Onto the Stage - Slighted Souls and other stage and radio plays by BS Murthy (speed reading book .TXT) 📕

no’. Am I right?

PRATAP: Yes and no, and I can’t I fault you for thinking so.

SEKHAR: Pratap, why talk in circles.

PRATAP: Because I can’t be forthright.

SEKHAR: What’s the restraint?

PRATAP: It’s my constraint.

SEKHAR: What is it?

PRATAP:  That I can’t tell you without being forthright.

SEKHAR: Why back to square one via your nonsensical route.

SFX – Car screeching to a halt.

SEKHAR: Oh, what an ass he is? If he came under, I would’ve been hauled up for manslaughter not amounting to murder? Oh the goddamn legal jargon.  

PRATAP: Is the Indian road sense any less nonsensical? We’ve hardly clocked a kilometer and I’m already crazy really.

SEKHAR: The chaos on the roads was no less yesterday.

PRATAP: Wasn’t my mind more chaotic yesterday?

SEKHAR: Yes and no.

VIMALA: Pratap, he won’t leave you till you commit yourself

PRATAP: Okay then, bank deposits “yes”, emotional withdrawals “no” and future course “don’t know”.

SEKHAR:  It’s the way life these days. What do you say Vimala? 

VIMALA: Ladies come last …

PRATAP:  With their last word.

VIMALA: Glad you haven’t lost your wit a wee-bit.

PRATAP: And you, your ability to appreciate.

SEKHAR: Why make me feel left out?

VIMALA: Are you not in the driver’s seat.

SFX –A lorry whizzes past.

PRATAP:  Is he drunk or what?

SEKHAR: Drink or no drink they drive insane.

PRATAP:  I’ve come here to mend my life, not to break my bones.  

VIMALA: Don’t worry; if it comes to that I’ll tend your bones.

PRATAP: Won’t I mend my life as you tend them?

VIMALA: How am I to know?

SEKHAR: You may know you’re in safe hands.

PRATAP: But still, we’ve a long way to go, to and fro.

SEKHAR: Why worry, you’ll get used to our traffic ways by then.

PRATAP: Only to lose my way on the U.S. roads.

VIMALA: But you said you would come back for good.

PRATAP: That is, if I don’t go back out of heart.

SEKHAR: Vimala, have you ever heard of an Indian American discarding his suffix.

PRATAP: Why do you prejudge to prejudice her mind?

VIMALA: I’ve a mind of my own and you know that.

PRATAP: But out of sight is out of mind.

VIMALA: Not with the nursery to degree kind of …well, I don’t suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, at least for now.

PRATAP: I tell you those days make the almanac of my life.

VIMALA: Well tucked in the attic to gather dust. 

PRATAP: I can’t fault you for faulting me. 

VIMALA: That Houdini like vanishing act and the prodigal son like   hibernation. What to make out of that?

PRATAP: Silence of the lamb.

(PAUSE)

PRATAP: Let bygones be bygones, won’t you let me dust my almanac.

VIMALA: You may need a broom for that. Wait till I fetch it.

PRATAP: Meanwhile let me clear the air. I felt sorry for you when I heard about your tragedy

VIMALA: (OFF) Hypocrite.

PRATAP: I took the first available flight.

VIMALA: I’m glad you care.

PRATAP: I wish I were there right then.

VIMALA: Maybe, it would have helped (PAUSE) or might not have. Now I’ve come to see it more as a tragedy of our country.

PRATAP: When Sekhar told me about it, I too thought so. I’m ashamed for what the world thinks of us Indians.

VIMALA: Why feel apologetic at all. Why, was it any worse than the senseless outrages in the U.S campuses? Bhadru’s killers had an ill-motive at least. But there, don’t sick-minds routinely gun down the unwary. What a shame, the so-called gun culture. 

PRATAP: Leave alone the U.S., tell me what went wrong here.

VIMALA: Blame the businessman, present company excluded.

SEKHAR: I’ve my share of sins and there is no shying away from that.

PRATAP: But give the devil where it is due. But for their enterprise India wouldn’t have been what it is economically.

VIMALA: It’s like not seeing the wood for the trees. It is they who corrupted our society and weakened its moral fabric. 

SEKHAR: What do you mean by that Vimala? It’s the so-called    government servants who started it all. Will they ever touch a file without greasing their palms? If I’m right, Nehru said that bribes act like lubricants in the smooth running of the government machinery. And what’s his daughter’s take on corruption? Didn’t Indira Gandhi say it was a global phenomenon? Mind you, both of them together ruled the country for the best part after independence, what do you say about it?

VIMALA: Well, the need to bribe the black sheep is not same as corrupting the entire flock. That’s what the business community did over the years. Who hasn’t heard of their bribe talk, khushi se dete hai or sabhi lete hai and such? Bhadru used to say only ten percent officials were corrupt in the seventies. I need not tell you less than ten percent could be honest now. 

PRATAP: What do you say Sekhar?

SEKHAR: In hind sight, I think she is right.

VIMALA: Seems we’ve lost the foresight forever.

PRATAP: What about having some garam chai to rev up a little.

VIMALA: Why not, we’ve a dhabha nearby.

(PAUSE)

SFX – Indicative of the car being parked near an open air eatery and the passengers alighting from the same. 

 

SCENE - 6

 

EXT - Pratap, Sekhar and Vimala take their chairs at a table in the open

VIMALA: Sekhar will you find out if there is a toilet somewhere here.

SEKHAR: Wait, let me go and check up.

(PAUSE)

PRATAP: How can you think of a passable loo in this filthy place?

VIMALA: I understand your obsession for cleanliness. But if you focus on what is lacking, you lose sight of all that is different.

PRATAP: Now I realize, much of your appeal is the way you think.

VIMALA: Are you dismissing me as a bluestocking?

PRATAP: Won’t my body language answer that.

(PAUSE)

SEKHAR: Vimala, it’s in the backyard.

(PAUSE)

SEKHAR: You’ve set her heart on the right beat.

PRATAP: But I’ve lost my heart all again. Never mind your Liz Hurly hint, how to imagine she would be so fascinating. But if I can’t have her I’ll have a twice broken heart to mend. And that would be my undoing.

SEKHAR: I don’t think you’ve to worry about it. I’ve a hunch she would not like to miss out either. But she may not like to migrate to the U.S. 

PRATAP: What I’ve got to do with the U.S any way. Know I am counting on you to tilt the scales.

SEKHAR: If need be, with the combined weight of my wife.

PRATAP: Quiet, she’s coming along with some bearer. (OFF) What a lovely frame in that graceful gait.

VIMALA: Hi Pratap, you seem to have lost yourself.

SEKHAR: Why are you after the poor fellow?

VIMALA: Sekhar, better get your eyes checked up.

PRATAP: Why, don’t I see that koya dora approaching us.

VIMALA: Wonder how these koya doras are such good face readers! It’s an idea to let him predict Pratap’s future. 

PRATAP: Why not let me enjoy in the suspension of belief.

VIMALA: Why, don’t you see he’s focusing on you?

(PAUSE)

KOYA DORA: I’ve got it from our goddess Poleramma. Beta, you are at the crossroad now. Is it not true?

PRATAP: When your goddess tells you, why do you ask me?

KOYA DORA: Oyoye. (PAUSE) You loved and lost. She agreed but not her father. You went west and married. Amassed wealth but not happy, no love, no children.      

SEKHAR: Pratap is it all true; I mean to the last million. No yes and no please.

PRATAP: Yes, including a meager fortune.

SEKHAR: It’s a sort of yes and no again. But why didn’t you tell me about that?

PRATAP: You know I’m never boastful. I’ve a small chain of Indian eateries over there.

SEKHAR: Understatement again, Koya Dora, what about his wife?

Koya Dora: I’ll see his hand. (PAUSE) She left you, ten years ago, right.

PRATAP: True.

SEKHAR: What about his future?

Koya Dora: He won’t go back. (PAUSE) Gets a beautiful wife, (PAUSE) she bears him a son, (PAUSE) long and happy married life. Give some money to please Poleramma.

(PAUSE)

KOYA DORA: Poleramma says I should take the money from beti’s hand.

PRATAP: Vimala, would you mind obliging him. 

KOYA DORA: Beti, Poleramma says you’ll get what you want.

SEKHAR: What about my future Koya Dora?

KOYA DORA:  Give me your hand. (PAUSE) You’re happy with your   family. You’ll be a very rich man. Your son goes abroad.

SEKHAR: Will he come back or not? 

KOYA DORA: I have to see his hand. (PAUSE) Poleramma blesses all of you.

(PAUSE) 

PRATAP: Wonder how he’s on dot about my past!

VIMALA: They’ve a knack of telling the past and gain confidence.

SEKHAR: What about their ability to foresee into the future.

VIMALA: That time only would tell.

SEKHAR: If this Koya Dora has his way, Pratap can blissfully wait and you can choose for sure, but what about me? God forbid, if his prediction comes true, I will be lost without my Suresh by my side.

PRATAP:  Why don’t you take advantage of his prediction?

SEKHAR: What advantage in a disadvantaged situation?

VIMALA: Wait Pratap. Sekhar, thank the Koya Dora for not taking advantage of his disadvantageous prediction.

SEKHAR:  It’s fine if you are thankful to him but not me. He gave you a blank cheque and me a bleak future, didn’t he?

VIMALA: Why are you cut up with him? You should be thankful to him.

PRATAP: Vimala, what this rubbing salt into his poor wounds.

VIMALA: You may not know but Sekhar knows the way the   soothsayers operate. But this Koya dora neither offered to do some puja nor wanted Sekhar to wear a tayattu. What’s more it was a free consultation. 

PRATAP: Any doubt he would’ve fallen for the bait, hook, line and sinker.

VIMALA: Well, I’ve nothing against astrology if it’s not handled by charlatans. If things are destined to go wrong, they will go wrong, never mind their fake supplements. I believe it pays to know the realities of life. I don’t think there was ever a way of making life a smooth sailing affair, all the way. Better, we learn to weather out the storm till it subsides. After all, it can’t last forever.

SEKHAR: I don’t see the clue to my rider lies in your theorem.

PRATAP: Then why not draw from the American way of life. What’s this parental urge to get glued to bearded children? Why not let them go on their own from adolescence as the Americans do.

VIMALA: Isn’t it the other extreme? What is adolescence if it’s not vulnerable? It’s stupid to abandon children at the crossroads of life. It’s    insensitive even; we know freedom without responsibility spoils, moreso at the tender age. 

PRATAP: Maybe, if we average both cultures, we have the optimum. 

VIMALA: I think you’ve got it.

SEKHAR: Let’s go then. (RAISED YONE) Bearer, bring the bill.

PRATAP: Sekhar, do you remember what lifting little finder in the class meant.

SEKHAR: Well, you can relive yourself but it’s an open affair here.

PRATAP: I’m relearning to be an Indian in India.

VIMALA: Is it under the koya dora’s influence or what?

SEKHAR: What laggards these bearers are. Let me go and see what the hitch is.

(PAUSE)

VIMALA: Pratap, why don’t you answer my question?

PRATAP: As he said you’ll get what you want, I think the answer to your question lies in his prediction.

VIMALA: What a puzzle for an answer.

PRATAP: What you want might solve the puzzle.

VIMALA: What I want is what I may get.

SFX – Pratap and Vimala break into laughter

SEKHAR: If you are not making fun of me, I’m glad to see Vimala laugh again.

VIMALA: Thank you.

PRATAP:  Let me go into the wilderness.

VIMALA: I hope you don’t get lost

SEKHAR: Don’t worry, I’m going with him.

(PAUSE)

SFX - Indicating that they get into their car and proceed on their way.   

 

SCENE - 7

 

EXT –Continuation of their journey in the hustle and bustle of the vehicular traffic.

SEKHAR: I may say, no friend like a childhood friend.

PRATAP: I would add, no sweetheart as the first love.

SEKHAR: I don’t know. Ours is marriage kind of love. 

PRATAP: Would it be any different with women Vimala?

(PAUSE)

VIMALA: Man or woman, love is love, isn’t it?

PRATAP: But the love in question is the first love.

VIMALA: My answer is, silence is golden.

SEKHAR: Is it a conspiracy of silence?

PRATAP: Are you not poking your nose too much.

SEKHAR: Maybe, for you, personal space is spacious but for us privacy yields to inquisitiveness.

PRATAP: Both cut both ways. I repeat, average these two for optimizing the way of living.

VIMALA: One day I may have to sit with you and arrive at the mean.

 SEKHAR: