Third Angle Projection (or Flashes)
A Short Story by
Have you looked at yourself? I mean really looked, not the mirror watching, not the reflection-in –the water watching or the Facebook profile watching of yourself in those countless hours to kill boredom. I mean really seen yourself? Well, I have, as a matter of fact I am seeing myself now sliding, on the asphalt ridden road that connects two great cities. The BU junction near Kengeri had always been known as an accident prone zone, and Amma did insist on me wearing a helmet today morning, but Eminem asked me to “Shut the f@%k up” in my iPod at the same time and so I listened to him. Now the iPod lay twenty meters behind, shattered under the wheels of the Swift that braked behind me. Ooh look at my face, I am contorting it with pain. Must be my left leg; It’s being creamed between the road and my Pulsar 250cc (with rear disk brakes attached. Now at an attractive price of Rs 85,000)… They say that your entire life flashes before you the instant before you die, but I never expected to float around actually watching it!! I have good seats too for my finale; I am watching it from the top, like a third angle projection they taught in my first year drawing class. Man this is morbid, watching yourself die!! Let me get closer to the ground to have a better look.. My glasses have shattered to pieces and they reflect the sunlight to the back of my head briefly before vanishing behind me. My formals with brand new shoes have been completely torn on the left side, and my head is bobbing up and down 2 feet from the ground going from 70 to zero in about three seconds. As the shadow of the killer KSRTC bus looms above me, about to take me under its wheels and out of this world, its number plate stands out like a huge flashing billboard in a cricket stadium: KA- 05 EX 2619.
KA- That’s the last two letters of my girlfriend’s name: BhoomiKA. Five –seven, fair complexion, brown eyes, straight hair, BE (pre final year).Hey I sound like a matrimonial ad in a cheesy newspaper. But let’s be realistic, she might need it after all once I go away on this one way train. She is beautiful, funny, intelligent blah blah blah and is also head over heels in love with me. Same here. We met at the ragging session, I helped her out in some labs, we talked a lot, had a couple of hands- locked-walking- in- the- rain sessions, and had planned to get married on a beach in Mauritius.. Will she come to my funeral? Probably not. Will my death scar her for the rest of her life? Mostly Yes. But she will move on, go to US for higher studies, find a decent chap, get married and have kids. I always wondered how our kids would look like and secretly hoped they had her good looks and my good intellect .But I will sure watch over her, making sure she at least leads a happy life and always wears a helmet…
05- That’s the day I was born. 5th of May, 21 years ago. My mom cried a lot that day since I came out after 5 years of her marriage after she had lost all hopes of having a little one running around. Dad didn’t cry, at least not on the outside. He is a brave man, my dad. On my third birthday, he jumped into the crocodile enclosure at the zoo to retrieve my superman doll- a birthday gift. He consoled me when my tooth came out on my seventh birthday and then again me when I my IIT’s came out on my seventeenth. He never told me what to do or what not, but insisted that I be hones t to myself whatever I do. Will miss you Daddy. I hope my mom doesn’t see me like this, and the police at least cover up my body. She wouldn’t want to see the hands that she once oiled to ensure bone growth now stick out under the rear wheel like a broken branch. I will miss your great food ma, along with the warmth near your feet where I lie down when I get really tired. You should have forced that helmet on me ma, you really should have…
EX- EXtreeeemely busy, that’s what the last six months of my engineering life has been. The project, the fest, the seminar, Bhoomi, GRE.. I almost lost it a couple of times. I wish I had done more in these 21 years. Maybe visited another country, helped out some orphans with some food, listened more to my mom’s naggings on the long hair…Man what a life wasted!! I Wish I had more time than these three seconds … (two now).. to just eat another samosa in the college canteen, to see Bhooms one more time, take blessings from parents just like any other trip. But as the song goes.. “Time won’t let me go……”
2- Two is the number of kisses I have received in my life. Number one doesn’t count because it was an innocent little peck on the cheek when I still wore shorts and thought Govinda was the ultimate hero. Her name was Keerthika and she was the girl I was gonna marry till tenth. I managed to find her favourite puppy after two days of searching together and she rewarded me with a kiss. She later thought we did something horrible and asked me to marry her. I agreed happily and we had a small little ceremony in the local temple. Amma thought it was really cute and I remember her laughing a lot that day .The second one was a more serious one on the lips by Bhooms the day I told her she had the most beautiful eyes in the world. She claimed I looked extremely cute that day and she did it at the spur of the moment. I thought many more of those would come around but the stupid bullock cart came in between and the bus bugger braked a bit too soon to avoid the little boy riding it..
6- Lakhs per annum. That’s the salary my first company is offering me. I, who never even had six hundred rupees in my pocket before, will make enough money in the coming year to buy a small car!! I wonder what I would have done with all that money. Buy loads of books, some decent clothes for my folks, a night out finally at an expensive restaurant with my friends. A gold earring for my girl as I promised. Maybe I would even give away some to the poor people like I always s wanted. My parents would have wanted me to “invest” it but I have always been a “live-in-the-moment” kind of guy. Ironic, I should say those words, in these last few moments of my life. I can see the two rear wheels of the bus now, with their zig- zag tire marks that will soon fill with my blood..
1- That was my rank in the Karnataka Common Entrance Test. My dad had promised a bike if I did top the exam and so I did. I was always into machines and wanted to study about them at the best place possible. I have spent four amazing years at that place, and the least thing I learnt there was about machines. I think college is much more than a place where you earn a degree from. It’s a place where you truly grow up, make lifelong friends, fall in love and discover the real “you”. You could also spend it smoking pot, seeing movies, going to pubs and fooling around, but that too is education of a kind. They say I was the smartest one in the family…. I wonder how that smart brain of mine would look like splattered all over the road, cerebrum and cerebellum smashed up like strawberry ice-cream melting in the hot sun….
9- Well I would really like to say what 9 is .. but the Big man is calling and I really have to go. Plus I don’t like this scene of my movie anyway, it’s too much to watch.
Nine is the number of fractures I suffered that fateful day that I floated. Three of my ribs, my left femur, my left shoulder, 2 carpus bones from my wrist and a crack in the skull that needed a lifelong titanium plate implant. I also vaguely remember the number nine on the ambulance that brought me here two months back but I might be hallucinating. Amma is sitting beside me and writing this out as I dictate to her. She and Dad don’t believe that I floated and saw it all happen in third person perspective. But Bhoomi does and says she hopes at least that third person looks better than me.. I try to laugh but that just hurts my ribs. I may have to walk with a limp the rest of my life and my chance s to go to Michigan State are pretty slim this year, but atleast I can go and have that samosa in the college and lay back down on my mother;s lap. Hey, I got to SEE myself and believe me, you don’t see that kind of effects in the movies…
