It's a fleeting image, but
nonetheless an image that has stayed in my mind.
The light is not good enough
at this hour. It's blurry and is casting
shadows too many. In a
matter of minutes the entire sky has turned bluish grey and a beautiful
gorgeous moon is holding up there. A dozen cars speed by with their
windows all rolled up.
A lam-post erected
at the corner of a road has a swarm of night insects circling round and
round it’s weak light, dancing perhaps to a melodious jig.
Clutching my heavy bag, I am
out there on the busy night street waiting for my vehicle to arrive. My
gaze keeps straying back from the moon to a street dog who is aimlessly
licking at some biscuit crumbs.
Something then catches my
eye.
I stand there transfixed, my
heart thumping a little louder which only I am able to hear.
A few hundred meters away,
at the end of the street, stands a lone rickety push cart, leaning against a
weathered wall. One of the wheel is crooked and bent and perhaps that explains
the reason for it abandoned there.
Seated atop the cart, I see a lady errr
a Ladyboy with his one knee raised and the tip of his chin resting on it. Every
time he would move, his slim waist would sway, adding an illusion of almost feminine
grace to his movements.
Pink, purple and blue fairy lights
dangle from a lone wire, creating an air of mock festivity.
He then lifts a pocket sized
mirror. Under the dim shadows I see him holding a brush and painting his lips with utmost precision. I imagine the lipstick to be a scarlet red. He
then moves to darken his eyebrows, and finally finishes off by dusting his face
with some loose powder.
Hordes and hordes of plastic bags are
lying all around him. From the heap, he rummages and digs out two Bob pins to
firmly secure his wig. A bottle of ittar lies close enough. He inhales the
fragrance and dabs a little on the spot below his ears. From where I wait, I
can make out a faint trace of his nearly bare back fastened with the flimsy
ends of a choli.
The pushcart wobbles a little as he
shifts his position. The broad flare of his crimson skirt gets neatly arranged
behind his legs. Resting his back against the wall, he pulls out a beedi to
light up a smoke. For a fraction of a second, the bluish flame illuminates his
face and I see him staring up at the moon, blowing thick smoke rings into the
night air. I couldn’t help but notice the soft tenderness in his face behind
all that garish make-up.
While the Ladyboy is busy dressing up
for the night, I notice that I have company. A tiny figure crouched beside me
on his haunches is also involved in watching the Ladyboy's theatrics. In fact
he seems so allured by the charm of the Ladyboy, that he is unwilling to peel
his eyes off him. Perhaps he is waiting for some sort of signal.
Within no time, I catch them exchanging looks. A flutter of fake eyelashes and a seductive smile from the
Ladyboy is all that is required for the man to muster courage and take things
in stride. He slowly gets ups, straightens his kurta, runs his fingers through
his greasy hair, and moves ahead. One confident step at a time. His Kolhapuri
chappals make a grating sound as he walks through the thick rubble of cement and
stones.
As he moves away, he turns around so
that our eyes meet. All this while, he probably knew that we were the only two
spectators to observe the Ladyboy so closely.
But now, it weighed on him, to give a befitting end to the story.
Tonight, an act or two was waiting to get committed behind the weathered wall in the overgrown bushes.
