A Show on the Wheels

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The duo set out on their morning walk as planned the previous night. A mist veiled the landscape, creating an ethereal atmosphere, though the gentle breeze hinted it would soon dissipate. Aarohan, walking just a few steps behind, remained resolutely silent while Mayank waited for him to catch up. Perhaps Aarohan would narrate another dream, revealing pieces of his past. Yet Mayank was cautious; a vivid recollection of past misery through a dream could push his friend into a fresh paroxysm of agony. How could he prevent that eventuality?

However, the silence proved companionable, and as the duo kept walking, it was punctuated by the sound of Aarohan’s rubber flip-flops. Before long, the wearer of the onomatopoeic footwear began to discern its meaning.

‘Tell you what, I remember something,’ Aarohan broke his silence.

‘What? You finally remembered? And what did you remember, Aarohan?’ stuttered Mayank impatiently, expecting a lot from his friend’s upcoming disclosure.

‘I recalled a dream from my childhood,’ Aarohan shared. Mayank could not guess if it referred to a dream Aarohan had as a child or a dream about his childhood.

Without further ado, the dreamer began recounting the dream.

***      ***      ***      ***

Some memories, you know, refuse to dissolve. Given that damage has already occurred, how can we recreate the past and institute justice ex post facto? I wish I could do that!

Then, I was a thirteen-year-old rustic with little or no aplomb. Need I say in as many words that I wasn’t smart? Well, was there any need? My seniors used to select my books, the movies to watch, the games to play, and the boys to befriend. The list of dos and don’ts remained open-ended: don’t climb a sacred tree; swimming is patently sacrilegious; avoid handling musical instruments; and so forth. A child should not act like an adult, which was the rule. If a senior bothered to explain on a good day, he would say, ‘Hey! You poor thing! You ought to first learn and then apply a skill, right?’ That’s fine, but didn’t it contain an apparent contradiction? If one were not to start a trade without learning, how would he learn it without starting?

Not that I didn’t resent such a state of endless suppression, but my protests were neither well-timed nor socially correct, so they were sure to recoil with loads of punishments. Punishments? That’s right. They’re to have a cleansing effect as my perpetrators ever believed. They’re meant to temper my childish yearnings to learn, question, explore, amend, cherish, and choose.

Ok, no more waffles. Let me relate my dream first.

That day, I had reached the limits of my endurance. An instance of humiliating treatment at the hands of Mahajan, the moneylender, proved to be the proverbial last straw on a camel’s back. He demanded that I own up to stealing guava from his tree because he had once seen me climbing a banyan tree on the embankment. That was his unassailable proof—as if I had plucked guava from a banyan tree, Mahajan’s magical banyan tree!

Then he slapped me—not to recover his imaginary loss, but to assert his authority as the community’s self-appointed disciplinarian. ‘A guilty child should receive a thrashing—the severer, the better,’ he would have pontificated had a bystander offered even a gesture of sympathy. But alas, there was none to come to my rescue. A second wave of abuse followed before I could even begin to dismiss the excess. This time, my music teacher took his turn, showering me with verbal abuse in his piercing nasal tone. Hold it! Now it was my father’s turn to enter the scene—not with any empty package of comfort, but to deliver the final blow: a wild, unrelenting thrashing.

Despite his insensitiveness, I was ready to excuse my father because he was indebted to the usurer for all I knew. In that case, who was not? The music teacher with a gleaming scalp, the headmaster with his ruler sticks and dangling specs, the pigtailed priest, the slovenly quack with his shoulder bag—all used to worry about their unpaid loans and the ever-burgeoning interest. Therefore, money was the answer; it stood between me and my father’s love. A few thousand was enough to liquidate his liability.

Thus, I made up my mind what I must do. I must leave home to earn money and return with wads to dare the lousy usurer. ‘Take your blessed money and leave us alone,’ I thought aloud. It was possible. There must be a place on earth, a town abounding with employment for sincere people. I would be honest and hardworking, and I would stand out!

The nightlong self-encouragement prepared me for the big job ahead. I was eager; ‘come what may’ was my mantra. I should perform with finesse in the first job of my life, so I would have no regrets later.

It was well before the first flush of the morning on the eastern horizon. Waking up before anyone else in the house, I left with a small bag containing three stale chapatis and a few jaggery chips. I met none except the rising sun on my way. So, the departure was well-timed, ensuring that my exit remained a secret. The morning dew soaked my feet as I walked, and my rubber flip-flops splattered the wet dust up to my knickers. I concentrated on my footfalls even as my footwear gave out a series of monotonous taps, as you hear them now. Thinking about what lay ahead, I ignored the sound. A chill was in the air, and I took long, determined strides.

Thus, the runaway I left home resolved to return soon with a bagful of money so I would avenge myself on the moneylender. How my mother had been spending sleepless nights praying to God! Once, I begged her to tell me the reason for her insomnia. She confided in me: our mortgaged homestead was at the mercy of the moneylender. Poor Ma! She deserved a good night’s sleep after a hard day’s labour.

The first bus on the route arrived on time, and I got on. I had just enough money to buy a ticket to Tatanagar, the steel town that promised employment.

Covering a ten-hour journey would take the better part of the day. The road had its bumps, but greenery lined the way. Those who looked out of the windows and breathed in the intimate sylvan fragrance didn’t mind the rough ride. As for me, I had never ventured farther than my district headquarters, barely thirty kilometres from my village. This was a brand-new experience—the earth I knew expanded, growing grander and lovelier than I could have imagined, staying in the hamlet under the constant threat of eviction. A feeling of belonging soon overcame me, easing my sense of uncertainty. Even then, I wondered what I would do upon arriving in Tatanagar, where I had no one to shelter me. ‘I’ll just squat on the railway platform,’ I thought, gaining an instant sense of confidence. In the face of uncertainties, adopting a carefree approach seemed best—a realisation that struck me profoundly.

It was about noontime when our bus halted for lunch. The place had a few roadside eateries. A little ahead, many lofty silk-cotton trees with buttressed trunks were standing in a row on either side of the road. I remember the red texture of its soil, very different from the earth that shaped my village. And I remember how a breeze wafting across the coppices of ipomoeas brought a heady scent.

‘Those who want to take lunch come out or else stay inside. I’ll lock the bus from outside,’ announced the doorkeeper. It was his security drill, a must to prevent possible theft.

All but me elected to leave. I needed money to venture out and order food in the eatery. Rustling my bag from outside, I ensured the chapatis and jaggery had remained the same! The vagrant in me could disappear from home, but not the chapatis inside my bag!

Seeing me stuck to my seat, the doorkeeper felt slightly foxed. ‘Won’t you take your lunch?’ he shot the question at me. ‘No, I won’t,’ I replied.

‘Fine, as you wish,’ the doorkeeper said, slamming the door, locking it, and leaving. I looked at his speeding steps. Maybe he was hungry. My stomach rumbled as I tried to gauge his hunger.

My chapatis would last at least two days if I could ration them judiciously. Otherwise, they would not be edible for much longer.

The bus halted for a little over half an hour. The driver returned and had to hoot the horn twice to hurry up the passengers. A couple of waffling women were among the last to enter. Everybody had a contented face. The eatery must be a place worth visiting, I concluded wistfully.

‘My ring, oh God, where’s my gold ring?’ grumbled the lady sitting beside me across the aisle. The bus was about to rev.

The man who accompanied her—he could be her husband or somebody as docile—stood up from his seat with a jerk. Finding a small object, like a dropped ring, amid their baggage jamming the leg space was challenging, yet the faithful chaperon knelt and groped around. But, alas, his efforts were in vain.

‘Where did you lose it?’ the man enquired.

‘Not that I know of,’ she said tentatively and looked at me. ‘Have you seen my gold ring? You’re in the coach while we all went out, right?’

I could easily sense that she had pointed her accusing finger at me. So indignantly, I replied, ‘Nope! How do I know where you lost your gold ring?’

‘You only stayed here when we all went outside, didn’t you?’ alleged the man.

Shocked, my facial muscles twitched. I couldn’t explain to myself why people took pleasure in blaming me. Only yesterday, the mahajan of my village accused me of stealing guava. Now, at a new location, a man unreasonably devoted to his lady baselessly suspected me of taking his lady’s gold ring!

‘So? Didn’t the doorkeeper lock the bus from outside? How can you forget that?’ I countered him.

‘Then show me your bag. I’ll check it,’ the man demanded.

‘My bag? Why should I show my bag to you, mister? Will you ask everybody here to do the same because you lost your blessed gold ring?’ I maintained my bold front as I retorted.

By now, others had joined him. What was it about this man that attracted friends to his cause? I wondered. Perhaps his affluence drew in those who saw an opportunity—an advantage that had even taught his lady to lose a gold ring without a second thought. I felt a scream building up inside me, but my poise had long since faltered.

Someone lunged at me, eager to be the first to apprehend the “thief.” I clung to my bag, unwilling to let go. If they opened it, they might discover I was a runaway, interrogate me, confirm their suspicions, and ultimately send me back. How would I earn piles of money to make my mother happy?

I held onto my bag, shielding it from the prying pack of self-appointed enforcers. Yet, they insisted on searching its contents, all the while escalating their verbal abuse. ‘He seems to be a seasoned thief; don’t let him off. He’s a dacoit in the making!’

The mob of passengers dragged me out of the bus. I leapt and covered the bag with my body. Before long, I was on the ground, lying flat on my belly. People started kicking my back. The first kick was by someone with equestrian nails on his heels, followed by another whose stiletto hit my shoulder. So, a woman joined them, too. Someone tried to lift me from the ground, taking my ears, but failed, and then another grasped my hair as if they were the two weightlifters, practising their jerk in turn!

I was pathetically powerless against a determined mob. No wonder my bag went out of my possession in minutes. Then someone upended it, and my invaluable chapatis bounced on the ground. They were already hard but remarkably in shape as they touched the soil. Aha! Their musty fragrance! Had I not stolen them from our kitchen, they would have fed my family at noontime. Oh no! They must be starving now. Before my eyes, someone pitilessly trampled the chips of jaggery, which were the last to fall out of the bag. I wistfully looked at them.

However, they did not get the gold ring.

The mob was not without wit. It had the cheek to cover up its unabashed persecution.

‘The rogue has hidden the ring inside? So, don’t allow him inside,’ suggested one.

It was the exciting denouement of the drama enacted on the road. Should I call it a roadshow, a street performance, or an improv theatre? There was no rehearsal nor back-of-the-screen promptings. Even the bus conductor’s silence was unscripted, bespeaking his concurrence. He had little to lose, for I had already paid him the fare. Hence, they left me there to salvage my chapatis and the chips of jaggery that lay trampled out of shape.

***      ***      ***      ***

Aarohan concluded and fell silent, his eyes tear-filled. A puzzled Mayank noted his friend’s real-life sulking over his in-dream persecution. Were the dream images following him to his conscious state? Was it a case of oneirophrenia?

‘What’s this, Aarohan? You crying?’ asked Mayank.

Aarohan did not reply. Perhaps his words could not struggle through the tangle of sobs. By now, he had chosen a wayside rock to sit on. He sat there for a few minutes, silent and pensive. Then he stood up to resume his walk. He was out of his emotional spike.

Mayank was not sure how to react. All that Aarohan claimed to be his own childhood experience was not true. Mayank knew his friend’s family possessed bungalows, vehicles, and gold ornaments. Even they had a ferocious dog as big as a year-old calf! Once, Mayank had wrestled with Aarohan, and he remembered the strength of the latter’s gold chain. It was even sturdier than the stay-wires of an electricity pole! So, why should they borrow? At Visakhapatnam, they had sufficient urban lands worth hundreds of millions. So, how could Mayank take him to be a poor boy who endured exploitation by moneylenders?

As for Aarohan’s upbringing, Mayank knew Captain Brijbhan Dev as a sedulous father and a liberal soul. Save for the instances of sternness that he adopted to wean his son away from bedwetting, he was, by and large, a loving father. He had nurtured the only ambition to make his son an IAS officer. Otherwise, Aarohan was the only child, the natural claimant to all his parental love and affection.

However, Mayank had seen hardships. His mother, Shalini, and his father, Shrikant, broke up when he was a child. Then, he and his mother left home in Berhampur for Visakhapatnam to live with his maternal uncle Sudarshan. He was admitted to a school with English as the medium of instruction. The school admitted him not to class two, where he was studying in his old place, but to class one, where he was taught alphabet lessons. Aarohan became his fast friend there, and Mayank remembered sharing his grief stories with his new friend. However, it was not to the extent Aarohan related to now. Despite not being rich, Uncle Sudarshan had been remarkably generous to Mayank. He got poorer by the year yet toiled hard to give the best to his nephew. He even neglected to educate his two daughters in the process adequately. Sometimes, Mayank would consider dropping out of school to earn and help his uncle financially. Once, when he broached the topic, it came as a shock to Sudarshan. He cursed himself for his inability to meet his nephew’s expectations. That event in Mayank’s life rather matched Aarohan’s in-dream resolve to seek a job in Tatanagar. But how his co-passengers treated him was not Mayank’s story—the latter had never fled his uncle’s house!

Despite all these, Mayank feared confronting his friend with the dream-reality dichotomy. Just a while ago, he saw how Aarohan was in tears; it meant the narratives had a grip on the narrator. But, by no stretch of the imagination, his was an attempt to shed crocodile tears!

Mayank changed the topic.

‘I was wondering, Aarohan, if you remember Visakhapatnam. Do you?’

Aarohan would not mind if one addressed him as such; he was not ready to face the following quiz—Well, if you’re not Aarohan, who are you?

‘Remembering Visakhapatnam? Nope. Hopefully, a Visakhapatnam dream will pass me by tonight,’ replied Aarohan while a sigh escaped him.

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By

Ananta Narayan Nanda

Bhubaneswar: : 3/8/2026

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