At around 4 AM, 81-year-old Venugopal woke up in shock with cold sweat. He had seen a dream and remembered it vividly. In that dream, he saw that he and his ailing wife Nalini were on a train journey. He didn’t quite remember where that journey started from. But he remembered that they were having … Read more
On a wet, gloomy, rainy morning, when the alarm rang, Supriya snoozed it again. She pulled the blanket over her ears. A few more snoozes followed. Her eyes sensed a streak of mild sunlight peeping into her bedroom from the window curtains. Though the sun was not seen, that small ray of light on the … Read more
At the red signal, with 76 seconds left for green, he felt someone touch his feet inside the auto rickshaw. He turned to look at his left. A girl in tattered rags, running nose and dishevelled hair stood there with a small board in her hand. It surprised him that she spoke in English. He … Read more
The morning sun reached the centre of the sky. Even in full brightness, Lakhinath Kaman looked like a ghost. He sat with a straight back on his second-hand two-wheeler. No beeps on his phone. Not a single phone call. No one thought of calling him. The only calls he received in the past week were … Read more
I see Ram Pyaare Yadav park his two-wheeler a few meters away from my shop. It is a three-wheeler actually, with brakes, gears, and the accelerator near his hand. There is a row of small chappal shops lining the lane at the end of which he parks it. Ram Pyaare Yadav doesn’t stop at any … Read more
It had been almost six months now that Kirthana had been bedridden. It had been six months since her husband Karthik had been her caregiver. “Another silent day, another silent night. What a useless life!” the thirty something Karthik said to himself. Kirthana tried to move her left hand and leg but her best efforts … Read more
They say that when someone goes out of your life, they go out of your memory. I will tell you that it is not true. I had convinced myself it was true, but it wasn’t. I can vouch for that. In that sense, my life has been a lie of some sort. The woman in … Read more
When she bent down to clean the floor beneath, her eyes were drawn towards that drawer again. The drawer was open when the bell rang. She knew what was inside it. She took a deep breath. “Shanthamma, give the keys to the driver,” she heard from the other room. She took the keys from the … Read more
Why did God give the human species the intelligence to invent the mobile phone? Sitting alone in a plush restaurant in despair, young Rakesh Oswal threw his phone away. Even in the AC of the restaurant, his forehead had a few drops of sweat. Lots of questions filled his tormented head. In a moment, he … Read more