"Blues"- Part 1

(diving board: blue is a color which signifies contemplation.. everyone of us must have gone thru a situation where we we try to concentrate hard on our studies durin night but we can't.. we keep imaginin abt things all around the world.. finally we give up and nvr realise when did we fall asleep.. blues is abt the same experience..the people and incidences in blues 2 are very much based on my life.. )

It was dark, way past midnight, July, monsoon and Mumbai. Rain was resting on lazy clouds since sunset. An open book lay in front of him. Thick. He was getting noseful from the new, glossy pages now appearing yellow from the dim bulb of the lamp placed just besides the table. The lamp had light yellow ochre fabric on its frame. Blacks on white. That’s how the book seemed to him. Thoughtless, his mind wandered through blacks on the book trying to make any sense out of it with half-asleep, half awake mind. Dissatisfied with his efforts, “That’s enough for today”, he said to himself, in spite of knowing it was important. The strong caffeine shot he took around midnight finally gave up fighting with his dozy brain after a long fight of two and a half hours.

The table was disarranged with other few books and loose sheets of paper. It was the only corner of the room which was visible. The glamour doll on the cover of the latest fashion magazine reached out for him. She had viciously inviting smile. With outstretched arms she whispered audibly, “I am ready”. “Shut up! Not tonight”. The loose sheets of paper often got disturbed and suddenly woke up with rustling sound to express their displeasure. They swayed with the soft, wet wind flowing elegantly from the open window; again falling asleep on its gentle arms. On one occasion the only blue Addgel pen which was acting like a paperweight, rolled down the table and on the floor it fell. Ball point first, rendering it useless for further use. Lips curled, for he had an excuse. Now his brain retreated and his mind had won.

It was its fourth consecutive win. Incidentally it was his fourth night trying to decode the blacks on the whites. This time the wind brought with itself a tremendous amount of refreshing energy. “Why coffee?” he asked. “Tomorrow I should try studying sitting on the window, hanging my legs from balcony like neighbor's laundry”. The wind powered his mind with mysterious energy. All the minuscule pores of his skin opened to assimilate that energy. He could never fathom how to dub this mental and physical state of body in which body is lethargic, brain is half asleep, but mind is dead awake.

At that moment, the wind gushed in with screechy swing of window making highway for it to go in and kick those loose papers and ruffle his hair. The ochre lamp raised its eyebrows, this unexpected chill from wind distrubed it. The screechy sound of window pierced the dominant silence and announced the arrival of rain. His torpid eyes twinkled. There was a sudden flash of blue light and one big explosion shook the table. Only one. He saw a small white light circling the black sky. In fact there were several of those lights rotating around each other and they were blue. Getting bigger and bigger with each millisecond, they approached his window. He took a step back. Before he could figure out what it was, the blue lights had struck his floor. The blue smoke from fallen lights swallowed him. He was subconscious.

Intoxicated, he felt a deep urge to throw himself out of his window. He obeyed it like a disciplined kid. It was a long fall. He fell head first in a deep blue sea. He was sinking deep. It was immeasurably deep. Throwing his arms and legs, he made futile attempts to stop himself. Water bubbles were rising over his head. But, he wasn’t scared. It was not the first time he had submitted himself to the vastness of the deep blue sea. He did not bother to look around. He knew there is no one except him. His right leg bent from knee and he opened his arms, as if willing to accept whatever the blue throws at him...