"Yes, Sahib. What is your order?" The question pulled me back to reality with a jolt. I gazed at the interrogator with blurry eyes. The boy asked again, "Sahib, what do you want?" I noticed a peculiar accent in his voice which was not very familiar.
I replied, "What do you have for me?" The very next minute he started blurting out a perfectly rehearsed list, learnt over a long time, of items the hotel provided. I chose the most familiar name and ordered. As the boy left whistling, I was plunged into the ocean of agony once again. "I have to find myself a new job. This won't work long. I have to send home money." I murmured to myself. "But where do I go? My qualifications are not enough for the job that I desire. If only Baba had adopted me a few years earlier! I would have acquired a sound education like the rest." I held my head in despair and waited for the boy to return. Suddenly, I heard a rattling of utensils followed by numerous clanking sounds and then a shrill cry. The boy came running out of a muddy enclosure. His master, I assumed, followed him carrying a rolling pin in his head. "Wait! You buffoon! How many more losses will I have to endure for your follies? Today, I am going to smack the devil out of you," the fat man with a bald head and an oversized moustache shouted. The boy turned around, stopped and laughed. As the man drew closer, the boy took the large pail of butter-milk and threw it on him. Before the master could hurl any more abuses the boy ran away, laughing all the while in a high-pitched tone.
I walked towards the bus-stop. My dishevelled state made everyone stare. My tie was loose, shoelaces untied and shirt smeared with all sorts of dust patches. As I waited for the bus, I could hear the same whistling sound again. I knew the boy was somewhere near. Someone tugged at my shirt and I saw it was the same boy. He smiled at me and asked, "Going home?" I nodded. It felt weird how a waiter in a dingy restaurant was interested in talking to me but not my family. Diwali was round the corner and still nobody would answer my phone. "Don't you have a home?" I inquired. He chuckled and replied, "Sahib, I am nobody's child. I got a job in the hotel because the hotel- keeper knew the master of my orphanage. I am free now. The fat man has kicked me out." The bus arrived and I waved him good-bye.
We met several times after that day, often at the bus-stop, in the evenings. Sometimes I felt he would deliberately wait for me there, though I could not guess the reason behind his blooming affection for me. It was during these meetings that we shared our experiences with life, with fellow humans. He confided in me that once he had been in jail for two hours for secretly
climbing up a water pipe and sitting in a classroom. No, that wasn't his crime. His crime was that he tried to lift the black veil of a ‘burqa’ worn by a young, married Muslim girl. Yet, in all these meetings the smile on his face remained as radiant as ever. He could not be more than thirteen or fourteen years of age. He had lived in a small, remote village in Bihar for some time which led to this peculiar accent in his voice.
Two years passed. The boy was now working in a garage next to my home. Though my bond with him strengthened over the years, I had somewhere lost my family completely. Home seemed like a distant dream now. All efforts to reconcile with the family which had adopted me thirteen years ago went in vain. However the boy became an integral part of my life. I would often carry food for him to his garage and engage in long, deep conversations with him. His loneliness and shrewd mind had made him more worldly-wise than other boys of his age. But one thing he never stopped saying, "I am nobody's child, Sahib."
Autumn that year brought a sense of gloominess in life. I developed a foreboding that something bad might happen. And all I could think of was that boy. I decided that I should adopt him; bring him home and give him the love of a father, the care of a brother. 14th November was drawing near. I decided to give him a surprise on that day. I was determined to educate him and make him a responsible man. And most of all, I wanted to keep him close to me, fearing that another string might detach if I were too late.
I took over a set of clothes, books and food items for him. Gazing through my car window, I could see him whistling and cleaning some rusted parts of a motor engine. Above him I could see a large chain holding a car high for the mechanic to work. The boy looked up and saw me. He gave me the same radiant smile, unchanged over the years. Only today, I could sense a fear in my heart. I waved and gestured for him to come closer. All of a sudden, the chain holding the car broke and the car came crashing down on the boy. I shouted in shock and ran towards him. The car parts had pierced into his chest. He lay motionless on the ground, his eyes staring at me. All emotions seemed worthless. If I had the power, I would have summoned the greatest powers of the universe to wake up the boy.
Three days later, sitting near his grave, I wondered, who was 'nobody's child' now? He, who had deserted me or myself, who had once again been forcefully plunged deep into the ocean of loneliness and agony?
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