Victim

So much water has flown down the river since I last wrote on this paper.It has yellowed out and is turning ancient and haggard.My hand is trembling .Age and disuse is taking toll on my nerves.They, my fingers are running ahead of my thoughts.Today is the deadline for me to come forth with the creative quota.I will have to fix each day's quota otherwise Iwill stagnate.To day it is very closed though the sun is not sharp.It is shedding a gloominess around.The palm plant before me is patiently spreading its leaves askanse for any benevolence from the skies above. The rains were scanty this Monsoon. The little showers which poured could hardly take away the accumulated heat of the hard summer. The steely roads are smeared with the grime and concrete of the constructions going around perpetually.They are further ploughed through by the swish shiny brand new vehicles of all makes.They run and screech with impunity over the broken and shattered pathways which raise rubble and hit helpless pedestrians.The dividers and brims are mercilessly marauded by these ever rushing nova rich who have obliterated the demarcations between the private and public spaces.
Neera was passing through all these observations or perhaps circumventing the task of writing her quota of the day.Her sister Ruma had just left after visiting them from abroad.It was generally a much awaited occasion.She was her younger sister who had left India after she got married some decades ago. She was an NRI now-a collapsed structure who seemed to have been gnawed at from all sides Neera remembered how her uncles had tried to dissuade her father from sending Ruma to a foreign country.But their father had dreams which seemed to be undefinable. Neera at that time was involved in the nitty gritty of her job hassles.She was ambitious and wove her world wherein she reigned supreme.She was an autocrat who was intent to grab the limelight and be the centre of attraction for all occasions. If she wanted to marry it was not for love or settlement in life but for not being labelled a spinster. So she lived in her own world which was overpowered and veiled by the opinion of other people.She walked through the dreamland which was incoherent with her material reality.She was a vacuous girl who drifted along haphazardly buoyed by the times passage. Ruma's marriage had ruffled many egos in the neighbourhood. Those were the days when the western aura had gripped the psyche of the rising middle class. The groom and his entourage were suffused with the smells which augured the affluence of foreign lands.Perhaps these were the dreams which Ruma's father harboured for his daughter or may be for himself.It was after her departure that put Neera in a daze.She still remembered the expression on her sister's face which was a mixture of fear ,confusion and deep sadness. She seemed to be in a daze.Her receding figure looked so diminutive and so frail.At that point of time Neera felt like pulling her towards her and run away.But then she looked at her father.He was flushed with deep excitement and awe.His newly stitched worsted suit sat so tightly on his body.His sparsely downy hair flew somewhat awkwardly but his glistening eyes showed absolute supplication to his resplendent groom who very gingerly held his bride alongside and was perfunctorily trying to wish goodbye to his new relatives.There was an imperceptible impatience to leave on his part.Neera saw two dew drops slid down the creamy soft cheeks of her sister. She once again wished to pull her away but the distance between them was intractable.On her way back she was unable to bear the excited blabber of her insensitive parents who seemed to have done their whole clan proud.




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