The idiot

Introduction

CHAPTER-1

Aaliyah shared her lunch with me during recess. She offered me homemade chicken sandwich. For ten seconds I could not decide. But I really wanted to eat it, my first taste of chicken in 12 years; plus I did not want to say 'No' to my first crush.

It was the same year my father abandoned us. I was still adapting to the life without him. His absence had turned me into a rebel and I was doing exactly what my mother warned me not to do.

I ate like a glutton, for me it unraveled the taste which I had not found in anything before. I could not open my plastic box that contained only a handful of plain puffed rice, not even tossed in few drops of oil.

As soon as I reached home, I told Ritvik, my elder brother, about what I did today. I used to tell him anything and everything.

"Promise me you will not eat chicken sandwiches again?" He asked. "They are Christians; they drink wine and eat flesh. We are Brahmins. We don't eat non-vegetarian food."

"Do you have any idea what will happen if mom will come to know about it?" he added.

"No," I replied, worried sick.

"She will not let you step inside the house," he answered.

I hung my head in guilt. He got me a tusli leaf and asked me to eat it. It was supposed to neutralize my sin for eating flesh. I promised him I will not eat non-vegetarian food ever again.

But who I was kidding I sometimes had these irresistible urges to taste delicious-looking chicken. I always resisted the temptation as my mother cannot stomach the idea of me relishing on flesh given that I was from an orthodox Brahmin family where even touching it was considered sin, leave aside eating it.

I will present you an example to help you understand the gravity of my chicken-eating-sin. Suppose if I have a sister and she has just lost her virginity, and I have adopted non-vegetarian eating habit. Now suppose we both somehow dared to break the news to our mother at the same time.

The scene will be something like this:

My sister: Mom, I lost my virginity today.

My mom: WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?!

Me: Mom, I ate chicken today.

My Mom: HOW DARE YOU! (The sound of slap follows)

I hope you catch my drift.

***

Hi, I am Hardik Shastri. 25 years old. Single.

Unfortunately or fortunately I was born in a middle-class Brahmin family in Haridwar, Uttarakhand, which was a part of Uttar Pradesh then. We were a typical Brahmin family and were strictly vegetarians. We were not allowed to touch non-vegetarian food, let alone eating it. Ravindra Shastri, my father, used to run our ancestral printing press there. Shashi Shastri, my mother, was a housewife but she also helped my father whenever required. I had one sibling, Ritvik. He was three years older to me.

The day I was born every single soul in the hospital was happy. There is nothing more enticing than a newborn's charm. My mother was so elated to find out that the new-born is a boy, she decided she will make me an engineer. All I managed to do was cry while everyone around me clapped in sheer happiness. Crying was my only way of communicating. The louder I cried the more the people mobbed around me. Who would have thought crying could make people smile? My alert tiny eyes looked at the faces surrounding me in great curiosity and utter confusion, still getting accustomed with my new environment. Having no clue, what so ever, that at that very joyous moment my destiny was sealed. "Mera beta bada hoke engineer banega," my mother said to the people mobbing around me.