Elation! That's what I felt. I clutched the novels, one from Alistair MacLean and another from Louis L'amour, as I left the library and started riding home on a rickety bicycle. The final exams were over. I could now look forward to six weeks of summer holidays before my junior year in high school commenced. I didn't have much to do but read, enjoy my solo rides out into the hot country and hang out with friends. I wasn't as given to spending a lot of time doing the latter. So I was spending a lot of time doing the other stuff.
That particular morning, I had found two of my favorite authors on the same day in the dusty chaos that was the little library in Narimedu! But before I reached home to devour my finds for the day, I had to make a stop at a friend's house in LIC Colony. After half an hour there, I was getting hungry for both food and literary content and so decided to leave. But rather than make my way back through Sellur, I decided to take a detour through Krishnapuram and then Reserve Lines (so called because that neighborhood housed quarters for the city's reserve police force).
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At the border, where I had to cross into Krishnapuram, there was a flat barren area littered with shrunken mesquite and what I think may have been giant milkweed. Some claimed that the milky sap of the latter was toxic. Anyway, it was an untouched piece of land in an otherwise intensely built neighborhood. Some of the plants were standing in black muddy spots with dragonflies buzzing about. It seemed I could make my way through the mesquite to get to the main road that ran along most of Krishnapuram. So rather than use a potholed, characterless street, I decided to go through the flatter terrain of the mesquite. Halfway in, my bicycle chain came undone. So I put the bicycle on its stand and set about putting the greasy chain back on its front sprocket. A fairly easy task. As I stood up and wiped my hands on a jutting branch of mesquite, I took in the scene around me.
There was an elderly man with a crudely made walking stick ambling along on the potholed street I had just avoided. A housewife, standing at the entrance to her house on the other side of that street, was haggling with a rural looking woman selling vegetables door-to-door. I could hear the ceaseless traffic noise of two-wheelers coming from the direction of Krishnapuram. Birds were chirping in a variety of trees -- banana and palm primarily -- surrounding the houses in the vicinity. An imperceptible aroma of Tulasi briefly permeated the air. And in the miserly shade provided by the mesquite and milkweed, a couple of stray dogs were resting and taking a nice respite from the slowly rising heat and humidity of the day. A white butterfly was wandering around aimlessly in the contrasty light. A scraggly looking donkey, with likely the same idea as the dogs, was slowly making its way into the mesquite. It saw me and stopped. I could see that it didn't want to go back into the streets filled with the infestation of humans and automobile dust. But it was also wary of me. Very wary. There was a battle-worn look about it from living off the streets and possibly putting up with local kids who no doubt pelted it with stones when they were of a mind to.
The sun beat down on me and sweat started trickling its way into the small of my back. I thought back to the recently concluded school year. It had been a difficult decision to make. To switch schools, I mean. I had had a great time at the school. All eight years of it. My friends attended that school and the campus itself was only a stone's throw away from my house. But I simply couldn't bear going through those Tamil grammar lessons anymore and if what I had heard was true, the experience would be even more painful during the last two years of school. And they offered French as an alternative in the new school. Well, maybe the decision was an easy one after all.
A distant rumble disturbed my thoughts. The dogs were on the alert with their ears pricked. The donkey was still there gazing at the ground, resigned to destiny. I pitied its situation and considered taking it home. Then I thought of the look on my mother's face and decided against it. What a life the poor animal must be having compared to my own carefree one. Now the skies were darkening. Where I lived, tropical thunderstorms came out of nowhere. As the air turned heavier and the dragonflies settled down, the mesquite and trees around me started to dance hesitantly to sharp gusts of wind. Dust was being kicked up in spurts. I mounted my bicycle and started furiously pedalling home still a good 2 KM away. As I reached the main road, I briefly glanced back. The donkey was meandering its way into the mesquite. A whole lot of good that was going to do in torrential rainfall. Then as I cycled past a workshop, the scene vanished from view.
"You abandoned me, Gopi! Et tu...you brute!"
My stomach was rumbling by the time I arrived at my house. With heavy clouds hovering over the city, the day had turned almost dark. Men and women, with the latter's saris billowing to a wind that was now blowing steadily, were hurrying along on the street. The guy who owned a tea shop at the corner of our street was quickly bringing in his benches. I put the bicycle in our verandah and breathed a collective sigh of relief and exertion as I reached for the books secured in the bike's rear rack. A few seconds later, the heavens opened.
