We were sitting cross-legged in front of a big man. He was big in all sorts of ways, huge face covered by a bushy salt n pepper beard with no or little hair on his shiny head. His whole limbs were long and large but were hanging loosely from an enormous frame slumped in defeat. Strangely for a man this large, his voice was soft n pleasant. In the beginning his voice was very low but as he got into the main part of his story his voice became louder, his hands moving in expressions and overall there in front of us he was transformed from a nervous wreck of a man to a passionate speaker. He looked at each of us in the eye and with small smile he started his amazing life story.
"In the beginning it was unbearable. Even just to breathe was so difficult that I literally had to push the air down into my lungs to stay alive. Yes , after all this, I didn't want to die, but I wanted to live for I know that even in death, what I desire is what I will never get.
Now it doesn't give anyone any inkling of an understanding if I were to say this story all backwards. So now in an ordered manner, this is what happened. But a word of caution, people who are non-romantics please don’t read it because this is something which i know you will not understand.
It all happened long back in time, around 21 years ago. I was just another guy in the street. I had a great job, had good friends and had a lot of time and money in my hand and it was and still is the best times that i ever had. Okay so if go on in this manner, I can assure you that you are going to get bored very soon because such long were the adventures we did in those long unforgettable days. Coming back, it was a period of fun, joy, friendship and lot of adventures. We were young and had all the time in the world with us and with not even a single care in the world. And then she came.
I didn't know where she was from, one day she just showed up in a burger joint we frequented. She was lonely so after a couple of hours, being chivalrous gentlemen that we were, we went and befriended her and that is how it all began. First of all, there was nothing special about her and you can always lose sight of her in a crowd. She was neither tall or short, nor fat or slim but a plain normal looking girl. But when you stand close to her and just look into her eyes, then you can see something very different. Unlike the usual listless or overly made up eyes in other gals, there was something more there. Her eyes had an unnatural shine and she had a way of closing her eyes half way through while talking and this really took my breath away. In her eyes I don’t know what I saw but it filled me with a new sense of happiness and joy which I have not yet experienced. I felt myself being drawn more and more into those deep dark eyes, the effect which I can compare now to that of a Black hole. To make the long story short, I fell for her and fallen hard. I don’t know how she felt about me, still I don’t know. But when I look back now, I think she enjoyed my company. What began as a friendly conversation and a casual acquaintance grew into something more. Gradually I began yearning for her company more and more. We spent countless hours talking and talking about anything and everything under the sun over countless beers and fries. But every time there was something between us, an invisible wall that I was afraid to breach and she didn’t try to bring down. Each and every day I was sort of lost in a world of my own until I saw her. Outwardly I was my old normal self but inside I was a wreck till I caught sight of her, sitting waiting for me at our own special seat in the joint where I first met her. All the time I was thinking, was I in love with her? But each time I stress that I am not, I knew that I was betraying myself but there was nothing I could do-nothing I could say that could define how I felt about her. She was special to me, precious to me in my own way; God knows what way it was. So this went on for a pretty long time, but then something began worrying me. That wall between us seemed to grow more and more solid. In all our time together, whatever I asked her, she didn’t tell me anything about herself. Repeatedly I asked, first casually, then forcefully but there were still no replies. The only thing she used to tell me is just one thing-will tell you later when its time. So now this perfectly innocent piece of conversation had me worried sick. A thousand questions sprang up to my mind. Was she married? Already got a boyfriend? Was she an orphan? All these thoughts combined together and drove me mad. One fine day or rather one fine evening, it erupted. I was having so much of these emotions welled up inside that I was so adamant that I asked her all these questions and much more to her face, eye to eye. But this time, she answered me with a smile, a smile that still haunts me, a slow sad smile that can set your pulse racing. Without a word she got out and started walking, I followed her. She kept on glancing behind to see whether I was there I acknowledged her looks with a nod of my head and then she would be walking again and I followed. This went on for quite sometime and finally she reached in front of my house and sat on a bench on the lawn outside. I went and sat beside her. We sat like that for around an hour, two people just sitting together. I could bear no more of this, so I turned, took her hands and pleaded with her, please tell me something. Gently she removed her hands from my grasp and stood up, her face glowing with that sad smile again. Then she took my hand and placed it on her heart. I was shocked.....my hand went right through her. It was as if she was not there. I tried grabbing her hands again but there she was just standing smiling like that and my hands going right through her. She mouthed a goodbye then and with that enigmatic smile still on her lips, she blew me a kiss and then she was no more there. I was stunned, shocked. I just didn't know what to do or what to say. I was destroyed; I do not know what had happened. I suddenly felt like laughing and crying all together and to shout and jump and climb to the moon. The days after that were just a blur. I was in and out of dreams so often that the line between reality and the fiction became blurred.
Two months passed before I could come back to my world. To all around it was the old me again, laughing and having the time of my life but inside i was bleeding every moment I live. The pain of loss was sapping all my strength and will. I lived like this for all this time and i haven't told anyone about it for all this time. Finally, I can feel the ache reducing in intensity, sharing one's sorrows with someone else is always a good way to reduce ones own sadness. I do not say you must believe it, but now as you all can see the person that I have become in all this time, I think you know in your heart that what I say is true. I think I can see the orderly waiting to see whether I have finished and to see you out. So come back again anytime so that I can tell you more about my past experiences. "
He finished and was escorted out by two burly men in blue overalls; standard nurse uniform. Before we left, we went to see the doctor as to ask him about the patient we visited that day.
When we asked him about what was wrong with him and mentioned his experiences, the doc gave a quiet laugh and told us,” He told it to you also rite? Actually he is in this institution for the past 20 years. He is convicted for killing his wife and her parents in a fit of rage and is been in denial ever since. As due to his unstable mental condition, he was placed here and is been here till then. All the stories that he tell is nothing more than a fragment of his fantasies...a form of self denial to bury the guilt he has within himself."
Who to believe, who not to believe? With this question weighing heavily on our minds, we got out of the hospital once more...not going back but to come back again later to complete this journal about the wandering minds trapped inside those 4 concrete walls.
