Fiction
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A Family Portrait
The old man turned the key to the door slowly so that it would not make any sharp noise. Yet, he couldn’t prevent the annoying clack at the end of the turn. He stepped inside to find his wife fast asleep on the sofa-cum-bed with the the TV on mute. He took the remote from… Continue reading
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Poop goes the Podcast
If you’re walking in the streets of Mumbai, you develop a certain skill, that of avoiding doggie poop. After a given time, it becomes a muscle memory; you learn to identify the object irrespective of its state of disintegration, and adjust your stride accordingly. Then one fine day, an expensively adorned cute little puppy and… Continue reading
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Six Word Stories
Someone posted a six-word story on LinkedIn (where? Yes, there – it’s full of motivational stuff, you know). I put out some fictional six-word stories as comments. Here they are. Wait, she said, ten years ago. Then the rain washed tears away. He asked. She gave. He left. Accident, he claimed. Murder, they proved. Bring… Continue reading
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Liberation
The day started bright and sunny. The MET department said no rain was expected as did my intuition. So I left the umbrella at home – managing a backpack and a handbag in the Mumbai trains was bad enough, I thought, As it turned out, by mid-morning, it was so bad that the principal opted… Continue reading
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Happy Birthday Babu Bhai!
This is a rant that I posted recently on LinkedIn. Nothing great about it; I’ve ranted often but what I like about this one is that I typed this entirely with my right thumb in stalled traffic at Chheda Nagar Junction while staring at these ‘chamcha’ banners, of mostly unknown faces wishing random politicians on… Continue reading
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The Open Door
We must have been on the fifth slide. The presenter stopped mid-sentence with his mouth open and his face white as a sheet. He was staring at me as was everyone else in the room. I wondered if I fell asleep or something. I mumbled a sorry, and asked him to continue, only to find… Continue reading
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The Barber’s Assistant
Once upon a time, in a kingdom that once stood near where you are right now, there lived a king and a queen. The kingdom was small enough for a man on a horse to cross in a week, but large enough to have everything its people needed. To the north and east were mountains… Continue reading
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The Embers
“Would you like some more of the champagne, ma’am?” the waiter asked, shaking her out of her reverie. “Yes, please,” she said. “He will be here in a few minutes.” “No problem,” said the waiter as he topped up her glass. He was already twenty minutes late. It will be ten more by the time… Continue reading
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Jesus at the Window
Contains colloquial words spoken by dakhni people of south Tamil Nadu. “Abbu! Don’t hit her Abbu! Usko maro nako… Abbuuu!” Thwack. That disgusting sound was all I could hear. But Nur didn’t cry. She kept looking at the ceiling, or maybe at the slow whirling fan. I couldn’t understand. She had been sitting there all… Continue reading
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The Family Reunion
It was a lazy mid-morning. We were sitting in the verandah, sipping cups of tea, the newspapers well into their second life as bits of entertainment sections. The brother-in-law tried to keep us interested in the local church gossip; my sister talked fashion and cuisines with her sisters-in-law. The kids were playing somewhere in the… Continue reading