At 3 am, Senthil is swaying in the middle of the room, talking about the tragic hero Karna. He doesn't know much about the Mahabharata but he knows about Karna because he's seen the movie 103 times. If you can improvise a bow and arrow for him along with a voluptuously curved moustache, he will do the entire movie for you, songs included.
‘Forget the other guys,’ says Senthil. ‘Forget that fucker Arjuna. A hero is someone who knows he's going to be fucked but is heroic anyway.’
‘What's the point in that?’ asks Jameson.
‘I mean Karna was better than Arjuna at everything but for some reason we call the national sports awards Arjuna Awards. They should be called Karna Awards!’ says Senthil.
Once Senthil actually made little Karna Awards out of matchboxes and beer caps. They were supposed to look like trophies but they ended up looking like matchboxes with beer caps stuck to them. Later he found a group of children playing cricket and tried to give them away but nobody wanted them.
‘And then he can't die,’ says Senthil. ‘There he is, Karna, King Of Everything That Goes Wrong Even When You Do Everything Right, eight million arrows sticking in his chest but he can't die. Just imagine that – I mean just think how much that would hurt.’
‘Is he from one of those Hindu stories?’ asks Jameson. Senthil rubs his face and blinks as if he's trying to clear his eyes.
‘What?’ says Senthil.
‘This is from one of those Hindu stories, right?’
‘Are you kidding me?’
‘The Ramayana or something?’
‘The Mahabharata,’ I say and someone starts to sing the theme song from the Mahabharata TV series.
‘Get out,’ says Senthil.
‘What?’ says Jameson.
‘Get out of my house.’
This isn't Senthil's house but Jameson stumbles to his feet and disappears down the stairs – he seems to clatter against the walls and I wonder if he's falling down. Senthil collapses on the floor beside me and I pick bits of popcorn out of his hair and hand them to him. He sadly puts them in his mouth like he's popping pills he knows won't work. An hour later, Senthil decides to go out and buy cigarettes.
‘Are you coming back?’ I ask.
‘Of course I'm coming back. Why wouldn't I come back?’
He disappears down the stairs and I don't see him again for a week.
*
Senthil is a wonderful concept, something that has great potential like a rising sun or a new bicycle. It's only when you take a closer look at him that you notice he's not held together very well. Sometimes he cleans himself up and becomes chubby and irritable, his lips puffing out while his eyes completely disappear into his face. But it's just a matter of time before he starts to wither again; his knuckles and elbows become dry and sharp while his eyes grow like puddles of dark water. You begin to hear stories about how he beat up an autorickshaw in the middle of the road or gave his shoes away to beggar. Once he called me shortly after news had spread that he had relieved himself on the hood of somebody's Mercedes.
‘Guess where I am,’ said Senthil.
‘I have no idea.’
‘Guduvancherry! I think. It looks like Guduvancherry.’
‘How did you get all the way over there?’
‘Must have taken a train, I think I'm in the railway station – I mean I woke up and there were railway tracks and a tea stall so I'm thinking it's a railway station. I could ask someone if you want – you want to hold on while I ask?’
‘Senthil I can’t do this now, I'm at work.’
‘Why don't you come down here? It's very small-townish. I could take you sari shopping. Or we could go to a temple or something.’
‘I don't think so.’
‘How come there are no Karna temples around? In all my life I have never seen one Karna temple. I've seen an AIDS manual written in Tamil though. Have you ever seen one of those?’
‘Senthil ...’
‘Did you know they have diagrams? They're not very good ones – I mean I didn't get what they were doing at first and it's hard to make out what the guy is holding. Then you're like oh! Ok, so that's what they're doing. It's strange because she seems to be looking one way and he's looking somewhere else.’
‘Senthil, I have to go.’
‘But what's the deal with the Karna temples? Is it against the law to have one?’
‘I don't know.’
‘But then there are no Arjuna temples either. How come none of these guys have temples? I could build one though. I could build a Karna temple, couldn't I?’
‘Ok, I'm hanging up now.’
‘Aren't you coming down here?’
‘No.’
‘I'll wait for you by the weighing machine.’
‘Hanging up now Senthil.’
‘I used my last 2 rupees on this call though.’
‘So?’
‘How am I supposed to get home now?’
The extension tone started to beep and he hung up. I was pretty sure he would spend the day wandering around Guduvancherry, unless of course he wasn't in Guduvancherry in the first place.
*
Senthil usually doesn't visit me because he doesn't like my landlady and my landlady doesn't like him. One day however he shows up with half a candy bar which he ends up eating himself.
‘You got fifty bucks?’ he asks.
‘For what?’
‘I'll pay you back.’
‘I don't have fifty bucks.’
Senthil nods and leans against the wall – he suddenly reminds me of a bundle of dead branches that has been sloppily tied together.
‘How about if I give you this?’ He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a dolphin pendant that has been cleanly snapped in two. ‘This is Karna. King of the Dolphins.’
‘Where's the rest of it?’ I ask.
‘100 bucks. I'll pay you back.’
‘Senthil I don't have any money.’
He nods and shrugs.
‘Keep it then.’
‘For what?’
‘For whatever. In case of something.’
After Senthil leaves I try to find a place for the pendant. I don't want to keep it but I don't want to throw it out either. I finally decide to put it outside on the windowsill. About an hour later the phone rings.
‘It's me,’ says Senthil. ‘I stole your sugar tin.’
‘What?’
‘I took your sugar tin when you weren't looking.’
‘Why?’
‘I thought you might have money in it.’
‘I told you I didn't have any money.’
‘I thought you were lying. I'll give it back when I see you.’
Two weeks later Jameson calls and asks if I will come with him to Central Railway Station. Senthil has called to say he is waiting for us beside some special railway tracks that come from Gujarat.
‘Did he go out of town or something?’ I ask.
‘No,’ says Jameson. ‘You know what he did last month? Comes to my house with two fucking geese! Geese!’
‘Where did he get geese from?’
‘Fuck if I know.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I said fuck off, you can't keep bloody geese in my house!’
Central Railway Station hits us squarely in the nose and we weave through piles of families who have fallen asleep on the floor, boxed in by their luggage. We find Senthil sitting cross-legged on a concrete bench. He holds his arms out, as if he expects us to hug him.
‘I wanted you both to see this,’ he says and gets up. He walks over to the edge of the platform and points down to the start of a railway line. ‘When the Gujarat riots happened and the earthquake and stuff, people just got on this train and stayed on till it stopped. And this is where it stopped, right here. No more track. This is where they all got off. Isn't that awesome?’
‘Oh for God's sake,’ says Jameson.
‘Wouldn't it be awesome to see it stop right here?’ says Senthil. ‘And it will stop here. Because it can't go any further. There's no more track. I mean where can it go if there's no more track?’
Jameson turns and walks away. I feel I should say something that will change Senthil's life and make him go home.
‘Where's my sugar tin?’ I ask.
‘Your what?’
‘My sugar tin. You stole it, remember?’
‘What sugar tin?’
I turn and follow Jameson so I can hitch a ride back.
*
Something tangible needs to be done. Something with words and a date and an incident so that years later I can look back and say yes, I told him. Sat him down and said Senthil, drug addicts get raped in the ass and in the mouth. They get pubic lice. Nobody feeds them. They smell bad. But before I have a chance to, Senthil calls up and says he's got a job with a call centre. They are really impressed with him because they think he is dynamic and energetic and they like the way he speaks English. Rumour has it that he will be promoted in a week or so.
We are very proud of Senthil because call centres are easy money. Jameson throws him a party to celebrate and Senthil arrives wearing a long-sleeved shirt that remains buttoned at the wrist for the whole evening. He does however take his socks off and I notice that his big toenails are missing.
‘They made me this team leader kind of thing and it's like being in charge of vampires, you know?’ says Senthil. ‘Because we all work at night, right? Karna, King of the Vampires.’
‘I don't think Karna had anything to do with vampires,’ I say.
‘I always think of that song that happens when Karna's trying to die – “Bravely face whatever comes your way Karna, bravely face whatever comes your way”.’
Senthil doesn't sing very well but his Tamil pronunciation is flawless and beautiful like water flowing over rocks. I can sense he is saying something very important, something that could change his life.
A few weeks later, Senthil goes to Mumbai on business and gets fired when he decides he doesn't want to come back.
*
Dreaming of Senthil is inevitable because he is something that intrudes and lingers like a thunderstorm or the tug of a beggar's grubby fingers. When I dream of him, he is standing alone in an abandoned battle field and the sky is a deep, dirty red. He is leaning against a broken pink and yellow chariot, peering into a quiver of mouldy arrows.
‘Have you died?’ I ask.
Senthil frowns and shakes his head.
‘No, I don't think so,’ he says. ‘They did make me king.’
‘Who did?’
‘They were here a minute ago. I'm pretty sure they said I was king now.’
‘What are you king of?’
‘Eggshells. Fingernail clippings. Broken pencils.’
‘Dolphins.’
‘They didn't say anything about dolphins.’
‘They probably meant to.’
‘Probably. I feel like I'm probably king of the dolphins too.’
Something black is trickling down the outside of the quiver of arrows. I can't tell what it is and wonder if it's really small insects walking in a slow, straight line.
‘These arrows burst into fireworks,’ says Senthil. ‘Want to see?’
He pulls out an arrow but before he can notch it into the bow it snaps and crumbles to the ground.
‘I had no hope for success,’ I say.
‘What?’
‘It's a line from the Mahabharata.’
‘Who says that?’
‘I don't know. Someone.’
‘Not Karna. Karna doesn't say that.’
Senthil tries to notch in another arrow and it crumbles into his fingers like soot.
‘No,’ I say as the black flecks skitter along the ground and disappear. ‘Karna doesn't say that.’
*
We wait for Senthil to call or mail or do something but nothing happens. Jameson and I begin to consolidate things we have heard about him – he was into event management and had met Deep Purple. He was working with Greenpeace. He was climbing the Himalayas. He was living in a slum and writing a novel. Someone had mentioned seeing Senthil in a railway station, sleeping under a bench but we never talked about that one. Instead we would rearrange the stories slightly or make up something completely new.
Once while we were talking, Jameson took out his wallet and started pulling out his business cards. He began sorting them in different piles, tearing up the ones he didn't need, putting the others in neat stacks of five or six. It seemed like he was making a tiny city of soft, rectangular buildings, neatly cut with straight roads and off-white buildings that had no windows.
‘We should go to Mumbai,’ I said. ‘We should go see him. Surprise him.’
‘We should definitely do that.’
‘Do you have his address?’
‘No. Someone will have it though.’
‘Yeah, someone will.’
‘He'll probably call us soon anyway. Or he'll just show up, just like that. I think he would probably do that, don't you?’
‘He'd probably do that.’
I picture the three of us wandering through Jameson's city of cards, turning into the wrong streets, cutting ourselves on the corners, trying to keep in step with people we can’t see. I think of Senthil sleeping under a bench in a railway station, the King of Things, Karna of the Vampires vomiting on the side of the road, screaming at the buildings for growing in his way and blocking out the sun.
I had no hope for success, I whisper to myself and watch as the pile of ripped business cards grows like a mountain of small mistakes.
*
This story first appeared in Per Contra [Winter 2007-2008]; it also appears in the author's short story collection Insects Are Just Like You And Me Except Some Of Them Have Wings, Blaft Publications, Chennai, India 2008.
Kuzhali Manickavel's collection Insects Are Just like You and Me except Some of Them Have Wings is available from Blaft Publications and can be found at Powell’s Books, Small Press Distribution and Amazon.com. Her work can also be found in Best American Fantasy 3, Subtropics, AGNI Online, anderbo, DIAGRAM and elsewhere. She lives in a small temple town on the coast of South India and blogs at http://thirdworldghettovampire.blogspot.com/.