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‘Maybe I just want a life without plans. I have followed them enough. I want to forget which day’s Monday and which one’s Sunday. When is the weekday, when is the weekend.’
‘Tell me something.’
‘What?’
‘When I visit your café, how much discount are you going to offer me?’
‘100 per cent.’
‘Then open it soon, yaar. I want to have free coffee so bad. Cheers!’
‘It’s not that easy.’
‘It’s not that difficult either.’
‘Is it that important for everyone to do something? Can’t we just survive without having to do anything?’
‘Do you know why we’re alive? Do you know the meaning of life?’
‘Every life has a purpose. To achieve that purpose.’
‘That’s your problem. You’ve assumed this rote answer to be your own. In fact, people have assumed most of life’s answers. Just like we used to assume values in maths. Life is not like maths. Here, you can’t assume, you have to know.’
‘There are plenty of things we have to assume to know. Not everything can be known, no? Anyway, you were talking about the meaning of life. So tell me, what is the meaning of life?’
‘Life doesn’t have any meaning, you have to give it one. Either with your craziness, or with your dreams. Actually, only crazy people can dream. Not everyone is restless enough. If you stay restless without being sick, you should understand that life wants to meet you.’
‘Why are we born then? Even if we are, then why do we stay alive?’
‘We all are alive to kill our boredom. The day we get tired of killing boredom, we die. The best thing about life is that we all get tired one day.’
‘I don’t really understand what you’re saying. I guess I’m too high.’
‘You’re actually not that high; the day you get high on life then you understand everything.’
‘What do you want from life?’
‘Nothing much actually, just a 100 per cent discount at your café.’
After hearing this, Chandar kept staring out of the window, looking for his own café, his childhood, thousands of books and the voices of children. The sky was blurred but Chandar could see and hear a bit more clearly now.
H for Honeymoon Suite
After the promotion, Chandar’s workload increased and he became really busy. Every day while going to work and coming back, stuck in traffic, he realized that everything was repeating itself. Nothing was new in life.
We all face such a day in life when we do reach the correct address day after day, but still feel lost. When there was nothing new, he would pester Sudha about marriage. More often than not, people say yes to marriage, out of sheer boredom. But whenever Chandar would ask Sudha about marriage, she would refuse every time.
Every time, her answer would be: ‘What is it that marriage will bring between us that we don’t have already? Name one thing.’
‘Honeymoon. You can’t have a honeymoon without a wedding.’
‘Why not? Let’s go on our honeymoon.’
‘Are you crazy? Go on a honeymoon without a wedding?’
‘What’s the big deal? Tell me where you would want to celebrate your honeymoon. I’ll look it up online. Wherever we get a good deal, we’ll go there.’
‘Seriously?’
