“Come on guys, let’s revise,” Sam said, opening his dapper notebook. It was ten minutes past ten.
“Show me as well,” Nick turned his lamp on, “I hope I can pass.”
Sam’s words did not bother Vinay, their third roommate and a genius in Maths. Both his roommates knew he would cakewalk tomorrow’s test. The three had shared the room for the past fourteen months, and were now into their second year of engineering.
“Hey, come on!” Sam patted his shoulder. Vinay moved as if his body was full of lead. Sam gave him a puzzled look.
A second later, the door flung open. It was Sharma, their neighbor. Sam frowned without looking at the entrant. “He’ll make a great batsman, what timing,” Sam said. Sharma rarely heard what Sam had to say.
“Guys, I have got it! This question is a sure shot for tomorrow’s test,” he said, pulling up a chair. He spread open the last page of a century old notebook frayed at the corners. Vinay sat nearest to him. In less then twenty seconds, he scanned the two-page solution, scribbled like an ode to a ghost.
“Don’t waste time, let these guys see it. You will anyway get hundred percent,” Sharma said. He pulled the book and handed to Sam.
“Actually, this professor is mad. He makes sure everyone but a few flunks the first test. He is doing it for the past ten years,” Nick said. Vinay listened without blinking.
“Then it’s fine,” Sam said and rested his back on a pillow, “I don’t want to be in the minority.”
“What happened to you?” Nick said.
“I am tense about the result,” Vinay said, standing up. Tomorrow’s maths test coincided with the first year’s result.
“You will get hundred in maths. That’s what you care,” Sam said.
“That’s why?” Vinay walked out of the room. He stopped in the balcony, to look at the entrance of the hostel. It was a square shaped compound with 40 rooms populated by a hundred students –a mix of freshers and seniors. The hostel gate was forty meters away from his second floor room. His eyes heated up in the smoke of watchman Raghubeer’s beedi (cigarette filled with tobacco leaves wrapped in tendu leaf). Every time Vinay smelled a smoldering beedi, he sensed he was entering or exiting the hostel.
Inside, Sam scribbled the solution from Sharma’s notebook. Sharma moved out. Nick and Sam folded hands towards heavens. Sharma stopped at the door.
“I heard a strange story today,” he said, “You know a guy mysteriously disappeared from this hostel some years ago.”
Sam and Nick stared at him.
“The story goes like this,” Sharma sat down, “a first year student who scored exact hundred percent in both semesters, committed suicide.”
“What?” The pen fell down from Sam’s hand. Nick scratched his head.
“Because he failed in the second year’s first test.”
“My senior told me this. People believe he jumped form the terrace end facing the jungle,” Sharma said, pointing the forest out of the window, “Some say he ran with a spread arms on the railway track and was blew by a train. A few years later, a skeleton was found scattered over 20 meters. ”
Both Sam and Nick turned their heads towards the window. Outside, dense forest lay asleep. Its tall trees and impenetrable bushes acted as a natural border to the nearby villages. Two hundred meters ahead was an abandoned railway station. Every few hours a shrieking train would crack the silence of the forest.
Vinay walked to his right, towards the staircase. He descended the steps submerged in semi darkness. He came out in the open pathway looking straight at the entrance. Raghubeer’s beedi was bellowing rancid smoke like a vintage steam engine in its greatest might. His shadow shortened as he walked to the centre of the compound, where stood a tall tower with four mosquito-laden halogens, now fully white.
Every time he walked past the tower, he would recall his home – a two-room government flat near a railway track. Ten meters away, stood a tower of halogen lamps. His house would be full of mosquitoes by the evening. He remembered the white light and clattering wheels of the trains rushing past every two hours. Vinay would time his study breaks as per the train timings.
His shadow elongated as he neared the gate of the hostel.
“Sahib, come soon, I want to take a nap,” Raghubeer said, as Vinay neared him. He sat on a three-legged stool. A golden brown bamboo stick lay besides. For over twenty years he had guarded the hostel. The only creatures he was able to keep out though, were dogs and the guys who wanted to enter the hostel after two am. Raghubeer was rarely awake after that.
“Sahib, for few weeks, I am very tired,” he said. Vinay nodded. “I can’t sleep. I keep hearing voices coming out of the jungle. Looks like if some animal has gone mad.”
Vinay waited for him to stop.
“Sahib, This beedi is jhakaas (fantastic). Sahib, you try it once. All your problems will go away. Why don’t you smoke? All sahibs here smoke in second year. All night stay awake and smoke. Don’t know do what!”
Vinay smiled and walked out.
Back in the room B13, Sam and Nick shared puzzled looks. Sharma lacked the capacity to hold on to anything he acquired. In between his praiseworthy supplies, he also delivered heaps of rubbish. Those living near him had no choice but to accept him as an administrative curse. Sharma was a master of rumors too. However, both knew even if this was a rumor, it was truly beyond his miniscule imagination.
An hour later, Vinay came back to the room. Nick had slept. Sam was still scribbling on his notebook. The room was lit with only Sam’s table lamp.
He looked at Sam, “I wish I could be so devoted,” he thought. He lay down his slippers and climbed to his bed.
“I have revised this ten times,” Sam said, without looking up.
“Good only if this question comes tomorrow,” Vinay said, pulling up his blanket, “It won’t.”
“What?” Sam stopped in the middle of his eleventh revision. His eyes fixed on Vinay, who looked like sleeping for hours. He had lain down just a second earlier.
Next morning, Vinay left the room earlier than normal. The three usually left together to the canteen for a snack.
“I will kill Sharma,” Sam said, “such a bastard he is.” Nick kept walking. Both were returning to hostel during lunch break. The path surrounded tall eucalyptus trees.
“I revised that question ten times. And it never appeared,” Sam kicked a stone.
“Everyone is screwed; I heard the toppers too didn’t get anything right,” Nick said, “At least you got more than eighty percent in the first year.”
Eighty percent bullshit! First time ever I will fail in a test!”
Sam was among the top five in his class. For Nick, results did not matter too much. He was a son of a businessman.
Sam stopped, “Okay now, the policy is – never believe Sharma.” Nick laughed.
“How much Vinay got?” Sam said.
“Seventy five something. But he got hundred in maths.”
“He is really a genius in maths. He got hundred in both semesters, right?”
Nick nodded. A passing train shook the winds flowing in between the tall trees. They could now see the hostel entrance.
Both did not find Vinay at the lunch. He had eaten earlier, someone told.
By the evening, the results of maths test were posted on the notice board. Except for Sharma and couple of others, everyone had failed, including the class topper.
“Sharma must have run away,” Sam said. Both he and Nick returned together in the evening. Vinay was not in his class. Sam crumpled the test paper into a ball and kicked it. He missed it. He jumped on it several times. Nick laughed.
“I am going to announce a thousand rupee reward for giving Sharma’s whereabouts. He is gone. He is a goner!” Sam said. Nick rested his hand on a tree to support his laughter struck body.
Two hours passed. Vinay did not return.
“Let’s wait for half an hour. He might have gone to the city,” Nick said as both felt hungry. “From the class? What is so urgent?” Sam lay on his bed, legs stretched.
“Now why is he missing? Everyone has failed. And he has got hundred in maths,” Sam said.
Both went down for the dinner. Vinay did not return. It was nine. Night had taken full control. The halogens had attracted thousands of mosquitoes.
“I think Vinay had killed Sharma and police had taken him into custody,” Sam said while both walked to the room.
“Shut up!” Nick turned grim at Sam’s remark. He stared outside the window before turning to Sam.
“Come on, I was just joking,” Sam said.
Nick did not say anything for a minute. He kept staring out of the window. The crackling sound of a train shook the sleeping jungle. Nick could see the tall trees moving in unison as sound pierced through them. He held a pencil and tapped it on the table. He then scribbled the number hundred with the back of the pencil.
“What this fucker was saying yesterday? Someone who scored a perfect hundred in maths disappeared from this hostel?” Nick said.
“What are you saying?” Sam said.
Nick brushed aside the horrifying expression that emerged on Sam’s otherwise carefree face. “Nothing, I hope he comes back. He moved his eyes from Vinay’s bed to the ajar door. A man with thin hair was standing outside. He had long, pointed nose, which held his thick glasses. Past the glasses were his non-moving eyes magnified to double the size. His roughened cheeks were sucked in. His clothes had dark stains.
Nick walked up to the door, “Yes?”
“I am looking for someone who has scored hundred in maths. I need him.” He entered the room and looked at Vinay’s table. Nick noticed his body was stiff as if his joints were tied.
“You are…?”
“I need him,” he said. He turned his whole body to look at the calendar. It had a scantily dressed Bollywood actress. Sam noticed he was not looking the picture but the dates.
“Tell him, I came,” he walked off.
“Listen, your name…” Nick said.
The man was gone.
“I am scared. Where is Vinay?” Sam said.
“That is what I am thinking. I am afraid if… you know the events have lined up in the same way,” Nick sat down, “A guy gets hundred in first year, he thinks he is a genius in maths, then he fails a test and …” With each word he spoke, perspiration broke out with greater force upon Sam’s face. He had never seen Nick speak so fast.
“And what? Bull shit! Sharma is idiot,” Sam said, “This story is baseless.” He wiped his forehead.
“It should be. But who was this ghost like man! What was he doing here?”
“No way!” Sam shouted. For a few seconds, both stared each other. Eyes widened with each moment, shivers reverberated in their bodies.
“Let’s follow him,” Sam pulled Nick. Both ran out of the room to the stairs. Sam skipped the stairs to reach the pathway. The gate was visible from here. He could see someone walking towards him. Raghubeer was sitting still, puffing a beedi. The man neared him. Sam ran. The man walked past Raghubeer. Their eyes met. A moment later, Raghubeer fell down from his stool.
“Chacha (Uncle)!” Sam reached the gate. He gave a fleeting look at the unconscious Raghubeer and ran out. Nobody was visible on either direction. He rushed inside. A lit beedi emitting smoke lay near Raghubeer’s toppled stool.
“Chacha!” Nick sprinkled some water over him. Sam bent beside him. Raghubeer opened his eyes.
“He is gone?” he said. Nick pushed him up.
“Sahib, I have heard voices in the night. That is why animals were shouting. I knew someday it would happen. I knew it,” Raghubeer shook his head. His body vibrated like a springboard. Sweat had been dripping from his grizzled hair as if a glacier had melted over hill. It had spread all over his mottled face, which now glistened in the semi lit ambience. “He came … I saw him fifteen years ago. He is the same, who jumped to his death.” Raghubeer said, panting heavily.
Sam and Nick stared at each other. Smoke from the beedi filled their nostrils. “No, no no way! Where is this f%#* Vinay?”
Both ran towards the room. Sharma stood outside.
“Let’s call the police!” Nick said. It was close to ten.
“Vinay is missing, who told you that story?” Sam resisted the temptation of strangling him.
“Which one?
“The one you told yesterday you f#%*, the guy died and all?” Sam said.
“Everyone knows it!” Sharma said. Abuses were part of the lingo in the hostel. But Sharma disapproved it.
“Sam! Vinay is back! Look!” Nick pointed to the gate. A silhouette had appeared at the entrance. Both knew it was Vinay.
Both ran back. Vinay stood there, near Raghubeer’s stool. The smoke from beedi diffused his image. Sam ran.
“Where were you bastard?” Sam said. His hair was dripping sweat. His body shook with each breath. He leaned on a wall.
Vinay kept quite. His face was half illuminated in the bulb’s light. His lips parted. A smile appeared.
“I have started weekly maths tuitions. I got five hundred rupees,” he said, “What happened?” Nick too reached the entrance where they stood.
“We thought, we thought you…” Sam said, turning his gaze from Nick and Vinay.
“Somebody came looking for you…he said he needs you,” Nick said.
“A man with thick glasses, right! Talks like lunatic? He is an old acquaintance of my father. He struggles to remember…some disease I think.”
“Are you sure you know him?” Sam said.
“Why are you asking?” Vinay said.
“Because Raghubeer says, he was the guy who died fifteen years ago.”
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