Inktober Day 2 prompt- Tranquil

SOME UNFINISHED STORY 

Mr. Venkataraman of MG Street was the happiest octogenarian you will ever meet. Now, whether he was an octogenarian or a sexagenarian was a matter of considerable debate in the entire colony. When anyone asked him about his age, he simply stroked the tuft of white hair at the back of his head, shrugged his shoulders and replied with a smile 'What is age, really? I am as old as you make me out to be.'

A wickerwork chair adorned the porch of his house and was surrounded by pots of green shrubs. 

Mr. V spent his evenings seated on this chair, watching; observing. The faces were known ones, the expressions comical, and there was always something to look forward to. He took great interest in the study of human behaviour. From time to time, he amused himself by providing the spoken content to a conversation inaudible to his own ears, solely going by the gesticulations and facial expressions of its participants. Every now and then, a troupe of fanatical cricket- obsessed boys would pass by and invite him to umpire their match. As always, he would first refuse, wait for them to coax him and then eventually accept their invitation. These matches were weekly fixtures and more than the trying task of umpiring, Mr. V enjoyed being in the company of children. Nothing pleased him more than being surrounded by shrieking lads writ with grime and sweat on their arms, clothes and foreheads; 'Makes me feel younger', he said. Was that then, the secret to the seeming inconsistency between his age and looks?

Either way, Mr. V was regarded enviously by everyone else falling into his age bracket and was well aware of the curse of evil eye making rounds about him. He took great pains to protect himself from it, making daily visits to the temple in the neighbourhood at dawn and dusk. Shutting his eyes tight as he stood before idols in temples, he can be heard murmuring a thousand hymns under his breath in less than a minute. He fervently prayed to be blessed with his youthful countenance till death did them apart. He spent a tremendous amount of time poring over dietary regimes published in magazines, choosing the ones most suited to his lifestyle and following them to perfection. Many an hour spent bent over the tiny imprints on the pages of a magazine had made him an expert on the subject, so much so that a mere glance at the title of the article now told him whether it was worth a read. He learnt to skim past oft- repeated clickbaits such as '30 ways for youthful skin under 30 days' and 'Say goodbye to wrinkles in a month with this magical new diet' and to pay attention to the more off- beat articles crammed into the unwanted corners of the magazine layout. These, tricks of the trade, so to speak, were, however, a strict secret. Even his wife; generally regarded as the apex authority on matters regarding scooping out information about anyone, had never managed to discern what went on in the bathroom once the curtains were drawn and she is chivvied into going to the kitchen.

Such exacting levels of care had dictated Mr. Iyer's habits for the past two decades and continued to do so till the morning of the arrival of the family next door. As he eyed the newspaper held in one hand and sipped steaming hot coffee from a tumbler (Yes, he drank from a spotless stainless steel tumbler; not from a glass mug.) he held in the other, he heard the blaring of a lorry entering the street.

When he was young and impressionable, moving into a new house had always been an exciting event. What new adventures would the new neighbourhood bring? Who would be his new friends? How far away was the nearest cricket ground? An endless flurry of questions would flood his mind and gradually, over the course of the subsequent weeks he would find his answers. His parents would invariably be busy during this time; his father screaming instructions to the poor labourers lugging around all their furniture and belongings, his mother making herself busy in the kitchen churning buttermilk and acquainting herself with her neighbours. He would thus have the freedom to roam abroad as he pleased, and discover all the crevices, holes and hiding spots around his new home. Yes, it house shifting brought back a wonderful slew of memories!

The house adjacent to his own had been empty since the time Srinivasan and his wife had evacuated it to go abroad to live with their sons. Srinivasan had been his friend and Mr. V missed leaning over the wall to engage in conversation with his amiable next door neighbour. So when he realised that a family was moving in, he hastily gulped down his coffee and went over.

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Rut tut tut tut. He rapped smartly on the gate.  A few moments lapsed before someone tapped him on the shoulder from behind. Mr. V nearly jumped out of his skin in fright when he heard 'Exactly WHAT do you think you're doing, sir?' Swirling round, he came face to face with a raggedly clad twenty- something youngster holding an axe in his hand. 

Concluding the obvious, Mr. V began to apologise profusely while simultaneously patting a napkin all over his clammy forehead and shiny bald scalp. 

Contrary to his expectations, however, a rather high- pitched peal of laughter suddenly cut through the palpable tension in the air. 'I'm sorry, I realise what I must look like, armed with an axe. But trust me, I'm not a violent convict or anything. I'm Kenneth. Just your average twenty- three year old, nothing remarkable.'

'Thank goodness. That axe gave me quite a bit of a scare. I'm Viswanathan, your neighbour. Say, you bear a striking resemblance to the lad I was six decades ago.'

'Speaking of axes, ever heard about the grandfather axe conundrum? It's quite a philosophical thing, really. So if this axe belonged to my grandfather and my father and I replace the head and the handle at different points in time, would the axe still belong to my grandfather?' Clearly, the boy had tactlessly changed the subject and Mr. V who himself was tongue- tied for a response, was relieved to hear his wife's voice ring loud and clear.

'Tiffin is ready, where are you?'

'Duty calls, m' boy. Duty calls. But quite an interesting point you've made there. Quite the typical food for thought.'

'Your food is turning cold. Where are you?'

Mr. V hurried in the direction of his house, muttering something that distinctly sounded like ‘women, humpft’.

‘Why don't you EVER let me do anything ____? It’s not like I’m participating in the Olympics, a few moments of playing cricket to flex my muscles…….’

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Mr. V was at his wickerwork chair next morning when he noticed Kenneth's head bobbing up and down the compound wall.

Kenneth was unemployed. The only reason he could afford to move in to a new home inspite of unemployment was the monthly allowance he received from his aunt and uncle. He had never met them albeit they had supported him for as long as he could remember. They were the reason he had had a more comfortable childhood in the orphanage than most. However, he longed for a parental figure to look towards and found himself drawn to his new neighbour. 

Ever the optimist, Kenneth, however, saw the silver lining of being unemployed. He had the entire day ahead of him, countless hours to do as he pleased; well at least until the end of the month till which time he thought he could survive on the cans of preserved food stacked in the fridge. 

Having finished breakfast, he hopped across the wall and ran into the sight of Mr. V reading the newspaper. 

‘Here, listen m’boy. About that axe thing you were telling yesterday-’

‘Want to catch a game of cricket, sir? The boys have just started an innings…’

Mr. V leaped from his wickerwork chair. ‘Just give me a moment, here. I’ve got to apply some sunscreen, won’t keep you waiting for long.’

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On strike to face a bowler menacingly hurling a ball at him after nearly half a century (No, those weren’t the runs he scored, I meant fifty years since he hung up the boots as far as playing sport was concerned. His palms profusely sweating, the helmet tightly fit atop his bald head, he was feeling rather nervous all of a sudden. He decided to remove the helmet; it was messing with his neatly combed hair.

As he was dong so, it seemed impossible that Kenneth had ever succeeded in talking him into walking onto the crease. The pressure to perform was mounting and Mr. V was crushing beneath it. As the ball charged through the air in all the speed that the little boy bowling could muster, Mr. V made up his mind to smack it for a boundary. Alas, the only thing smacked was his face and the old man was knocked out cold.

When he eventually came to, he was lying on his bed at home, in the comfort of an air conditioned room. Staring into the mirror at the dressing table on the opposite end of the room, he was in for a rude shock. 

Instead of the fair, smooth skinned charming figure that usually stared back at him from the mirror, he saw a tanned old man with swollen cheeks and for the life of him did not know what had happened. 

‘Ah but nothing that a little extra care into my skincare routine cannot fix.’ he concluded with relief. 

‘The man ought to realise that he’s eighty. EIGHTY is no age to go parading up and down a cricket field. What was he thinking?’ he heard the shrill voice of his wife float around the house and called out to her. 

Rushing into the room, she snapped ‘WHAT WERE YOU THINKING? ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND? Just because you don't LOOK your age, it doesn't mean that you aren’t eighty. Get that into your head. And to help you do so, I’ve tossed all the creams, lotions and ridiculous paraphernalia from your little vanity boxes into the dustbin.’

How Mr. V wished he had spent the day in the tranquility of his backyard as he had been doing the past two decades.