The Arrest and After

Aryan, staring at the policemen, wondering why the policemen have decided to push him around and scream at him. He has not committed any crime. He has not violated any laws still why the policemen are thrashing. The policemen hit Aryan in the chest and send him against the wall with a bang. His body is trembling. One of the policemen kicks him in the mouth causing profusely bleeding. Aryan has lost some teeth. He is afflicted with tremendous torment but not able to understand this heinous act. Because of bodily pain, Aryan is almost in a drowsy state of appearance.

After a while, the policemen reappear and drag Aryan into a dungeon full of people. There is hardly any place. People are huddling with each other. However seeing the deplorable condition of Aryan, everyone moves aside a little to make room for him. Aryan lies there with eyes closed.

A woman’s voice, “All of us have had our share of it.”

Aryan opens his eyes reluctantly and looks at the face that is staring to him. Pale and very thin is the face.

“I am Judith,” She says.
“And, that is my father, Menaclem.” An old man grovels and enquires to know why the policemen have beaten him so mercilessly.

Aryan is not able to respond only to look.

Again Judith says, “That is Deborah, my mother.”

“Where am I? There must be some mistake. There is some mistake,” Aryan repeats.

“There is no mistake, my dear friend; you are here definitely for a reason. In fact, we are all here for a reason,” Judith replies with complete assertion.

Aryan looks around and finds the room is packed with faces that he has never seen before. There is a bare chested black curly haired woman sitting crossed legged. There is a gypsy singing softly to her. She is standing up and then sitting and continuing the posture again and again. Aryan stares and tries to ascertain the reason of this melancholy. Wherever she is standing, there is some swaying. Her flowing skirt is ripping up to the waist revealing bony thighs. “That is Isarina,” Judith says to Aryan.

“She has the voice of an angle. They think she is a witch.”


Isarina is not bothered and now starts swaying her body with full rhythm and singing loudly to everybody’s surprise.

“There is some mistake. Aryan repeats, why am I here?”
“It is not a delusion, there must be some reason,” Judith smiles.
“But I have done nothing wrong, no crime and I am not a lucifer also.”
“You don’t fit in. In fact, none of us fits in. that is why, we are here.”
“But, which country is this?”
“This is the country of the dead,” She replies and the room is flooded with fragrance of grief stricken people with sullen faces, scanty clothes, unmindful countenance, but gypsy woman still sings louder and swings her hip.

Aryan searches for a known face.

Judith reads his mind. “No one knows you here,” She says.
Suddenly, a loud voice stars bellowing, “Lots, lots, time for lots.”
Everyone rushes towards the door. The policemen push them back.

“Sit down you filthy swine, sit or else we will break your teeth.”

Then a basket is passed around and each of them draws a piece of folded paper. Judith and Aryan get the paper with “X” mark. They are set free.

In the night, they stumble down the silent streets. Stopping near a lamp post, she says “Oh God! My parents.”

“Do you want to go back?”

“Let’s go on,” She mutters to herself and starts crying.

She sees her toes are bleeding.

Aryan and Judith turn the bend on to a familiar street.

“I can’t stretch myself any more to walk,” She says.

They decide to settle down beside a huge pile of cardboard boxes. They somehow manage to huddle into a corner. There is a cold breeze which increases their unpleasant because they don’t have any worm clothes to offset the cold. She starts sobbing like a child and touches Aryan.


“I wonder where my children are,” She speaks with a soft sigh that vanishes no sooner Aryan stares and all that remains is the sigh only, wearing into the wind flowing by.

She puts her head on his shoulder first, then on his lap.

Aryan runs his fingers through her grass like hair.

He thinks what to do. He hears an inner voice saying, “Don’t play in the tall grass, there may be snakes.”

But he does not bother and continues to feel the grassy and dirty hair and take the warmth of the deeper into the thicket.

A cloudless dome arches overhead, reflecting waves of the tall grass. When the green is up to the waist of Aryan, he lies down, breathing in the fragrance of the earth. Above him, the grass half sheets out of the view of the dome. He is inside a womb of grass. He lies and feels earthworms under him, toiling away in the soil, ants trouping by in stream; a spider floats overhead – from one blade of grass to another, swinging on one sticky silken thread. “Where are you son? Where are you?” Aryan gets alert to hear the voice calling. He gets reach out, holding a handful of grass, pull the soft blades down to the face of Judith and breathe in the aroma of typical fragrance.

Aryan further bend down and bury his face in Judith’s hair, breathing in the smell of perspiration, dried blood from small wounds on the scull. There is nothing synthetic in her hair. It is all natural. It is dried and matte. It is her hair. Judith turns back to see him. Hey eyes are telling something, searching something and same is luminous. Aryan is drawn towards them like a lifeless body towards the water eye of a well.

” I wonder where my children are,” She murmurs.

“Does it make any sense anymore?”

“Yes, it matters. You guy will never know. I can’t forget them. They are my own creative thoughts. They have left their footprints on the walls of womb.”

Aryan continues to stare at her eyes.

“Do you have children?” She enquires.

“Yes, but I am not aware about their present whereabouts.”

“Do you think about them?”


“I do. They have left their little fingerprints on the surface of soul.”

“Don’t you want to go back to them?”

“I don’t know where they are. If I try to search them and then not able to find, I have no other choice except to commit suicide. So, I don’t want to do any reminiscences. Please do not excite me to exert pressure on my thought process whereby I get engangle in the cobweb of miseries and grief only.”

“What type of father you are! Don’t you want to look for them, embrace them and hug them?”

By the time, I find them, they will have children and their children will have children. They will not remember me. They will not recognize me.”

“Children, don’t forget ever. You are completely mistaken. You are dreaded coward. You don’t like to face the truth. You want to flee from the life. You accept this fact.”

Aryan doesn’t retaliate except to kiss her on her cold forehead.

While talking they reach the main road of the town. They walk seeing the beauties of big coconut trees, palm trees, and some big and old buildings and ultimately land near the sea.

“Let us go to the beach and observe the dance of wave and tide. I like this,” Aryan proposes and Judith immediately agrees.

They sit, almost huddle together showing love for each other.

“I am still not clear why they have arrested me and put in the jail. I was a good student rather rank holder. But I used to attack the rampant corruption prevailing in education systems of that time. People did not like my attitude. I could not tolerate the inefficiency and corruption and so one day I was involved in a bitter argument with the Principal of the college who ultimately rusticated me. The ultimate result was a tremendous bickering, quarrel with me and the goons of the political bosses instigated by the Principal thrash me. I was hospitalized for three months.”

“Why did they arrest you?”

“Because, I raised protest against the influential people of the society. I used to expose them. I became a thistle in their wrongful and evil growth. So, after spending nearly one decade in hail, I do not want to remember my family. I just want to live the balance life with some of past thoughts.”


“What do you remember about your children?” She asks.

“My daughter would sleep on my chest when she was hardly a month old. Like a tiny frog, I felt her heart against mine, beating. She smelt faintly of incense.”

“My feet hurt,” Judith says, with tears in eyes.

“Do you think we can lead our lives again?”

“Does it matter?”

Aryan leans back again the wall. When he looks down at his lap again, Judith’s head is not there anymore. Neither is she sitting near him. She has gone. Gently, calmly, somewhere in the wind that cries along the empty street, he can hear her tired footsteps.