A Broken Anthill

Heavy raindrops fell on an anthill, like missiles falling on an enemy territory. The rainwater flowed over it, eroding it and breaking it apart. But instead of leaving their home, the termites went deeper into it. They waited for the rains to cease, for a dry day, to build their home again. But they had to wait for a long time before it happened. And by the time the rains ceased, more than half of Assam was submerged in floodwater from released dams and overflowing rivers. Nevertheless, the termites came back and rebuilt their home. And within a week, it was as good as the old one… 

Anu, the maid, was leaning against the chair. A painful nerve disease left her with a pronounced limp and had made her unable to sit. So she was leaning against the chair with her back, without actually sitting on it. The rainfall outside the windows soaked her mind with memories. And gradually, the memories started dripping. 

A little girl woke up from a deep sleep. She had dreamt of rainbow-colored sheep in her sleep. It was a pleasant dream; by walking amongst those rainbow-colored sheep she felt pseudo-happiness, which she now realized as utter stupidity. 

She got up from her bed and stood on the threshold of the door, which opened to her mother’s room. Her mother was already up. The bed had already been made and the sheets had been folded. She came out of the house to tell her mother that she had woken up. Her mother was washing clothes, sitting close to the hand-pump, in the backyard. 

“Go and wash your mouth,” her mother said, without looking up from the pile of clothes which she was soaking in soap water. The soft clinking sound coming from her bangles enchanted Anu for some moments. Little Anu stood there, staring at her mother, thrashing the clothes one by one, on a raised concrete platform. Then she turned her back and went to fetch a tumbler and a neem branch. 

The clouds started to gather; the weather was calm. 

Little Anu had her breakfast and left for school. 

Anu, the maid, was called by her master and her train of thoughts came to a sudden halt. She rolled the pre-kneaded dough and made perfectly round rotis for her ‘Saar’. She served them hot, with a little pile of ‘kumrar’ sabzi. 

She was a competent maid. She was more intelligent and clever than others on her field. She had been working for more than a decade in the same house. 

She waited for her master to finish his roti, so that she can clean the table and wash the utensils. He ate slowly, savoring the sabzi. He praised her for the sabzi and the roti went unnoticed, as always. Some of the successes always outshine other small successes. But only a few people appreciated that the failure of those small successes can outshine even the biggest of successes. He had finished eating and she cleaned up the table and washed the utensils. She went back to her room; it was her off-time. 

Back on her bed, with a mixture of saliva and paan in her mouth, she sat and resumed the train of thoughts, which waited in the platform of her mind. 

Little Anu walked. She walked past the mailbox, past the vast green paddy fields, past dark and dense bamboo vegetations, past the milkman’s house where the cows were mooing, past the unemployed boys who were playing football. She walked for more than half an hour, and finally concluded her journey when she reached her school; a multi-roomed long house with walls of painted red bricks, which were bordered by cuboidal logs of wood, which were painted white. The entire house looked like a uniformed British military officer, of the good old Victorian times. Of what happened in the school, she had only a vague memory; nothing particular. She remembered being beaten by a cane stick, by Abani Master. She copied her lessons. She talked with her twin best friends, Rupali and Deepali. Those were usual things; same on any given day. Though she got punishment from her teachers almost every other day, she was the kind of student, to whose parents the teachers say, “Your child is good in studies. She has a bright future.” 

But nobody, on that day, knew of the stroke of luck, the stroke of bad luck to be specific, which will change the brightness of her future. Maybe that’s how god worked, thought Anu the maid. He changed the brightness of people’s futures by organizing simple incidents of luck. She knew not that luck is a kind of consequence, which your actions give birth to. Nevertheless, the little Anu came out of her school premises in the afternoon with her twin-best friends. 

The dark-clouds that had gathered silently began leaking. The raindrops were tiny, barely noticeable. Yet they started to speckle the dry anthill with wet spots. 

Little Anu told the twins about the large pond next to her house. The black broken boat that was anchored to a corner of the pond, the largeness of which was exaggerated by Anu, was bragged by Anu to be theirs. They won’t believe it. She told them about the pink lotuses that bloom there, about their leaves that covered almost the whole pond. They believe that either. And so she promised to bring them a lotus bud the next day. What she forgot to brag about, was the depth of the pond, which was about 6 feet. 

The raindrops were getting heavier. The termites were trying hard to protect their home. 

She went back to her home and quickly finished her lunch of curd and rice. She was eager and excited to collect the flowers to show them to her friends. She ran towards the pond at once, as soon as she had made sure that her mother was taking the evening nap. She hoped for her uncle’s absence in the pond. Her uncle had bred some fishes in the pond. And now he was fishing. Later, at the evening, he would sell the fishes in the evening market. Anu was disappointed to see his presence. She could not possibly go and pluck the flower by herself. She went timidly towards her uncle. But before she could utter even a single word, her uncle turned his head and saw her approaching. 

“What are you doing here in the middle of the day? Go and sleep with your mother. Run,” he said, or to be specific, barked. 

The timid Anu got scared at the fierce glare from her uncle’s eyes. She trembled with fear and, turning towards her home, ran as fast as she could. No, she would not be able to pluck any flower for her friends if her uncle remains near the pond. And Anu knew well that her uncle won’t move from his position till evening. I will be able to pluck the flowers after ‘mama’ goes to bazaar, thought little Anu. But when the evening approached, she grew too scared to go outside in the dark. Now she couldn’t think what she should do. She had no other opportunities left. She was growing restless, thinking how her best-friends would make fun of her. No, she couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t let go of her pride that way. She needed to do something. An idea came to her… A lightning stroke fell from the clouds. 

She made a decision. She would go out tomorrow at the dawn, and pick the flowers before her uncle comes to fish in the pond. She decided that she would wake up the next day and would go straight to the pond, before telling her mother that she was up from the bed. She had her dinner a little earlier than usual and went to bed almost immediately after that. She made herself ready for the dawn to come. 

Anu the maid was summoned by her master, once again, to collect the salary that she had earned through her hard-work. She slowly climbed up the stairs and on the floor where the flight of stairs ended; she rested against the pole that supported the banister. There she had to wait for a few long minutes. And somehow, unknowingly between those collections of sixty seconds the torch of her thoughts got ignited again and it enlightened the dark of her mind. 

The rain was getting heavier and now the entire anthill was wet. The termites were still trying hard to save their home and keep their tunnels open. 

Little Anu slept a dreamless sleep. Though she didn’t notice it, it was a thing that seldom happened to her. She woke up early in the morning. Her mother was already up and washing the clothes and utensils. She had a golden chance of sneaking out through the front door. She did that. She crossed their uncle’s house and went along the bank of the large pond, to the corner where the old broken black boat was. 

Though it was known among the villagers as the ‘Broken Boat’, the only broken thing is its mast. The boat could still be rowed and still be sat on. Little Anu went towards that boat and sat on it to get closer to the lotus buds. Her uncle was still in his home. But she knew that he would soon come to fish. And if he saw her doing this then he would probably even beat her. So she hastened. 

The raindrops were falling at tremendous speed and made violent noise as they crashed against the tin roofs. The anthill was becoming muddy. 

And suddenly her foot slipped. She fell into the pond. A loud splashing noise echoed and suddenly she was drowning. She desperately tried to get hold of the boat. But as she held its mast and tried to pull herself up, the boat turned and fell over her, missing her head by a hair’s breadth. She kicked her legs and jerked her hands, trying to move the boat and somehow get to get to the shore. She tried to push the boat away with all her strength. It moved and she came to the surface. But still the shore was very far from her. The pond water entered her mouth and nose and finally her lungs. She stopped jerking and kept going downwards. Her hair floated at the surface. 

By an ironical stroke of luck – ironical because the person she feared was to be her savior – her uncle came out from his home with the net and a fishing rod. He sat down on the shore and was about to start fishing, when he saw a tuft of jet black hair, floating on the pond. Suddenly he knew what has happened, as if God suddenly gave him an entrance to His vault of knowledge. He started to shout, “O bou! Anu pukhrit porsi!” and at the same time, jumped into the pond. 

The anthill got heavier with water. Its top fell off. The termites couldn’t save it. But they went deeper inside the mound of dirt and secured themselves. 

Little Anu was brought to home. Water was pumped out of her lungs. She escaped death by hair’s breadth. But she seemed to lose all her senses. 

She would stay mute all day and night and was reluctant to walk. She would scream when she saw those twin sisters. She would scream, at the thought of having to sit with them, if she went to school. She stayed like that for months after months… She stayed like that for almost a year. And she was never enrolled in the school again. 

But the termites came back after a long time and built their home again. And there it stood, resting against the banister of the staircase inside a doctor’s home. 

And there she waited a few more minutes, until her master, the doctor, came out and gave her the salary and said, “You don’t have to work for us from tomorrow.” 

“Why, sir? Did I do something wrong?” she asked with a startled voice. 

“Arre, nai nai nai,” her master laughed. “We will shift to Guwahati, I have talked with your mistress today. She didn’t want you to end your term in the middle, so we are bidding you farewell with this salary. We will shift about a week from now.” 

The sky became grey with the clouds once again… 

 

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