Kadale

Here we go again. 

I wait, for her to arrive.

It will take another half an hour or so I think. It usually does . 

My heart beats with anticipation and I am troubled with the remote possibility of the thought doodles in my head becoming louder and everybody hearing them.  But the waves will make sure that my silly thoughts  are swallowed before  reaching the prying ears . So I have nothing to worry in  that sense.

I notice that  I have  been drawing heart shapes  from my big toe, in the sand.

Very soon now , she will be here and  she will hold my hand . And my Pushpa  will talk …. She will talk about her Anoma missy’s latest face makeup fiasco . Nandini missy’s  new hair style or her affair with the manager,  Mr Albert  , who is old enough to be her father.  Or about the big robbery in Watsala missy’s neighborhood.

She will talk .she will talk

You see , my Pushpa works in an office  . She  goes at six o clock in the morning and cleans the office , makes tea for all the Mr’s & Missus, run all odd errands , and is off by four thirty . Then she comes to the beach to me and to spend her evening with me and the setting sun .

(As for me I am a ….an entrepreneur ..That’s what Mr Sam ,who walks the beach in the evening,  called me . …I think it means "the one who sells kadale" in English. )

 Mr Kumar will come up in her conversation too. His film star like hair style . His walk . Will be all repeated. How she puts extra sugar for his cup of tea..”Paw ne Ane “  she says. 
I nod in agreement, but  in my mind I run again and again how he gets hit by a lorry , carrying a full load of sugar . Now that’s Irony for you..

When she talks ,I run dumb . I am scared that if I open my mouth , my usual cry  will leap thruogh my lips “Kadale Kadale …Badapu Kadale” . The ocean will go silent and the whole world will start laughing. Louder and louder, the laughter will grow.  Pushpa will stare with tears welling in her eyes for a moment before she   runs away in shame. Leaving me alone on the shore .

So I just keep gazing at her . How her mouth moves . How she pauses , taking a short breath . How her chest heaves gasping for breath. How she adjusts the stray tresses dancing in the breeze.  I just keep on looking.

May be today I will  come up with something to say. May be I will tell about the couple who were caught by the police in the morning ,behind the watakeyya  shrub  and marched down to their jeep. 

On second thoughts……. that will be not be  appropriate and will be a definite  mood spoiler .

A crow is  trying to pick a stick half buried in the sand .  It  flies back to the land when the waves come ,  returns to continue digging,  when the salt form regresses.   

I contemplate on all the couples who buy  gram  from me , how they pick one or two grains by their fingers and put in to their mouths, like the crow picking with it's beak,  and how it seem to make the sweet nothings flow . How they feed each other gram and snuggle more in the shade of their umbrellas.

But  here I am, with a whole cart of Kadale fried with neatly cut squares of coconut and chilly pieces  ,  dumfounded .