It was some time past two in night and the flyover over the Chikroli slum was deserted. A Mercedes sped from under the street lights that were otherwise only giving light to the insects who had gathered around each one of them. The driver could see a woman sitting on the roadside and as the car approached her she stood up and indicated it to stop. The car stopped and the skimpily clad woman went up to the driver’s window and waited for it to open and as soon as it opened she said, “Two thousand for routine and if you want me to…”. “Shut up and get in.”, the man interrupted her in a very heavy voice. He had eyes deep red with insomnia and drinking and he smelt of burnt tobacco and alcohol. The lady got in and the car sped again.
The man said nothing. He was around fifty or fifty five, tall and looked very strong. The woman, who was around thirty, too kept quiet. It was only after fifteen minutes had passed that she asked, ”where are you taking me?” and on receiving no answer, said, almost to herself, ”I hope you are not a cop”.
The car stopped at a beach. It was a very secluded beach, very calm and tranquil. City lights couldn’t even be seen. A big silver moon hung at the horizon over the roaring waves and a cool breeze was blowing. The man got out, took out a bottle of whisky from the rear seat and went on till the water and lit a cigarette while sitting down. The woman got out and stood by the car confused for some time, while the man sat drinking and smoking and looking into infinity. Then she went upto him, sat down on her knees and started massaging his back. He turned around her and slapped her so that she fell down and then enraged, asked him, “are you going to do anything or not?” . He looked at her, with eyes all filled with anger, and then looked away again. She gathered herself and sat down a few steps away from him. After some more silence, the man, without looking at her, asked, “why did you become a prostitute?”.
“Are you some journalist? ”
“Can we just talk?”
“Would you pay me?”
“Yes, I would.”, and then with a deep inhale of smoke,” why did you become a prostitute?”
“I was raped by a college mate during riots. I am a Hindu and he was a Muslim. I guess a very religious person. He did it for his religion. Nothing personal”, she smiled a sarcastic smile. “My parents married me off to a sympathetic Hindu who came forward for help just after the riots and he brought me here and put me into public service.”, she said finding some humor in her own suffering. He turned around and looked at her. This was the first time he actually looked at her. And then he again looked away and silence ensued. Her face turned pale with the old memories coming back and the humor dying away. She was too lost into infinity when his heavy voice brought her back. “Look at these hands. I murdered my own son with these hands. He had turned twenty three this month. He was so beautiful, so handsome, so young… I am a very bad man.”
“Oh! my God. Why would you do that?”
“Have you heard about Syed Husain. “.
“That underworld…”. “Yes, I am that same don. I had given him everything. He was my favorite son. I had so many plans for his future. I do not remember having not given him even one thing that he either needed or wanted. But he in someway or the other found reasons to hate me. He would go against my will in every possible way. I kept forgiving him and tried my best to bring him back to love me again. But he would never come back. The more I tried, the more he went away from me. And then one day he gave out information that resulted in death of five of my people. I had to do justice. I myself shot him in his head. I could see fear in those eyes and still I shot him. Oh! how could I?”, and he was on brink of breaking down when he stopped his narrative and drank some more whisky.
“It must be difficult to act God.”, the woman said.
“What! You think I was acting God.”.
“Well you had to do the justice, however it may hurt yourself. That’s what God does every time. Caring for his own sons and getting stabbed by them. Listening to their constant nagging and still loving them in spite of receiving nothing but selfish requests daily and being blamed for every mishap in their lives.”
“What a learned whore you are. You have nothing against God?”
“We all have something against God”, she said embarrassed, “but we all have more things to be thankful for.”
There was silence again and waves overlapped in the sea just like thoughts overlapped in mind and they both made uncomforting noises.
“I slit a boy’s throat when I was fifteen. He had called my mother Sheikh’s whore. What else was I supposed to do?” Syed broke the silence,” My father never married my mother. He went to Saudi and she never saw him again. My mother faced constant abuse but she never said anything. She could have remarried but she did not, only for me. After that I too ran away to Middle East as I had no other option. When I came back after seven years my mother was dead. I hated my father, whoever he was, but I loved my mother and I was earning money and having fun when she was facing all troubles here. She died because of me. I did not even see her funeral. I have no idea whether she was buried or crows and vultures ate her up.”, he could hardly complete those sentences when he gave in and started crying loudly. “I have piled up wealth but I am left with nobody to love. All I have is a paid prostitute to listen to my woes. Where is my God? Why is he not here? Why did he do this to me”, he said all of this crying and screaming heavily.
“I can assure you that what you are left with is not just a paid prostitute and its certainly not God who is responsible for what you are today. He has to do justice and who knows it better than you?”, the paid prostitute said.
After long silence and in the faintly rising twilight the man said, “Will He ever forgive me? I hurt everyone who loved me. I never believed in God. I knew that He existed but that was only a theoretical notion. It’s only now that I realize how much I fear Him.”
“When I was young girl my uncle told me that there are people around, who are not people but God himself who lives life like any other human and He comes and talks to you. And if you are truly repentant for what you have done He forgives you for all that you have done and lets you live your life all over again. This was the reason, he said, why we feel sometimes that all that is going on has already happened sometime in past because we have actually lived all that in past.” the woman consoled him.
“You don’t believe that. Do you? You think God would ever forgive me for all that I have done? When will I meet my God?”, he said each question with a pause, before and after.
“Maybe you are already meeting him. Maybe I am your God”, she said smiling.
“You are a prostitute. Are you not ashamed to even hope to be God?” Syed said. Though he was hypnotized by the possibility, yet he knew it was a joke.
“What difference does that make to God? I sell my body for money but I am better than those selling there souls. If he has to come he’ll get down here in anybody’s form. ” and then with a pause and with playful expressions, “Tell me where you want me to send you?”. Syed, participating in the comforting little game, thought for a while and said in his drunk heavy voice,” take me into my mothers lap.”
She held his head and put it gently in her lap. He, comforted by the serene surroundings and the tenderness of her hand, closed his eyes.
And then he got up with anger and slapped her so badly that she began to bleed. He took out money and threw at her and shouted “you are not my mother. You are a whore. How dare you! You are not my mother.”, saying this he went to his car and fainted there.
Next when he woke up he could hardly open his eyes. Sun was so bright upon him. He was sleeping on the same beach. He was ten years old now. His head was rested in his mothers lap who was young and beautiful. “Did you fall asleep? Get up we have to go back home.”, she said in her honey voice. He got up, and as he dusted sand off his pants he felt that all that had happened before. Any how, he just held his mother’s finger and walked back home alongside her.
