A pebble for a dowel pin (1993)

The entire street was turned dark due to power cut. Though it was an irritating time for some, I was enjoying while playing hide and sick with my friends. After some time, a fallout amongst us stopped the game. All of us went to a man who was making gum, which was to be used for pasting paper in the note book producing company. That was the only place where some light was available. I always wanted to speak Hindi. The tall dark man was from Kolkata and did not know any language other than Hindi. For me, Hindi is always a complete language in which we can express all our feelings. We grew up watching Delhi Doordarshan, a Hindi channel. We were brought up with all the popular daily soaps like Ramayan, Mahabharat, Vikram Vetal, Vyomkesh Bakshi, Alif Laila, etc. Everything was in Hindi.

As all my friends enjoyed observing how the man was preparing gum, I asked him, “Aap Kolkata se aaya hai?” He shrugged and smiled. I think, my Hindi grammar and accent sounded strange to him. But he could make out what I meant. For next five minutes, both of us talked in Hindi. It was only when I repeated each sentence three times, he could be able to make out. My friends around me were silent, observing the conversation. All of a sudden, one fellow started to play with the fire. All the children followed him. Everyone went away carrying some fire either with a stick or with a cardboard. I sat with the man for a chat. “I can make out”, he said when I asked how my accent was. Before I could take the conversation to the next level, suddenly I felt immense pain on my right shoulder. It took me no time to realize that my third brother had placed a hot dowel pin on my shoulder. The hot pin burnt the part of my body. I was finding it hard to bear the pain, but couldn’t help it. I ran back home, but did not tell anyone about this. There is a reason behind why I didn’t let anyone know about the pin story. Every time I complained against my third brother to my mother, I was the one who deserved the first slap. Maybe this was the disadvantage of having a comparatively more notorious image. One thing was very common between me and my third brother. We never hit each other immediately after getting hit by the other. Both of us took some time and retaliated with a perfect plan.

The next day, my grandma was trying to sleep during the noon. I was also trying to sleep, but could not lie down on my back because of the pain in the shoulder. Hence, I was just spending the time by pinching my grandma with a dowel pin once in a regular interval of five to ten seconds. She got irritated and asked me to stop. However, her irritation made me more active. I continued pinching her. She was helpless. All of a sudden, my third brother came running from somewhere. Grandma told him, “Bapini, just snatch the pin from this boy’s hand.” Acting like a true rescuer, he snatched the pin from my hand and ran away. I ran after him to get it back. He went out of home and then, fifty meters away from home. I stood outside the house and found no reason to run in the hot noon. My eyes fell on a pebble. I just picked it up and threw at him only to reflect my anger. However, the stone traveled in a direction that resulted in a half a bowl blood from his cracked head. “O my God! That was not intentional.”, I told myself. He came back home placing both of his hands on the part of his head where the pebble hit him. I thought he would kill me then and there. He crossed me and went inside the house. Perhaps, he remembered the rule of not hitting each other immediately after getting hit by the other.

It was ten days after the incident. Bapini got up in the midnight and asked me to get up. Those were the days in the year when a folk dance called “Danda Nach” used to take place in every nook and corner of the city. The dance was normally followed by a play in the midnight. We planned to go to watch a play that would take place half kilometer away from our house. On the way, he said, “You know, you have done a good thing by hitting my head with the pebble. I can’t sleep even now because of the pain. And as a consequence, we will be able to enjoy the drama today.” To add his philosophical thought, I added, “Really, don’t worry. I will hit your head with a pebble again next year during this time so that we will be able to see dramas next time too”, placing my left hand on my right shoulder to feel the signs of the burns that was created by the hot dowel pin. As soon as the sentence was complete, I ran away fearing a punch from him. “Hey, don’t run. I won’t hit you. Come back.”, he said. And we enjoyed the play together until morning.