Drugged Love (On Hold)

Chapter Twenty, Part One

Ishan stared with contempt at the two needles of his watch which lay on top of each other. Not a single soul was to be seen around the bus stop where he waited for his ride. The call on the untraceable ancient cellphone was crisp,

"Bus stop near Gandhi nagar at midnight. Border check today."

Zakir had taught him how the drugs, which had arrived in copious amounts at discrete locations across the border had to be checked. Sneaking out of his home was not an easy task itself. Now, he cursed himself as the cold winds bit his face. He did not know who it was that would pick him up, but his intuition told him that they would recognize him easily.

Headlights closed in on him, hidden by the dense blanket of fog. A black SUV stopped near him, with a single person in the driver's seat. "Ishan" he called out and he understood that it was his ride.

Apparently and much to his disappointment he was not getting kidnapped tonight. Even if he was kidnapped he knew that these people would still find him and put them to their use.

During the entire journey, the driver was silent concentrating on the road as if his life depended on it. They reached their destination within an hour and Ishan observed the way carefully, all the twists and turns that comprised the journey. Something in his mind told him, that this would help him one day.

As they edged near the border, the driver took the car off the road and into the field. He turned the headlights off and they moved in complete darkness. Ishan was amazed that the driver was driving by pure instinct now.

The thought that anyone could be so easily killed here and no one would ever know where the person went was spine chilling. The car slowed down and came to a halt in the middle of nowhere.

In the distance not more than a few meters away headlights flashed on and off twice. Some kind of signal, he speculated as the driver gave the same signal and a silhouette of a truck came into view within the few seconds the headlight was on.

"This is it. Get out" the driver muttered in an almost robot like voice.

Ishan got out of the car. There were no signs of life within hundreds of yards. The high way was illuminated with little yellow dots in the distance. He walked with calculated steps towards the truck. A man alighted from the truck, and stood out.

"Hey new boy, make it quick in there." the man called out.

Ishan nodded. He could barely make up the face of the man in the dark as he the man opened the back of the truck and Ishan climbed in.

He found himself surrounded by a stacks and stacks of boxes with only few inches to move around. The man had followed him inside and closed his door behind him. He felt nervous cramped up in the presence of a potentially dangerous man. He got to work at once.

He took a mini torch out of his bag which included all the tools which would be required to do what he was going to do. Zakir had given him the tools while preparing him. He counted the boxes, throwing light at them.

32, as expected.

The light fell upon the face of the man, as he checked the boxes. The man was sturdily built wearing a windcheater which was the natural attire of all the truck drivers. His beard didn't give much of his face, it was an ordinary face, the kind that could blend in among the crowd.

Ishan took out boxes at random from the stacks and set them in the narrow space, exactly as Zakir had told him. His hands were shaky, he was not sure it was the winter or the stress.

"You look nervous," the man said in voice as mundane as his face.

When Ishan ignored him and got busy at opening the boxes the man continued, "I remember the first time I drove this truck. It gets hell scary at the border. But then again the cops are paid up with the right people. But you never know when some self righteous cop might nab you and you're staring at a solid 10 behind bars."

"How long have you been doing this?" Ishan said as he took samples of white powder out of the packets in the boxes. He put the samples in the beaker he carried with himself and added water. The samples dissolves almost completely. Perfect.

"Longer than I can remember. It was hard at first. I heard stories about how they tortured anyone they caught, tying up to a chair and beating them till they spilled out names." Ishan gulped his throat as the words hit him, "Some of my friends were caught too. I wanted to get out. But I continued, the money was good. But who was I kidding it was not the money, it was the thrill of it all more than that"

"The thrill?"

"Yeah. The uncertainty. One second you're driving and the other second you have a hole in your head. If you ask me, I'd say that's way more addictive than any of the stuff in these boxes", the man chuckled.

"Well, what would you say to a person who's not in this for the thrill or the money?"

"I'd say he get the hell out of this dirty business as soon as he can then," he stared at Ishan as if he knew whom Ishan was referring to.

Ishan allowed himself a laugh. He wanted to know the man's name. But the unsaid rules prohibited him. The less people know you personally, the better.

"I'm done here. It's all great", Ishan said resoundingly.

"Here," the man said as he tossed a packet towards Ishan. "Personal stuff for your boss."

As they climbed out of the car Ishan noticed that three vans were parked side by side near the car in which he came. The transfer was smooth, as Ishan and the driver he came with loaded the boxes into the van.

The vans drove into the night towards the belly of the city, whose hunger for these drugs was insatiable as was the greed of the men who called the shots here.

As the driver dropped him, at the bus stop and he walked like a zombie towards home, his phone buzzed.

"Bring package to me at the mansion at 3pm. Sharp. " – OCG

He understood what OCG meant, Omar Carlos George.

He stepped onto a glass bottle while staring into his phone screen. He picked it up, and smashed it as hard as he could into the nearest wall. As the glass pieces splattered he wondered what would happen earlier—him losing his sanity or the drug lord losing him.