Category: The Black Curtain series

They chomped out of the wash basin….probably that’s the best way to define it.

Out there stood a guy, tall, well built, looked like a bull with great strength, only short of a matador to send it to slaughter house. Well, it might be the that the bull sends the matador to the slaughterhouse instead, the strength oozed from his eyes.

“Doped?” I whispered.

Rocky nodded, “seems like.”

“Well, Mushy this is a small team here….” Marco was interrupted as he flipped through his tablet.

“Ms. Reasha Markonikoff alias Reasha Romanikoff, Julius Rocky Sengengwe and Martin Andrew Jones.”

“Wow! You impress me all the time.” Marco clapped as I stood wondering if he knew my whole story.

We passed through his surveillance monitor and once on the other side, walking through the barbed electrified fenced tracks, I asked Marco.

“How much does he know?”

“Nothing more than ten years of your life. The world had no cameras & no hidden sound recorders, no mobiles, no spies working for their own countries behind lay men then remember.” Marco whispered.

“Rocky, you move ahead of us.” I instructed.

“Reasha can you please remember I am Martin, instead of the usual names you keep calling me. It’s slightly embarrassing.” Martin beseeched. I understood it from his tone since being shorter than him with the globe sitting tight on my head and his, I could not see more than his eyes which were now smaller with pleading.

“Okay. I will remember.”

“Where are we heading? It seems to be an unending barbed fence.” Far down, a tiny dot was now visible and it seemed like a man.

“Over there, our tryst ends.” Marco pointed out with his fingers.

Cameras lined up the whole wall through tiny holes which walked with us as we moved.

I walked past each imagining how we looked in those cameras.

“Don’t worry, they are mute. Only your moves are studied. Unless the siege is broken. They don’t talk. There are no thought readers though, but once you are in, make sure you know what you think.” Marco blabbered.

“Boss, I am turning blank and Martin turns his thoughts manipulative, is that fine?”

“Fine. These very garments might be recording us, relax.” I pointed out.

“Hello! What brings you here Lucas? We are though always pleased to have you and your friends.” The man was ordinarily lean, his specks spoke how less he could probably see far or near, whatever.

“This is Jerome. He is in charge of what belongs to you.” Marco’s second name was Lucas.

“This is Ms.Reasha. Oh! My Jesus, I am so glad to meet you.” Without a word he flanked my arm and shook it longer than I have ever imagined anyone could probably shook those firm hands.

“What belongs to you Boss?”

“I am yet to find out…..we don’t know what Marco thinks and talks.”

“Why? Is he insane or something? In that case are we in the right place?” Martin looked around, there was no escape. It was as high as probably a hundred storey building, remodelled probably coz a hangar is usually lower. We all had started whispering our thoughts.

“No, coz he does poetry and no one really can guess a poet’s thoughts. It might be one at a point antagonising it in the next. Precisely thought readers and lie detectors don’t do much well with such people. An innocent may think like a criminal for his poetry and prose and vice verse.”

Martin gulped down, the shrill tone at the end of each statement died for him. His voice became more base.

“What is this place? Where are we?”

The boys were hesitant to enter the ward, as Marco called it. We were supposed to wear our dresses, nothing but temperature regulators, sort of to be able to regulate it.

“Come on, wear the suits, I need to show you something.

Show you something,

Endow you with a gift,

Take it, coz I won’t keep it.

It is not my kind of wit.

Please, please do hurry up.”

“If this is some sort of trick then know one thing come what may, I will not leave you.”

“Oooo…you are warning me….!!!! chill, relax girl…..I won’t run away. You can keep your eyes back in the socket.”

“Wear it boys.” The heart could not believe what it saw.

“Well, trust is very important, even when you know you would be duped or dumped. It tells you one thing very precious and what is it?” He shouted out from his cabinet. There was a flush as I entered it, some mud like black sticky paste dropped on me as soon as I had left my clothes in the bin. It was hot, then some rays, some hot water and cold water probably.

A suit stood as I stood there almost benumbed by the experience.

I could Rocky screaming out, he was probably sitting on the floor trying to tolerate what he did not know, without his clothes on, his boogy body.

“Remember trust is when you

know the hunger, trust is when you

know the thirst, trust is when you

know the eyes, trust is when you

know love is in the soul. Trust,

even if it fails, yet it strengthens your soul, you.

It washed you clean. You matter and only you.” He was singing as I came out, quite uncomfortable with what I wore, each looked somewhat like an astronaut more slim, and probably a few gadgets less.

“What is this?” Rocky asked me, thoroughly irritated by the iridescent rain.

“You will love me, more child

When you know what I

have saved for you. Maybe the guy

you love will love you even more.”

I smirked, “he doesn’t love me and has rejected me. Can I come out of him so that I can live too, it’s terrible indeed to know your proposition is weak. Here it’s you and there it’s me.”

“Hola, hola, Marco.

Has traído amigos?” The man was beefy, red like carrots and had a strange glint in his eyes.

“Lutes….Lutes….my friend…it’s been long. Si…..friends.” Marco introduced us.

Rocky was unusually jolly, probably the fact that he had met another jowly face.

“So, let’s go.” Lutes was a strange name.

“I must admit your man is a little weak.” Marco whispered into my ears.

“Yes, heroes don’t do nine to five jobs, he feels and that’s what he does. Since he is not a hero, rest assured courage is not his forte.”

“Courage of a truer kind….not the ill willed ones, since I’ll will requires courage too, but the courage is aligned diametrically opposite to the true ones.”

Marco was with me on the rear seat.

“Well, but the man must be good for you to like him.”

“Of course he is. I wish if only we could be together forever, only if he had courage to see and stand.” I smiled at Marco.

“Well, What if he already has someone?” Marco was asking questions and I was not seeing a point, he was drawn perhaps by the urge to believe in good endings. He perhaps was suffering from anticipating results of actions and above all good actions and good results, good endings.

“Well, I wish and would always pray all the happiness in the world then and just be happy knowing he exists and loves and lives. That does not change my feelings. Yes, of course I would not say I can be selfless yet I am not a selfish shell, by all means.” The hairs was now on my face and it was flowing over, trying to divorce me and was probably planning to marry the hot winds.

The jeep was moving faster, faster than the winds.

The hangar had a left half and the right half. Lutes went right and Marco took us left.

“You know the drill, see you on the other side.” Lutes shouted from the other half.

“Here, we are almost here.” Marco seemed elated.

“Great, can you unblind all of us then?” Reasha was not finding it comfortable.

“Just another few minutes. See, if someone asks you, you always can say you don’t know the way. That’s it. No one can force you, even if they do nothing comes out.” Marco clapped his palms.

“As if I care who thinks what? I won’t answer anybody if I don’t find him or her fit.”

“Well, the world still tries to hound.”

“As if it can, idiots run everywhere who cares. Above all, I care for few.”

“Who was it, whom you liked so much?”

“A doctor, I met only recently. I love him.”

“Till now?”

“Seriously, Marco it’s not hormones, don’t ask such weird questions. I would always love him. Forever, there is only one. Though I would not deny having fooled a few who tried idiotic ways.”

“They don’t trouble you?”

“Well, if you make someone mad who is trying to make you mad, what else can they do? Accumulate more of them and try to prove they were trying to blurp, when actually they were trying to kill you. The real intentions when jeopardised due to clever or overly seeming maniacal tactics, it creates idiots and you have to ignore, forget whenever required, and be back to your innocence. Coz no one can touch that.”

“Why nothing happened?”

“It was not possible for him since he believes in the system. By the way, he has to understand the point. He knows one thing and he will know it always. I love him like the wind that touches his face, I don’t meet him coz I promised him I won’t show him my face, but then I remember him forever. That place is locked for him, rest of the world can create anything, my feelings can’t change, can’t be moulded or adulterated. Sometimes humans must know the strength with which they are dealing. Considering your target weak is the biggest mistake humanity makes. So, nothing walks past it.”

Marco took a deep breath. He smiled from the heart for the first time.

I wish to really give you a hug. My daughter has such a love story, I have none such and I am so proud you lived it fully.”

The chopper was descending. I could say that since my legs and feet were tingling and the numbness increased.

Marco loves hearing love was still conquering hearts. He believed in love strangely and practiced it with whoever he was not set to kill even during his job.

The cold climates gave way to the warmer ones as we began our journey in the unknown terrains, rather my journey.

The boys, as I am now used to call them were certainly not enjoying the confusion. They chewed possible everything they called food, trying to gulp down the mis-sense link in their DNA right now.

“Well, another few hours and you could see what I have done. When I was shuffling from one country to another I had to travel with many kinds of people…studious, notorious, rickety, frolicking, maddening, marvellous geniuses. One day a young man in the train sat on the seat in front of me and looked at me several times before I knew he was a future marvel budding within the closed dark walls, ready to sprout into a beautiful plant anytime. He told me the definition of work which is force multiplied by displacement. He said I was though doing some real work on the front, he meant on the exterior circle ⭕️ however on the inner one I was not doing any work at all. Since, I was doing the same work again and again, I was not deriving anything out of it except money, so that be. But, then since there is no displacement of any kind in the interior, there was no work at all.”

I was blindfolded and he said it was for my own good. We had got a chopper and the men were trusted. The boys were munching, certainly missing out details of the story with their jaws moving and their thoughts flipping through the pages of food and story.

“Now, I was baffled. It seemed true since on the inners a constant climate or environment can seem like a control in an experiment and not the testing process. So, I was the control according to him. Nothing changed, year after year I repeated the same process. Initial years I went through changes and growth, but then I was dying.”

“Really, So this was displacement then.”

“Certainly it was. The first few days in my job if job it was, the day I met your father, the day I met this man certainly counted only three days of existence. Rest of the days I did not even exist. It was astonishingly bland on my tongue. He said rather I had lived before this part of my life, under the starry skies I had grown. But, then an inner fear ruled me…fear of a food less, shelterless living, and this fear also repeated itself like a robot within me. I became it’s slave soon and my daughter and wife further expanded the horizon of this very fear within me.”

“How did meeting my father changed you?” It was absurd to hear something which was neither negative nor positive about a person who was questionable to my very existence. I felt a childlike restless curiosity arising within me and moving upwards like a snake making its way through a dark pit. The Sun shone bright and the heat and warmth touching my skin was proof enough of it’s very existence around me.

“They can build airports differently. The design and interior can be a source of newness, every time you land in one of them. These have same structural issues and similar arrangements. I am bored looking at them, often the same smell….Barista is my favourite though.”

“Who asked you to blabber?” The burly burly man behind him in the queue hung down his squinting eyes at the old man.

“I am sorry.” Marco peeped out only to find Reasha and the boys way back in the queue.

“Sorry, I just thought they were behind me, coz they made me stand here and I felt they were around, old man’s wits. I lost it. Sorry.”

“They were but then I was even before you, I had gone out of the queue for some things and yours guys were using muscles. I pushed them back.”

“Ahh! I see. Good they deserve it, harassin* people…” They flapped their hands, and shared a light moment screeching in joy for no reason.

“Here goes a few lines for you,

“The words ruin the silence,

the skin is turning into ashes.

As the benumbing droplets touch

the fair skin, I know its not fire

neither rain nor akin to the worthy attire.

Adorn the beautiful, brash world of old

ruins stand upon which, since times of gold

rushes fire, pyre, upon a pyre stand on fire.

The suit abandoned, the worthy detained

Heights sustained yet the path contained.

The abyss cannot be seen, the tall mountains

cannot be reached. Man is caught in the

holiness of haulocausts, beauty retained

in false fires, jewels of men tainted.

“It was for me, I did not get it, but I am so touched indeed thank you old man.”

The men hugged each other as others stared in awe, some in disbelief and some ashamed with presumptions. Such unabashed human compassion does no longer befit the small, tiny, single centred brains. The world can of course, never change in a day.

“Marco, wake up, c’mon get up. I need to talk now. You slept for almost seven hours now, wake up.” Reasha began slapping his right arm to draw him out of his sleep.

“Wha….wha….What? What happened. Someone is staring at us….” Marco was dragging himself out with the ever seeing eyes probably closed for a while before he woke up.

It was still evening as we were travelling east now.

The kid in the next seat woke up and he was deafeningly annoyed. He pressed his palms on his ears and clenched his teeth instead his fists probably.

“Sorry. Old man is out of his wits.” I indicated whispering slowly.

“Awagh man, wtf…..why did I wake up. It’s still evening….” he grumbled.

“I got a message from Mac, I had got it while the flight began but since I had switched off my mobile, I did not try to look at it further.”

“Who the hell told you to look at it?”

“He writes they attacked you since you are hiding something very precious till date. So all This armoury is your den in which you hide your tiny selfish self? This is it.” She whispered it and Marco heard it silently.

“You want to know it, I will show you. We get down in Amsterdam and then we board another flight. You pay for it.”

“What? Yes, all these words won’t help. If you have courage come and have a look.”

“What if it’s a trap you set for me?

Ahh! A trap. Good. Mac is never a person whose head can be whizzed into believing anything that does not serve his purpose or motif. You are right now important resource with ah-so-takoosh-skittish-beefy-gormandisers-no brain poofs.”

He spread out words like petals of flowers underneath your feet.

“Great, let’s do it.”

“I have hide outs but I am no longer willing to hide, this one takes us to a land between the mountains and you would travel blindfolded once we enter the Spanish capital.”

“Why are you showing me?”

“Probably, because i do not want to carry the load anymore on my head. Probably i do not discrimathe. Hola.”

The rose with its fragrance is allowed far and wide,

Why then do the purple pearls in the grass hide?

The pebbles lying in the river bed are beautiful too.

But, we prefer to look at the marbles white, to woo

Our many beloveds, we laugh and roar, care little

‘Bout that one single flower within us in shackles.

Discrimination runs deep only in human nature.

To be this, that or not to be a bat,

Hitting oneself, hitting others like a mat.

To unite with nature and the beauty of soul.

We need to close this one single hole.

Only then we turn to our future

Blocking away those tiny, minute fissures.

“Well, I remembered, we have eight holes and we are addicted to another pair, our ear holes than our noses. We breathe less and we lay our ears out in the open fractions. Most of us are even addicted to this form of living.”

“Yeah, messy shit holes, the waxy, crammed dark places where the darkness whispers into the void creating dirt, filth and more wax each day.” Reasha was tired from again having to find out the reason behind this attack.

She had called Mac while boarding the flight.

Even Mac was not aware of the attack, sometimes Reasha wondered about Mac’s involvement.

The flight had begun and she knew she could at least rest for these few hours, do normal things, look around normally. She was pretty sure she had left all the comedians behind for now.

She closed her eyes and the setting sun seemed like a warm gift to a tired soul.

Marco was beside her and he seemed shaken, tired, bore a haggard look on his face.

“Who were these guys?” Marco’s inquisitiveness found a new foothold and his mind was racing at the options. Before he glided his body out of the plane into the irrational world where every dot seemed to connect Marco’s mind to the right point had to pass through Reasha’s sporty logical reasons and aptitude tests. The question would put that part to rest.

“I don’t know. Mac, my boss says even he doesn’t. Good part is they were few and themselves doubtful, hence managing was not a problem.”

“Hmmm. I see.” Reasha looked innocent to a man born to meet the evil at every corner of life. Now, he was sure to launch himself into this awkward world.

“You tell me, you must know if they were behind you.”

“It could be. I am not denying that even after twenty five years of hiding, a pseudonym and all the dust around me and on me, someone out there still does appreciate my presence as much as I do.”

“I could have failed. Do you know that?” Reasha told another fear of hers, out loud. She was becoming fearless from letting others know them and ruin them much before she anticipated their success.

“Silly girl. Aye must know failures are a pile of rubbles to cross the boundaries. The more roubles you have beneath you, the higher you stand closer to the wall.”

Reasha had never heard such an optimistic answer and for a moment, a huge grin crossed her lips, she pursed them to stop it.

“Wow! The world should have thought so.”

“Why would they when you stand higher even if roubles, but if you know to balance, you can cross it faster than them. Precisely why, they stop ya from seeing this plain fact.”

“Marco, you are nuts.” She was laughing aloud.

She looked back to see if the boys noted her unvoiced happiness, newly found with a man who doomed her twice only to save her thrice.

“Mam would you like to have a cup of coffee?”

“I want some and some water and a little supper. I also want dinner. Right now I am stuck between being ravenous and being famished.” Marco looked at the air hostess who seemed to melt at the words from an old man. Old age makes you really capable if only you know how to use it well.

Reasha took a cup of coffee, thanking her.

“Remember balance is the word. The path.” Marco winked once and ate like, he was hungry for ages.

“Laugh while you can, for laughter is precious.

Precious than black gold, precious than all treasures.

For one day, it may be lost, not to be found again.

When you may still be hoarding the treasures.

Laugh from the heart, laugh from the mind.

Laugh while you can, for laughter is precious.

Laugh from your front, laugh from the hind.

Laugh the love, laugh the sorrows,

For one day, it may be lost, not to be found again.

Laugh at humans and their petty tomorrows.

For none is real, except the soothing sound of laughter.

Laugh while you can, for laughter is precious.

Smile at your mother, smile at the old.

Smile at the new for they are pure gold.

For one day, it may be lost not to be found again.

When you are scared, laugh at it,

since nothing remains in the sands of Time.

Laugh while you can, for laughter is precious.

For one day, it may be lost, not to be found again.”

He was walking with us, reciting his lines, probably creating them spontaneously.

All of a sudden we increased our speed and he did not know the reason,

“Are we trying to run in this crowd?”

“It’s Kentucky, we can run through the crowds.”

“But why on earth are we running? What happened? I can’t run with my lungs puffing up, please.”

“Okay, you stay here. I will come back for you.” Reasha vanished and Marco sat on a chair heaving and panting by the chair. But, then he saw a bunch of some six men who were trying to be not so obvious, but his experienced eyes revealed the strangers.

The moment they vanished Reasha came back and tugged his right arm holding him tight almost dragging him. Regale was a heavy man and he almost lifted him up the floor dragging him with them. The security found it strange and decided to follow them.

“The bathroom.” Reasha turned to her left and entered the bathroom shocking a few and wounding another few.

“Sorry men, sort of emergency. He is my father and this is my brother and I leave you guys in peace.” She turned her eyes away from the crowd and the gathering even though she heard several zips zipping up, the sound is distinct and has a tinge of its own.

The security guards were almost at the door.

She pulled the door open only to meet the guys from the security.

“Are you following us? I suppose so.” She smiled bright and her face lit up for a while.

The security guards nodded not aware of any other gesture. Such a short notice for them to not react normally.

“Ahh! You see he is my father and he sort of soiled his pants. He is old and we gave him tablets in the morning to relieve his constipation. I am not sure if that kinda of overworked.” She smiled again, giggling a little.

One of the guards peeped inside and seeing Regale outside the door, nodding curtly at the guard, he came out and left them without another word.

They came out in five more minutes and they all headed for the lobby since it was quite a number of times that the flight had been announced.

“Now, hold this. Now just aim at that fat tummy and shoot.” Marco was startled for a moment.

“Do you want me to kill again? Why? So, you brought me here for this? To relieve you of some shitty pain.”

“Just shoot, trust me I told you the truth.”

Marco was quite tired and unable to find a way did as he was told.

He pressed the trigger………..