Chapter 1: The one that hummed and the one that is handsome
Bangalore, India
The fir trees were dressed in
yellow, the more dapper ones in green. They stood firm as the wind hurried
through. The more risqué coconut trees flirted with the wind, allowing him to
run his hand through her outstretched leaves. But just when the wind gained
confidence in its approach, they would return to their original upright
position, leaving the wind huffing, puffing and dejected, only to be teased
again.
In the middle of the park stood Raam,
a young man of fifteen, as young a man as any man of fifteen should be. He was
neither dark nor fair. His height was just about average. His features were far
from striking, the kind that might rob a bank on Tuesday morning at 10:00am and
have the teller unable to draw him out from a line-up of him and old women by
10:14am. We are of course assuming a
teller of sound intelligence, the kind that manages to find two bunnies in those
memory games.
“Hummmm” hummed Raam. It wasn’t
the most original sound he had uttered in his fifteen years, but it was off
late, a common one. Young men hum for two reasons. There is the more loving
sighing hum that starts at a low pitch and ends even lower. This hum usually
follows spotting a girl with a cute hairdo or just after you consume a sloppy
burger, fries and a belch inducing large coke. There were many girls in the
park that day, some with exceptionally cute hairdos but none had passed by Raam’s
field of vision. It was safe to assume that the young man had not been on the
receiving end of a happy meal either.
Clearly, the hum was of a
different lineage. In its formative years the hum had been influenced by
watchful parents and an irritating older brother. As it grew up, it had
experienced mediocrity in poetry and sport, failing to impress the fairer sex
and the darker one. On a dark rainy night, some might mistake it for a guffaw
and they wouldn’t have been way off the mark. “Hummmmm” he hummed again, hoping
it would draw the attention of either a fellow Hummee or anyone who would be
willing to give him a listen. Finding no Hummee rushing to his aide, Raam put a
hand on his red cycle, as a show of support and escorted it as it creaked and
rolled devotedly by his side.
His father had bought him the cycle
from the monumentally prestigious store – Hanu’s Cycle shop. The owner of the
shop had first shown them cycles from Belgium, Germany and other countries of
questionable existence. His dad has smiled, unperturbed by the salesman’s pitch
and Raam’s wide eyed coat-tugging every time a shiny new European cycle was
pointed out. The owner finally sighed a
loser’s sigh and had shown them one made much closer home, and the red bike had
never left Raam’s side since.
He mounted his steed with elan,
and after a 5 second pause, his legs that pedalled, the pedals and the chain
that rounded the wheel found synchrony. He rang the bell for effect, but its
rusty sound only reminded him that he needed to take it back to Hanu for an
overdue service. Ten minutes later he rounded the kerb near his house and made
a dash for the finish. Screeeech
“Congratulations Raam, You are
late again. If you start making this a habit, practice it with resolve, and if
they decide to include it in the Olympics, you would make us so proud”
“Thank you Dad. I would love
nothing more than to collect my medal and make a heart-warming speech thanking you”
Rebuttal completed, Raam trudged
upstairs to his room, slammed the door shut and plonked himself on his bed. He
had hoped an owl, partly grey, partly white would arrive soon with his letter
of admission. He had hoped for it so much that he even left the window open one
night. The pigeon that had relieved itself on his desk had left an amusing
reminder of the folly of such hope. The window had stayed shut since, and his
desk had been subjected to no further abuse from fluttery fiend.
Damnnnnnn whooose a sexxxxxxyyyy
“Hey, Whats up” said Raam. He
always made sure to pick up phone calls before the singer got around to
finishing the sentence. He suspected that letting the singer finish the song
might coincide with the thwacking sound that would doubtless emanate when
father’s hand met son’s back at above average speeds. He had no interest in
hearing a thwack, but ringtones needed to be cool, that’s just the way things
are, he concluded.
“Nothing much Raam, I just
reached home after basketball. Do you want to head out for a bit?”
“In this weather? I was just at
the park with a few friends of mine. Its really hot. Id rather not”
“I don’t mean head out Raam! I
mean lets head out”. The last two
words were said with so much stress that two junior spies on a spying mission
would have spotted that the words ”head” and “out” were of significance. This code
was luckily not lost on young Raam
“Aaah, head out we shall. Usual place at 8pm. I have a good feeling about
this one”
“Sure. Bye Raam”
“Bye Lx”
Lx a.ka Lakshminarayana
Subramaniam was a good friend. His name was not incredibly difficult on the
tongue. But neither were the names of India’s biggest export – IT engineers in
strange foreign lands like Fremont where Rajendran transmogrified into R-cat
and Sivaramakrishnan dudified to S-dawg. Lakshminarayana Subramaniam was Lx simply
because he was a whiz at mathematics, and any self respecting algebra solver or
worshiper of Fermats theorem would understand that x was central to
mathematics. The letter and what it stands for is usually all that stands
between any 10th standard student and the elusive centum in the
board exams. Raam was quite proud of the name he had given Laksminarayana. Lx
sounded tough enough a name to announce to a pizza delivery guy to deserve some
attention and an extra slice of pepperoni. It was also short enough to leave
your mark in toilets, buses and on trees; the three favourite forms of writing
paper for young lovers, ruffians and drug addicts.
Raam mumbled “Dad, I’m heading
out to Lx’s place, Ill be back before sundown”,
“Sure raam, have fun, and don’t
forget to practice for the Late-a-lympics! Hahahahahahohohohoho”
His father had been laughing at
his own jokes more often than not, a product of senility with a heavy dose of
caffeine, he concluded. Raam set off on
his bike, occasionally getting off his seat and powering his feet downward to
gain momentum.
He loved the feeling of cycling.
It was like flying, except there were wheels on the ground and flapping your
hands like wings made you look slightly demented. In all other aspects it was
exactly like flying! He made his way past 5th cross, 4th
cross, allowed 3rd cross to sneak past as a cute girl carrying
tuition books fluttered by. Reaching 2nd cross he concluded that the
girl must have been cute enough to beat the sign for 3rd vying for
his limited teenage attention span. The abandoned plot was a breeding ground
for pollen, weed and other forms of tropical vegetation that Sir Attenborough
would have loved to explore. It was also the breeding ground for the boy’s
secret hideaway. He swung the wicker gate open, noting that the light white
thread that they had tied near the bottom was broken. He knew what that meant,
either the Indian police force had finally caught up with their small detective
outfit or his friend Lx had reached slightly earlier than expected. He sized up
the first hypothesis as follows: The Indian police force while competent,
extremely intelligent and comprised some of the toughest moustached men south
of the Himalayas, they were also by prefix and nature Indian, which made them
late. He steamrolled past to conclude
that the second hypothesis however improbable must be true, an epitaph to the
late Holmes or was it Poirot or was it Holmes
Ram exclaimed to his
general-in-arms, “Hey Lx, whats up dawg, hows it hanging L Man, whats the word
XL”. Lx replied with equal aplomb and weighted enthusiasm “Hey Raam”.
The boys had been classmates
since as long as they could remember, and their memory stretched as many years
back as they had birthdays and as many years back as they had not got up to
watch the Republic Day Parade on the telly. A cursory glance by a less informed
stranger, which is the level of information most strangers have, would have
concluded that the two boys could not be friends.
One was average looking and
hummed a lot, messed up hair, grungy clothes and grungier demeanour.
The other, tall, fair and handsome,
the stuff face-creams should be made of and the top buzzwords on any marriage
website of decent repute.
Raam, the one that hummed faced
his friend Lx, the one that was handsome.
They glared at each other with
unsaid brotherly friendship, that is unbreakable till broken and is carved in
stone through years of broken noses, dusty cricket and sharing ice-cream in new
unhygienic ways that their mothers were oblivious to by choice.
“I came here as fast as I could”,
gushed Raam. Patting his cycle for effect, and allowing his panting to be more
audible than the panting itself would have wanted. “I know you did, shall we
enter our secret hideaway” said Lx
Raam declared with authority, “Sure,
allow me to lead the way. It has been a while since we entered our secret
hideaway. I hope the roots haven’t grown through it!”
“Sure Raam, to the secret
hideaway!!” boomed Lx
Raam shook his fist at Lx
threateningly and declared “Lx….if you say the words secret or hideaway in any
particular order, either one by one or one after another or in reverse or even
use the letters in that word one more time…..”
“Sorry mate. I will make sure to
keep it a secret”, Cough, “Hi”, Cough , “D”, Cough , “Away..we go?”
The two boys carefully held back
the wooden boards that fortressed the impregnably rickety wooden shack. Raam
scurried in first with Lx following close behind. Bumping into Raam’s posterior, Lx straightened himself up and flicked the
switch flooding the room with light.
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