Blahsphemy

There was a time when nothing mattered. That was long ago when the sun was just a speck in the sky.  But everything has changed. It is now a ball of fire scorching everything in its sight. Now even simple things like stepping out matters. 

It's time to clear the stage. The curtains are coming down. The music has ended. The audience are on their feet. The applause has died away. It's another day at work, the janitor mumbled. 

The bookshelf creaked under the weight of words. Especially when they were from authors who have honed their craft over the years. The wood was no match for the intellect. It felt the burden every time a new masterpiece was added.  

Suspense filled the room like fog fills the valley. Who killed poor old Doug? He was last seen nursing his margarita near the bar. The big game was on TV and everyone was glued to it. That's when Marge screamed seeing Doug slump in his barstool. All they saw was the blood gushing from his slit throat.  

There is always two sides for a story. The one that you get to hear and the one that you think it is. The story is never complete without knowing both. Most of the times it's just a half cooked story one gets to hear. That's when you inherit the story. You become a pawn. You start manipulating the story. Soon the story starts manipulating you.  

Reality sucks and no one needed to tell him that. Every time he faced the mirror, he was reminded of it. Nothing much has changed expect for the fact that the hair on his head has dwindled and new wrinkles have been added to his forehead. Can this be evolution? He used to wonder.      

Today there was this smiling face. It smiled at me amidst a wall of strangers. I suddenly felt at home. I smiled back only to realise that it was a mistake. The whole wall smiled back.   

This is to make up for yesterday. The story was pending. But yesterday wasn't like any other day. The story was ready to be told. Then came the rain. The pitter patter of the raindrops on the roof lulled him to sleep. When he woke up, it was today. Now that it's another day, the story has to wait. 

His main task was to get the right story for the right audience. He always felt he came up short in his duties. For there will always be someone who didn't quite agree with the stories he picked. It was a bitter pill for him to digest. That's when he met the doctor. It was in a seedy bar in the by-lanes of Mumbai. The doc was drunk and was shouting at anyone who dared to go near him. Pretty soon the bartender had to kick the doc out. That's when the doc uttered the magic words "Art is subjective you fool. Just like your wife." 

The story wrote itself. The events unfolded on their own. The lights came on and went off on cue. They just happened to be there at the right place at the wrong time.

This is the story of a hole in the wall. Everyday it shows what's on either side of the wall. One day a thinker came along and looked at the hole from both sides. Finally he muttered to himself "It's the hole that makes the picture whole" and he moved on.  

The story was missed sorely. The empty pages of his life sobbed to sleep. The day job didn't let him loose from its clutches. He was bored to death. 

The ground was damp with blood. It was a carnage last night. Emotions went on a rampage. Reason was marauded. The words exploded. The wound festered. They were two strangers on the same boat. Sailing to distant shores of their own.