Memory of a Girl

I love to watch the sun rise. Seated on the terrace floor, with the misty silence interrupted only by lively intermittent birdsong, I wait for the sun to rise. The climb is slow with first light, then picks up pace with the burst of orange and red, till it is too bright for me to stare. This morning, after that, I spotted a green cloth on my neighbour’s clothes’ line, probably a child’s top or table-cloth or track shorts.

Was that the trigger? Or, did it happen last night at the relative’s place, when I watched the ‘toilet scene’ in the movie Slumdog Millionaire? I prefer the scene in Schindler’s List – the concentration camp Jew kids hiding in the toilet shit-pool trying to escape extermination.

One of these two scenes or maybe both, the green shorts in the morning light or the toilet shit-pool, triggered the memory of a girl.

Then, I was a common adolescent in a boys’ high-school. It was also common then for a student to spend two-thirds of his life on extra-curricular activities. In my early years, I dreamt of making the school football or cricket team. The school football team did not exist because we were not rough and tough enough to play football outside the school. As for cricket, economics and restless pride made me quit the game. I did not enjoy being the water-boy. And, when I had to ask my parents for money to buy personal gloves and abdomen guard, I let that dream go.

I could run and jump in those days. With less than hundred rupees, my kit was ready – a pair of ‘spikes’ along with two track shorts. The school provided the vest with the school’s emblem and my favourite number. Only one of those shorts was ‘lucky’, a maroon one with thin white stripes on the sides, and I rarely used the other.

From late June till the end of the year, the calendar used to be marked with the dates of the sub-District, District and State-level athletic events.

I saw her for the first time at the District-level meet. She was participating in the same type of events as I was. She wore green track shorts. Her friend, a light-eyed fair girl, attracted a lot of attention. I must have observed her due to these three reasons. I called her Green Shorts (Pacha Nikkar).

We got selected to represent the District at the State-level athletic meet. The District team consisted of twenty to thirty kids. It was a motley group – girls and boys, fourteen to sixteen years of age, from lower and middle class schools. There were three or four adults from the Sports Council to manage us during those five-days.

The State-level athletic meet was hosted by another district that year. The train journey to that place took about twelve hours. A few parents, including mine, turned up at the train-station. None seemed unduly worried about the separation or any danger. It was not really safer then. There were rapists, paedophiles, groping adults, teenagers with raging hormones and misguided or uncouth kids. It is pointless to ask if the parents were foolish or the kids were lucky. It was just common for parents to worry less in those days.

In the host-district, we were lodged in a classroom of a government school. The girls had their own quarters somewhere. We were served filling, if not hygienic, food in a large tent which served as the canteen for the visiting athletes and managers. We slept on the floor of the classroom. There was an open shower stall installed outside. The toilet was the only tricky affair in that Spartan setting. The toilets were half-lit roughly-planked make-shift enclosures with a rickety door. It consisted of a big hole in the ground with two planks placed across that hole. We used to joke about how the acoustics changed from ‘Plupp’ on the first day to ‘Plupp-plupp’ on the other days. Some tried to be serious and told us tales about how a kid slipped and fell into such a shit-hole the previous year, and died. We preferred to hear the jokes. Anyway, we were in the stadium most of the day.

The whole town seemed to be involved and decked up for the event. The atmosphere in the stadium made us feel like champions entering the Olympics arena. Sports and Arts Festivals always attracted such crowds, even at the school level.

Our team grabbed our space in that stadium. We sat together and cheered for each other. Most of us did not have track-suits or even starting blocks for the sprints. Before an event, I would remove my pants and shirt, tuck the vest properly in my maroon shorts, put on my spikes, stretch and warm-up, and ask one of the guys to take care of my stuff. It was the same with her. She would stand, stretch, unbutton her skirt at the side, let it drop, step out of it, put on her spikes, remove her shirt, adjust her vest and the green shorts. At times, we would give a thumbs-up to each other before we set off for the event. Some times, we just smiled. After the event, we rested in that space, stretching, loosening the tight muscles. We exchanged packets of glucose, bottles of water, watched the sweat drop from the forehead or trickle down the neck to the heaving chest, and wanted to brush off the sand from the jumping pit on the other’s limbs and shoulder. We were fine being animals, admiring, distant and wild. Slowly, relaxed, we would pick up the clothes and dress.

Meanwhile, on the field, we lost more than we won. Even when we lost to worthy opponents, it was difficult to swallow the bitter taste of defeat. We did not exchange words then. Sometimes a nod, most often not even that. But, we did look at each other and we let the other see the pain, the hurt and the shame in the dark eyes.

I realized soon that we were quite similar. The same type of events, the same level of expertise (a bit above average, at best), the same amateur aspirations and hopes, and the same way we fought and lost battles on our own.

Before I realized the need, I started to search for her before every race or jump. And she was there, in our team’s space or amidst the crowds close to the starting line. Maybe, it was because it was just a four or five day event. Still, she was always there.

I knew even then that it really mattered to me. I also knew that it was not because she affected my performance. She did not. I ran or jumped as usual. It would have been nice to say that she was the woman behind my success (or my loss). Those are just nice meaningless words. For me, it was something different, that’s all. It’s a bit like watching the sun rise. I can watch it alone. The scene is no less beautiful when I can also feel a woman’s hand in mine. It is just a different beautiful story.

I did not get the chance to ask her if I was there for her every time or if she ever needed me. We hardly talked. In those days, it would not have been proper if I tried to get her alone to talk. Between races or at the end of the day, we went as a group to an ice-cream parlour near the stadium. Outside the stadium, we guys or the lady-manager escorted the girls. On the journey back home, we sang and cheered till we lost our voice. We smiled and laughed together. We hardly talked.

We got off the train at the same station. I went to my folks and she went to hers.   

A few months later, I saw her at a theatre. She looked smart and beautiful in a lovely dress. I did wonder if she was wearing her green shorts beneath. She introduced me to her mother. I smiled, wished them well and left. I could not stay. I knew she meant a lot to me, though I did not really understand the reason at that time.

It was much later in life that I realized that in every woman, I searched for the girl I called Green Shorts (Pacha Nikkar) – the animal, the equal, the woman to trust.