The Indigo Blossoms

There’s a plant in my living room now with indigo blossoms. Its quite curious actually. Every morning I will water it and go about my own business. It sits there. The blossoms faced towards the open balcony and the summer sun. I sit there, working as I type along. And once in a while I spot the blossoms out of my field of vision. Indigo-purple flowers. From here, they look fake. They look too realistic to be real. As I said, fake. And I pull my attention back from the flowers to my keyboard. Type Type Type.

Next morning. I wake up. The blossoms are still facing the balcony. Pert and lively, yet on some primal level, they appear to be made out of velvet. The kind that only factories in Indonesia can make. Soft, rubbery and Indigo. So very indigo! I water it, perch it on its regular counter and get back to work. I am cooking now. In my little kitchen. Cereal boxes abound, pending dishes abound. And I start cooking. I hate it when onions caramlize too much. My stove hates it too. It starts producing obnoxious fumes. My roommates don’t agree. I can’t believe they cant smell them. I mean the fumes are obnoxious and pungent. How can anyone not smell them. The indigo blossoms can. They turn their head away once I start cooking. I noticed that once, or twice. But maybe not. It might just be that the indigo is so beautiful. The texture…

Next Day. I water the plant. Its cloudy outside. Its 3 pm and it feels like 6 already. A long day. A sun-less day. The plant moves closer to the edge of the table. Seeking sunlight. I slightly nudge it back. I don’t want it to fall. I push it back. But it must be hungry, coz it moves again. Right at the edge. Hmm, poor blossoms. They wilt with hunger. Damn the rains. The day drags on. I pull up my plate. Warm my rice. Am about to eat when, the plant turns aorund. The blossoms staring at me. I look at it. It stares as it shifts away from the edge of the table in my direction. Inches closer, the leaves casting huge shadows on my plate. NO! I empty the plate in the thrash can. Damn, indigo blossoms!

Recently, my roommates have started whispering. It annoys me. They seem to hate the plant. I don’t blame them. Its such a murky weather outside that the plant becomes inhospitable, snappy, ill-tempered. It just starts yelling out if someone’s cooking. Maybe it is bothered with the caramelized onions. I don’t know. I don’t talk to it anymore. I used to. It was good to have someone to talk to. The roommates only whisper amongst themselves. And I hate to whisper. I don’t. Whenever they start I just go inside away from them. Pretty soon I started talking to the blossoms. They are smart. Intelligent and challenging. I finally had someone to discuss things with. Get opinion on my writing. They had good feedback. But not anymore. I don’t like their feedback. It makes me feel dumb. They are always so right. I don’t want that. I don’t talk to them anymore. But when I write, I see them nodding in disagreement. I just ignore them. Its easier that way.

After a week of cloudy weather, the sun is out. Its bright again. I started eating the very same day as the flowers turned their heads to the balcony. I can easily eat a couple of slices of bread without the blossoms noticing. Then I have to thrash the rest. But it was good eating bread after a week. I hadn’t realized how dry my throat had been.

I think about getting a tattoo some day. Maybe a flower. Indigo blossom. My roommates were really judgmental of that. They just don’t get it.I wish I could discuss this with the blossoms. But i want to surprise them. Can’t disclose it yet. Not yet.

I have noticed, recently that the onions caramalize even though I am not cooking. I havent bought any groceries for a month now. Its getting unaffordable since my roommates all moved out. The rent alone is heavy plus, I have to buy the green supplements for the blossoms. The weather is so unfriendly these days. I have to make sure it gets enough sunlight to eat.

Finally I drew a picture of Sun on the wall besides my balcony wall. The blossoms move towards the wall now. Right at the edge of the table. Its pretty to see them. The velvety touch, the pure indigo colour, the new thorns that have started popping all over the stems. Its so beautiful. I can’t believe I ever thought it was fake. How can it be?

The green supplements taste funny. Like tangy and acidic. It burns my tongue. I wonder if Blossoms have tongues way inside somewhere. I tried to look but the thorns hurt my fingers. I think it might have. I will have to check for it later.

Lately, I have noticed that the plant moves around during the night when I sleep. I once sneaked around to see it sliding in the kitchen. I think its poisoning my bread. I hate that plant now. Every morning, I add a teaspoon of vinegar in its water. The blossoms aren’t smart now. Not anymore. It doesn’t know what the taste is. I tired it. It tastes different than the supplements. Doesnt that mean they don’t have tongues? But sometimes when I am working on my broken computer, I think I see a huge tongue propping out with a huge slurpy sound. Yet I never see it on my second glance. But the plant is sneaky. Its sneaky.

Lately, I just feed it vinegar instead of water. The apartment smells like caramalized onions all day long. And I hate it. The blossoms are catching on to my plans, I think. I have to make sure I finish what I have started before they realize what I am doing.

One night, I woke up, and there it was- the plant. It was inching towards me in my room, the blossoms laughing as… there.. .I saw it.. the tonuge was out… It was about to reach me.. But I couldn’t look at it anymore.

I have given it vinegar every day for the past month now. Just to make sure it doesn’t suspect anything. I drink it too. So that it will think its water. But it doesnt wilt at all. I have started getting thinner, my nails are corroded lately, chipping off, cracking and dropping off my fingers unexpectedly. But the leaves don’t wilt at all.. Maybe its the sun on the wall that’s feeding it. Maybe I should knock that wall out?

The building manager was shocked to see me on the floor, he told me. I was lying on the floor holding on to a dead plant. With no blossoms. And I can’t remember what happened to those indigo velvety blossoms. I swear they were there all along. I swear they were. Big indigo blossoms that used to suggest me feedback, that hated the caramelized onions. Maybe they went away when I knocked out the Sun-wall.

Maybe they died with hunger… Hunger. Oh my God, I was hungry.

I was hungry now.

Diamonds and Rubies

The cigarette in his hand glowed. Smoke trailed upwards forming dancing images. It swirled over his wrist and his face. The smoke was beautiful. He placed the cigarette on the ashtray and typed “the swirling incongruity delivered a blow…” CTRL A. delete.

He sighed. The smoke still rose from the ashtray. The wooden ashtray that had… He typed “the smoke rising form the woods led the search party over the Madison river towards the elevated….” CTRL A. Delete.

He covered his face with his hands. They were smooth for a man of his age.  It reminded him of the warm afternoons he spent with his wife. She said his hands were as soft as her mother’s. He sneered. If anything about him was congruous with her mother then he would be damned to have… He typed “The lovers rested on the bed covered by a soft and warm comforter. She smelled like vanilla and…” CTRL A. DELETE.

He shrugged. Picked up the cigarette from the ashtray and took a drag. A light breeze pervaded him, the papers on his desk wavered reinstating their presence. A bold typeface  on one of the letters caught his eye. “Rebuttal of Contract” Unwillingly the lines ran in his head, “Dear Mr. Jones, with deep regret we hereby inform you that your due to your recurring failure to send in your monthly submissions, we have to rescind your contract. Please find enclosed the due settlement..”

He made himself stop. It was over three weeks and the letter seemed still fresh. Huh, rebuttal of contract, my ass. They think I won’t bounce back? Those arrogant little bitches…”

He typed, “The girls ran in the room together and shut the door. They ran and collapsed on the bed still giggling. It was sheer luck that they got away this time. Amanda was still out of breath as Stacy looked up at her. Stacy moved in and kissed Amanda. It was weird yet electric. Amanda drew back. Stacy halted. Amanda held Stacy’s hand and drew her forth, a surge of insensibility running through her…” He paused. CTRL A. DELETE.

The acrid smell of the burned out cigarette butt caught his attention.

“Dear Mr Jones, your submission for this month is discarded. We think it is out of sync with our readership. Please re-send…” STOP. They won’t win this, he told himself. Not in sync? What do they know? He had been writing all his life and after fifty years they tell him, he can’t write.

He pushed back his chair and got up. The chair clamored to the floor. He strode to the kitchen and came back with a knife. Pulling up the chair, he sat down at the desk. The knife gleamed welcomingly. It seemed simple. He kept the blade on his left wrist. The metal was cool to touch. He tilted the knife to see his reflection on the blade. Not in sync! He slashed his wrist.

Surprisingly the pain didn’t register till a moment later. The blood came first, then the numbness, then the shivering fingers and then he felt it. Biting pain. He dropped his left hand on the desk, fervently typing with his right, “The blood trickled from Marsha’s wound dripping from her elbow onto the polished wood. Breathing deeply she sat up straight. The crimson rivulets seemed alive. It seemed wondrous that such frivolity survived within her damaged, broken body. Her hands shivered as she held her wrist. The engagement ring was turning red by the second.  Diamonds… Rubies; who cared? He didn’t. She won’t. Not any more.”

He sat up looking at the cut. He blinked as he was drowned in waves of silence so powerful that they engulfed the chirping birds.

“Marsha felt cold inside while the blood gushed out warmer than she ever imagined. It seemed criminal that she never felt this heat before. She grabbed her wrist and looked at her palms. They seemed clammy and detached form her body like an alien hand. This couldn’t be her.”

He panted as his left hand seemed heavy and screaming. He pushed himself to concentrate on the screen. The cursor played tricks on him. Why wasn’t it blinking any longer?

She saw him walking in and looking at her. Through the maddening darkness she was appeased by his shock. The bitch who walked in with him screamed. Serves her right! It took him a moment to register what he saw. Bewildered he ran besides her dropping down on his knees. He was yelling. She couldn’t hear. Not any longer. Tell your lies to someone else now, she thought. Tears sprang in his eyes as he tried to pick her up in his arms. Darkness abets death, she smiled as she was engulfed by darkness for a second and then the brightness of the fireplace…

The breeze sifted through the dank crimson letters as he sat on the chair, his head on the desk, eyes wide open staring at the screen. Death and darkness.

 

Nights are always elegant

Nights are always elegant, she used to believe. Not a
single ray of light and yet it gave hope to all. There might be
millions who would be finding havens in the night, people who would
realize their long lost dreams in those few hours of silence, so
many more who would be together in bed with the ones they love and
many all the more who would be in the bed alone thinking about the
way life would have been only if. It was thus so curious that she
had to die at night. He walked like a ghost between those
tear-streaked faces. Step by step he was aware of the looks towards
him as if the people around were waiting for him to react- like a
bomb that might just go off any moment. And yet he could not feel
the moment. Nothing seemed real. It was like he was walking through
a dream. In fact it was like he was walking through someone else’s
dream where you are only a prop waiting for directions while the
one to direct you is so subconscious that nothing makes sense. Life
seemed to be at halt. And yet he knew he was alive. Why he knew
that, he couldn’t fathom even years later. Because he was alive,
yes, but he died that night. Nights are always elegant. The table
lamp lit the mahogany wood. It stood there silent, paused in time.
The crystal glass casting its coloured light all across the room.
He looked at it a moment and couldn’t help chuckling- at least the
lights are alive. He stood there for a moment, for an hour, for a
day, he couldn’t tell; but he stood there looking at the light. It
was alive. Finally he moved away, the dancing crystal lights still
warm inside him, the energy riding through his veins. He couldn’t
understand what made him do so but he walked towards the balcony.
He reached out to grab the door handle. The door slid aside on a
single touch as if it understood him perfectly. The cool night air
hit his face. For a second he jumped due to the sudden touch. A
second later he was as dead as a moment before. He walked on to the
balcony holding on to the railings. The cold metal soothed him. He
stood there tasting the darkness. In the distance he could see the
rare treetops swaying in the night wind. She loved the trees at
night. They were like the people, she used to say, who came out in
the dark being themselves. The trees were swaying together in the
wind like people dancing on those rare beats in front of their
secret mirrors. The trees were being alive. The trees were
themselves for a change. The nights are always elegant. Dancing
trees. On other occasion he would have shrugged it off. He always
did when she said something like that. Today however he was
listless and he didn’t find it amusing. All he could think of was
her standing besides him on a similar night, her hands around him,
her head touching his shoulders, her dreamy eyes that stared out in
the distance while she breathed slowly. He took a deep breath. And
his heart skipped a beat- he could still smell her. The mild
fragrance of her drifted through the air. He had once described it
to her in those early hours of a lazy morning when they lay naked
in bed together. She smelled like freshly ground cinnamon, wild
flowers and hint of coconut. And she giggled. She often did that.
It always angered him. It never stopped her. She giggled. He sighed
helplessly longing for that giggle again. A bat swooped low in the
night sky and then a moment later it was out of sight. All too
suddenly he felt warm in his throat, a closed hard feeling. It got
difficult to breathe. The wind stung his eyes. He blinked. A tear
rolled down his cheek silently. The very next moment, disgusted, he
wiped it off with his palm. He turned around and walked into the
living room. The house seemed unusually empty. Empty enough to say
that it missed the one person that granted it life. The one person
that rendered life in everything she did. Her. He missed her. It
never felt this way though when she was away on work or those rare
occasions when she visited her mother’s. The house was silent then
but never empty. Now it was dead. He shivered internally by the
thought. It felt as if everything that ever mattered to him was
passing away one by one. Or actually, he thought, it all went away
together, in that one single night. In that one instance when he
had decided to kill her. Nights are always elegant.