D R O P O U T II

The interruptions of Destiny…

The moonlit path through the garden was a melee of shadows, smells, contours of mist, rising heavily from the skin of the earth. It wasn’t smooth. It was studded with pieces of rock, some shining, some dull, some hard and some soft…some of them bumped into my foot, some grazed past my toes. But of course they really didn’t affect my walking, and I couldn’t care less for such unwanted interruptions. Well, to wonder aloud, I actually never wanted to be in the garden in the first place. I mean it wasn’t one of the beautiful gardens you saw in the city, or the manicured lawns of the rich fellow: no this garden had nothing to do with the embodiment of beauty – it was strictly utilitarian. Somebody, to produce an effect, upon me, created this. I mean you must understand- suppose your boss wants to put a point across to you, he would love to show himself in a magnificent light bring up a David-Goliath imagery in your eyes, and impressing upon you his power and superiority, he would ask you to obey.

And so it was that on one fine stretch of time, Destiny found himself walking through his gardens, towards a high pedestal of Power. He watched with an appraising eye, as his own destiny unfolded before him, the Interpreter of Maktub, himself at a joint where he was the creation, the clerk, the object, and definitely the idea about to be reproached.

I reached the high pedestal…a towering column of something…maybe gold, maybe silver, platinum or marble…or maybe of precious gems- all depended on the pint of observation. To me it was a pillar, a wide chasm, I found nothing interesting in his self-assertion of his power….to me it was mortalish…I was more interested at him , above the pedestal, clearly enjoying the sight of me waiting down , and wondering if I was overawed or was curious or was showing any signs of wea

‘DESTINY!! , you came,” he shouted jovially, “ I am touched.” and added mockingly.

“ Can we stop acting like Mortals?”

“Oh! Well u never had that imaginative strain eh? Very well, how would you want me to look?”

“ I would want you to look like something that is ready to cut the crap, and come straight to point.”

“ Impertinent”
Spoke a voice behind me.

The owner was a Man, in pinstriped suit, and very much with an admonishing air.

“ Thank you for coming down; it was really very show-offish on your part to….”

“ To infuriate you and force you to deviate from your destiny” The Voice came sneering. “ Really! You of all the people.”

I mused, legions away from being amused.
“ You must understand that I am actually the destiny, I am the creator and I am the person who…well! Lets say, made you and gave you the responsibility in this huge syndicate of mine…you are the manager and I am the CMD…dear”

I hated mortal connotations in matters concerning business.

“ Of course you hate these references. And that makes your destiny so tough. How can then it be that the man who refuses to be personal with anything Mortal, when it concerns business, how come that man is so interested on the after life of a mortal? I mean how does it concern you?”

I smiled. He didn’t know that the Mortal under question was The Mortal…he challenged the creator, he broke His rules in full willingness and justification…

I saw Comprehension dawn into his features, as he read my destiny. Sometimes our identities in the realm of destiny are so entwined that it becomes hard to separate them. Right now he understood, that the action by the Mortal, whom he found so wanton…that Mortal did the unthinkable… he questioned the Point Of Existence of the Creator…

GOD

“I see..”, he muttered,” clever, very clever. But I suppose you don’t realize that you are being a little too futuristic…too imaginative.”

I stopped walking and faced him fully.

“Aah! C’mon. Don’t gimme that look Destiny dear…I am the creator, I am the person who makes the rules, in my palace, in my world I am the ultimate, the extreme…no one can oppose me…don’t you know that the Creator is infallible, there is no one mightier than me, no one who can challenge me. Yes, yes yes…I know, you have that boy… but you see no mater how much he has ‘willfully’ disobeyed me, he cant take over me, he cant usurp my power, he cant go on prattling in the world saying that “I am the new creator.” The people, be they of different religions, they worship God, yes in every religion they erect a different version of mine, and they worship that. No body has ever usurped this force that made these people come to existence.”, he shouted, beside himself in emotion, “For you see , if anyone did, the entire process existence will come to a standstill. The forces at play in this world, they obey me…you know why? Because I am the only Power in full awareness of their working, I alone know how they come to function, and that’s why I am the creator and it isn’t you, it isn’t death, it isn’t any of the other people under my employment. Don’t you see that even with the power you have, you cant stop me from irritating you, you for example couldn’t stop me from creating a garden, and putting up a pompous display of unnecessary stuff…you were the first being I created, and I gave you a pseudo-life. I made you Destiny, I made you nearly the same thing as I am … are you different than me?”

With that he took my form, my looks, my clothes and spoke in my voice…
“You are the same being that I am…but only the difference is that, if Anyone usurps my power, I can well go and create a new world, but you will stand rusty, worthless, and unable to function without my intervention. An the reasonable and practical man that you are, why would you want that to happen?”

I smiled. It was too obvious.
“ Do you think you don’t know the answer?”, I smiled broadly, “ No one wants to usurp your power, and certainly not that person. Especially if he feels that your power has nothing of reason. I want to know what he wants to do, once he knows that he has violated you.”

“And what may he do, Destiny?”

Again I smiled.
“you know that already… he will deny you the chance to torture his soul in hell. He wont allow you to torture him just because he made you look like a fool…”

“ Wait a minute! I don’t torture no-one, that’s the job of Lucifer…I”

This was really too much…
“ Stop Hiding behind this façade of religion…there is no Lucifer , you are the Devil..its your dungeon…the lower levels of your palace is hell… and that boy will not go there…”

“and what good will it do”, he asked in a rumbling voice.

I smiled a last time.
“It will deny you the joy of success completely, it will humble you…and you cant stop me… because I am the person who will ultimately chart out the course of his afterlife..”

With that I left; because there was nothing more for me to say there. My destiny was fulfilled there.




The sands of time…

He sat hunchbacked on the bench, pulling the coat closer to his body. Not that he actually needed the coat, but it was an action borne out of habit. Around him the storm raged in the trees, the shrubs, the bushes. The park was completely deserted at this time, and he really liked sitting there, all alone, under the light-post; and he really appreciated if there wasn’t anybody around that time. Very few people can actually be scolded for raising an alarm at seeing a coat hover on the bench. Really, he mused, it was amusing that people could have problem with you even after you were dead.
But right at that time he was enjoying himself. He liked the rain, as it splashed on his face: though he couldn’t feel it now, he still savored the memory of drenching in the rain.It felt nice, sitting all alone, thinking, thinking…atleast he didn’t have to deal with the troubles that he was having for the past few days.

It was three weeks till he jumped from the balcony.He remembered seeing the pavement rush up to him, with enormous speed. He remembered the dull thud on his head the moment he touched the cement blocks, upside down. It was like a needle, stot through the head, one stab of pain, a rushing sensation of tasting bile in the mouth, and then the feeling in the nose as the blood came spilling out. It was all momentary, before he realized that he couldn’t see so well, his eyes were refusing to foces, there were black spots in his vision.black spots that refused to go away, spots that steadily grew larger, wider, and gradually encompassed the entire vision. By that time the lungs were caling good-bye, he couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t say a word; actually he didn’t want to say a word. He felt suddenly relaxed,as if he was floating in the air, eyes shut…he opened his eyes. And YES! HE WAS FLOATING! Like a feather, he felt like going up…he saw the ground below. There was a bloody body lying on it. Suddenly everything was silent. It felt eerie. Slowly he looked at his hands, but he could see right through them. He thought that his heart would have given a big leap at this sight. But without any trace of any emotions, he realized that it was over…he was outside the nets of life. He was dead.

The man sitting on the bench gasped. These reminiscences never ceased to shock him.They were there in his mind, as vivid as if they happened just the previous moment:the memories refusing to part, clinging on to remain intact like a mortal, afraid to slip into obliviation. He smiled ruefully. They said that spirits had no feeling, thay said that after death you left all worldly desires behind with your body. He snorted. How pathetically wrong were these philosophers. They thought about things incomprehensible to their escapist brain…they were never realistic, always trying to sound hi-fi. How on earth, he wondered, could one attribute the functioning of a human mind entirely to the brain? It was pathetic. Why would he need a brain to feel, to understand, to get struck by a girl who came yesterday with her boyfriend? It was obvious that he needed no help from the brain, the over-rated part of the body. It was the soul that mattered, and strangely his soul was intact …even after he had died.

He shifted his position, and ambled towards the lake. It was over-flowing with the rain water. He stared at the flowing rain, splattering on the wet gravel that lined the edge of the lake…once he had loved the edge…so much that the edge was his salvation, his escape. Today, he found it amusing that once he was obsessed with the idea of letting go of his life. Factually. Death itself was so boring, so every-day that he couldn’t bring himself to come to terms that he was in an irrevocable situation. How his life was like the overflowing water, he mused. It was so full, and yet at any instant it was flowing away…like the water that now started flowing over the gravels. E turned away, remembering the day he met with his love…for the last time…

“Erik!! What a surprise…long time no see mate…I thought you had for gotten me buddy! Do come in.”, she laughed, joy twinkling in her eyes…a joy that caught him unawares.

“Juss passing by you know..thought I would pay a visit.”,he managed to say. A well of emotions rose in him. It was a four months since he had seen Christy , or even talked to her face to face…and now that she sat four feet away from him on the couch…he was completely mute, flooded over by emotions. He shuddered to think about the load that tortured his soul…and for a fleeting moment he wondered what it would be like to come back to life, relive the old days of joy and laughter, when they used to stay up late to chat over the phone. they didn’t need a topic to converse…it happened anyways.

Christy was clearly happy he could see…and it was evident from the joy that radiated from her words as she talked non-stop. Well she should be, mused Erik, she has a successful boy-friend, she’s a popular girl in the school, and a dear girl.He couldn’t find reasons why she shouldn’t be happy.

The hour that he spent in her house was the closest thing he had to time-travelling…as if they had been propelled towards their past…where an imaginative weirdo found a perfect friend, a friendship so perfect that its remnants were enough to turn someone insane…

But then , the man mused, he was only Dead, rather than insane.

“so... let me ask the bad questions for a change,”, Christy spoke, as he sat on the couch, musing,”you still being sadistic?”
he was jerked out of his wonderings…”Er! What?”

“Oh! C’mn Erik, you are no fool…you know what I am hinting at…you still hell bent on waiting for me? And hurting yourself…you know the situation right? I am never coming back…”

Erik smiled. He wondered how he would say the words…without being too much callous…and he gave it a shot

“well actually no…its me who is coming back to life”

It was funny…always funny…so predictable…so obvious…Erik sat on the park bench…smiling inwardly…sniggering…trying to stem an outburst of laughter. But it was impossible…it just burst forth…and Erik doubled over clutching his sides…his eyes were watering madly…and he couldn’t stop. It was like suddenly he had spotted a great cosmic joke…and was laughing his head out...some joke that nobody could perceive…

Yes! Erik wondered…trying to sober down…they were so predictable.he had seen Christy behave in the exact manner that he had thought she would. And it had taken him quite some qork to convince her thathe was not deserting her , but was being a friend still.


Erik sank back into the bench, wondering if anybody saw him.but then he shrugged, anyway he shouldn’t care…none could see him...for he was

“A ghost?”

A voice spoke from behind…no, rather it asked…or even better, made a statement.

Erik looked back, searching for the source of the voice…and it spoke again , now from a clump of trees just beyond a bleak looking statue of a dove n flight…

“I am over here Erik.”

Erik walked over to the statue, nd squinted his eyes. He could make out a man half shrouded in darkness, wearing a grey cloak. He was more like a spectre than a real man f flesh and bone…one look at him and something in Erik ticked…something told him that this was a person more like him, atleast not like the general people around him…the ones who took no notice of him…but went their own ways, casting their shadows. But this man himself was a shadow, he gave out the aura of someone who knew everything, but actually knew nothing…he smelled like one who is positively brimming with the potential of being all knowing. Suddenly Erik wondered what made him make such an analysis…and just as he was about to get surprised…the man spoke in his head…

“you are thinking this because I am making you think like this.”

For the first time in many incidents Erik was surprised…at least he ventured near those emotions, which may be called as surprise.

“and will you answer back in my head if I ask who you are?” Erik enquired a bit testily…ghost or not…living or dead , nobody liked his head being used like a school commonroom…

“ I think you know me…”, the shadow spoke,” at least you have cursed the shit out of me quite often…I am Destiny”

“you mean you are my Destiny?” erik repeated flabbergasted.

“No dear! I am not your exclusive property…I am the universal Destiny, bearing the thousand crores of accusations from various quarters…all holding me responsible for anything that doesnot go out as planned…what wouldn’t I give to make them understand that I only turn the pages of this book chained to me…I didn’t write what’s written here.”…he ended in a lamenting voice…”Although you may argue saying that I have really taken quite some interest in you for some time now.”, he added with something that seemed like a twinkle in his eyes.

Erik was taken aback. No, firstly it was the reason that he really enjoyed the seclusion of being dead, he liked the notion of looking at others, unknown to them. But this sudden change of situations, this inclusion of a person who could make him out really disgusted him.

“ Don’t you think you are intruding?’, Erik persisted.

The man in grey scratched his chin. He seemed to hesitate, as if making up his mind on something and then he whispered at Erik.

“You are alive.”



On the turning away…

“Shit!”…that was the first thought that came into Erik’s head.
“either I am getting mad…which is probably unheard of in a ghost world…or I am hallucinating…which is even more impossible”

“You are doing neither”, the man spoke, “It’s just that you don’t understand: you …well when you actually jumped down the balcony, you remember throwing up a challenge…”

“Are you satisfied? …………is that what it required me to know…..have I got anything more to offer to you?? I have shredded each ounce of my sanity to interpret….I have found my point of existence….then ..then.. Its time in the end….I am the only person who decided when to offer my life to you…”

A badly wound sound came into is ear, as Erik shuddered once again, hearing the wing swishing around him as he fell…
“Yes! You remember do you. Now let me get to the point fast. When you did that, you actually challenged God…now don’t give me that “its so impossible” look. Ok! You did challenge him, and you would do better to accept it. He is really supposed to decide when someone dies, and by willfully, purposefully ending your life, by throwing a challenge out to him you did make him scared of you. What if you were going to usurp his throne, like he has usurped the one of his predecessor? This is a risk that he can’t take. Now the point is that actually there’s no point in reality. You don’t have any special powers, its just that you think too much. And you have uncovered a part of the plot…you have at least found out that he hides the reality from us. But theres another part to the story, something that you don’t know. You see, the afterlife is also guided by him. Escaped as you have his schemes in the real life, you can’t escape him in afterlife. So here you are, in the intermediate; cleverly hid by me..so that you can make the choice…”

All this time Erik was getting too much flummoxed…so deeply flabbergasted that he was having trouble believing any part of what Destiny dude was actually narrating. He calmly sat on the bench, clutching his head…grasping the news that he had failed to die, to defy life, that mesh that shrouded him, trying to ensnare him in its strings.
He felt destiny approach him
“look, have you noticed that you haven’t met anything like an heaven or a hell…you are just a spirit here in this earth…andyou are one of the many who come here after defying their natural methods of leaving. And you have it in you to change a lot of things…you don’t need to go on and get caught in God’s traps…escape him, or you have the potential, the desire…to escape anything that makes it a point to make your life go in one way like a clock-work mouse.”
“ And where do I go?”
“Come back to life”, came the reply.
“How?”
“take a swim. This lake…it’s the same to you as the Styks…won’t make a difference…as long as you choose to decide your path. Defy life again, leave what he will be guiding. Because life also guides Death…channelise you feelings...and you will be free…free to have defied life …both in it and beyond it.”
Erik walked slowly towards the lake…this time in unsure footsteps; he didn’t know how life would embrace him again…how he would return…he touched the cold water…and as he moved down the slope, water slowly filling his torso, he felt a pull…a familiar sensation of winds soaring up his ears…something roaring beside him…his vision blurred…and he tripped…just as he touched the water, he let out a gasp…
“We are getting positive pulses…I think he is coming round”, a voice spoke from somewhere.

Trying hard against the dazzling light, Erik opened them a bit…

“ Three days in coma, I thought we lost him…will you inform his friends outside…that girl, Christy, she was crying like hell the last time she came…maybe you ought to break the good news to her. Man! This must be a miracle…a living body after a suicide from the seventh floor”


As the words around him became more incoherent…Erik became drowsy.

And he thought.

Maybe this time he would get a chance.

Maybe, this time he would be his Destiny.

About to start a new story…