An Ordinary Life

difference of a few months is sacrosanct, bursting with unsaid superpowers and bullying privileges if you are older, or painfully empty of them if you are younger. There is one brother younger than me, after whom comes Almas. He has always been a miser, hoarding pennies and planning what he would do with them. When we grew up, he would save and keep planning on how much more he needed to save to buy a car. When we were little, the ambitions were simpler but probably more gratifying. Our roof at home was made of wooden beams called kadiyan, upon which lay tiles made of clay. The kadiyan in our storeroom, which we call kothri, was the safe place where Almas used to hide his secret stash. One day, Faizi saw Almas climb up quietly and add to his little savings account. Since Faizi was much younger, Almas did not think of him as a threat and ignored him. But what he did not realize was that in spite of our six-year age difference, Faizi and I were the best of friends. Immediately, Faizi came to me and revealed the great sight he had just witnessed. When the two of us went to perform this little bank robbery, we discovered about 40 or 50 rupees. Back in 1985, this was a neat amount, especially to a teenager in the eleventh grade. ‘Fifty-fifty!’ we said as we split the amount equally between us. Since then, every time we passed each other, Faizi and I greeted each other with a ‘fifty-fifty!’ instead of a hello. Everybody, including Almas, wondered what this mysterious code was about. They wondered if it was a secret game just the two of us played. Not quite understanding the details but not wanting to be left out of this cool little gang, Almas too started saying ‘fifty-fifty!’

Two days later, Almas went to the kothri when nobody was there, quietly removed the kadiyan in great excitement, probably to add to his fund, salivating at what he could buy with it . . . until he noticed the empty space staring at him. His dreams shattered, his heart broke, and instantly his mind put two and two together to make ‘fifty-fifty!’ He screamed, ran to us, pushed us to the floor. A massive fight ensued with great hue and cry. He ran to Abbu to complain. Instantly, Abbu paid Almas from his own pocket. Surprisingly, everybody, including Abbu, found this entire incident hilarious and extremely cute. So he did not beat us. We got so, so lucky.

In fact, I was always in Abbu’s good books. I was always the good, disciplined lad who never talked back to his elders. Outside of the household though, I picked quarrels frequently. Then I would go home and complain to Abbu that this guy had beaten me up, a completely false allegation. Children often do this and parents often believe them. And due to my wonderful reputation, Abbu did not suspect me even once. He would instantly don his kurta and walk briskly to those hooligans to question why they had beaten up his docile, goody-goody boy. In fact, Abbu picked many such quarrels this way.

* * *

Abbu never doted on me or pampered me openly or cuddled me the way Ammi did. He loved me dearly but he had a strange way of showing his affection. I loved rasgulla and one day, threw a tantrum late at night that I wanted a rasgulla. It was almost midnight, so naturally the shops were shut. Ammi tried to pacify me. But Abbu took me to the halwai’s shop. He woke up the shopkeeper and made many polite requests until he relented and opened the shop to only give me rasgullas. Abbu made sure I had my wish fulfilled. As I gobbled up the little moon-like sugary balls, I was over the moon.

Abbu was always like that. He was a strange sort of a foodie, strange in the sense that he wanted the treats to be all around, not as much for himself as for his loved ones. Every year, there would be an abundance of whatever fruit was in season. So if it was the rainy season, there would be buckets upon buckets of Langda, my favourite variety of mango, which would soon be replaced by Dussehri, which arrives at the very end of the monsoon.

* * *

In the late afternoons when Abbu returned from his aara machine shop, he would hang his kurta by the door and rest for a bit. Ensuring that I was invisible to him, and to anybody else, I would go to his room with feline dexterity and my fingers would creep into the depths of his pocket. Only to a small child’s hands would the pitiful contents inside seem like Ali Baba’s treasure. There would be a few currency notes, totalling to maybe 40 rupees or less, accompanied by some coins. I was always clever to take only a meagre amount, like 2 or 5 rupees, so that it would not be missed. But then came the fateful day when there was only the scant sum of 5 rupees, in the form of cold coins. It was a massive blow to me. To a little boy, his father is his hero. Moreover, Abbu had never told us about his economic woes. It was hard to know at that age because we lived in abundance, enjoying the best food and so much love. What more do children need? Only then did I realize how awful the situation really was and how crushed he actually was beneath that veneer of pride. And I had stolen from this man, not just stolen, but had turned it into an everyday routine.

I walked away with tears of great guilt and enormous shame.

* * *

As you probably know, Muslims have a religious tradition of qurbani, of offering a doomba, which could be a goat, sheep or any other cattle. The idea is that you fall