my head, my legs stepping back. "I...I...."
Before I could utter anything more, she grabbed my shirt's collar, and pulled me inside the hut.
My legs moved to her pull and she shoved me to the ground as soon as we reached inside the hut, throwing the book towards my dad. "See...what this filthy creature is doing."
The book landed on my dad's feet. He just stole a glance at the cover page, made a disgusted face and gritted his teeth, pulling out a burning wood from the stone stove, which was burning in a corner of our home for cooking.
My stomach flipped.
He stormed towards me, the flames dancing at the tip of the wood.
I understood what he was about to do.
I raised to my feet and stammered, "I...just saw it in the book store..."
Even before I could complete my sentence, the burning wood was pressed against my calf muscle over my pants. "Will you touch these again?"
"No." I screamed, squeezing my eyes shut as the fire burned my pants and reached my skin.
He removed the burning wood from me. I fell in a corner of the hut, grabbing a sack to stop the fire from spreading, crying badly, my body aching everywhere in and out.
He threw the burning wood away, staring at me.
My step-mom yelled, "His mom eloped and proved herself as a slut. Now he is turning into the same....Son of slut."
Slut! I didn't know the exact meaning. But I knew it was a bad word.
Damn it! She was crossing limits.
I was accepting everything from them as somehow they provided me with at least old dresses and porridge. But she didn't provide any damn thing to my mom. She didn't even have any connection with her. My mom didn't hurt her in any way, either. It was her who accepted to marry my dad, knowing his wife eloped and had a 5-year old child. How the hell could she accuse my mom?
My weep came to an abrupt halt, my physical pain turning insignificant, and I stared at her with my teary eyes.
"Oh..." She raised her eyebrows. "You are staring. You are getting angry, it seems. That slut can leave her illegal child as a burden to me, but I should not say a single word about that slut, isn't it?"
That was all I could tolerate.
I raised to my feet, wiped my tears and warned, "You can beat me. You can burn me. Say anything about me. But if you dare to say one more word about my mom, I swear, you will regret uttering those words with your dirty mouth. Don't think I am naive, just because I am silent in front of you all. A person filled with unspoken words is way more dangerous than the people with dirty mouths like you all. A person filled with wounds in and out is way more dangerous than hurting people like you all. A person whose love turned into nothing is way more dangerous than the hateful people like you all. If you think hate is more powerful than my love which was turned into emptiness, show more hate. speak more." I glared at her, gritting my teeth, and raised my voice. "Show more hate. Speak more. But don't forget, my mom didn't leave me as a burden to you. It's you who accepted to marry someone with a child. It's you who is torturing the child after marrying his dad. I don't know why to marry a person with a child, and then to torture the child. If you didn't want a child for your future husband, you should have had the courage to stop your marriage with a person like my dad. Otherwise, you should shut your dirty mouth and at least show kindness to the child. Instead, you should not marry and then torture the child. What a shitty character is that? You have shits in your back. But you are blaming my mom with bad words. How dare you! Have some sense before saying anything. Otherwise, I will put some sense in you in the ways you wouldn't want."
While she stood thunderstruck, my dad grabbed my shirt and pulled me out of the home. "Your mom is a slut. You should not talk this much. How dare you raise your voice. You should not be here anymore..."
I yanked myself away from him and shouted, "Yes. I will go. But let me say something before going. You are the worst man I have ever seen. The way you ignored me and treated me is itself a proof of how you would have treated my mom. I still remember how I was always walking behind you and hugging you, but you didn't bother about even a 5-year-old child who didn't even know what was happening around him and you used to walk away while I was crying. When you can't even be kind to a child, it's impossible for you to treat your wife with love. So she would have decided to leave you just like I decided to leave you now. I find no mistakes in her decision of leaving you." My eyes flickered between him and my stepmom.
I added, "I am saying with all the experience I had in this home, you both are devils. This home is hell. My mom should have been an angel. The beauty and the beast would be good for fantasy stories only. But for reality, an angel wouldn't be a good match for a devil. An angel will never be inside hell. An angel doesn't deserve hell, either. So, she must have left, searching for the heaven she liked, she deserved. The only mistake she made was, leaving me to struggle with you. I hate my mom for that. I hate her to the core. I hate her more than I hate you. If anyone has the right to blame her or to question her or to punish her, it is me. Me only. If I ever get to meet her in my lifetime, I will decide what I should do about the only mistake she made. You all don't have that damn right even to say a word against her. If you all take that right of me, the consequences you are going to face from me will be your worst nightmare. Mind it." I stepped away, but my legs stopped as my eyes landed on the burning wood.
I added, "I too have hands. You too have skin. The fire can burn your skin, too. But I didn't do it to you because I am not you. But remember, I am Arun. The sun! The fire of all fires. I wouldn't need a burning wood to burn your skin. I am myself enough to burn you into ashes. I hope you understood." I stormed out of the hut, walked towards my school bag which was under the tree, opened it, pulled out the saree, belt and the shirt from my bag, let out a sarcastic smile and threw them away.
I walked away, fresh tears forming in my eyes.
I too didn't like what my mom did. I too hated my mom more than them. She was the root of all my struggles.
But it doesn't mean I should watch people blaming her with bad words. After all, she nurtured me with her blood.
When I thought of buying a saree for the person who provided me with porridge, how could I witness someone blaming the person who nurtured me with her blood? I couldn't. No matter how much I hated my mom, I couldn't witness anyone speaking bad about her. I didn't have any wish of punishing my mom, either. All I wanted was, if I ever got to meet her, I wanted to ask her my questions, "Why did you leave me alone? I understand no one would want me. Everyone thinks I am some illegal child. But was I that much filthy from my childhood in a way even my mom didn't want me?"
I reached the bus stop with my burnt pants, my fingers wiping my tears often and got into a bus aimlessly. I got a ticket for the last stop. The bus halted in Chennai in the early morning 3AM.
It was almost 18 hours since I had my previous food. My stomach started rumbling, begging me for some food. But I didn't have anymore money to buy food or to search for a home or to join any hostels. I was not a person to steal money or to beg, either.
I took a deep breath, controlling my hunger and walked to a public tap. I filled my stomach with water and laid down on a footpath, having my schoolbag as my pillow, my mind flooding with questions, my tears pouring.
Why was I ended up on the footpath?
What mistake did I make?
I was struggling almost from my birth. What the hell did I do from the day I was born?
Was it my mistake to be born in such a family?
Was it karma that followed me from my previous birth, if any?
If yes, what was the use of that karma when I was being punished when I didn't even know what I sin I did?
Punishments are given to reform the people or to make other people scared to do such sins. But what is the use of a punishment when you don't even know why you are punished?
I couldn't find any answers for those questions. All I could do was cry endlessly. I didn't even know why I cried.
Was it because of the physical pain I had because of the burn?
Or was it because I was completely orphaned, abandoned, and had no one even to ask me whether I had food?
Or was it because of both?
I had no idea. But I cried and cried and cried.
After a long time, when it was about early morning, my tears stopped.
It was the last time I cried.
I got up, my entire self void of any emotions. I felt as if all the moisture in me had left me in the form of tears and I had become a stone.
I bathed, covered my burnt wound with a cotton kerchief, wore the same clothes again as I didn't have any clothes to change, searched for a job, and got a job in a hotel as a cleaner. The owner saw my burnt pant which had a hole and gave me his son's old dresses to change. I thanked him and got them. I stayed on the footpath and had my food in the hotel where I worked.
The footpath had become my comfortable place. But after a month, my hotel owner noticed me on the footpath and told me to stay on his home's terrace which had a single room with an attached bathroom. I agreed. He helped me in continuing my studies, too. He was the one who identified my skills in music and encouraged me to join in the guitar classes after I failed in my tenth std. I respect him a lot.
My guitar classes and my job in the hotel were going smoothly.
But whenever my classmates in the music class talked about their family happily, I remembered my family who didn't even care about me. Every time I remembered them and about my fate, my chest did painful things to me. I wanted to forget everything that happened in my so-called family. But I couldn't. They were always in my mind, giving me unwanted feelings. In an attempt to forget about my childhood and my family, I tried alcohol. It worked. Whenever I had alcohol, I forgot, not only my family, but also myself. I felt as if I was flying in the air, free of all burdens. That was all the feeling I wanted. When alcohol gave it to me, I couldn't turn it away.
Soon, alcohol turned into my addiction. The alcoholic addiction at a young age of 18 gave me some reckless bar mates. They shared sexually adult videos with me. I started watching porn, triggering my own physical desires at the age of nearly 20. Adult videos and masturbation also became one of my escapes.
When the hotel owner, who was also my house owner, found my drinking habit, he told me to vacate the house. I too vacated and found a new shelter for rent.
As years passed, the adult videos made me wonder what it would feel like to touch a woman in real. But I had no idea to love or to marry. I had a belief that no one would be with me forever when my mom and my family themselves abandoned me. I didn't want to have any family who would leave me half way and make me sleep on the roadsides again.
But at the same time, I couldn't control myself from my physical desires. I masturbated to satisfy myself. Approximately weekly thrice! I didn't think of sex workers. But in a reckless curiosity, I contacted a number which was in the porn video, and you all know what happened.
I ended up doing something the society might feel disgusted. But I didn't care about it. Having sex with the other person is a betrayal and pain to the loving wife/husband only. When I was sure of not marrying anyone, my sex life with the sex workers, with their consent didn't give me any guilt.
Even my friend Nivas who studied with me in my 10th std didn't know my personals. According to him, I am an orphan whose parents passed away. He had a beautiful family with a mom, dad, and a younger sister. He was taking alcohol just for fun unlike me. Though he looked at women and admired them, though he watched porn movies, he never encouraged having multiple sexual partners. He has always advised me not to sleep with random women. But I didn't care about sexual diseases, either. I was ready to die at any moment. I didn't have any dreams, any wishes or any person to live for and to love for. I was just moving in the direction where the crushing waves of my life carried me. Without having any wish or energy to fight against the crushing waves!
But I didn't think even in my wildest dreams that the crushing waves of my life would take me to Diya and crush her, too, temporarily. But it did. As a person who became a reason for her wounds unknowingly, I had the responsibility to take care of her till her wounds healed. But I couldn't take care of her.
All I could do was, thinking of a way to see her from a distance, without her knowledge.
Did I find a way? What would have happened? Did I just see her or did I meet her?
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Nilah R.
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