The breeze was still fiercely active in the atmosphere at the Gore's square.The place was unusually deserted but for some people.Among them were a little kid perched on a stone bench,and a man smoking in front of a tea stall and an old man holding a walking stick staggering by on the same lane.The quiescent environment had its own music of sereneness.The clouds lowered alarmingly that they could pour down anytime then.
The young man observed the kid on the stone bench.He gulped down the tea,paid for it and asked the vendor,"Who is that little kid?"
The vendor glanced at the kid,considered for a moment and then said,
"I don't know,sir.But he's been coming here for the past four days,he sits there awaiting someone.And later,his mother would appear,the kid would refuse to go but she would somehow manage to drag him off."he explained.
"Just call me K"he said.
He then frowned getting the recitement into his mind and asked,
"Who is he waiting for?"
"From what i have gathered,he's been waiting for his father,he was a military man" he said placidly.
"What do you mean 'was'?"K inquired.
"Well,he was dead about a fortnight back in the shooting at the border."the vendor said plainly.
That came as a boulder to his heart,he remembered reading about the commotion at the border.He turned towards the little kid,his face was too pale and cute for one's liking.
'This is too cruel' K thought,'How could this innocent soul bear the truth.He was solemnly expecting his father,how painful the disappointment could be!.And how such disappointment would affect him mentally.'An aura of melancholy spread around K.
He hesitated but then firmly resolved,he headed towards the little kid.He crossed the road,the road was literally empty.He approached the kid and sat beside him.The boy lifted up his head to look at him for a fleeting moment and then turned abruptly.
"Hi"
The kid didn't respond.K pouted and cleared his throat,then said,
"Seems like you're waiting for someone"
"Yes!,my dad"the reply came in a smooth tone,the childish one.
"Oh,i see"he said gently,"but did he say he would come?"
"Yes,he promised"
"Okay,but what will you do suppose he did not come like he had promised?"
The little boy turned and scowled at K,"He promised me,he will come" he yelled in a higher pitch.
"Whoa whoa,calm down kid"He said,"I was just saying,because you know you should not expect too much because expectations can hurt"
"I am not just blindly expecting" he retorted but made sense.
K was baffled,speechless.He thought,'In this case,yes,poor kid'
"Yet you have to be strong,i believe you can be,suppose if your father doesn't come back"he said lightly.
"HE IS COMING BACK!"the boy screamed and got up still scowling at him.
"No,he's not!"he said curtly,then realised it was a mistake.
Tears sprung from the kid's eyes,his eyes were entirely moist and he weeped in a frenzied manner ,"He's coming back ,he's c-coming back,he ... he'll c-come b-back"
Then in a flash,he picked up the package and ran.He stopped at a distance,turned to K and yelled,
"He's on his way home!".Then again turned and disappeared.
Another kid some years older than the first one appeared,riding on his bicycle.He was heading the opposite direction.He swayed back his head to look at the half-running,half-weeping kid.
K stood still,looking after the kid.He didn't know what to do,he realised that he had better not spoken to the boy.All he could do was to feel sorry for the kid.He felt an omnipresence behind him,he turned around to face an old,senile face.
The old man had an impassive expression but his eyes were twinkling.He was gazing at the direction where the child had left.The wrinkles on his face were the indication of his sturdy life.The old man's eyes whirled towards K.They locked their gazes,and remained still and motionless for sometime.They seemed to indulge into one another,elucidating the divine that the world could not see or feel.
K saw through the eyes,the melancholy buried deep down inside.But K was not aware of how this old man had been betrayed by his assistant thirty years ago and how disastrous his life had become since then.K didn't realise that the old man confronting him had spent most of his life shut up in an asylum for the past thirty years and how he yearned to get to the outer world.And yet!,those feeble eyes glimmered brightly.
Suddenly,there was a crashing noise.Both the faces turned around to the source of the noise.A bicycle flew overhead and thrashed against the compound of the park.The child was lying on one corner of the road,dark-red blood littered all over him.He was quivering on the ground gasping for air.K rushed forward and knelt down beside the boy to lift him up.
The old man stood frozen to the spot.He regained sense when suddenly a hand pulled him from behind.And a voice said,
"Uncle Kevin,what are you doing here?"
He turned around to meet his nephew,Layla.He was surprised that she was completely calm and there was no trace of tension in her countenance.He said to her hastily,
"Layla!we have to save this poor child."
"Child? What child?" She asked skeptically.
"This boy here,look!"He pointed out the battered boy.
"There's nobody there,uncle Kevin"she said sternly in a higher tone,"compose yourself."
"Oh!Layla,why can't you see?"he wailed in despair."Look at him,he's bleeding,help him please."
There was apprehension in her face, then,she called out for someone from the car parked ahead," Vivek! Come over here!Quick.He's hallucinating again".She was clearly frightened.
"No! I'm not!"he wailed,"Oh! Please save him,please,he needs help"
Three men appeared and hauled him off against his weak resistance.The old man still wailed,"Please!,save him,or he will lose his childhood!"
