Middle - Earning Hands

(inspired from a true story)

Earning hands
by Jupinderjit Singh

OUR roof will surely leak this monsoon”, muttered Karuna Devi, lying with her back on a worn-out mat, half-asleep but fully worried.

Excruciating waves of pain passed through her feeble frame as she tried to turn and lie on her stomach. She rose before the sun rise and went to bed when even the moon looked tired in the sky. She dreamt sometimes of better days, when her six daughters and three sons would grow up and the family would earn more.

Her husband returned home late, smelling of liquor, as ever, mumbled abuses at all, especially at the eldest son, Ramdin. “He roams around all day, and returns home without much picks. I thought I got two more earning hands when he was born and then two more with the next birth and so on, but in the end I got more stomachs to feed and more bones to cover. To cap it all, you frustrate me more by talking about the weak roof.”

His abuses went on and on and eventually lulled all of them to sleep. Next day began as usual. They went out from their shanty to do labour work. Ramdin went to his “area” — the bus stand. He was determined to fight a group of urchins, who snatched his picks.

They robbed him again. No one in the busy bus-stand intervened. For them, the fight of the rag-pickers was like the fight of dogs. It seemed a group of stray canines just attacked an intruder in their area. Just that. Nothing special.

How would he go home now? “Bring some good stuff. We need to plug the leak of the roof. Do you understand?” he remembered his mom’s words.

He wanted to end her misery as fast as possible. He often dreamt of finding a diamond in the rags some day. “There are so many careless people in the world. Some can drop those by accident”

At that precise moment, a shining object caught his eye lying besides two empty bottles under an AC bus. He got up slowly and slid under the bus. It was just a heart-shaped yellow button. He was disgusted. He extended his hand to pick up the bottles that had rolled towards the centre of the bus.

Just then, he heard the roar of the engine. In panic, he gripped the bottles and tried to come out swiftly from the other side. It was too late. The rear tyres crushed him like a bee gets swatted. His shriek was no louder than the sound of a lifeless dry leaf when it is trampled upon.

The driver of the bus ran away. No one tried to catch him. The parents cried and beat their chest. By the evening, they were all quiet. The powerful transporter had compensated them “suitably” with Rs 20,000.

She sat that night against the wall, all numb. She touched the currency notes in her lap shining above her soiled sari. Her other children too stared at the pad of notes out of their deep sockets.

Once she used to cuddle her son in the same lap. She looked at the roof and through the holes, she spotted clouds hovering above the sky.

“He did have earning hands,” said her husband.

Then, he looked at his other children who were looking at their earning hands — a total of 16.