Voiced Whispers Part 2

"No. It's way too dangerous to do something like that right now. As it is I don't have a good name on the street now."

It was very hard to get him to agree to it. He was upset about the last time when I asked him for help, and both of us got into trouble for a stupid thing I did. "I've grown up now! It won't happen again. Trust me one more time man!"

"Okay. But it will never ever surface that I am doing this for you. We keep distance. I'll get you the information you need, but you'll have to just shut up and keep it to yourself. Do whatever you want to do with it, but do not get traced back to me. If you're caught doing something fishy, handle it yourself."

"Thanks a lot! I owe you one!"

"Oh, you owe me a lot more than one. What do you want to know about?"

"Well, there's this girl, used to live in Panskura, and recently got married to a guy who lives in Burrabazar. The girl's father claims that the guy is a jerk, and that he messes with her at home. I went to the guy's home, but couldn't see the girl. She's a stay at home 'housewife', from what I know till now. She was married to him in her childhood, and hasn't yet become an adult. She's allowed to come back to her home for a few days every few months, and it was during one of these visits that I met her, in the train.

The guy is not a good man. He looks like the average villain in a B-Grade movie. When I went to his house yesterday, he didn't mention about her at all. When I asked him about her, he threw me out of the house. Something is seriously fishy with this guy, and I really need to find out about this."

"What's the name of the girl?"

"I don't know."

"Why didn't you ask her father?"

"I didn't because I was stupid enough not to ask him."

"Okay. Do you know the guy's name?"

"No, I don't. I've told you everything I know."

"You do realize that you're making me work very hard for this, even though I'm getting nothing out of it? I really don't want to do this."

"Please man. This is someone's life we are talking about. I need to figure this out, and I have to do it soon!"

"Okay. Give me some time to do it."

"How much time do you need?"

"A couple of days should be fine. Most of my relations with the people on the street are a bit rusty. I will have to revive some of them, pull some strings, but yes, it can be done."

"Thanks a lot! I'll wait till then."

Two days. That wasn't a long time for me to wait, but was it so for her? Every single moment of delay was causing her more and more pain. I was so sure now that he was treating her pathetically, and yet there was nothing I could do about it. I needed to act on the information as soon as I would get it. All I was hoping for now was that he'd get what I needed.

The two days pa.s.sed pretty quickly, with a messed up cla.s.s test and quite a lot of catching up with work. The work was being done smoothly, except that I didn't want to do it. I finally got a call from him in the evening.

"What information did you get?"

"Dude. I don't think you should pursue this guy anymore. Leave him and move on. This s.h.i.+t keeps happening with people. It is not your responsibility to make sure that everyone gets what they deserve."

"What's with the lecture? What did you find out? I know he's a rich guy, and has a pretty large textile business, but why do you sound so serious about him? What information do you have about him?"

"This guy goes by the name Gujjar on the streets. People don't know his real name. He is one of the richest people in the city, but maintains an extremely low profile. Most people wouldn't even know that he is that rich.

He is quite literally a hotshot when it comes to the textile business. Owns a couple of the biggest shops in the area, and the money flow is decent. He's also a loan shark, and primarily targets the poorer sections of the society, who often are not able to pay him back.

But all of this is supplementary. That's not what he's primarily doing. This guy is a b.l.o.o.d.y pimp. He picks up girls from these families, by striking deals with their fathers. When the father is unable to pay him back, he agrees to let go of the loan, and sometimes even incentivizes the father with money, in exchange for 'marrying' the daughter. He then brings the girl to the city, and hands them over to the madams. He controls a majority of the prost.i.tution networks being run in the city. Most people don't know about him because he hardly ever talks to anyone. Since his textile business does well, and he maintains good relations with the cops, n.o.body raises a finger at him.

This girl you're talking about, is actually lucky to be able to come back home. After a while, these girls start calling their centres home. They never go out, remaining locked inside the place forever. There is no escape for them, and prost.i.tution becomes the only option, since their skills at other jobs are almost always zero.

This guy is very well connected. He knows way too many people to be able to be hurt by any of your attacks. Do not try any stunts with him. He will crush you like an insect, and you'll be invisible even before you'd make any impact. I really think you should just stay out of this. There is too much dirt in this, and you shouldn't get your hands dirty."

"Do you know the locations for his centres?"

"If she's new, she'll be located in one of the three low profile centres in the city. From the looks of it, she seems to be new to this, given that she hasn't been drafter in completely, and is still being allowed to visit her parents. I'll send you the list on hangouts."

"That'd be great. Thanks a lot for your help. Give me a call whenever you need any help from me. I will always be ready to help."

"For your own safety's sake, Ansh, stay out of this. You don't know what you're getting yourself into. There is too much trouble in this, too many issues. You shouldn't get into this. Stay away from Gujjar. He can destroy you."

"Thanks for the advice. I will keep it in mind. Take care. Hope you do well ahead."

"Hope you do well too. Good luck in IIT. Bye."

It was back to the contemplation. Gujjar was strong, and powerful. I was nowhere. There was no way I could match up to this guy. I did try, but there were better things to do for me. Trying this hard for something that could potentially kill me was stupid. She was suffering, but that didn't mean that I had to go ahead and save her. I was not the saviour for every person on the planet. I had my own things to do.

Fighting these powerful goons had never been my specialty, and this matter was best closed here. I had my studies to get back to, the exams would be here in no time, and then I'd complain about how tough things are. I had to study, work, and play. I had my own life too. This was too tough for a teenager to take charge of. It was best for me to leave this matter as it was, and pretend that nothing had ever happened.

I was back on the study table, with the fluid mechanics text book in front of me. Her eyes kept flowing in my mind. They were sad, desperate eyes that were hoping for a day when she would be free again, yet knowing that it was impossible. Why couldn't she tell her parents the truth? I was convinced that they would be able to do something about it. There was nothing I could do here. This was not my responsibility. I couldn't take charge of the situation. I was just another silent spectator, standing in the crowd and seeing the situation from far away. There was no way that I could take such people head on, and win the battle against them.

One must accept that there are some things in life that one can't change irrespective of how strongly they want to change them. I was sure that this was one such thing. I couldn't have done anything for her or anything to him. There was no point trying. It would be a matter of time before I would forget about all this, and move on with my life. My dreams were more important than hers, and easier to achieve. It was time to start focusing on them again.

CHAPTER 8.

It is said that when one sleeps peacefully, his subconscious rests too, and hence, one doesn't have dreams. I've had dreams since I was a child. Sometimes I would dream that I was flying around my house, while there were times when I was attacked by swarms of insects in my dreams. Often, the movies I watched and the books I read spilled over to my mind, and I would often see myself fighting basilisks with the sword of G.o.dric Gryffindor, or travelling to Narnia through a cupboard. This was also a probable reason for my inherent fear of the dark, and of horror movies and novels. I haven't watched a single horror movie or read a scary novel till date.

I was back to college before my leave period had ended, which meant that I had a few days to spend just chilling, since the authorities wouldn't really care. Unfortunately, the people of my society did care, and soon I had scores of missed calls on my phone, and my friends', if mine was switched off(I'd often put my phone on air plane mode just to avoid them.) After a busy week, I thought that I'd finally manage to get some sleep on Friday. Or so I thought. My dreams almost always ended with me being the hero of the entire scenario. The one I had on Friday was one of the few in which I was not.

It was probably three in the night, at least that's what the clock read, when I sat up. The dream that I had just had shook me out of my sleep.

"Ansh?" A familiar voice said. The voice I had not heard for years. It was the voice of a little child.

"Aliya?" It had to be her. Her voice was one I could never forget. I could see her, that little girl, right in front of me. She was the same little playful girl, who was once my best friend.

"I have missed talking to you. Life back then was so much fun."

"I have missed you too. You were my best friend!"

"Was I, really? You could have saved me from my father. You could have stopped him from dragging me all the way down into the h.e.l.l I am in now! You were there, and you saw everything that was happening to me. You saw me begging and pleading to my father to let me stay. You knew that I was a good girl. Yet, you kept quiet. You didn't tell him anything, you didn't take any action, even after I was gone. You knew that I was not going to be kept safe, that I was being taken to a dangerous place. Yet, you kept quiet, like a mute. You let me go through the worst, and you still call me your best friend?"

"There was nothing I could do out there. I was a child, and was helpless too. I wanted to help you, but there was no way I could stand up to him. I had even told my parents about this, but they said that doing anything against him would not be possible. He was a very bad man, but I really couldn't do anything about him."

She stood right there, her eyes fixed on me. She hadn't changed a bit. Her beautiful eyes were staring at me in anger. Her smooth hair was running down just up to her shoulders, gently brus.h.i.+ng against them as she s.h.i.+vered in anger. Her lips placed in a quiet frown. This was her anger, coming out on me after years. The disappointment had slowly manifested itself in this anger, as she poured it all out on me, sentence by sentence, reminding me of how I was at fault in this, and I could have helped her, only that I didn't.

"Both you and I know that you are just trying to excuse yourself out of this. If you had had the will, you would have done something!"

"I tried my best! There's not much that a four foot kid can do! My parents couldn't act at that time, and your father was not a person I could take on alone. Appealing to the community would have had no effect at all, and n.o.body would have cared much about my word anyway. Your dad had it all handled well Aliya. I'm sorry, but believe me, I tried."

Her angry expression slowly changed into a grave one. She a.s.sumed a more serious look. I had never seen this face of her before, even during the most serious of our conversations (which mostly involved the colour of our school bags and different methods of riding the broken slide). She moved closer to me, her face almost against mine.

"You can do something now."

"What can I do to save you now? Tell me where to find you, and I'll be there first thing tomorrow!"

"You can't save me now Ansh. But you can save someone else. Someone whose life you had promised to bring back. Someone you are giving up on without trying hard. It is time you learn to keep your word."

"The guy I'm up against is possibly one of the most powerful, and evil men of the city! There's no way I stand the tiniest of chances against him. Besides, I don't even know the exact location of her captivity. All I know is that she's kept in one of three centres that the man holds in the city. There's no way I can track her down. My exams are approaching in a few weeks, and I haven't even started to study. I have to maintain my own progress before I go on to save someone else! I did try hard to figure things out for her, but this is beyond my control."

"You've become really good at making excuses nowadays. Earlier, you at least had the feeling of guilt when you couldn't do something. Have you lost the conscience that I loved so much? Your heart was the one thing that separated you from everyone else, and it seems like you've lost that too with time. It was the fact that you put others before yourself that drew me closer to you. You were my best friend because you cared Ansh, not because you were special.

I wish you were still the person who I was proud to call my best friend. It turns out that these years have changed you immensely. You're grown up now, and have drawn a circle around yourself, inside which you keep only your loved ones. It's time to start caring about others too."

"But what can I do about this?! There is no way that I will be able to conquer this person!"

"For starters, stop lying to yourself. You know very well that you can do this. You have enough strength in you to take this person on. You don't have to destroy him. Just fulfil your promise: The promise that you made to yourself, the promise of saving that girl's life. If you can do that, it will make me happy. Consider it a fulfilment of the promise that you had made to me a long time back. Can you do just this much for me?"

I paused, and shook my head silently. There was no way I could do this.

"This was not what I was expecting of you. Ansh, you are supposed to be the saviour here, the hero for her. You can do this; have faith in yourself and your abilities. You can do wonders if you are determined enough. Please Ansh, do this for me. Please!"

I owed Aliya a lot of things, and the fulfilment of an age old promise was the highest on the list in that. This was my best chance to come clear to my conscience, to myself. I nodded slowly.

"That's more like my best friend. Thank you so much! You really are the best person I have seen in my entire life. Thank you so much Ansh, for doing this for me. You will always be a great person, because you have a pure heart. It's collected some dust as you've grown, but it will always be pure. You just needed some reminding from someone that you needed to do this. Thank you for taking the right decision. I'm sure you'll succeed."

She smiled at me, and those eyes changed back to the big beautiful eyes that I always loved. She was jumping up and down with excitement, as I smiled back at her. She held my hand and ran around the place, pulling me along with her. I had not been this happy in a really long time."

"I have something to ask you though."

"Go on Ansh, I'd answer any question you ask me right now!"

"Why do you still look like a kid to me? Aren't you supposed to be a grown up now?"

I sat up on my bed, and looked at the clock. It was 3 am, and I wasn't going back to sleep this time.

CHAPTER 9.

I had a day left on my week long leave, and the test would be rescheduled for me anyway. There was no point staying on the campus, as I'd have to do tons of tasks I really wasn't interested in doing. I decided to pick up from where I had left off, and go back to Kolkata early morning the next day.

All I knew were the three probable locations of her presence, but for me now, that was enough. I was putting everything at stake here, just to ensure that I save the life I had promised to save. Somehow, I now began to feel that saving this girl's life would bring me closer to the peace of mind that I never had since that incident with Aliya, when she was dragged out in front of me. The dream had a huge effect on me, and it had changed the way I looked at things now. It wasn't the same again, it could never be. This was more of a 'want to do' thing than a 'have to do' thing now, and I had, over time, learnt to do things that I wanted to do.

My first stop was Shyambazar. A quick Google search will tell you that Shyambazar used to be the citadel of the aristocracy of Kolkata. A blooming shopping hub, this was, at one point of time, the place for the people of North Kolkata to shop. I knew the place a little more than Wikipedia could tell you, since I had a few relatives living in the area. It's both good and bad to be studying so close to where your entire family, cousins and others included, lives. This was one of the advantages.

Shyambazar, like a majority of places in the city, had become increasingly polarised in terms of the lifestyle of the people there. It included the rich, and the very poor. The rich were, of course, oblivious to the presence of the poor, except when the needed their toilets cleaned or the cars washed. The poor were content with their life, and except for the occasional abuses they hurled at the rich, with the surroundings. Both of them never interfered with each other's activities. The rich continued to stash their black money in the house, and the poor continued to violate almost every basic law in the const.i.tution every day.

What I didn't know about the place was that amidst the slums and the nearly broken houses, there was a 'training facility', owned by none other than Gujjar. It didn't even require a front, since the cops never dared to go there. Even the bribe paid to them was just to avoid some fuss, as the cops were too scared of the people there anyway. Gujjar had three such centers across the city, and would basically send the 'new recruits' here. These places would also function as prost.i.tution centers, and these girls would generally be cheaper than most other girls, since they were less experienced.

I knew the exact location of the place, and went straight to the place.

"You look new here. Coming for the first time?" asked the man in broken Hindi.

"Yes, I'm here for the first time. I'm looking for a specific girl though." I replied in broken Bengali.

"We don't cater to specific demands." He retorted, switching to Bengali now.

"But I was told a lot about her. One of my friends said that she was the best he's been with."

"Then your friend must've also told you that requesting specifics means triple the usual rate."

"Yes, I know. I'm willing to pay that rate. Just get me to her. She's got dark, black hair, and big eyes. Her skin isn't that white, but it isn't that dark either."

"You've just described 70% of our girls here."

"Can I look inside please?"

"Of course you can. Most of them are in here right now. Not much business in the morning time."

I walked inside the tattered building, and crossed each room, one by one. All the rooms looked alike, with a single bed, one window opening outside, and a door. I didn't have enough time to look at each room more closely. I scanned the girls in every room, but I couldn't see her anywhere.

"She's not here."

"She must've been s.h.i.+fted to Rajabazar. A good quant.i.ty was s.h.i.+fted there last week. You should check things out there."

"Okay. Thanks."

I left the place, and took a cab for Rajabazar, hoping that I wouldn't have to go to the third location.

Rajabazar, unlike Shyambazar, was not as polarised. Slums covered almost the entirety of the location. It was one of the busiest areas too, for there were tons of hawkers, occupying the pavement completely, often spilling over to the road too. The place always smelled of rotten fruit, and I used to cross it in an auto rickshaw every time I went to school. Traffic would sometimes be stuck here for hours, and it used to be a test of my patience every single time.