Layers

A CROSSOVER


On the other side was just darkness and a buzz!!
Everything was slow and only spoke in a hush
I crawled back into my bed but couldn't sleep. Something told me I was in pain and the crossover was over, and I recorded every moment of it in my head. This i would never forget
I crawled out of my bed, fumbled into a drawer somewhere, I do not remember anymore which one, checked the foil under the light of my mobile phone and put two tablets in my mouth. I didn't need water. only when I swallowed i realised I had been screaming with all my strength.
I did not need anything anymore. I did not know if i would wake up the next morning, and with those tablets in me chances were less that this time I would even be able to scream for help.
someone did come into my room again, very close to me, to touch me and check something. I wasn't asleep still,pretending to be asleep was very difficult. my breath was in paranoia.my mind was numb and I was feeling deaf.
only the next day would tell me that everything that I was feeling had become real, that I breath like I had been running from an unseen fear, that fear had sprouted in my mind with its roots deep and that I was now really partially deaf.

Darkness seems to have followed the memories a long way.
Almost everything i can recollect is either just the feeling of it or the fluctuating shadows under the dim yellow street lights of some city.

GRUDGE

Academic year 1989-1990

I realise my name has been announced from the stage. My classmates, the ones behind me start pushing for me to move and the ones ahead turn around and start calling my name in random turns.
I walk through the rows of tall girls watching me and reach the stage, still unable to register that it was really me who was walking up there. I avoid looking at anyone. Someone was handing me some kind of a colourful packet. I vaguely remember what the assembly looks like when you are on the stage, embarrassed of many eyes just following me.
I had walked back slowly into the respective line, meanwhile other names were being called. I was comfortable feeling short again among the taller girls and their attention now more on what I was carrying back in my hand.

When I got back home and told ma about it, I still was yet to believe it happened to me. Ma listened, asked me to use the packet well and carefully and then went back to her cooking. I don't remember what was baba's reaction
no one ever spoke about it anymore, at least I do not remember about being spoken of. Nor did i ever again take part in any other competition.

That was about winning the Camel All India painting competition first prize in the respective age group.

THE OTHER SIDE


This other side is not a stranger
Its like walking along the other bank of the same river. Everything is familiar but not same at all.
You know the waves, the colour and shape of them but familiar faces on the other side are now blurred dots. The colour of soil is different with some familiar hues in the rocks washed over from the other side. Unknown trees, with a familiar green and the same friendly shade. The same birds...perhaps they have forgotten where they actually belong too, may be they are in love with both sides and are happy with their lost identities, they are happy as long as the river keeps them together.
And I
Am i still the same or have I changed?
At 30 im feeling a like a 14 year old, all feelings mixed up. i dont really know where I belong. Should I have better in life to fit in where I am, or have had remained unknown to it.
Should I call myself ignorant, or just a skillful labourer
Why is the feeling- that I have lost too much time, have paid attention to the wrong things in life for a very long time not letting me live with easy dreams.
Do I bother or I dont... confusion seems to have stayed in the shallow layers of my life.

Who cares as long the river keeps everything together.