Anurag Anand - Where The Rainbow Ends

Also by Anurag Anand

The Legend of Amrapali

Of Tattoos and Taboos!

Reality Bytes Bites.

The Quest for Nothing!

SRISHTI PUBLISHERS & DISTRIBUTORS
N-16, C. R. Park
New Delhi 110 019

First published by
Srishti Publishers & Distributors in 2013

Copyright Anurag Anand, 2013

All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental. For authenticity and to aid story telling, the author has used places, organizations and institutions that are real, however, there is no intention to imply anything else.

The author asserts the moral right to be identifited as the author of this work.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the Publishers.

Typeset by Eshu Graphic

For Naisha,
my little bundle of immeasurable joy

One

O bviously the economic pundits and politicos, who cant seem to stop raving about Human Capital, deemed to serve as a catapult for propelling India into the coveted league of developed nations, have missed out on a crucial point somewhere. Or perhaps the perks accompanying their V.I.P. statuses have so distanced them from reality that they are able to see an illusionary promise even in the sea of utterly hopeless humanity that surrounds us morning through night.

As far as I go, there isnt a tinge of optimism I can feel about the sweaty, stinking oaf- a quintal-plus would be my most conservative estimate of his weight ahead of me, who has been spraying my crotch with poisonous, ill-smelling vapours ever since I joined the queue. Well, perhaps I am being a tad harsh on the fellow who has visibly been betrayed by his own digestive juices, a victim himself, and is clearly in the need for some sympathy and a very strong antacid. But what about the lady there, dragging two defiant and wailing brats as if they were items she had forgotten to check-in? Or that man screaming his guts out into the phone, leaving me in little doubt that the fellow on the other end was either deaf or marooned on an island where the telecom companies were yet to erect towers? If this is the bunch we think will steer us to our promised glories, well, God save Mother India.

Anyway, after being adequately frisked and felt by a perverse-looking member of the airport security staff I was eased into another crammed-to-the-hilt zone - the departure lounge. I glanced at my watch, an Espirit timepiece I had received as a gift on my last birthday. Forty minutes, I still had forty long minutes to kill before boarding. Hopefully!

I glanced around for an empty seat (realising delightfully that my supply of optimism hadnt entirely waned) and not finding even a single one, settled for leaning against a vending machine to unfold the newspaper I had been clutching. I had plenty of things playing on my mind and knowing myself for as long as I had, 34 years to be precise, I couldnt allow my thoughts to run amok and distract me from my immediate objective of boarding the plane.

In contradiction to the horrific tales of delayed departures I had heard, the boarding was announced on time and we were herded inside the craft. I had been allotted an aisle seat. And thankfully the man preceding me in the check-in queue was now separated from me by at least five rows of well-padded seats. Some benevolent soul had saved my nasal glands from certain torture and potential impairment, and I could only close my eyes in a silent expression of gratitude.

The cabin crew comprised all of three people - a young man and two women, all in their early twenties or thereabouts. It was a budget carrier after all, and for the sake of sound commerce they had to make do with the minimum possible headcount. I can appreciate the perspective of the airline management, but the three poor souls designed to bear the strategys brunt were having somewhat harrowing a time.

Stuffing ill-sized baggage into overhead compartments while passengers waited on them with an aura of aristocracy, as if the flight ticket entitled them to a brief stint of feudality, and scurrying about to deliver water bottles to impatient travellers, the crew members were getting a taste of reality that doesnt usually find its way into the airline hiring brochures. Cattle class, wasnt that the term an esteemed statesman had bestowed upon this phenomenon? How apt, but only if one ignored the minor subtlety that the remark eventually resulted in his ouster from office (or was it resignation, a more responsible but equally baffling act, considering we are a democracy that guarantees everyone the right of expression).

As the plane began to crawl, crew members took their positions, demonstrating how to efficiently buckle and unbuckle a seat-belt and other such. One of them, whose name I read on her breast-plate, Rochelle, was standing right in front of me and mechanically going about her duties. I glanced at her with comical curiosity, wondering how she endured a task of such insipid nature without as much as a frown on her face, my gaze lingering for just a wee bit longer than intended. A genial smile was affixed on her face-a cultivated facade to conceal her private self from those she met during the course of her work.

She was just like Her. Or maybe she wasnt. Who am I trying to fool here? Had it been the other hostess and not Rochelle who was in the periphery of my vision, would I have stopped from drawing parallels then? The answer is no. My mind, and more so my heart, needed an excuse, no matter how feeble, to begin thinking about Avantika, and Rochelle had served precisely that purpose.

Instantly I was drawn to the day I had first met Avantika, a day that could be traced back by eight calendar months, which now seemed like another lifetime altogether. It was another flight, a premium carrier instead of the budget one I was sitting in now.

Back then my life had been racing on a completely different track. I was among the privileged few, financially at least a bright corporate executive with a promising career ahead of him, a stud among mules, a man who did not have to endure the travails of travelling cattle class. Though the nature of my travel had been personal, my frequent work-related jaunts had left me with enough reward miles to book myself a business class ticket on my preferred airline.

After disembarking from the coach a business class exclusive, mind you I had walked to my seat with the usual arrogance and gait of the privileged, acknowledging greetings from the crew members with only a genial nod. I wasnt wearing a jacket, so when one of the stewards rushed to appease me by helping me with my overnighter instead, I gladly allowed him the pleasure, turning to carefully pick a business magazine from the pile ahead.

The plane was airborne soon and I engrossed myself in figuring out the possible good that could emerge from the elitist tea party underway in Davos, Switzerland, under the garb of The World Economic Forum meeting. Then suddenly, without a warning, a splash of cold liquid, followed by something human tearing its way through the magazine to land in my lap, left me startled and drenched.