FICTION
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| VIBHOR AGARWAL |
Joy of a Candy
Twelve year old Abdul pushed the tyre tube in order to pace up the
momentum. He ran with the wheel on the narrow dusty stretch dividing
the factory boundary and a water stream where factory waste was dumped.
Even the stink that prevailed in the air couldn’t discourage him from
enjoying his free time outside the factory, but his joy was short-lived
when at the end of stretch he saw Akram, The six-foot giant with an
ugly scruff in exchange of a beard.
Abdul suddenly lost his momentum, the tyre strode a good distance
ahead of him and collapsed on the ground. Akram came closer to him and
grabbed his collar, thus further tearing the already worn shirt. Akram
raised his other hand and swing it backwards to strike a deadly blow on
Abdul’s sunken cheek. Abdul closed his eyes and raised his shivering
arms and waited for the blow but Akram swing his arm above Abdul’s head,
thus missing the target intentionally.
Abdul opened his eyes to the sound of incessant and uncanny laughter of Akram still holding him.
“Come to work…” Akram said in an authoritative tone.
Abdul said nothing but nodded and followed Akram to the main Gate of
the factory, from where Akram dragged him inside the factory. The
factory was enormous, Abdul always got fascinated by the size of the
building but what attracts him most was the water cooler which was near
the gate where he could drink as much cold water as much he wants.
Abdul followed Akram hesitantly through a flight of metal stairs that
led to a corridor, with several rooms running parallel to each other,
Abdul glanced at each room as they moved across the passage, and the
walls were charred with black dust and the floors occupied by children
even smaller than Abdul.
They enter into a similar room across the hallway. The children were
sitting with their backs towards the wall, forming an elliptical shape
with baskets of raw material in the centre. Abdul sat in the corner next
to Raju, Who was as skinny as Abdul but a good two inches shorter than
him.
Akram passed him a similar basket which was filled with a black
powder and rolls of paper. Abdul took out a paper spread the powder on
the paper and rolled a perfect stick with his little fingers.
The children made thousands of those sticks and store them in a big
box in the corner of the room. They worked at full speed under the
timely inspection of Akram. But as soon Akram would have left the room
the children started to sing….
Here hope dies at the beginning of hour
The taste of our mouth is sour
Sad frowns and tattered clothes is all we wear
All day long we labour in our childhood tear
They beat us, curse us
Badger us, exploit us
But we wait for the day
When tomorrow will be a new today….
The taste of our mouth is sour
Sad frowns and tattered clothes is all we wear
All day long we labour in our childhood tear
They beat us, curse us
Badger us, exploit us
But we wait for the day
When tomorrow will be a new today….
Raju forced a smile, removed a candy from his pocket and offered it
to Abdul. Abdul took it without hesitation and passed a smile while
putting the candy in his shirt pocket, instead of putting it in the
mouth right away.
Akram saw the two peasants wasting their time in idle talk and
giggle. He came closer to them and quietly grabbed them by neck and
bumped their heads, “Work. You two fools, I don’t feed you to sit idle.”
And he slapped Raju with a brutal force. Then he turned to Abdul.
Abdul with his frightened senses, took a leap and jumped out of his
reach and ran out of the room. He only stopped near the water cooler to
catch his breath, and to fill his growling stomach with water, he saw
something stashed beneath the water cooler, rolled in a plastic paper.
He quietly removed the object from its hiding and unwrapped the
paper, He saw a bundle of tobacco leaves rolled in a stick. He
recollected the memory of his Uncle used to roll one of these leaves and
would inhale the smoke produced by burning its tip.
Abdul placed one of the tobacco leaves in his mouth and searched for a
matchstick to burn the roll. A security guard, who was standing beside
the gate saw him and ran towards Abdul. He snatched the biddhi from his
mouth and said in a loud voice “What were you doing, don’t know it is
banned in here… Who is your station coordinator?”
“A… Akram Ali…” Abdul answered with a fear in his voice, but he hid the bundle in his back pocket.
The guard took Abdul back to the hell hole from where he escaped.
Akram received his prey with a grin and said “You pig, can only be
disciplined with a beating.”
Akram lifted his arm, forced Abdul to bow down and with his elbow he
assaulted Abdul’s back until his own arm hurt. The room felt mute when
Akram left, neither they nor the other children spoke a word but only
the silence listened to their moaning.
The sun came down and the harsh sky turned into a comforting grey,
the foreman rang the bell ending the day’s peril for the tortured soul’s
and all the children form a line and marched to canteen where they got
their day’s pay in the form of meal to satisfy their day long hunger.
Abdul and Raju were an exception to this feast as they were detained
by Akram to work for extra hours, Akram sat on a chair while Abdul and
Raju sat beside him on the floor, Akram was listening to the radio and
said “where is the bundle of biddhi that you stole from water cooler?”
Abdul looked at Akram flabbergasted, wondering how Akram knew.
Fearing Akram would hurt him again he removed the bundle from his back
pocket and offered it to him. Akram glanced at the bundle with a smile
and said “Now you are learning some manners…” and took the bundle.
He took out one stick and placed it on his mouth and took out a match
box from his side pocket. Akram lit the biddhi with the help of a
matchstick and threw it on the ground.
What Akram was unaware of was the fact that the matchstick still had a
sparkle left when it touched the ground, which was covered with the
black powder. The powder instantly caught fire.
Akram saw what he had done and ran out of the room, Abdul and Raju
followed him in a hurry, while the fire grew stronger and like a monster
with a giant appetite ate anything that came near it.
Outside, the children and the workers heard a loud bang and saw a
huge fire-ball erupting through the windows of the upper level. The
darkness of the sky was overshadowed by the monstrous light that was
slowly swallowing the building into its dark pit. Everyone ran outside
the gate.
The only people left inside the building were Akram and the two
children. Akram ran hesitantly towards the stairs, the stairs were hot
but he started to climb down the stairs, with great caution. Abdul and
Raju couldn’t follow him with their bare feet. So they stood at the edge
of the stairs and saw a burning splinter falling over Akram’s head.
They were alone, waiting for death to come as they were trapped
between the fire and burning splinters, when all of a sudden Abdul saw
an opening which led to a balcony for ventilating the floor. They both
climbed on the boundary of the balcony and saw the water stream right in
front of them.
Both were hesitant, as neither of them want to jump from such a
height, they saw each other in the eye, nodded doubtfully and jumped out
of the building without the slightest of the knowledge where they will
fall or whether they will survive or not.
In a matter of seconds, Abdul felt his body hitting the water and
completely engulfed by soothing coolness of it, he almost forgot about
Raju. He cried out Raju’s name three to four times before listening to a
faint cry.
Raju was in a semi unconscious state when Abdul helped him out of the
water and to the surface. They were panting profusely and laughing at
their close escape. They hugged each other and bid farewell after drying
themselves under the cool moonlight that bathe them with joy.
When Abdul got home, he saw his mother sad and lost in a trance.
Abdul expecting a joyous smile on her face, tapped on her shoulder. She
saw him but instead of even a smile she frowned and said
“You survived…!, it would be better if you had died there at least we could have got compensation….”
“You survived…!, it would be better if you had died there at least we could have got compensation….”
Listening to this, he ran into the house crying and thinking, whether
she was his real mother. He laid on the bed his face down, Abdul felt
something in his breast pocket, and he stood up and checked his pocket. A
candy came out.
