Voiced Whispers Part 3

Gujjar had chosen a brilliant site in Rajabazar. He didn't require a front here, since the entire area was a front for him. Most women here didn't speak to men, and mostly kept to themselves. No one questioned these women, or disturbed their privacy, for they would then incur the wrath of the men 'protecting' them. This society was possibly one of the most patriarchal ones in the city, and therefore, women here were not looked at twice.

This time, I had to work a little harder to locate the area. There wasn't enough s.p.a.ce to walk, and the constant pus.h.i.+ng and shoving didn't really help me much either. I finally came to one small two-storied building. The paint was wearing off, and it almost looked like it could collapse any time. The building wasn't really the main attraction though.

In front of the building were standing two muscular men, staring straight into s.p.a.ce. That was an immediate giveaway. I was surprised that n.o.body ever questioned the activities there, but then I thought that they probably knew about it already. Some of them may even be customers.

I walked up to the guards and tried to go past them.

"What's your business here?" asked one, in nearly flawless Hindi.

"My business is the same as everyone else's." I replied, happy to s.h.i.+ft back to Hindi.

"I've never seen you around here. How did you know about this place?"

Things were getting weird here. The guard at Shyambazar let me in without even much of a query. This was probably a high profile centre, I thought.

"A friend of mine told me. He said he had the best time over here." I replied, taking out a hundred rupees from my wallet.

"Okay, go in", said the guard, as he pocketed the money without the slightest change of expression.

I was greeted by another man inside. He seemed more pleasant.

"Do you want the regular stuff or extra?"

"Regular, but I want someone specific."

"All our girls are the same quality. You won't need specific."

"I want only her. I won't go for anyone else." My tone of conversation and choice of words surprised even me. I didn't know that I could ever talk this way about someone.

"No. You can't have specifics."

"Then I won't have anyone."

"Get out of here then. We don't need such people here."

I knew I had to do something quickly, or I would be thrown out in no time.

"Let me be with her!" I shouted at the top of my voice.

"Stop raising your voice, and get the h.e.l.l out of here!" he hushed back.

The trick worked. Soon, the women and girls came out of the rooms to see what was happening. A crowd was gathering.

"Pappu! Come here now, and throw this man out!"

"Why can't you let me have her?!"

The guards were here, with the same expression that they had when I came in.

"Get out of here", one of them said to me. I a.s.sumed he was Pappu.

The girls were all out, but I couldn't see her in the crowd. I needed some more time inside. "Let me be with the girl I want to be!"

"That's it", he said, and pulled out a knife. He then tried to grab my arm, but I made a dash in the opposite direction. He ran after me, and managed to grab my arm, slas.h.i.+ng my forearm slightly with his knife.

In the commotion, I saw the one face I needed to see. The girl was there. I didn't know what I had to do next, but I did know where I had to do it.

The guards dragged me out by my arms and threw me on the road. Most people didn't even care to turn and look at me. Apparently, people were often thrown out of this building.

"Come when you can adjust to our rules, or don't come at all", said the guard to me.

I stood up, dusted my clothes, and walked back to the main road. I took a cab, reached the station, and took the next train back to Kharagpur. My leave period was ending today, and my day's job was done.

CHAPTER 10.

"What did you do this time?" Niki was furious. She had just seen the cut on my hand, and a.s.sumed that there was something wrong.

"I haven't done anything! My hand just got scratched against the railing of the stairs when I was running down today. Chill, things like these keep happening!"

"He must've cut his hand again," added Ayu, equally furious. Sitting and studying with these two people, while often helpful, put me in a terrible situation at that point of time. They knew nothing about what I was up to, and I intended to keep it that way.

"When did he cut it the first time?" That was why I hated such situations. I knew I had had it now. There was no way I was getting out of this. It was best to go with the flow.

"Niki. I'm sorry. I just got too frustrated with the academic pressure, along with the work that I do in my society. It's just a lot of hard work. I got irritated with all of that, and in my frustration, ended up cutting my hand."

Silence from both of them. What was about to come next would definitely be bad.

"It's such a small cut," I said, pointing to the two inch long gash. "It'll go away soon. I won't do it again, I promise."

Niki and Ayu both slammed their laptop screens down, as if my head was under them. Both of them got up and left, giving me angry stares in the process. The noise attracted the attention of every person sitting in Hall 4 of the library. I was sitting there, a little shocked.

"Just what I needed right now," I said to myself. "I run around between Kolkata and Kharagpur, get thrown out of houses, visit brothels, get slashed on the hand by people, just to save her, and these people think I'm going around slas.h.i.+ng my hand out of frustration. I can't even tell them the truth! I have no idea of how I'm going to handle them. I hope they cool down soon."

I picked up my stuff and left quietly. I cycled around for a while, and then went to the Nescafe of my hostel. I really needed a cup of coffee, so that I could stay up at night and study for the cla.s.s test that was coming up the next day.

"So, I hear you're going home way too often nowadays."

I turned around to see Chas and Surya walking up to me.

"Yeah man. Got some work to do back home. How's the midsem preparation going?"

"Don't ask about that. I'm failing in SigNet and Introduction to Electronics. Even studying this stuff doesn't help me understand. It doesn't matter though; I'll probably do an MBA later."

"Don't worry bro, you'll do just fine. What about you, Surya? Finished the syllabus?"

"No man! I still have the video lectures left to study in Fluids. I've just completed reading the theory from the book. I'm going to fail this time in at least a couple of subjects. I haven't studied at all!"

That was a statement I was expecting from him. Surya was the guy I quite literally ran to before every examination. He was the only person I knew who had the patience and the goodness to sit down and explain things to me. He was the princ.i.p.al reason of me being confident about pa.s.sing the semester. Even though our streams were different, our department was the same, so we had a few common subjects, which he taught me.

Chas, on the other hand, was my wing mate. We'd spend time talking about random stuff, often singing karaoke songs and doing all kinds of crazy things at random times. He was one of the nicest people I knew, and would always be ready to help, no matter what the situation was.

Both Surya and Chas was really good friends of mine, and we would often debate together, roaming around the country for various debating tournaments.

"I gotta go man, got lots to study for the midsems," said Surya.

"Yeah, all the best to you man. Take care. Good night!"

Chas and I started to climb back up to our rooms. The four floor climb was probably one of the reasons why we started to talk so much.

"What happened to your hand?"

"Oh, you saw that? It's nothing much."

"Doesn't seem like it. Did you apply anything to it?"

"Antiseptic creams. I didn't apply much though. It will heal on its own."

"Take care of yourself man."

"So, how's everything with you?"

"Things are pretty great. Trying for interns.h.i.+ps and stuff you know. Second year is pretty difficult, and the professors, for some strange reason, are worse. I mean, the Signet professor literally puts me to sleep every time he talks. I don't even know why these people get hired here."

"I share the same sentiment man. I sleep in every dynamics cla.s.s I attend, and thankfully the professor doesn't do anything about it. There were only 7 people in cla.s.s today. I really need to start studying though, because I'm lagging way too behind the stuff being taught in cla.s.s."

"I need to study too. I'll catch up with you later. Good night. Study hard for the exams!"

"Good night. Sleep or study well!"

He went into his room, and I into mine. I needed to study too much to allow myself to get distracted by my phone, so I put it into the drawer and took out the economics notes.

Despite being one of the easiest and my favourite subject, Economics seemed to run away from me tonight. None of the theories I was studying were actually going into my head. None of the concepts were understood, and I was just shuffling from page to page, thinking that there might be something that I would understand.

The problem, however, was not with the subject. It was with me. I was way too distracted to study anything. I couldn't get her face out of my mind. That look that I had seen on her face that day, was different our first meeting. When I saw her for the first time, she had an admiration for me in her eyes. She respected me, and thought highly of me. I think she misunderstood my intentions when I came there. I don't blame her for that though, because anyone would have thought the same. People go to such places only for such things.

She had a look of disgust on her face. No, it wasn't disgust. It was disappointment. The kind of a disappointment that one faces when one's hopes crash. She had probably thought of me as a morally high person, and, as of now, I had made sure those hopes had gone cras.h.i.+ng down.

I needed to bring those hopes back up. I needed to give her the life she deserved, and not the life she was forced into. For that, I needed a plan of action.

I put my economics notes away. I didn't understand anything anyway, so there was no point studying it. I pulled out my laptop, and took out my phone from the drawer. It was time to organize things.

As I opened my phone to make the first call, my hand froze. The phone slipped out of my hand and fell on the bed. The home screen was displaying the most recent message received, and it was from an unknown number. I didn't have the guts to pick the phone up again for a while. When I did, I read the message again and again.

"I know who you are, and I know where you live. Ansh, if you want to save yourself, and your family, stay away from my areas. Maybe you don't care about yourself, but I'm sure you care about her."

Attached with the message was the Facebook profile picture of my mother.

CHAPTER 11.

"I don't know how he got to know who you are, or who your mom is! I had told you to stay clear form him, but you had your own intentions. Suffer for it now!"

"Come on! You have to help me out here. I'm working way too hard for this, and there's no way I'm giving up on this. I need to know whether this was an empty threat or whether he can actually do anything."

"You're getting into risky business. Gujjar is not a person you can mess around with. He will take you down pretty easily. He is a very powerful man, and knows how to use this power. Don't try to fool around bro, or he will pretty much destroy you. Maintain your distance. You still have time, take my advice, and get out of this mess while you can."

"We've had this conversation before. I am not getting out of this. Find the source of the number and give it to me. I need to get stuff done."

"Okay then. The drill stays the same. My name does not come up anywhere."

"Of course it won't come up anywhere. Just get this done for me. I promise you that your name will remain a secret."

"Actually, I've already done it for you. I knew you would ask for this. The number is local, and is owned by one of Gujjar's henchmen. He is rather high up in the ranks, and handles extortions for him. He's rather dangerous, and lives in Rajabazar. My guess is that he lives either in or near the centre Gujjar holds there. He has a weakness for prost.i.tutes and alcohol, like most of Gujjar's men."

"How on earth did you get so much knowledge? I'm pretty sure Gujjar doesn't maintain records of his illegal activities and his henchmen on websites!"

"He doesn't, but the internet is not my only source of information you see. Anyway, this is all I know about him. Should help you get to some stuff. Just be careful, and make sure n.o.body finds out who you are. These threats are not baseless, and Gujjar can cause some serious damage."

"Okay. I will be careful with what I'm doing now. Thanks a lot."

"Good luck man. Hope you stay safe. Take care. Bye"

He hung up, and I was left to think of my next step. I couldn't go back as myself, because I had clearly given away more than I should have. I needed a source, someone inside that centre, someone who could help me get that girl out. I had no intention to destroy Gujjar; I just had to get the girl out.

The train whistled, and jolted to a start. He was in a hurry to get on, for this was his train back to Delhi, where he was going for the vacations. The exams were over, and after a day long trip in Kolkata, he decided to go back home for the week. He broke into a run, but just as he did, he collided into a young bearded man. He looked straight at him, apologized to him, and hurried off, jumping into the train just at the right time.

The man he collided into stood there and smiled. He was wearing a yellow t-s.h.i.+rt and track pants. His beard looked like it hadn't been shaven for a month, and he had a mole beside his nose. He looked dirty, drunk and ragged. He was just the kind of guy you'd expect to see in a brothel. That was probably why he had come to Kolkata at night, to spend the night there. The collision served as a perfect test. n.o.body could recognize me in this get up.

I took a bus to Rajabazar, and walked straight to his 'centre'.

"What do you want?" Someone else was on guard today.

"What do people want here?" I said in the best drunk tone I could fake.