a ribbon of culture in a vessel of warm milk, unleashing
a streak of vendetta towards those who still had complete, intact, unbroken,
seemingly happy urban lives.
Why? It was because a part of me that
confronted my own loss prevented me from accepting this convivial logic of
abetting crimes before muting into a mutually beneficial existence. An
existence filled with happy families that turn away from the crimes of
compromised decision making that its bread winners fool that other world with,
the world of the lost and the broken, one I had become a part of.
Georgy’s phone buzzed silently, its screen
glowing with the Facebook profile picture of Fang Wei, which had been changed a
few months back, me being the conspicuous exclusion from it. In a measured
move, he turned the phone over and into silence, gently putting it face down on
the table between us. I am not sure if he saw I had noticed her appear on his
phone. I am not even sure if it was her, yet it was deeply wrenching for me to
witness my wife calling common friends, while choosing to stay cut-off from me.
Behind my back, they would discuss each pertinent thread of detail, vilifying
the core of this plot, me and my string of follies.
“Georgy, we have known each other for
years, I can’t do this mate, I can’t be the one who passes this audit,” I said,
again with forced calmness.
A calm, if it caps a volcano, is an
internal eruption one should mange well, venting slowly, till no pressure remains.
“You should think about this carefully, I
don’t think you understand the fall-out of your decision. Yes, we go back a
long time, and that is the reason why I think you should give it one long-hard
thought before you let me know how you want to move forward. Let us talk about
it tomorrow. I will hold people off till then; don’t worry about the deadlines
etc. at least not for a day. But, tomorrow let me know your final decision,” he
delivered his caveat with grace. To his credit, he remained business like right
till the end.
To him, I would have appeared slumped and
lowered, which I was, given how I felt - very close to giving up.
“Sure, I will see you tomorrow,” I got up
and left, not just the meeting room but the office itself, knowing that my
decision on this matter was far greater than the sitting at my desk, attending
to mundane office matters that an afternoon demands.
A hangover, I was certain, could not last
till this late in the afternoon. For I knew I had not had that much whisky on
the previous evening. I went straight to Dr. Tho, my physician, a specialist of
sports-medicine whom I had been seeing for years of niggles, picked in the
squash room now and then.
Neck pain, I believe, was right up his
alley.
“Doctor, it is my neck,” I burst into his
office, aware that he would do a quick consultation before sending me away for
a few scans, mostly x-rays, asking me to return in about thirty minutes with
the films, looking at which he would declare my prognosis.
After I suffered the humiliation of being
stripped, I was asked to first stand and then lie down in still-awkward
positions. The staff at the department of radiology was not rude; they were
simply clinical, offering neither sympathy nor tenderness, wanting to work
through patients without the build-up of a queue, working robotically till the
shift changed. I was sent back to Dr. Tho’s clinic, where I awaited news. I was
certain it would be the onset of spondylitis, or some such inflammation or
internal disfigurement needing prolonged treatment. Or, worse still, a cancer,
which had finally reached and invaded a sensitive portion of my body like the
nerves in my spine or the base of my brain, the medulla oblongata. A flash
recollection of anatomical nomenclature left me pondering the consequences of
diminished body function caused by paralysis.
“Your neck and your shoulders seem fine,”
Dr. Tho said, still looking at the film illuminated from the light coming
through his viewing
a streak of vendetta towards those who still had complete, intact, unbroken,
seemingly happy urban lives.
Why? It was because a part of me that
confronted my own loss prevented me from accepting this convivial logic of
abetting crimes before muting into a mutually beneficial existence. An
existence filled with happy families that turn away from the crimes of
compromised decision making that its bread winners fool that other world with,
the world of the lost and the broken, one I had become a part of.
Georgy’s phone buzzed silently, its screen
glowing with the Facebook profile picture of Fang Wei, which had been changed a
few months back, me being the conspicuous exclusion from it. In a measured
move, he turned the phone over and into silence, gently putting it face down on
the table between us. I am not sure if he saw I had noticed her appear on his
phone. I am not even sure if it was her, yet it was deeply wrenching for me to
witness my wife calling common friends, while choosing to stay cut-off from me.
Behind my back, they would discuss each pertinent thread of detail, vilifying
the core of this plot, me and my string of follies.
“Georgy, we have known each other for
years, I can’t do this mate, I can’t be the one who passes this audit,” I said,
again with forced calmness.
A calm, if it caps a volcano, is an
internal eruption one should mange well, venting slowly, till no pressure remains.
“You should think about this carefully, I
don’t think you understand the fall-out of your decision. Yes, we go back a
long time, and that is the reason why I think you should give it one long-hard
thought before you let me know how you want to move forward. Let us talk about
it tomorrow. I will hold people off till then; don’t worry about the deadlines
etc. at least not for a day. But, tomorrow let me know your final decision,” he
delivered his caveat with grace. To his credit, he remained business like right
till the end.
To him, I would have appeared slumped and
lowered, which I was, given how I felt - very close to giving up.
“Sure, I will see you tomorrow,” I got up
and left, not just the meeting room but the office itself, knowing that my
decision on this matter was far greater than the sitting at my desk, attending
to mundane office matters that an afternoon demands.
A hangover, I was certain, could not last
till this late in the afternoon. For I knew I had not had that much whisky on
the previous evening. I went straight to Dr. Tho, my physician, a specialist of
sports-medicine whom I had been seeing for years of niggles, picked in the
squash room now and then.
Neck pain, I believe, was right up his
alley.
“Doctor, it is my neck,” I burst into his
office, aware that he would do a quick consultation before sending me away for
a few scans, mostly x-rays, asking me to return in about thirty minutes with
the films, looking at which he would declare my prognosis.
After I suffered the humiliation of being
stripped, I was asked to first stand and then lie down in still-awkward
positions. The staff at the department of radiology was not rude; they were
simply clinical, offering neither sympathy nor tenderness, wanting to work
through patients without the build-up of a queue, working robotically till the
shift changed. I was sent back to Dr. Tho’s clinic, where I awaited news. I was
certain it would be the onset of spondylitis, or some such inflammation or
internal disfigurement needing prolonged treatment. Or, worse still, a cancer,
which had finally reached and invaded a sensitive portion of my body like the
nerves in my spine or the base of my brain, the medulla oblongata. A flash
recollection of anatomical nomenclature left me pondering the consequences of
diminished body function caused by paralysis.
“Your neck and your shoulders seem fine,”
Dr. Tho said, still looking at the film illuminated from the light coming
through his viewing
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