It’s a warm night with a thick cloud cover making it unbearably humid. The clock chimes ten in the distant tower that Oscar can see from his window. He stands there wearing only his bathing towel, wrapped around at the waist. His arms are stretched across the width of the window over his shoulders. The street lights are bright orange giving the road a surreal sunset feel. The smoke from the vehicles on the road is adding to the ugliness of the moment.
Just when he thinks it opportune to open a bottle of beer to beat the heat, his door bell rings.
“Comiiiing…”
He looks at the wall clock across the room on the opposite wall.
“Who has come visiting at 10:10 in the night?” he wonders.
“Ah! What a pleasant surprise Mahesh. I was just going to help myself to a bottle of beer. You would love to have one, at this most unpleasant moment. Won’t you?”
Mahesh enters without uttering a word and seats himself on the couch. He immediately jumps and walks up to the window where Oscar was standing a moment ago.
The house is very small with only a hall and a kitchen. The loo is to the left hand corner of the hall if you have just entered the house. And the kitchen has no door. It is like a triple sized closet sunk into the wall right opposite the entrance door.
Oscar goes into the kitchen and emerges with a bottle of beer and two mugs.
He slowly pours the beer into the mugs with perfect veteran’s comfort with the skill. After he is finished he lifts the mugs and walks up to Mahesh who is still standing at the window.
“Cheers my friend!” And he hands over one mug to Mahesh.
Mahesh turns, looks at Oscar for a second in the eye, takes the mug, raises it and nods his head with a raised eyebrow. He then starts looking out the window again.
Oscar walks up to a small, broken, wooden center table in the hall. He lifts his packet of cigarettes and lights one. The sound of the match scraping the strip of the match box fills the room and soon smoke follows suit.
“Would you like to have a fag?” he asks Mahesh.
Mahesh doesn’t reply. He just keeps looking out the window.
“What happened to you today? Why are you so unusually silent?”
Oscar walks up to the window and stands next to Mahesh. But he still doesn’t answer.
“Ok. Enough of dumb charades! It is getting irritating now. What happened? Did you see a ghost on your way or what?”
Mahesh turned slowly to face Oscar.
“But you don’t believe in ghosts. Do you?”
“Of course I don’t. But if you tell me that that is what it will take for you to talk tonight, I will. But only for tonight.”
Mahesh sits on the couch and keeps his mug on the center table.
“Now now now. I know that look on your face. It is veeeeery veeeery familiar. Please don’t tell me that you actually saw a ghost on your way here, yet another time. Just yesterday we spoke about this Mahesh and I told you in clear terms that if you ever tried to convince me on the existence of ghosts, I will simply switch off and never see you again”
Oscar takes a long drag after saying this and gently buffs the ash in the empty Kingfisher beer can he uses as ash tray. Mahesh still doesn’t speak and simply stares at Oscar.
“I can’t believe this! You have been here thirty minutes and you have only spoken eight words, out of which one word is ghost. Ridiculous! Don’t you think you are taking this ghost thing too far now?”
“Oscar, sometimes we see but we don’t see and sometimes we don’t see but we see.”
“Oh my god! Look at the philosopher talking. Sigh! At least it is better than your stupid apparitions. Go on!”
Oscar guzzles the remaining beer and rises to fetch himself another bottle. When he returns he realizes Mahesh has not eve touched his beer so far.
“What the heck man! Why aren’t you drinking? Are you alright?”
“Oscar, life is so cruel to people sometimes. Just when you think you are getting somewhere, everything changes. The entire map is re-drawn. You lose direction. The place you were going to is not there anymore. It’s in some other place. And you have to re-work from scratch!”
Oscar stubs the butt and lights another one immediately. He drinks his second mug half and wipes his lips with the skin on his arms.
“Mahesh I think you need to visit a doctor. You are getting sick by the moment. I can’t see you this way anymore. I guess I will take you to a psychiatrist.”
“I won’t need a doctor anymore Oscar.”
Just then Oscar’s mobile phone rings. The sound is traveling from the kitchen. Oscar gets up and walks to the kitchen to fetch the phone.
“Hey! Naina, How are you? And what makes you call ME so late? Your guy is sitting here with me and we are having some very interesting conversation.”
“Hello…hello…Naina? I can’t hear you clearly. Hello? Are you crying Naina?”
“Os-car, today Mahesh asked me to marry him. It was the most beautiful moment of my life. I was so happy. I said a yes and accepted his ring. He was so excited he wanted to go and give you the news himself. So he dropped me home quickly and rushed towards your house.”
“If I heard you correctly you said that Mahesh was coming to my house? I know of it because he is right here. But why do you have such a hurried and troubled tone?”
Oscar walks out of the kitchen but doesn’t find Mahesh sitting on the couch. He thinks he must have gone to the loo.
“Naina can you hear me? There is a lot of disturbance in the line?”
“No, I cannot hear you very clearly. But Oscar, I called to tell you that Mahesh is dead! He died… i..n a..n accident. On the way to your house… I just got a call from the police. They got my number from his dialed numbers log in the mobile. I am so s-h-a-t-t-e-r-e-d Osc…………………”
Oscar freezes! Everything stops.
The cigarette drops from his mouth just as his body does to the floor. The cell phone slides out of his hand on to the floor and he falls on his face.
“Hello…hello…Oscar…can you hear me? Oh shit! I was kidding Oscar. He is not dead. We were playing a prank on you. Mahesh is hiding in your loo… Hello…Oscar, are you there??? Hello…hello…”
Oscar lay dead on the floor!
