The Boy Who Took Flowers from the Devil | Shashank Yadav

 There was a little boy named Bhanu who stole flowers from the garden of his school every morning. That was the only time he went towards the school except for the exams. Sometimes his mother sent him to fetch flowers for her morning rituals, but mostly he just went for himself.

He liked being in the garden in the early morning. There were flowers of all kinds, drenched in the waking mist. The garden started with rose plants which gave red and white flowers and were sowed randomly giving sometimes an illusion of a plant giving flowers of two kinds. Bhanu always picked a rose first, preferably red, smelled it and put it in the pocket of his shirt like Pandit Nehru, just as he had seen in the pictures in his history books.

Bhanu did not like to read. But he liked to see the pictures, which is why he mostly failed in subjects whose books had no or boring pictures. He also loved riding his bicycle on the road alongside the canal outside the village. On the way too, he plucked beautiful ripe flowers wherever he found a chance. This he only did when he could not take flowers from the school. The watchman of the school had become Bhanu’s arch nemesis over time, an evil incarnation in a world where Bhanu saw himself as the saviour.

The watchman used to sleep over a cot in the open at the entrance of the school. When he was asleep, or not there, Bhanu was able to sneak in and out without any worry. But when the watchman was there, Bhanu could only hope to have taken too little flowers for his own good. Nonetheless, Bhanu would get a beating. Bhanu used to hide his bicycle near the close by sugarcane fields, so that’s where he’d run to when caught.

Some days the old watchman got scolded by the principal for failing to protect the garden. The flowers were meant for the school events only and for the beauty that they brought to the otherwise hideous compound. Some days when the watchman woke up early, he lit a small fire right outside the school’s gate, while absconding and absorbing the morning cold through a chipped chillum. Whenever Bhanu showed up at such times, even the sight of the watchman sitting by the fire, wrapped in a dirty brown shawl, staring through his bloody red eyes emphasised by the shine of the fire as he blew smoke over the stars, was enough to scare him off.

Bhanu especially loved to pluck flowers from the plants that had climbed up the baby guava trees at the centre of the garden. With each plucked flower, a rain of miniscule drops of mist fell down as if to grieve for the plucked flower. And Bhanu would close his eyes and look upward to sense each drop that he could, on his cheeks, and then smilingly rub his hands over his face and open his eyes to see the world again as if for the first time.

The watchman had attuned his ears with the rustle of the leaves, especially if it were the baby guava trees. The guava trees made the most sound. So much that in the silence of the morning, the watchman didn’t need to get an alarm to wakeup. He had a lathi, which he used to strike the ground and the walls with, whenever he heard any sound.

Earlier he used to think it was a dog, cold and stranded and hungry. But then he saw Bhanu one day, running around with his hands and pockets full of flowers of all kinds. To him it was an insult to his being. And from that day onwards, the watchman vowed to protect each flower of the garden. Even if it meant that he’d have to wake up before the sound of the morning azan from the mosque in the town-market a few miles away, he would.

And he did. The watchman became obsessed to the extent of knowing the days when azan started a few minutes late, even though he did not have a watch. Bhanu also did not have a watch. He had always imagined a clock to be hung right over the place his mother cooked.

As both of them grew wary of each other with every passing day, the watchman one day decided that he would now sleep in the garden itself. He was smiling looking at the stars thinking of the great idea of his. He felt had he joined the police when he was young, he could have been a killer detective. And Bhanu would be a little thief troubling people, who he would then catch and thus reclaim the lost prestige of his department. Before the haze cleared, he found himself lying on his cot under the baby guava trees. His lathi and the lantern came along with him. He had thought he would succeed in keeping Bhanu away like this. But he had not known the beautiful dreams he would dream when sleeping in the garden. That day, the old watchman was taken back to the days when he was a child.

When he woke up, it was noon and the sun was shining behind the clouds. Thankfully, it was also a Sunday. The watchman did feel bad about not waking up on time, but somehow he was taken in by the night’s sleep. He hadn’t slept like that in ages. He did not know whether Bhanu came or not, or whether he took flowers or not, and it didn’t matter.

The watchman then shifted his base to the garden each night. He saw Bhanu on many days, taking flowers from the yet sleeping plants. But strangely, he did not do anything. Initially Bhanu too acted indifferent to the watchman. But then he went up to him to see if he was really sleeping. The watchman was sleeping, as the watchman tried his best to show. And Bhanu too, almost convinced, accepted the lie. And he then proceeded to pluck the flowers from the plants climbing up the baby guava trees, his favourite.

Little drops of dew fell down, and Bhanu paused to see if he had woken up the watchman. The watchman wondered if Bhanu had seen the twitch on his face when the dew fell over it. When neither of them did anything, the watchman slowly opened his right eye to see if Bhanu was still there. He was, standing to his right, holding the flower in his hand.

Bhanu threw back the flower as the watchman, who now caught sleeping in the line of duty by the criminal himself, got up and reached for his lathi. Bhanu was still standing there, looking quite surprised.

The watchman stepped ahead and twisted Bhanu’s ears almost to the point of lifting him up. He then stopped and took out the rose that was hanging out from Bhanu’s shirt, smelled it, and threw it over the bushes. He slapped Bhanu’s head asking him to leave and never come back to the garden.

Bhanu came back to the garden the next morning.

He came and shook the baby guava trees with all his strength. The watchman was actually sleeping this time. Also Bhanu did not stand still this time. The watchman ran before Bhanu, leaving his lantern behind. It was dark. Bhanu knew the shortcuts and the hiding spots better than the watchman. But the old watchman was adamant. He kept running, either behind the sound, or behind the shadow.

The watchman could not catch Bhanu that day. But he went and complained about him to the principal. The principal called Bhanu’s parents and gave them an earful. Bhanu was left for the time being, but as warned, would be thrown out the next time a complaint surfaces. His parents forced him to go to the school everyday. His uncle took over his bicycle from him and Bhanu was seldom allowed to take it out after that.

Bhanu still woke up early. Now he was not asked to bring flowers for any worship. Bhanu sometimes went for a walk on the road alongside the canal outside the village, but he did not like walking. He liked riding his bicycle. He missed it very badly but there was no way he could get it back.

One day he went to the school at dawn and angrily plucked all the roses and threw them on the pathway. The watchman was sleeping soundly under the baby guava trees. When he woke up and saw the chaos in the garden, he picked up his lathi and the lantern and went to Bhanu’s house.

Bhanu’s father had just woken up then. He was washing his tractor beside the unwilling buffaloes standing there for their turn. The watchman struck his lathi on the ground a few times to notify his presence. He had known Bhanu’s father from before.

‘Your son has really been troubling my life. Why don’t you keep him in control?’ The watchman asked.

‘He is sleeping right now. What has he done? I will speak to him when he wakes up.’ Bhanu’s father replied.

The watchman said that Bhanu had just been to the school, spoiling all the roses and he definitely could not be sleeping. Bhanu’s father said that the watchman was lying. But the watchman was adamant like always. There was shouting from both the sides. Bhanu’s mother came out of the house like an interested spectator. Both men reminded each other of their casts. The quarrel halted with the loud bellow of the buffaloes. Bhanu’s father asked Bhanu’s mother to go inside and bring Bhanu outside. The watchman lit a bidi, and the buffaloes sat down on the ground.

Bhanu’s father went back to washing his tractor. But he could not continue much longer as Bhanu’s mother shouted for him to come inside. The watchman waited outside as Bhanu was looked around for in every corner of the house. Their effort was nowhere near coming to a halt, until the watchman welcomed himself inside the house and asked the question no one had an answer to, that where was Bhanu.

They went back to the school garden. The garden seemed dead and rotten as they walked over the roses scattered on their path. Bhanu’s father reflexively picked up a rose, smelled it and put it in his shirt like Nehru. Bhanu, Bhanu, Bhanu. All three shouted with their full capacity, many a times. Bhanu did not answer back.

They then went to the canal. But the canal was long. Yet they walked on the road alongside it till it met the town junction. They could not find Bhanu. They asked the shopkeepers on the road. They went back and searched the school. The principal asked the school to assemble and asked the same question that no one had an answer to, that where was Bhanu.

Where was Bhanu, the students asked each other.

The school was cancelled and all the students happily went out looking for Bhanu. By evening even the villagers were looking for him. From the women talking to each other on their rooftops, to the loafers standing under the banyan tree, Bhanu’s name was heard everywhere. Nobody could find him though.

Bhanu returned after the sunset.

They surrounded him and asked where he was till now, and he said he was in the sugarcane fields. They asked him what he was doing. And he said he was chewing sugarcane.

Bhanu’s mother grabbed his ear and dragged him inside the house. The villagers left murmuring about Bhanu’s mother. Bhanu’s father got some sympathies and the watchman left reminding him that Bhanu was only a child.

The next morning Bhanu went back to the school garden. The watchman had shifted himself back to his original place after yesterday’s pandemonium. He was awake, wrapped in his dirty brown shawl, inhaling through his chipped chillum. Bhanu slowly went close to the gate and waited there as if to catch the watchman’s attention.

The watchman blew on flame of the lantern as the sun turned a little brighter. He looked at Bhanu and went back to sit on his cot. He picked up the lota underneath and sprinkled some water over the few embers which were still burning like the night. Bhanu slowly opened the gate as the watchman kept staring at him. Bhanu went inside and took whatever flowers he could. When he came out, little buds of sunflowers were falling out from his pockets and shirt. He had not left any roses yesterday that he could pluck today.

The watchman was still staring at him. As Bhanu paced himself, the watchman asked him to stop. ‘Take my cycle.’ The watchman said as Bhanu turned around, ’You will reach earlier.’

Bhanu cautiously went inside again and came out on the watchman’s bicycle. It was a much lighter cycle than his. The roads were empty and the air smelled of lots of flowers. Bhanu went around the village and on the road alongside the canal till the town junction and then to the mosque in the town-market a few miles away. He lost count of the rounds he made of the sugarcane fields.

After that day, Bhanu came back every morning and took the watchman’s bicycle, even when there were no flowers to pluck.

And everyday, he returned it after the sunset.

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Shashank Yadav is a short story writer and the author of the novel The Stolen Bliss. | Visit us for more authors from around the world.