Once upon a time in the future (part II)

The year...is not important. The time... is monumental. Memories of the night are among the first I can recall vividly. Things were rolling into motion for the worst much before I remember. We only lacked the foresight to see this eventuality....

Life is lonely.  I breathe in a time when the definition of life has ceased to be of any significance. I wake up everyday, drenched in sweat, with the same dream- It's pitch black. There is a thunderous roar in the sky. The skies light up obscure faces below, all expectantly facing up with open mouths, begging for water. There is no rain. It gets dark again. I hear the rain. I see sparkling rain droplets in the sky, but they don't reach the ground.   I see ropes dangling from the sky, people hung by the neck from the ends. There's a blinding streak of lightning. A baby cry. The sky is clear. It's pouring rain.

 I'm startled from my sleep. The cat clutching on to my leg scrambles and dashes for the window. Stranger cat. It's 7:55 AM. I wake up at the same time, same place everyday. I have had the dream again. I sit up on the bed damp with warm sweat. I shiver awkwardly ; it's the chill crawling through me. I shake it off, jump off the bed and stroll to the bathroom. I had managed to recycle 6.354 litres of water. Time for the prized shower. The next shower is scheduled for a date exactly 128 days later, god willing. The sensation of water on the skin serves as nostalgia. 170 years ago, showers could readily be arranged for. There was ample water to take 2 showers, sometimes even upto 5 showers, a day. The smell of the body after the shower gathers hope for me. This smell is only one of the many things that is on the brink of extinction. There's a grotesque body odor everywhere today amongst others; that due to the lingering smell generated by the breakdown of apocrine sweat by  a grossly mutated form of staphylococcus epidermis, and the scarcity of clean water. Whatever purified water is availabe is routed to the diet; the diet mostly of the elite. People of godforasken land has learnt to embrace this fate and many such others. That is  because it's all a manifestation of their cumulative undoing. I take one last sniff of my body before my clothes spoiled the smell. I sit down to eat 'the meal'- a few crumbs of bread, 9 bean seeds, 17 grams of 'meat'(textured vegetable protein/ soy protein) and one glass of water. Since the 'golden days'( A period 200 years ago) sky high costs of food have restricted 92% of the population to one meal a day. I'm about to cringe at the thought of the day ahead when my cell phone beats rhythmically for approximately the duration of a news bulletin. The screen is crammed with information-1289 txt messages, 89 voice messages, and over 800 missed call alerts. I scroll through the voice messages, and screech to a halt at Dr. Rozario. The content of the message is a massive breakthrough.  I put on my goggles, my gas mask, and I check my watch which is in working order, by virtue of the flaring solar energy, before I step into the smog.....

to be continued....

Once upon a time in the future (part I)

Eyes flutter open. Pitch black. A lazy drift of wind makes way through the window, but dissapears in haste. I try to retrieve what time, date and place it is. My cell phone beeps. The screen flashes a wink of 'el lumbre'. It warns- battery low. Now I know I'm in my bedroom. It's midnight. The same midnight, same place, same life. Almost a Deja Vu.

The heat is unbearable. The occasional heimlich-charity-breeze-maneuver prevents me from choking from the heat. Attempting to fall back to sleep is 'mission impossible' re-defined. Counting sheep isn't an option.(The creative portion of my brain draws up a deadly association between wool and heat). I try counting polar bears. Can't, I'm still bothered by the fur! I give up. Time for brainstorming! Read a book? ; But which? The Bangla novel I read halfway through? Any of the three other English novels I read to varying page numbers? None. It had slipped my mind that 'el lumbre'-the elusive blessing- was missing. I devise a plan B- listen to the radio on my cell phone? Curiosity gets the better of me, and I wonder if the radio stations have a power cut too. The wondrous brain has a rebuttal- even if they did have power your cell phone's battery is dry. Plan C-Make for the kitchen, and find something to snack up on with whatever light is at your disposal. Plan C in effect. As I scan through the freezer all I could interest my taste budswith  is some kebab with a cold glass of Ayran(a yogurt based beverage, popular in Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Greece, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey and other parts of the Balkans, the Middle East, and Central Asia.)

I whisk the kebab and the yogurt out of the fridge and rehearse the steps of making the ayran:

Pour the yogurt in a medium mixing bowl
Using the electric beater, blender or whisk, beat the yogurt until it is completely smooth.
Add in the water one-half cup at a time, beating it into the yogurt after each addition
When all the water is added in, continue beating for one minute. The surface of the ayran should be a bit bubbly
Add salt to taste, beating the salt into the mixture.
Add mint to taste, beating it into the mixture to release its flavor.

Ahh..mmm. The thought bubble in my head already has me sipping and savoring every bit of the Ayran. I'm through step 1, and 2(had to go with the whisk), and then I gleefully greet everything in the freezer to take 'cold water' out tonight. After ransacking the fridge and the freezer, first patiently and then gradually more frantically, for a good few minutes, the closest thing I find is a bottle of ketchup. No problemo. I check the jug- it's dry! I check every other container for water- dry! I resort to the faucet-it's dry! With utter frustration I divert my attention to the kebabs. I poke a lit match at the stove repeatedly.Voila-nothing!  Murphy's law or Karma?

I'm crotchety. My life path number says so. But things are happening on a big scale now, so I can't give the credit to my life path number for feeling the way I'm feeling by now.  My cell phone is dead. No power, no water, no gas. No, we're not at war. We haven't been hit by missiles, or mortars, or RPG's, or anything the military might use to bring about this outcome. No, we're not reeling from any devastating calamity, or such. We haven't been hit by cyclones, or droughts, or floods, or anything nature might use to bring about this outcome.....