The End

 

It was drizzling as I walked back home after my Sunday evening mass. Jumping from here to there, avoiding the muddy potholes I reached my street. Nivya road was relatively well maintained, thanks to the ex-minister who lives in the area.

Setting a mind-plan of what was to be done before I left for hostel, I entered my house. The rain drops falling on the aluminium roof created a noisy atmosphere. Still I could hear my sister Ann’s voice loud and clear.

“Chechi, there’ll be a bomb blast in Kochi and Wayanad”. Her voice filled more with excitement than horror. How anyone could be excited at the news of a probable bomb blast, I wondered.

“What? You must be kidding”. I replied rather disinterestedly.

“No, I swear...It’s in the news. See”, she said pointing to the TV. In spite of my sister’s approaching board exams, we hadn’t cancelled our cable connection owing to my dad’s news addiction.

Stroking his grey moustache, dad sat on the sofa right in front of the TV. Bold red letters on the screen read “THREAT OF BLASTS IN KOCHI”

A shiver of mixed fear and excitement ran through my spine. Eh..did I say excitement?, well, it is not every day that you get a bomb blast threat, isn’t it? My initial disinterest suddenly transformed into curiosity.

‘After Bangalore and Gujarat, it’s Kerala’ said a phone call from Islamabad. The call was received by a TV reporter in Bangalore. The blast was scheduled to be at 7:00 pm. I looked at my watch, 6:40 pm – 20 minutes to go. I sighed and took the remote. I swapped between news channels to know just about anything related to the blast threat.

Ministers and officials asked the public not to panic. ‘Panic’ was not something in the dictionary of a Kochiite for, a reporter said that the public was upset the first and second shows in the theatres had been cancelled owing to security reasons. Strange, how people crave for entertainment at the cost of their lives! Keralites have never really understood the impact of terrorism. Some part of me wanted the blast, just to make people realize what the trauma is like. But still....wouldn’t it be a heavy price to pay?

“There’ll be blasts only in states governed by the XYZ party.” My dad said breaking the awkward silence that filled the house. “You are wasting your time in front of this”, he continued. “Why don’t you go do your packing? Nothing is going to blast”.

‘What if I’ll not have to pack at all’, I thought.

“And you, don’t you have a test tomorrow” dad asked Ann who was curled up on the sofa with her pencil sized legs pulled upto her neck.

“Oh! It’s just English”, she said lazily. I gave her a stern look.

“No offense”, she smiled at me. It was not until I took up the subject that I realized how little people valued language studies.

Ann passed me a packet of banana chips. I took a handful and placed it on my lap and passed the packet to my dad.

“Mom, come fast if you don’t want to miss it”, Ann shouted over the screeching sound of our Philips ‘Super Silent’ mixer grinder.

One minute to go. As if watching a rocket launch, the three of us sat glued to the TV.

10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1.. TOH...TOH..

I jerked back only to see my dad have a hearty laugh at me. He had burst the chips packet to scare me, and it did scare the wits out of me. What about the blast? My sister snatched the remote from me.

“What number is Indiavision?” she asked furiously, for she knew only the numbers of MTV and Zoom.

“Three” Dad replied.

For the next ten minutes we scanned channels for news on the blast. In the end my sister gave up.

“What a big fat lie. Why do they give us hopes?” she frowned.

“What hope?” Mom enquired from the kitchen.

“Oh never mind”, she stood up to leave. I looked up at her. She was a few inches taller than me, but her lean body made her look taller than that.

“Now that I have to study for tomorrows test” she mumbled under her breath.

So that was what she ‘hoped’ for – a holiday so that there wouldn’t be a test. Lazy little nincompoop!

Mom came to the drawing room, her hands partly covered with chilli and turmeric paste. She looked through her large spectacles at the TV screen that now showed the scenes from the previous Ahmadabad serial blasts.

“This world is no longer good to live in” she said in disbelief staring at the TV screen. “All these are signs that the last judgement is near“. The paste on her hand dripped onto the mosaic floor as she lifted her hands and prayed “God save us!”

I stood up to leave, now that I had to pack!