Pir-E-Kamil: The Perfect Mentor (28 page)

Having bathed, he went into the kitchen—he was ravenously hungry. He made some noodles for himself. 'I must go to the doctor tomorrow for a complete check-up,' he decided as he ate. He felt light and better after the shower, but his whole being felt drained and weak.

He had switched on the TV while eating and flicked channels to find something suitable: there was a talk show going on. Salar stopped eating— spoon poised in mid-air, he stared at the TV in distraction and picked up the remote to change channels. Now he was looking carefully at the programs on each channel and the confusion on his face was growing.

'What's this?'

He remembered that it was Friday night when he had been taken ill and had collapsed on the road, and had been taken to the hospital. Saturday was spent there, and he had returned to his apartment on Sunday. After going to sleep on Sunday afternoon, he had awakened the next morning at eleven; that night he had fever which must have lasted till Tuesday, and it must be Tuesday night now. But the television channels told a different story—it was Saturday night and the next day would be Sunday.

Salar glanced at his watch, lying on the living room table and his mouth fell open in amazement. He put down the bowl of noodles; he couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the date on his watch.

'Does this mean that I've been ill for five days? Out of my senses for five whole days? How can that be? How is it possible?' he muttered. 'Five days is a long time—how come I did not even notice the passage of time? How could I just lie there, senseless, for five days?'

He stumbled towards his telephone to check the answering service— there were no calls.

'Papa didn't even call me...and neither did Saad ....what's the matter with them? Didn't they miss me?' Salar was shocked to find there were no messages for him. He sat silently by the phone for a long time.

'How can it be that Papa did not even think of me? None of my friends thought of me—how could they just abandon me?' He realized for the first time that the thought made his hands tremble; it wasn't weakness or debility, but then what was it that had shaken him so? He sat down on the sofa and tried to finish the noodles, but they were no longer appetizing. He felt as if he was chewing in pieces of soft rubber—he couldn't eat any more. He was in a strange state of uncertainty—had he really spent five days alone and that neither he nor anyone else had known what had befallen him?

He went into the bathroom again. His face was not as haggard after taking a shower, but the dark circles around his eyes and his overgrown stubble were still there. He stood there, staring at his reflection and touching the shadows under his eyes as though he didn't really believe what he saw. Suddenly, his hirsute face was bothering him. He took out the shaving kit and prepared to shave; he realized then that his hands were still trembling and, in close sequence, he managed to nick his face in three places. He washed his face and patted it dry, trying to stanch the thin trickle of blood that had appeared. Vacantly, he kept staring at his image. The cut bled again—dark blood oozing out—and unblinking, he watched the tiny drops roll down his face. 'What's next to ecstasy?'

'Pain.' A cold, low voice spoke. He stood rooted to the ground.

'What's next to pain?'

'Nothingness.' He remembered each word.

'Nothingness,' he mumbled, looking at himself in the mirror. The movement made the drops of blood roll down his face.

'And what comes after nothingness?'

'Hell.' Salar retched again, all of a sudden, and doubled over the wash basin. The food he had finished eating a few minutes ago, was ejected once again. He turned on the tap to clear away the mess. He remembered what he had asked her next and what her reply had been.

'You're unable to make any sense of anything right now—and you won't be able to, either. There'll come a time when everything will be clear to you and you'll understand it all. In every life, there's a time when everything becomes clear—when there's no more mystery. I am passing through that stage,' she had said, 'but that stage will come upon you at some future point. Then remember to check if it doesn't amuse you.'

Salar retched again. He felt his eyes streaming.

'In life, at sometime or another we come to a point where all relationships cease—where there is only us and Allah. There are no parents, brother or sister, or any friend. Then we realise that there is no earth under us nor is there sky above, but only Allah who is supporting us in this emptiness. Then we realise our worth - it is not more than a grain of sand or the leaf of a plant. Then we realise our existence is only confined to our being. Our demise makes not a whit of difference to the world around us, nor to the scheme of things.'

Salar was feeling an unusual pain in his chest. He licked the water flowing down his face and he retched again.

His thoughts continued. 'We come to our senses; we understand our utter insignificance.'

He was trying to rid the voice from his mind. He wondered why he remembered her now.

He splashed water on his face, wiped it, opened the bottle of after-shave and applied it to the wounds on his cheek. For the first time, he felt the pain.

Coming out of the bathroom, he realized that his hands were trembling even now.

'I must go to the doctor.' He clenched his fists. 'I need help. I must get myself checked up.'

He did not know this feeling of wild fear. He was suffocating. He felt as though someone was slowly squeezing the life out of him.

'Is it possible that my people would forget me, forget me this way '

He took out clean clothes from his wardrobe and started to put them on. He wanted to get to the doctor fast. Suddenly, the apartment became a frightening place.

That night, on returning home, he had been awake almost the whole night. He was in a strange state: he could not accept that he had been forgotten. He had always been well looked after by his parents. Considering the way he was, Sikandar Usman and Tayyaba had handled him cautiously. They always worried for him, but now he felt that for the last few days he was completely out of everyone's lives—his parents, brothers and sister, friends. If, as a result of his illness, he had died in his apartment, probably no one would have known. Maybe till his corpse had begun to rot, and in this weather how much time would that take?

That night, he checked the phone's answering service every hour. In a state of disbelief, he spent all of the next week waiting for someone to call, but no one called.

'Have they all forgotten me?'

He panicked. After waiting a whole week, like a fool, for someone to call, he himself tried contacting his folks.

He wanted to tell them what had happened to him and what he had been through.

He wanted to share his woes with them. But, for the first time, he felt as though nobody was really interested in him. Everybody had details of their own activities.

Sikandar and Tayyaba kept telling him of their holiday in Australia and how much they were enjoying it. He heard them absentmindedly.

'Are you enjoying your holidays?' After a long conversation, Tayyaba enquired about him.

'Me? Yes, very....' He could utter only just these three words. He did not really know what to tell Tayyaba, what to disclose to her.

Speaking to every one that he called, he faced this situation for the first time: he realized that they were primarily interested in their own lives. Maybe, if he had told them what he had been through, they would have expressed shock, and maybe they would have got worried. But this would happen after he had told them. What place did he have in their lives? Was anyone interested to know what had occurred?

Perhaps then he pondered for the first time that if his life were to end why would it affect anyone else. What change would it bring to the world? What would his family feel? Nothing... nothing, except grief for a few days. As for the rest of the world, it would not be affected even momentarily.

If Salar Sikandar were to vanish would it make any difference to anybody? He tried to banish such dark thoughts, but the despair and his state of mind overcame him. 'What's come over me? Of what consequence is it if people were to forget me temporarily? Several times I have myself lost contact with a lot of people. Then, why bother if this has happened with me.'

'But why did this happen to me? And if I had really not regained consciousness If my fever had not subsided, if the pain in my chest and stomach not abated '

He tried to rid his mind of these troubling thoughts, but could not. He was more in fear than in pain. 'Maybe, I'm becoming too sensitive, otherwise why should I let mere temporary unconsciousness get to me so.' He fretted.

'At least now I've recovered, but why am I thinking of death? After all, I've fallen ill before also. Tried to commit suicide without cause, but now, why am I being assailed by these fears?' His agony increased.

'Nor do I remember the misery of the fever. It was, perhaps, only a dream or somewhat like a coma. I can't recall more.' He tried to smile.

'What is bothering me? What disease? Or is it the realization that nobody needed me, nobody thought of me, not even my loved ones, my own family, my friends '

*****************************

'Oh, my God, what's happened to you, Salar!' Sandra exclaimed, seeing him on the first day of the new semester.

'Nothing really.' Salar tried to smile.

'Have you been ill?' she asked concernedly.

'Yes, a little.'

'But it appears to me that you have been quite ill. You've lost weight and have got dark rings around your eyes. What were you ill with?'

'Nothing much. Just a little fever and food poisoning, I suppose ' he smiled.

'Were you away in Pakistan?'

'No, I was here.'

'I phoned you several times before leaving for New York. Each time the answering service responded. You should have recorded that you'd left for Pakistan.'

'Just stop it!' he exploded. 'You're bombarding me with questions.'

Sandra looked at him in amazement.

'You're interrogating me as if you were my wife.'

'Salar, what happened?'

'Nothing happened. Now, you stop all this talk of what-where- how-why rubbish.'

Sandra could not speak for a few moments. She had no inkling that he would react so.

Sandra was not the only one to have expressed such concern to Salar. All his other friends and acquaintances had reacted similarly on seeing Salar.

By the end of the day Salar was thoroughly rattled and had become somewhat aggressive. He had not gone to the university to be interrogated. The concern of his friends repeatedly reminded him that something really awful had happened to him, and he wanted release from this realization.

'Would you like to go to the movies this weekend?' Danish, who was visiting Salar, asked.

'Yes, I would,' Salar agreed.

'Then be ready. I'll pick you up.' Danish confirmed the arrangement.

Danish picked up Salar as arranged. Salar had gone to the movies after several weeks and he was looking forward to an enjoyable evening, but ten minutes after the movie began he suddenly felt an acute and inexplicable fear. The characters on the screen ahead appeared to him like puppets that he could not understand. He quietly got up and left. He sat on the bonnet of Danish's car in the parking lot for a long time, then hailed a taxi and returned to his apartment.

Professor Robinson had started his lecture. Salar noted on the paper in front of him the date and the topic. He was speaking on the economic recession. As always, his eyes were fixed on the professor but his mind was elsewhere. This had happened the first time in his life that he did not know where he was mentally. His mind flitted from one image to another, and then onto another. From one scene to another, and then onto another. He heard one voice, then another and yet another. He had no idea where his journey started or where he was.

'Salar, shall we not leave?' Sandra asked, shaking his shoulder.

He was startled. The classroom was empty and only Sandra was besides him. He looked in bewilderment at the empty classroom, the wall clock and then at his wrist watch.

'Where's Prof. Robinson?' he blurted out.

'The class is over and he has left.' Sandra replied, looking at him somewhat amazed.

'The class is over?' he doubtingly asked.

'Yes'. Salar rubbed his eyes vigorously and leaned back. The only thing he remembered of Prof. Robinson's lecture was the topic and nothing else. He did not know what the professor had said.

'You're looking a bit upset?' Sandra enquired.

'Nothing, really nothing. I want to sit here alone for sometime.'

'O.K.' Sandra said looking at him, and picked up her things and left.

He crossed his arms across his chest and started staring at the blackboard ahead. This was the third such occurrence of the day. He had thought that on rejoining the university everything would fall back to normal and that he would come out of his depression. But that did not happen. At the university too he continued to be a complete victim of his mental turmoil. Also, for the first time, he was losing interest in his studies: everything appeared artificial to him. For the first time in his life, he had gone into deep depression. Studies, university, friends, club, parties, restaurants, outings and the like had become meaningless for him. He had stopped meeting friends. His phone often had a recorded message that he was not home. On the insistence of his friends, he would relent to go out with them, but at the last moment drop out. Even if he did go, he would suddenly leave without saying a word. He was doing the same thing at the university. He would attend one day and absent himself the next two. One class he would attend and forego the next two.

Sometimes, he would spend the whole day in bed in his apartment. He would start watching a film but after a couple of minutes, he'd have no clue as to what he was watching. It was the same when he'd be flicking through the TV channels. His appetite had disappeared—he'd begin to eat but halfway, he'd leave the food and some days, he'd go without it. All he did was to down endless cups of coffee.