Cobalt Blue

by Sachin Kundalkar

One of the fundamental rights of mankind should be that of wearing as many or as few clothes as one likes inside one’s own home. Or one should be able to wear none at all.

When I was a schoolboy, this was the room of my grandparents’ illness. There were two low cots ranged against opposite walls, my grandmother on one, on the other my grandfather. Then only grandmother remained, the room suffused with the smell of Amrutanjan. After she had suffered all her karmic share of suffering, phenyle drove out the other smells: of the ageing body and drying behada bark, of supari and medicine. But the smell of Amrutanjan lingered.

Midnight in the window, just you and me. Even then you didn’t cry. At these times, I felt I should be your mother, your father, your brother, your friend, everything. But you had long reached the point at which you decided you would never cry again.

For a while, I seemed to go deaf. The multicoloured lights began to merge into one. And suddenly, nothing seemed clear. Who are you? Would you acknowledge me if I met you on the street in broad daylight? What do you want? What is going to happen after this? My head began to spin.