They howled into the night and listened to the echo, and urinated into the water flowing from the culvert. Shaking a wet sapling in the darkness, they made it rain again.

‘Still, how stupid are you!’ the second man made fun of his friend. ‘Looking at John Abraham’s photo and thinking it is Sukumara Kuruppu!’

‘I’ve met Kuruppu in person,’ the first man countered, angrily. ‘My mother’s house is in Harippad where he was from.’

‘Yes, well, I’ve stood right next to John, like this! My father had a share in his movie.’

In that deserted spot, without anyone to bear witness, the argument heated up. They called each other names. The second man accused the first man’s wife who worked abroad of being a prostitute. The first man called the second man’s father a homosexual. They expressed doubts about each other’s virility. Finally, John Abraham picked up a large stone and bashed Sukumara Kuruppu’s head open with it, and bewildered by his action, ran away into the darkness. It was the first serious crime in the area ever since Maadan Thambi became a law-abiding citizen. As the crime was taking place, Thambi was fast asleep in his room, by the old photograph in which he stood next to a bearded man. A hiccup, the result of overindulgence after years of judicious drinking, rose from him.

magic tail

‘Edee! Neethu! Pooy . . .’

Bineesh jumped out from behind the handcart of guavas as the vendor sprinkled chilli powder on the cut fruits. It brought a smile to Neethu’s face even in the midst of her crying. A long time ago, he had jumped out in front of her exactly like this with a small knife in his hand because she had written down the names of the pupils who had talked in class and given it to their teacher. That time, she had laughed looking at the open fly of his buttonless half-pants.

‘Don’t laugh,’ he said, and touched the front of his jeans. ‘This one has a first-class zipper.’

Neethu refused the piece of guava he offered. He persuaded her into one of the least crowded bakeries in the Majestic area, and ordered two glasses of pineapple juice. As the heat increased, people came in and sat panting at the tables. Lonely middle-aged men struggled to look away from the tables where young men and women sat together, regretting, perhaps, that they had failed to be adventurous even once in their lives so far. One of them shouted angrily at the young waitress, whose only privilege was the glory of her youth, who served him his juice. She had just been discussing with her friend the weird behaviours that men over the age of forty seemed to develop.

‘What’s up with you?’ Bineesh asked. ‘Do you have conjunctivitis? Or fever?’ He tried to contain his surprise at how much she had changed in the last eight–ten years they hadn’t seen each other.

‘Papa passed away last night.’

‘Aren’t you going home?’