Torment: Short Story

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 of customers or employers. That too few and far between. That too when they wanted something.

He had no one of his own who called him now. He sat gazing in the blank space in front of him, at nowhere in particular. Sweat dropped from his forehead on his shirt till his shirt was wet, but he didn’t notice. When a rare breeze blew, dust on the road covered his face. He sat as motionless as a live man could. What he looked like or smelt like didn’t matter. Nothing mattered anymore.

The concrete jungle in front of him went about life unchanged. Tall buildings. Cars zooming around. People walking in a hurry, always. Trains and stations always overflowing. Buses filled to the brim.

He had no choice but to go with that flow. A living had to be made. The city made it possible. If not for anything else, then for the food to keep him alive and breathing, he had to work. He wondered in the past one week though, whether even his own breathing mattered anymore.

There had been no orders since morning. His phone beeped and he knew what it was. It was just past noon. Time for the lunch orders to start coming in.

He opened the app on his phone as if by habit. “Just Delicious” was the name of the pickup. An order of parathas and dal with some rice. He moved his tongue over his dry lips and then over the sides of his cheeks inside, and he gulped the saliva when his mouth watered. Lunch orders did this to him. He never had breakfast. Now he didn’t care for breakfast anymore, especially since the past week.

The pickup point was two kilometres away. Ten minutes in this traffic. He kicked his two-wheeler to life. There was no other option. The city was the source of his livelihood. There was nothing to go back to his far-off, remote village to. There was no one to go back to.

He had to reach the pickup point on time. It affected his ratings and his pay.

“Just Delicious” was a small place. Three or four tables. Ten chairs. All empty. Couple of people in the kitchen. No one came there for lunch. It was all delivery nowadays. One man at the counter.

He was, by now, a familiar face. Lakhinath came there every other day for some pickup order.

“Order #2210,” Lakhinath said, without any expression, and showed him the order from his app.

“Paratha Dal order ready?” the man at the counter with a familiar smile shouted at his kitchen.

“Five minutes,” a voice from the kitchen howled. The man signalled Lakhinath to wait. He moved on to the next order he had received. A couple of other delivery boys were waiting for pickup. They were busy on their mobile phones. No one noticed Lakhinath.

After a couple of minutes, Lakhinath looked at the man at the counter. “Sir.. my.. umm.. younger.. .”

“What happened to the Paneer Butter Masala and Naan order? #2207?” the man howled.

“Yes, what.. happened?” he then turned to Lakhinath.

He hesitatingly continued. “Sir, my.. “

“Yes, your younger brother?”

“Sir, my younger brother died last week.”

The man at the counter turned his face towards Lakhinath, but only slightly. “Add one Lassi to #2209,” he yelled. “Oh.. Sorry to hear. How?”

“Sir.. I don’t know. He had fever for three or four days. They took him to hospital. He died there.”

“I see… Well, nowadays one can’t say anything about life.”

“Yes, Sir. God’s will.”

“Right. You should take care of yourself.”

Lakhinath stared at the man in silence. A waiter barged in and said, “Ok, here is Order #2210.”

The man handed over the parcel to Lakhinath, who picked it up and waited to see if the man asked him anything else. He didn’t. Lakhinath walked out of “Just Delicious” with drooping shoulders. His gait was listless. Small steps followed by long steps.

He checked his phone for the delivery point of the parcel. He sat on his bike and rode away.

The address was familiar. He knew the apartment. He had been there many times for food delivery. He knew the blocks inside the apartment too. This one was at the far-right corner from the main gate. The security would stop him and enter his name and mobile on their app and let him in.

Everything has to have a record, nowadays. He knew everything, the works.

But he still called the customer from his bike.

“Sir, I am bringing your parcel,” he said to the man who picked up the phone. “Parathas, Dal, Rice.”

“Yes, I can see that in the app. Do you know the address?”

“No Sir, where is it?”

“Take right after Raghavendra Swami Temple and the apartment is in the lane on the third left after that. B block, 3rd floor, 304. Follow Maps. Come fast.”

“Ok Sir.. I will.. I am..,“ Lakhinath started but the man at the other end had hung up.

Lakhinath desperately wanted to talk to someone. For three days, he had tried.

He wanted to tell someone what happened to his younger brother.

How his brother suddenly took ill last week. How his fever did not subside. How Lakhinath had no one else in the world to call his own now.

How his villagers took his brother to the closest doctor six km away. How his younger brother could not be saved. How his younger brother was the only one Lakhinath had in this world after their parents died ten years back.

How he could not even go for his brother’s funeral. How he saw his cremation done by his village friend on video call. How God had made a mistake by leaving the elder brother alive and taking the wrong, younger brother.

He wanted to talk about all of it. But no one asked. Or listened. No one noticed.

Lakhinath slowed down his bike. He could have easily passed the signal, but he halted even when it was still amber. Another biker zoomed past him and abused him turning back on the way for stopping even when the signal wasn’t red.

A car came from behind and stopped next to him. Lakhinath peeped inside the window. The man at the wheel gave him an awkward smile. The woman next to him rolled up the window. Lakhinath heard the couple say out some abuses, addressed to him.

Lakhinath looked at the traffic constable and turned to him to tell him how his younger brother died. But the signal turned green, and the constable waved to him to move ahead fast.

When he reached the flat for delivery, a woman opened the door and a man followed her.

“Must be the food delivery guy,” he shouted.

“Yes, Sir… Madam, your parcel,” Lakhinath said and waited for a few uneasy seconds.

The woman went inside but didn’t close the door.

“He is waiting for a tip,” Lakhinath heard her whisper to the man. The man came to the door.

“Thank you,” he said and pushed his hand forward to give Lakhinath a crisp note.

“Thank you Sir. But Sir, my younger brother…umm.. he died last week.”

The man’s expression changed from a smile to that of disbelief.

“Oh.. is it? So sorry to know,” the man said, standing at the door.

“Yes, Sir, he was four years younger to me.”

“I see. Everyone has to go from this world. But this is so sad.”

“Yes, Sir. God’s will.”

“Are you married?”

“No Sir.”

The man went inside and got some food in a paper plate.

“You can have this.”

“Ok Sir. Thank you.”

“I have to run into a meeting now. Take care.”

The man closed the door and Lakhinath took the stairs to climb down the three floors listlessly carrying the food plate. He gazed at the people walking in and out of the gate.

Every time he saw someone walk past him, he thought he will talk. But no one talked.

Can I not find a single person among the thousands here who will hear my tale of torment? The unnamed crowd flitted by, busy in their own world or maybe not that busy, but still paying no heed to him and his sorrow. If his sorrow were to break out of his heart, it would drown the entire city. But still he had no choice but to keep it locked inside his tiny heart.

He finally gave up on people. It was no use talking to anyone. They may take me for a madman. He shook his head in disdain. But the torment in his heart did not subside.

He stepped out with the plate of food. He walked outside the apartment gate.

A stray dog saw him come out with the food. The dog followed Lakhinath while he walked towards his parked two-wheeler. Lakhinath showed him the plate and the dog licked his hand.

“Are you hungry?” he asked the dog. The dog wagged his tail. “Come with me,” Lakhinath said.

Lakhinath walked away from his parked vehicle with the dog following him.

“My younger brother.. err.. you know.. the only one of my own I had in this world.. umm.. you know.. err.. he suddenly died last week,” Lakhinath said. “Take this, eat this,” he said and held his hand in front of the dog. The dog looked up to Lakhinath, licked his hand again, wagged his tail even more, and munched into the food plate.

Lakhinath put his hand on the dog’s head and sat on the ground next to him.

“He had fever for three days and .. umm.. died suddenly in the hospital. It was all very sudden. I couldn’t even go for his funeral…My friend in the village – he.. umm.. cremated him,” Lakhinath said and broke down. The tears that he had held back within broke the dam and flowed like a river.

“If you had a dog brother in your village, how would you feel if he left you all of a sudden? What if you had no chance to say goodbye? Wouldn’t you be sad? Wouldn’t you want to talk about him?” Lakhinath whimpered, with a choked voice.

The dog kept listening while munching the food and occasionally nodded and licked and breathed on Lakhinath’s hand. Lakhinath spoke his heart out. He told him everything about his younger brother.

***

This story was first published in the October 2021 issue of Misery Tourism. You can read it here.