The clock ticked seven. The annoying alarm sound from the clock disseminated throughout Hoggar’s room. The ‘alarming’ noise was reverberated by the smooth metal walls of the room. Whoever told him that metal walls reduce reverberation. It helps him in a way too. He was always late in getting up in the morning, late in getting up from the single cot that seemed to be the only decent piece of furniture in his one roomed apartment. The cuckoo from the dirty clock was rocking in and out, shouting its shouts, and it would do it for about five minutes. Normally he would wake up after a minute of the cuckoo’s visit and switch the alarm off but today he didn’t. The plastic cuckoo finished its five minutes work and went back to its place and would not show its face for another hour. Hoggar just laid there, on his bed, under his bed sheet, his head over a pillow, everything like how they always were, except for one single thing, he was shivering, shivering so much that tiny droplets of sweat stood over his forehead like dew drops. His best and only chum, Timothy, was getting killed by a massive truck in a freak road accident.
It took him five minutes to gain consciousness and even realize what was actually happening to him. He didn’t wake up shouting like a petrified woman with her hands covering her mouth, like how they do in the movies. He got up shivering, just plainly shivering, with a look in his face that would have fetched him an Academy Award if he were doing that in a movie. He was wiping the tears, really salty tears, which were flowing from his eyes. He never knew such things could happen in a dream. He dreams every single day but none was like the one he had during that early morning. Maybe no one wished him ‘sweet dreams’ the previous night. But talking about it no one actually wishes him ‘sweet dreams’ on any day.
He got into the shower quickly because he didn’t want to go late to his office, not even a minute late. Water was pouring down like a thunderstorm but Hoggar was just standing there, with no reaction, as if cold water always pours down on him throughout the day. His thoughts were all directed towards Timothy. They were both orphans and were brought up in the Mother’s orphanage. An amazing friendship blossomed between them while they grew up in the orphanage together, a friendship that stayed for life, a friendship that existed even long after they came out of the orphanage. The interesting fact about their camaraderie was that both of them were as contrary as summer and winter. Hoggar was a reticent, opens his mouth more to yawn than to converse. Timothy was his only close friend. Timothy on the other hand was gregarious and candid.
All this nostalgia and history only took away some of his not-to-waste-away-today time as he was already very late. He had his ready-to-eat breakfast in his small kitchen cum dining room. He had to hurry to catch his mundane train, the 800 Central to his office at Central Park. It was a ten minutes walk from his home to the railway station and another ten minutes walk from the Central Park railway station to his office, but just today its not going to be a ten minutes walk, it was going to be a two minutes run. As he was running to the railway station he didn’t know whether he had to think about what all the people looking at him were thinking about this crazy runner or about his early morning nightmare. The nightmare was just a nightmare, not reality, he was convinced. But he was not convinced about the strange looks people were directing towards this ‘awkwardly running man’.
As the day leaved way for the noon, memories of his nightmare also leaved way for good thoughts. He thought of all the good days he had spent with Timothy, all the fun (actually, all of the fun he has ever had) he had with Timothy. As the head clerk of a private office he had a lot of work to do and he was also the kind of a person who would never compromise his work life for his private life (if at all he had one) but today his thoughts were all directed towards Timothy, the ‘Timothy thoughts’ sans the nightmare. By the time he left for lunch he had almost forgotten everything about the nightmare, or at least he forced himself to forget it. He was walking all alone to the nearby restaurant to have his lunch, to relish his economical burger and the small dose of coke. The restaurant was on the other side of the road and he was trying to cross the road, making his way to the other side of the road interrupting the meteoric-like madly moving traffic. A massive truck just missed him by an inch. The wind traveling along with the truck just pushed him away as horns screamed and heads turned. Somehow he made his way to the other side with a head heavy with thoughts and ears heavy with the onlooker’s ‘be careful’s and ’watch out’s.
Glimpses of his nightmare started surfacing back into his head. Had the truck that just missed him not the same one that killed Timothy in the nightmare? Yes, they were of the same make and color. Instead of getting into the restaurant he was just walking, walking wherever his legs took him, not walking wherever his mind took him. He forced himself to stop but couldn’t for about half a minute. Then he did stop, cleared everything from his mind and walked back to his office, carefully, without taking his lunch.
He had his dinner at about ten in the night. He had come home early from his office with an empty stomach. He wanted to sleep but he could not. He wanted to eat but could not. He did not want to think about that day’s incident but couldn’t do anything else other than that. A couple of mild sedatives were taken in between gulps of water. Sleep came to him automatically in about a few minutes.
The ubiquitous silence was broken by the rare ring of Hoggar’s telephone at about midnight. Hoggar woke up thinking it was the alarm, telling to himself ‘man, time sure flies’ and was amazed to find out that it was the telephone and not the alarm. All the sedative had done its work. He was so tired that he didn’t even want to get up to pick up the telephone. He let the telephone ring. It stopped after about 30 seconds. Just when he was drifting back to sleep the telephone started ringing again. He somehow coaxed himself to attend the call, telling himself that it might be important.
He sleepily picked up the phone receiver and identified the voice at the other end as Timothy’s roommate, Steve. Steve told him something in a very disturbed voice, something that made Hoggar go white allover in shock and surprise. He heard the words crystal clear from steve’s mouth, “Hoggar, Hoggar….. Timothy… our Timmy’s killed….killed….by a truck”.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
I LEAVE IT TO YOU - CHAPTER II
Minutes passed before he was brought back to conscience. His mind however hard it tried to render him sentient, his heart acted otherwise. You know, there is a greater indication of sorrow than tears, the state of shock in which the brain stops working, tears stop flowing and the body just stays stiff as if approaching rigor mortises. Finally the battle between the mind and the heart was finished and done with the mind emerging the slow victor. Tears started flowing immediately and his body began loosening. It took him a couple of minutes again to plan the next course of action. Timothy had no one else other than Hoggar and Steve. He should go there immediately whatever said and done. So he just started running all the way to Timothy’s place. He did the right thing as the frequency of buses and trains at this time of the day would be minimal or completely nil. He didn’t have a vehicle of his own too.
He ran frantically, palpitating heavily and his soft black hair waving up and down like the great oceans. Tears and sweat flowing together through his face. Totally exasperated, he rested for awhile on a bench at the side of the road. His heart beating fast and his stomach making crests and troughs like radio waves. After a few minutes he started running back. Timothy’s place was not very far, just about 2 miles. Not a distance at all for wheels but really a big distance for the foot. Reaching Timothy’s place, he saw Steve standing near the door as if like a watchdog. Steve looked devastated too partly because of his friend’s death and partly because of his inability to think what he was supposed to be doing next.
“He was just returning home from his office” Steve was telling Hoggar inbetween sobs “guess he didn’t see the big truck coming fast in the turning”. Hoggar just pushed his hands in air as if asking Steve to stop talking. He knew the rest of the story. He had actually seen the whole scene already. He didn’t need to hear the whole thing again. Steve looked shocked at Hoggar’s behavior but he thought it was because he couldn’t take in the facts of his friends gruesome death.
Both of them used each other’s shoulder to place their heads and each other’s shirt to wipe their tears. After their eyes went dry without any tears to shed they decided on what to be done next. They planned for a funeral to be held two days later. They wouldn’t require a lot of time to inform people and ask them to attend the funeral because of the very simple fact that there are just a handful of people who would be informed, just a few colleagues and a few friends.
He returned back home at about two in the night. He had calmed down. He was a very pragmatic man. Eventhough Timothy was his best friend and there was no one else in the world more valuable than Timothy, he couldn’t imagine sitting at a corner of the house and mourning for him a whole week. He was practical enough, but not enough to get him sleeping that night. Sleep was really necessary, he knew it. The next day he had to inform a few people the not-so-good news and arrange for the funeral and make some money too. He took sedatives and sleep came to him ‘tablettically’. It would have been about 4:30 in the morning. Hoggar was enjoying his soporific interlude till then. Then he started dreaming his early morning dreams.
Hoggar was standing perplexed and intrigued. The train was moving at a slow speed and had a big crowd in it. He was standing near the door wondering why he ever got into the train. He wanted to break the glass and just jump out of the train but he could never do such a thing. He was standing there, all shivering and frightened. Why? He didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Next, there was a continuous honking noise that penetrated even closed doors and windows. Immediately next, a big bang and a huge crash. He didn’t know what was happening to him. He was thrown over some smooth green fields with terrible injuries and little conscience. A severe pain on his ankles was trying to kill him. For that matter, he didn’t even know if he was dead or not.
He ran frantically, palpitating heavily and his soft black hair waving up and down like the great oceans. Tears and sweat flowing together through his face. Totally exasperated, he rested for awhile on a bench at the side of the road. His heart beating fast and his stomach making crests and troughs like radio waves. After a few minutes he started running back. Timothy’s place was not very far, just about 2 miles. Not a distance at all for wheels but really a big distance for the foot. Reaching Timothy’s place, he saw Steve standing near the door as if like a watchdog. Steve looked devastated too partly because of his friend’s death and partly because of his inability to think what he was supposed to be doing next.
“He was just returning home from his office” Steve was telling Hoggar inbetween sobs “guess he didn’t see the big truck coming fast in the turning”. Hoggar just pushed his hands in air as if asking Steve to stop talking. He knew the rest of the story. He had actually seen the whole scene already. He didn’t need to hear the whole thing again. Steve looked shocked at Hoggar’s behavior but he thought it was because he couldn’t take in the facts of his friends gruesome death.
Both of them used each other’s shoulder to place their heads and each other’s shirt to wipe their tears. After their eyes went dry without any tears to shed they decided on what to be done next. They planned for a funeral to be held two days later. They wouldn’t require a lot of time to inform people and ask them to attend the funeral because of the very simple fact that there are just a handful of people who would be informed, just a few colleagues and a few friends.
He returned back home at about two in the night. He had calmed down. He was a very pragmatic man. Eventhough Timothy was his best friend and there was no one else in the world more valuable than Timothy, he couldn’t imagine sitting at a corner of the house and mourning for him a whole week. He was practical enough, but not enough to get him sleeping that night. Sleep was really necessary, he knew it. The next day he had to inform a few people the not-so-good news and arrange for the funeral and make some money too. He took sedatives and sleep came to him ‘tablettically’. It would have been about 4:30 in the morning. Hoggar was enjoying his soporific interlude till then. Then he started dreaming his early morning dreams.
Hoggar was standing perplexed and intrigued. The train was moving at a slow speed and had a big crowd in it. He was standing near the door wondering why he ever got into the train. He wanted to break the glass and just jump out of the train but he could never do such a thing. He was standing there, all shivering and frightened. Why? He didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Next, there was a continuous honking noise that penetrated even closed doors and windows. Immediately next, a big bang and a huge crash. He didn’t know what was happening to him. He was thrown over some smooth green fields with terrible injuries and little conscience. A severe pain on his ankles was trying to kill him. For that matter, he didn’t even know if he was dead or not.
I LEAVE IT TO YOU - CHAPTER III
Hoggar woke up suddenly like how a doll attached to a spring would open to our surprise from a gift box. It was a cold day but that did not let him go without sweating. Everything was still vivid to him. The whole thing. He was actually touching his ankles, squeezing them to wrench it out of pain. The funny part was that his ankles were not aching at all. Such was the effect of the dream. Now that was very comforting, that it was just a dream. He let go of his ankles and tried to sleep again. But sleep wouldn’t come, not without another sedative. He was definitely not going to take another sedative. He had already taken one. He didn’t want it to be ‘one is company, two is the crowd’. The sedative he had taken the previous night had suppressed all his feelings for his lost friend and had activated the sleeping nerves. But now? He just passed the early morning sitting down on the floor with his eyes wide open, lost in thought, but definitely not sleeping.
The morning came as he was sitting, just sitting. In another ten minutes the alarm would start its chore. He switched it off before it could even go on. The dream had been very strange. He hadn’t got dreams like this before. He did get one the previous day and that was equally bad. He forced himself not to believe that whatever he dreamt of was going to get ‘realitised’. He somehow coaxed his mind to understand that Timothy’s death was already preordained and that he didn’t have anything to do with it. Possibly yes. But what if it was another way. Maybe his dreams were giving him glimpses of the future. Maybe the dreams were the blueprint of whatever that was waiting in store for him.
He had to leave early for he had lots of works to do. He wouldn’t waste time, he would never do it. That too in cases of emergencies he would function like a meteor. He hastened his breakfast. He was going to take the ‘previous train’. The appointment with the funeral people had been fixed and he was going to meet them before going to work. While walking along the road he reprimanded himself for behaving so badly in the morning. He had lost an hour of his sleep thinking about some stupid dream. However hard he tried to be skeptical about the ‘dreams coming true’ thing, his fears did surface up like bubbles. He reached the station and there was a huge crowd waiting for the train, double the amount that would wait for his usual train. He still had his qualms of taking the train but somehow inexplicably he moved towards the train. He thought it was like winning over nature, fate, destiny and all that one can’t actually win over. He wanted to show fate that he was not afraid of his dreams and was not going to run away from it. The train was approaching the platform and the crowd raced to get into the train.
A sudden flash in his mind and the next thing, he didn’t want to get into the train. Something pricked him and pinned him mentally and out of all the things he was sure that he didn’t want to board the train. He didn’t mind losing to fate, he didn’t mind accepting the fact that he was afraid of fate, afraid of what it might to do to him. But unfortunately he was late, too late to back out. He was in the middle of the crowd and the racing crowd was just pushing him into the train. He tried his best to escape, but as everyone say, there is no escape.
The horn blew, hands waved goodbyes, reds became greens and the wheels started turning. Turning…..turning…..turning………..
Hoggar was standing perplexed and intrigued. The train was moving at a slow speed and had a big crowd in it. He was standing near the door wondering why he ever got into the train. He wanted to break the glass and just jump out of the train but he could never do such a thing. He was standing there, all shivering and frightened. Why? He didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Next, there was a continuous honking noise that penetrated even closed doors and windows. Immediately next, a big bang and a huge crash. He didn’t know what was happening to him. He was thrown over some smooth green fields with terrible injuries and little conscience. A sever pain on his ankles was trying to kill him. For that matter, he didn’t even know if he was dead or not.
Hoggar woke up not from sleep but from anesthesia in a small community hospital room. The cot was made of metal and was hard and really uncomfortable for him but the anesthesia had taken away all those discomforts away from him. A nurse in white was standing next to him, doing something with his leg. The pain in the ankles was really terrible and the nurse was giving him physiotherapy. She looked like an angel in white. It was like as if some angel had given him a new life (with aching ankles). The physiotherapy was appeasing but it didn’t help much. The nurse later explained that their train had collided with another train. Strange. The other train had also come in the same track but in the opposite direction. It was not very strange for him. He knew it was fate’s game. It wouldn’t have been strange even if an airplane had come and collided with the train. Nothing was very strange once he started understanding the way fate worked. Even if he had stayed at home without taking the train some devil would have carried him to the train.
The nurse told him that a lot of lives had been lost. Those who escaped death had been brought to the community hospital. He had come with a severe fracture in the ankle and scratches and wounds allover the body and one severe wound in the head. An operation had been performed and he was out of critical conditions. He was given painkillers which extricated the pains in the ankles and the head to a considerable extent. The sun had set and was giving way to the nighty night. A ‘fluidy’ dinner was given to him. The angelic nurse gave him some tablets to take, a sedative was one of the tablets that were given to him. After a few minutes it was good night for him.
All the kids were replete with ecstasy and rapture. There was so much of uproar in the mother’s orphanage that no one even heard the telephone bell ringing in the other room. The clock in the main hall ticked 3 in the afternoon. The two teachers, three maids and three matrons were all boarding a bus with the thirty-five children. It was a paid trip for them. Some charitable organization had arranged for a trip for the orphans. This does not happen a lot of times, not more than twice a year or so. They planned to go to the museum and beach. The bus was standing just out of their modest one storied building. From somewhere a lighted cigarette flew towards the bus. Just like bulls eye it reached for the gas tank and just like magic the gas tank flew open and just like a cataclysm the bus burst into flames and then there was nothing just like it. A minute later about 50 charred corpses and a completely dismantled burned bus were the only occupants of that place.
The morning came as he was sitting, just sitting. In another ten minutes the alarm would start its chore. He switched it off before it could even go on. The dream had been very strange. He hadn’t got dreams like this before. He did get one the previous day and that was equally bad. He forced himself not to believe that whatever he dreamt of was going to get ‘realitised’. He somehow coaxed his mind to understand that Timothy’s death was already preordained and that he didn’t have anything to do with it. Possibly yes. But what if it was another way. Maybe his dreams were giving him glimpses of the future. Maybe the dreams were the blueprint of whatever that was waiting in store for him.
He had to leave early for he had lots of works to do. He wouldn’t waste time, he would never do it. That too in cases of emergencies he would function like a meteor. He hastened his breakfast. He was going to take the ‘previous train’. The appointment with the funeral people had been fixed and he was going to meet them before going to work. While walking along the road he reprimanded himself for behaving so badly in the morning. He had lost an hour of his sleep thinking about some stupid dream. However hard he tried to be skeptical about the ‘dreams coming true’ thing, his fears did surface up like bubbles. He reached the station and there was a huge crowd waiting for the train, double the amount that would wait for his usual train. He still had his qualms of taking the train but somehow inexplicably he moved towards the train. He thought it was like winning over nature, fate, destiny and all that one can’t actually win over. He wanted to show fate that he was not afraid of his dreams and was not going to run away from it. The train was approaching the platform and the crowd raced to get into the train.
A sudden flash in his mind and the next thing, he didn’t want to get into the train. Something pricked him and pinned him mentally and out of all the things he was sure that he didn’t want to board the train. He didn’t mind losing to fate, he didn’t mind accepting the fact that he was afraid of fate, afraid of what it might to do to him. But unfortunately he was late, too late to back out. He was in the middle of the crowd and the racing crowd was just pushing him into the train. He tried his best to escape, but as everyone say, there is no escape.
The horn blew, hands waved goodbyes, reds became greens and the wheels started turning. Turning…..turning…..turning………..
Hoggar was standing perplexed and intrigued. The train was moving at a slow speed and had a big crowd in it. He was standing near the door wondering why he ever got into the train. He wanted to break the glass and just jump out of the train but he could never do such a thing. He was standing there, all shivering and frightened. Why? He didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Next, there was a continuous honking noise that penetrated even closed doors and windows. Immediately next, a big bang and a huge crash. He didn’t know what was happening to him. He was thrown over some smooth green fields with terrible injuries and little conscience. A sever pain on his ankles was trying to kill him. For that matter, he didn’t even know if he was dead or not.
Hoggar woke up not from sleep but from anesthesia in a small community hospital room. The cot was made of metal and was hard and really uncomfortable for him but the anesthesia had taken away all those discomforts away from him. A nurse in white was standing next to him, doing something with his leg. The pain in the ankles was really terrible and the nurse was giving him physiotherapy. She looked like an angel in white. It was like as if some angel had given him a new life (with aching ankles). The physiotherapy was appeasing but it didn’t help much. The nurse later explained that their train had collided with another train. Strange. The other train had also come in the same track but in the opposite direction. It was not very strange for him. He knew it was fate’s game. It wouldn’t have been strange even if an airplane had come and collided with the train. Nothing was very strange once he started understanding the way fate worked. Even if he had stayed at home without taking the train some devil would have carried him to the train.
The nurse told him that a lot of lives had been lost. Those who escaped death had been brought to the community hospital. He had come with a severe fracture in the ankle and scratches and wounds allover the body and one severe wound in the head. An operation had been performed and he was out of critical conditions. He was given painkillers which extricated the pains in the ankles and the head to a considerable extent. The sun had set and was giving way to the nighty night. A ‘fluidy’ dinner was given to him. The angelic nurse gave him some tablets to take, a sedative was one of the tablets that were given to him. After a few minutes it was good night for him.
All the kids were replete with ecstasy and rapture. There was so much of uproar in the mother’s orphanage that no one even heard the telephone bell ringing in the other room. The clock in the main hall ticked 3 in the afternoon. The two teachers, three maids and three matrons were all boarding a bus with the thirty-five children. It was a paid trip for them. Some charitable organization had arranged for a trip for the orphans. This does not happen a lot of times, not more than twice a year or so. They planned to go to the museum and beach. The bus was standing just out of their modest one storied building. From somewhere a lighted cigarette flew towards the bus. Just like bulls eye it reached for the gas tank and just like magic the gas tank flew open and just like a cataclysm the bus burst into flames and then there was nothing just like it. A minute later about 50 charred corpses and a completely dismantled burned bus were the only occupants of that place.
I LEAVE IT TO YOU - CHAPTER IV
The ward nurses were taken by a surprise when they heard Hoggar shouting like a siren. The other patients in the neighboring rooms had got up. The nurses came running to him. Hoggar was sitting, straight up, still screaming, even after he knew it was just a dream. The nurses tried their best to calm him down. The angelic nurse gave him a glass of water. He drank it obligingly. He was thankful for all the nurses around him. He would have died shouting like that if the nurses hadn’t come. Another gave him a dose of tranquilizer. The medicine gave immediate effects. His eyes started to get all hazy and his body loosened as if going to fall flat. The next minute he was lying prostrate, deep in sleep.
The morning came, Hoggar didn’t get up. It was about noon when Hoggar got up lazily with no particular memories of what had happened the previous night. The angelic nurse came to him and asked him if he was ok. Once the nurse started telling him what had happened, it all came back to him. Now it was there, the dream was actually going on like a video in his mind, a video that he couldn’t control but only could sleep and watch. The nurse asked him if it was some nightmare. He told her that it was .He didn’t say anything more. She didn’t ask anything more too.
He asked the nurse to call a particular person and ask him to visit Hoggar. It was Steve she was going to call. Hoggar could confide everything only to Steve now. If Timothy had been there it would have been really different. But no, Timothy was not there. In one way Hoggar had always felt guilty for Timothy’s death. And sitting in the hospital, he felt guilty for his own near death experience. He was going to do everything to make sure that he was not going to feel guilty for the death of so many orphans. He would do anything, just anything. But unfortunately he was not in a state to do anything productive. What can someone who spends the whole day on a hospital bed do? Thinking is one thing that could be done. Giving orders to someone else is also another thing that could be done. That someone was none other than Timmy.
The nurse told Hoggar that Steve was on his way and that he would be there any minute. Hoggar had no time waste at all. He knew it was all going to happen at 3. He should ask Steve to go to the orphanage ask them to move out of the place before 3. Not for one minute did Hoggar realize that it might all happen before 3 or even after 3. He somehow knew that the details in the dream were authentic. Not once did he doubt the precision of the dream. In fact the whole ‘dream turning real’ thing could be a hoax, a false indicator. But Hoggar knew better. He was not going to let fate overtake him this time even if that meant projecting him weird.
Steve was there by 2. Hoggar told him everything, just everything. Steve started to doubt Hoggar’s sanity. One can’t blame him though. But still Steve listened to everything without the slightest traces of suspicion on his face. He may not have believed whatever he said but he didn’t ridicule them too. Whatever Hoggar asked him to do, he was going to do. Hoggar and Steve didn’t know each other much and the only common thing between them, Timohty was also dead, but still Steve wanted to help Hoggar by doing whatever he wanted him to do. That might not have been out of camaraderie but just out of respect for someone severely hurt, both mentally and physically.
Steve was supposed to go to the orphanage immediately. He took a taxi from the hospital and was going quite fast. At about 2:10 his taxi met with a small accident. Steve escaped uninjured. He paid whatever he had to pay to the taxi driver and was looking for another taxi. After about 10 minutes he found another one. He was about 10 miles away from the orphanage when the tires, all the four got flat. It was weird, really weird, all the tires getting flat at the same time. The taxi driver had just one spare tire to replace. It was all deliberate, calculated. Destiny’s plan was really conspicuous. If just one tire had got flat, the driver could have easily replaced the tires in a minute and could have continued driving, but there were two tires to replace now. Steve actually started believing Hoggar.
Steve too was determined that somehow or the other he was going to get all the orphans safe. He abandoned the taxi and planned to hitchhike. He was taken by one of the cars passing by the road. Luckily the car was also going to the same area. The time was already 2:30. But still Steve was sure he could make it. When they were approaching the orphanage’s area the car’s owner suddenly got a call on his cell phone. While speaking over his cell phone his face turned really worried. He was saying something like “Yup, will come immediately’ and immediately turned his car a 360 degrees and headed back the same way he was coming. ‘Sorry man, gotta go home, my niece just met with an accident’. Steve got down from the car, thanked him for the ride, and said that nothing would happen to his niece. Steve was sure that nothing would happen to his niece now that he was out of the car. He knew pretty well that it was destiny’s plan to just get him out of the car. Later the car owner would find out that it was just a crank call.
It was just 15 minutes to 3 and Steve was running all the way to the orphanage. Back at the hospital Hoggar was waiting impatiently. He was biting his nails, biting the bedsheet and was actually shivering. The nurse thought he was cold and so gave him an extra blanket. Thanks to the nurse. Now he had two blankets to bite and chew.
Steve was running, running really fast that he could have got a medal in the Olympics if he had participated in it. From somewhere suddenly a stone came flying at him and hit him on his head. It had missed his eyes by just a centimeter. Maybe his eyes were the target and somehow the stone might have just missed it. For once destiny’s plans were foiled. Blood was dripping down his face. There was not one single soul near him to help him. He thought he was going to fall unconscious. He couldn’t do anything. He was helpless.
There was one phone booth near him. He somehow dragged himself to the booth. He went inside and browsed the telephone directory inside for Mother’s Orphanage’s number. He got the number easily. He was dialing the number with one hand and with the other he was holding his handkerchief at the spot he was hit to stop the blood flowing out. It was 10 minutes to 3 then but it was already 3 at the Mother’s Orphanage. Their clock in the main room was about 10 minutes fast and the clock was showing 3 PM. Steve was dialing and the bell was ringing but no one was picking up the phone.
All the kids were replete with ecstasy and rapture. There was so much of uproar in the mother’s orphanage that no one even heard the telephone bell ringing in the other room. The clock in the main hall ticked 3 in the afternoon. The two teachers, three maids and three matrons were all boarding a bus with the thirty-five children. It was a paid trip for them. Some charitable organization had arranged for a trip for the orphans. This does not happen a lot of times, not more than twice a year or so. They planned to go to the museum and beach. The bus was standing just out of their modest one storied building. From somewhere a lighted cigarette flew towards the bus. Just like bulls eye it reached for the gas tank and just like magic the gas tank flew open and just like a cataclysm the bus burst into flames and then there was nothing just like it. A minute later about 50 charred corpses and a completely dismantled burned bus were the only occupants of that place.
Later that evening the news came to Hoggar. He was waiting for a telephone call from Steve. He was repeatedly asking the nurse if Steve had called. He actually wanted to ask them if they had heard about an orphanage in fire, but he didn’t dare ask her. All through the day he was shivering and sweating at the same time. It was about 6 in the evening when he heard a radio announcement about a fire at some orphanage. He didn’t even have to listen to the name of orphanage, he knew it, he knew it the previous night only. The radio cried when it talked about the 50 dead people. But Hoggar was not crying. He reached a stage in which people were not meant to cry or do anything but just can sit and watch whatever was happening and remain mute spectators.
What was the reason for everything that had happened? Fire accidents are very common but how the hell does a cigarette fly by itself and light the gas tank of a bus? Train accidents are usual too but how in God’s name can two trains come face to face in the same track? One hears about these kinds of freak accidents at least once a week at some place in the earth. They are all quite usual but still in Hoggar’s case it was all unusually usual. Whatever happened, happened just to emphasize the fact that he can never ever change the fate or fight against it. To emphasize this fact something harmless could have come in his dreams. He could have actually dreamt of him winning a lottery or something but why did nature choose such pernicious events? Again one cannot question destiny. We can just question ourselves.
The morning came, Hoggar didn’t get up. It was about noon when Hoggar got up lazily with no particular memories of what had happened the previous night. The angelic nurse came to him and asked him if he was ok. Once the nurse started telling him what had happened, it all came back to him. Now it was there, the dream was actually going on like a video in his mind, a video that he couldn’t control but only could sleep and watch. The nurse asked him if it was some nightmare. He told her that it was .He didn’t say anything more. She didn’t ask anything more too.
He asked the nurse to call a particular person and ask him to visit Hoggar. It was Steve she was going to call. Hoggar could confide everything only to Steve now. If Timothy had been there it would have been really different. But no, Timothy was not there. In one way Hoggar had always felt guilty for Timothy’s death. And sitting in the hospital, he felt guilty for his own near death experience. He was going to do everything to make sure that he was not going to feel guilty for the death of so many orphans. He would do anything, just anything. But unfortunately he was not in a state to do anything productive. What can someone who spends the whole day on a hospital bed do? Thinking is one thing that could be done. Giving orders to someone else is also another thing that could be done. That someone was none other than Timmy.
The nurse told Hoggar that Steve was on his way and that he would be there any minute. Hoggar had no time waste at all. He knew it was all going to happen at 3. He should ask Steve to go to the orphanage ask them to move out of the place before 3. Not for one minute did Hoggar realize that it might all happen before 3 or even after 3. He somehow knew that the details in the dream were authentic. Not once did he doubt the precision of the dream. In fact the whole ‘dream turning real’ thing could be a hoax, a false indicator. But Hoggar knew better. He was not going to let fate overtake him this time even if that meant projecting him weird.
Steve was there by 2. Hoggar told him everything, just everything. Steve started to doubt Hoggar’s sanity. One can’t blame him though. But still Steve listened to everything without the slightest traces of suspicion on his face. He may not have believed whatever he said but he didn’t ridicule them too. Whatever Hoggar asked him to do, he was going to do. Hoggar and Steve didn’t know each other much and the only common thing between them, Timohty was also dead, but still Steve wanted to help Hoggar by doing whatever he wanted him to do. That might not have been out of camaraderie but just out of respect for someone severely hurt, both mentally and physically.
Steve was supposed to go to the orphanage immediately. He took a taxi from the hospital and was going quite fast. At about 2:10 his taxi met with a small accident. Steve escaped uninjured. He paid whatever he had to pay to the taxi driver and was looking for another taxi. After about 10 minutes he found another one. He was about 10 miles away from the orphanage when the tires, all the four got flat. It was weird, really weird, all the tires getting flat at the same time. The taxi driver had just one spare tire to replace. It was all deliberate, calculated. Destiny’s plan was really conspicuous. If just one tire had got flat, the driver could have easily replaced the tires in a minute and could have continued driving, but there were two tires to replace now. Steve actually started believing Hoggar.
Steve too was determined that somehow or the other he was going to get all the orphans safe. He abandoned the taxi and planned to hitchhike. He was taken by one of the cars passing by the road. Luckily the car was also going to the same area. The time was already 2:30. But still Steve was sure he could make it. When they were approaching the orphanage’s area the car’s owner suddenly got a call on his cell phone. While speaking over his cell phone his face turned really worried. He was saying something like “Yup, will come immediately’ and immediately turned his car a 360 degrees and headed back the same way he was coming. ‘Sorry man, gotta go home, my niece just met with an accident’. Steve got down from the car, thanked him for the ride, and said that nothing would happen to his niece. Steve was sure that nothing would happen to his niece now that he was out of the car. He knew pretty well that it was destiny’s plan to just get him out of the car. Later the car owner would find out that it was just a crank call.
It was just 15 minutes to 3 and Steve was running all the way to the orphanage. Back at the hospital Hoggar was waiting impatiently. He was biting his nails, biting the bedsheet and was actually shivering. The nurse thought he was cold and so gave him an extra blanket. Thanks to the nurse. Now he had two blankets to bite and chew.
Steve was running, running really fast that he could have got a medal in the Olympics if he had participated in it. From somewhere suddenly a stone came flying at him and hit him on his head. It had missed his eyes by just a centimeter. Maybe his eyes were the target and somehow the stone might have just missed it. For once destiny’s plans were foiled. Blood was dripping down his face. There was not one single soul near him to help him. He thought he was going to fall unconscious. He couldn’t do anything. He was helpless.
There was one phone booth near him. He somehow dragged himself to the booth. He went inside and browsed the telephone directory inside for Mother’s Orphanage’s number. He got the number easily. He was dialing the number with one hand and with the other he was holding his handkerchief at the spot he was hit to stop the blood flowing out. It was 10 minutes to 3 then but it was already 3 at the Mother’s Orphanage. Their clock in the main room was about 10 minutes fast and the clock was showing 3 PM. Steve was dialing and the bell was ringing but no one was picking up the phone.
All the kids were replete with ecstasy and rapture. There was so much of uproar in the mother’s orphanage that no one even heard the telephone bell ringing in the other room. The clock in the main hall ticked 3 in the afternoon. The two teachers, three maids and three matrons were all boarding a bus with the thirty-five children. It was a paid trip for them. Some charitable organization had arranged for a trip for the orphans. This does not happen a lot of times, not more than twice a year or so. They planned to go to the museum and beach. The bus was standing just out of their modest one storied building. From somewhere a lighted cigarette flew towards the bus. Just like bulls eye it reached for the gas tank and just like magic the gas tank flew open and just like a cataclysm the bus burst into flames and then there was nothing just like it. A minute later about 50 charred corpses and a completely dismantled burned bus were the only occupants of that place.
Later that evening the news came to Hoggar. He was waiting for a telephone call from Steve. He was repeatedly asking the nurse if Steve had called. He actually wanted to ask them if they had heard about an orphanage in fire, but he didn’t dare ask her. All through the day he was shivering and sweating at the same time. It was about 6 in the evening when he heard a radio announcement about a fire at some orphanage. He didn’t even have to listen to the name of orphanage, he knew it, he knew it the previous night only. The radio cried when it talked about the 50 dead people. But Hoggar was not crying. He reached a stage in which people were not meant to cry or do anything but just can sit and watch whatever was happening and remain mute spectators.
What was the reason for everything that had happened? Fire accidents are very common but how the hell does a cigarette fly by itself and light the gas tank of a bus? Train accidents are usual too but how in God’s name can two trains come face to face in the same track? One hears about these kinds of freak accidents at least once a week at some place in the earth. They are all quite usual but still in Hoggar’s case it was all unusually usual. Whatever happened, happened just to emphasize the fact that he can never ever change the fate or fight against it. To emphasize this fact something harmless could have come in his dreams. He could have actually dreamt of him winning a lottery or something but why did nature choose such pernicious events? Again one cannot question destiny. We can just question ourselves.
I LEAVE IT TO YOU - CHAPTER V
Two months had passed by. It was night time. Hoggar was sitting pensively on his bed. Thousands of things were there to think about it but he chose just one single thing. One single thing that made him happy after all those things he had lost. He hadn’t dreamt at all since the Mother’s orphanage’s fire incident. He was in the hospital for about 15 days. A matured friendly relationship had blossomed between the angelic nurse and him. He was so happy about it. He never even believed he could find love at all. It had not become love yet, at least from her side but still he was happy. After all the hardships he had gone through the last 2 months, one can’t deny the fact that he at least deserved some kind of happiness.
There was also an other thing that made him happy, the fact that the dreams had just disappeared. His nights became devoid of dreams. Sometimes his sleeps were not even like sleeps. It was just like some time ripping session. Some mornings he had actually felt like he as if he didn’t sleep at all the previous night. But these things didn’t actually worry him. In fact he didn’t worry about anything at all.
The minute he felt his pillow under his head, he would just drift away to another world. A world without any dreams, a world without anything at all, a world replete with only chasms and abyss. But that day was a little different. He slept well till about 3:50 in the morning. But……..
The clock showed 4 in the morning. Hoggar looked so motionless in sleep that he looked like as if he was hibernating. Suddenly the clock just started moving fast. The minute hand was rotating ten times its normal speed. In about a minute 4 hours passed in the clock. Whether it was just a minute or four hours, there was one thing that just remained constant. It was Hoggar. He just laid there. Without getting up. Without movement. Without anything. The clock continued its mad spree. In about six minutes the next day had come and still he was lying on the bed, motionless, lifeless.
Hoggar got up with a shock. Since he didn’t dream at all for about 2 months, the dream that he got that day felt remotely strange. He didn’t believe what was happening to him. He didn’t want to believe anything at all. He just wanted to have a good sleep, which meant a time ripping sleep. He couldn’t watch himself lying motionless and lifeless. He didn’t know what to do. He saw the clock and it showed 3:57. There was nothing to worry, he assured himself. The war between fate and him was over. He could sleep his time-ripping-sleep happily.
The clock showed 4 in the morning. Hoggar looked so motionless in sleep that he looked like as if he was hibernating. Suddenly the clock just started moving fast. The minute hand was rotating ten times its normal speed. In about a minute 4 hours passed in the clock. Whether it was just a minute or four hours, there was one thing that just remained constant. It was Hoggar. He just laid there. Without getting up. Without movement. Without anything. The clock continued its mad spree. In about six minutes the next day had come and still he was lying on the bed, motionless, lifeless.
Did he wake up? I leave it to you.
There was also an other thing that made him happy, the fact that the dreams had just disappeared. His nights became devoid of dreams. Sometimes his sleeps were not even like sleeps. It was just like some time ripping session. Some mornings he had actually felt like he as if he didn’t sleep at all the previous night. But these things didn’t actually worry him. In fact he didn’t worry about anything at all.
The minute he felt his pillow under his head, he would just drift away to another world. A world without any dreams, a world without anything at all, a world replete with only chasms and abyss. But that day was a little different. He slept well till about 3:50 in the morning. But……..
The clock showed 4 in the morning. Hoggar looked so motionless in sleep that he looked like as if he was hibernating. Suddenly the clock just started moving fast. The minute hand was rotating ten times its normal speed. In about a minute 4 hours passed in the clock. Whether it was just a minute or four hours, there was one thing that just remained constant. It was Hoggar. He just laid there. Without getting up. Without movement. Without anything. The clock continued its mad spree. In about six minutes the next day had come and still he was lying on the bed, motionless, lifeless.
Hoggar got up with a shock. Since he didn’t dream at all for about 2 months, the dream that he got that day felt remotely strange. He didn’t believe what was happening to him. He didn’t want to believe anything at all. He just wanted to have a good sleep, which meant a time ripping sleep. He couldn’t watch himself lying motionless and lifeless. He didn’t know what to do. He saw the clock and it showed 3:57. There was nothing to worry, he assured himself. The war between fate and him was over. He could sleep his time-ripping-sleep happily.
The clock showed 4 in the morning. Hoggar looked so motionless in sleep that he looked like as if he was hibernating. Suddenly the clock just started moving fast. The minute hand was rotating ten times its normal speed. In about a minute 4 hours passed in the clock. Whether it was just a minute or four hours, there was one thing that just remained constant. It was Hoggar. He just laid there. Without getting up. Without movement. Without anything. The clock continued its mad spree. In about six minutes the next day had come and still he was lying on the bed, motionless, lifeless.
Did he wake up? I leave it to you.
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