From 12 to 12 || English Story

Life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.

-O. Henry

It was around 12 at night. And I was crying.

I was not able to sleep as usual in my 1 room kitchen flat in Mumbai. Calling it a flat sometimes makes me laugh. It's actually a little box with some lighting inside and a Window to outside. An outside, where there are only buildings with some caged children inside, and nothing more.

I was lying on my bed, looking at the fan trying to rotate faster every single minute and creating varied sounds in that process. Chilled breeze outside was hitting the glass windows and I could hear it. But with not much clarity. Sounds coming out of the fan were much more louder. The sounds inside were louder and were sounding heavier than the sounds outside. Isn't that how mind works? One can absolutely not focus on the outside world if everything is blurred inside, inside the mind.

My eyes were wide open and eye lashes were blinking in a music with the ticking clock. An interesting blend, I must tell you. 

Apart from the dreams just hanging in there and hundreds of questions lying unanswered, One could see the reflection of that rotating fan in my eyes. I was stuck at it. This was when my phone buzzed for a second. It wasn't a call or an Indian missed call. Calling it so because nowhere else in the world you will see or hear anything about a Missed call. The term I think is invented in India and has been in use since the time it was invented. 

It was a what's app message. Actually a reply to a message I sent as a broadcast to my contacts. 

"Hey!" It was

"Hey!" I replied 

"What is "Aranya"? The person on the other side of the chat typed.

"Wilderness. The word means Wilderness." I texted back. 

"Oh, Okay! That's a good piece of writing" this was for the little poem I shared as a broadcast. 

"Thank you!" I replied. 

"And....How are you?" This was the question directed to me and was never called for. 

I am, I don't know why always hesitant to answer "How are you?" Because it has to be a lie all the time. There is this Feeling that your pessimistic or saddening answer may trigger other person's feelings and thus you reply with a well furnished, oiled and greased answer which has everything in it but the truth. I have somewhat started hating "How are you"s and always feel this urge to get over them but still I answer them and even throw them at others. How hypocritical of me!

"Well, I am okay" I answered and thought about turning the internet off.

"Why just okay?" I was asked immediately. 

I mean why can't someone be just okay? And why is it necessary to be great always? We are Humans and we are not programmed to be sorted and have a perfect mindset all the time. We are known for our swings - In mood, in lifestyle, in clothing, in eating, in creating. Even in destroying - We are the most unpredictable, unstoppable and uncanny creatures with a colorful mind. And black is a color too. isn't it?

Black. It was black all around and just the screen light of my mobile was on. My eyes were on that text - 

"Why just okay?"

":)" I sent an emoticon which had absolutely nothing to do with my mood, feelings or with the question asked.

"What do you think is bad about you? And is stopping you from being great?" This person was talking all philosophy at 12 midnight. 

I replied with around 5 bad things about myself. And took a deep breath of sigh! These things came to me within no time. "Everyone sees our kindness, but only we can see our shame." I recalled Nirmal verma.

"And what do you think is good about you?" I was asked soon after. 

I searched 23 years of my life quickly and looked for something good about me all over in my memories, mind, heart. I searched myself in and out and got nothing. I didn't reply. Switched off the phone and went into the same position of staring at the fan. The only difference this time was that I had tears in my eyes. One could now see the reflection of that fan even more clearly. 

23 years of living, working , doing things and I couldn't think of even one thing good about myself? I couldn't type, my fingers went numb. I was shook, and was taken aback by my own thought process and the level of self scrutinizing I have done over these years. I was crying now. And the fan started rotating faster with every tear rolling down my eyes and falling on the bed. I felt pain, I couldn't figure out where and I felt it without even knowing a valid reason. "Pain, I knew. The reason for it, I did not." So,  I cried and cried and sobbed and wept. And then slept. 

White. White lights of the new day crawled inside through the window and tickled me on my feet.

I woke up with wet eye lashes and dark circles below them. These circles I believe have the unknown reasons of the pain I feel often. 

I ended all the morning chores and got all dressed up for office. I reached there at 11:30 and was welcomed as usual by the Allahabadi guy, who is all - A cleaner, a cook and a care taker at our office. 

"Sir jiiiiiii...." He stretched it from Andheri to Allahabad.

"Aap sabse pehle aae hain, roz ki tarah....AC chalu kar deta hun, Chai chadha deta hun.....Aap baithiye" He said it all at once.

I sat at my usual place in office and turned on my laptop. The sound of AC took me back to the question I was asked last night. The question which I left at crying. My attention was broken when the office guy tapped me on my shoulder. 

He kept two hot cups of ginger tea on the table and sat beside me on the other chair kept over there. He had a book along with him. Showing it to me he asked "Sir, aaj ye naya shabd dekhe hain....Matlab subah se padh rahe hain ye kitaab. Is shabd par aakar atke hue hain. Matlab kya hai iska, Bataiyega zara."

"Aranya" I read it to him and said -

"Maane Wilderness. Aasaan bhasha mein jungle ya beehad" I explained. 

"Acchaaaa" he stretched while staring at the word. And continued reading. 

He read for a while and then stopped. Gulping whatever was left in his cup, He stood up and looked at the clock.

"Chaliye coffee chadha deta hun baakiyon ke liye...,Dhanyavaad sir, Ek shabd aur seekh liye aaj. Hindi ka accha gyaan hai aapko." He said to me and walked inside the pantry. He left the book he was reading on the table.

It was around 12 in the morning. And I was smiling.

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