I return to my apartment. There is gloom in my heart. I tell myself that everybody in this world suffers from one issue or the other. Even normal people have pain in their hearts. But they live their lives and some of them go ahead and make a name. The song, ‘Haan yahi rasta hai tera, tune ab jaana hai, haan yahi sapna hai tera,  tune pehchana hai, tujhe ab ye dikhana hai, roke tujhko aandhiyan, kya zameen aur aasma, payega jo lakshya hai tera, lakshya to har hal mein pana hai,’ is playing in my mind. What if I have schizophrenia, it’s like another pain. If normal people can make it, I can make it too. This thought gives me strength. I take my medicines and with these thoughts go into a sound sleep.

Next morning my eyes first open at 8 a.m. My body is aching. Something inside me wants to sleep again. While there is a voice which says that I should get up, I neglect it. I sleep again and when I wake up it is 12 p.m. I get up from bed and sit on the chair in my study room. I sleep for half an hour on the chair. At 12:30, I go to the bathroom and brush sleepily. I come out and look at my bed. It is a mess with clothes scattered all around it. I have been sleeping on my clothes. From experience I knew the more I stay in this house, the messier the bed becomes. The song, ‘Ek pal ka jeena, fir to hai jaan, tohfa kya leke jayiye, dil ye batana,’ is playing. I start performing it. In the midst, I dance as well. ‘They are going to get you out of this University if you do this, you will be a sad man, a man of doom,’ a voice inside me said. A fear grips me inside. I start doing everything very fast. I take a bath, eat two apples which I had bought from the nearby market, wear my clothes and rush to the gate of the apartment. The bus would arrive in another five minutes. There are two other faculty waiting to board the bus. Thank God, there are others who are late as well, I said to myself. Still my anxiety does not go away. My only wish is to get to my office and sit on my chair.

After spending half an hour at the office, I decide to go to the canteen for lunch. There I see Sabina chatting with two other faculty. They are not from the business school. She has made friends so soon! I serve the food on my plate and sit beside Sabina.

‘Hi,’ I say.

‘Hello Kabir,’ she smiles, ‘Have you met Michael and Sohini? They are from the law school.’

‘Hello. How things?’ I speak half looking at them.

‘Good. We are fine. How are you?’

‘Good. I thought, punished, for getting late.’ I speak fast. All three of them laugh.

‘You are no more a school student. Here nobody cares when you come and go. As long as you do your work,’ says Sohini.

‘What a kid you are Kabir! Still in school?’ Sabina looks at me with piercing eyes and a glint of playfulness.

‘Time to get out of school.’ I say. All three of them laugh.

We finish lunch and go our own ways. Sabina did not talk about last night. Maybe, it was normal for her. I did not know how to mention it to her in any case.

Classes are due to begin in two weeks. I can see only a worker or two on the deserted campus. It is hot and humid. It is preferable to stay in the AC in the office or at home. The whole week I would come to office for an hour, have my lunch, and get back home. There, I would either spend time talking to myself, watching movies, or reading an economics textbook. There is a local aunty who gives Tiffin in dinner. I have subscribed to her so did not have to go to the campus to have my dinner. I have not started work on my research. Thinking of research brings sour feelings in me. I am filled with dread when I open up the paper I am writing based on my thesis. The events of the past would conjure up in my mind making me unable to proceed with the paper.

Next day is a Saturday. I have come back from lunch. I get a call from Sabina.

‘Hey hope I am not disturbing you?’

‘No. Nothing in particular.’

‘Why don’t you come over to my apartment? Let’s do something, watch a movie?’

Generally, I would have an excuse. But I did not make one here. Sabina is the kind of person who could transfer some energy of life to you without judging you or asking you whether you would take it or not. I feel comfortable with people like her.

‘Will be there.’

I am in her apartment in fifteen minutes. There I see something which makes me uncomfortable. On her dining table, lay a bunch of rolling papers, tobacco, cigarettes and roaches. She has finished rolling one joint.

‘Care to smoke one?’ she asks giving the joint to me.

‘No thanks. No Ganja.’ I lie.

‘This is not Ganja. It’s hashish. Pure hashish.’

‘O.K. Whatever, cigarettes for me.’

‘You are from IIT Kharagpur, right. How didn’t you get into this habit? Some boys from kgp at our Institute are the biggest smokers of Ganja.’

‘I used to. Not anymore.’

‘Never mind,’ and she lights one with a lighter. The base of the joint rages with fire. It is mellowed down by Sabina as she blows the first smoke on the table.

‘Got this at Kolkata?’

‘I learnt it at Presidency, but was never a pro. At Kolkata, I became one. You know Anirban always hated this habit in me.’ Her eyes sadden at this. ‘I have this stupid habit of talking about him. Did I trouble you a lot that night? You were fine, no?’

‘Yeah. Not much trouble. No issues.’

‘They say troubles get half with sharing. I wish to get rid of this past but it keeps coming back.’

‘Takes some time to heal.’

‘What a killer line you have said, wah’ she smiles in appreciation as a listener does to maestro’s performance. She passes the burning joint to me. ‘Ek kash to banta hai professor sahib.’

‘Cannot smoke.’

‘Everyone can smoke. It’s medication.’

‘Have an issue.’

‘Issue?’ she laughs. ‘How does a simple and quiet person like you have an issue?’

‘Have it.’ I say and look away, out of the window, telling myself to stop from speaking further.

‘So tell me about your issue then?’

‘Someday later. Will leave.’

‘Do you have work to do?’

‘Yes,’ I stammer. I have never been good at lying. ‘Not exactly.’

‘Yes, that’s what no. Life needs fun, and this place looks like we can have a lot of it. The classes have not yet started. It’s 9 in the night. Ohh. Is it a girl somewhere?’

‘No. No. Not that.’

‘Then sit no. I do not wish to be alone. Ipsita has gone to Delhi to be with her family. Otherwise, she would have been here too. Tell me about your issue. You know a lot about my problem. I deserve to know about yours.’

‘Schizophrenia. I cannot smoke hash or weed.’ I light a cigarette and look at her. She is staring at me with her mouth open. I search for rejection in her eyes. Something I have imagined people doing when they face a person like me. There is no rejection. She is looking at me.

‘You mean the mental illness, right?’

‘Yes.’

I think she will let me go now. But she says ‘what a coincidence!’ she looks straight into my eyes. ‘My PhD work is on mentally ill people and how to create workplaces conducive to them in business.’

When I hear this, a joy erupts deep inside my body. A confidence that this woman would not reject me from the natural emotions she has been showering on me. She is not the kind who pretends to show care but wish they were not the one to give it. The kind of people I met at the Institute. Instinctively I open up in front of her. I want to tell her everything like she had done some nights ago. She was drunk with alcohol then; I am drunk with a wish now.

‘Want to listen?’

‘Why not! I am smoked up. And I know how difficult it is to get people to give their firsthand accounts of schizophrenia. I got my ass fucked in finding people to speak during my thesis work. I would love to.’

In the next hour, I tell her everything that occurred to me since my first episode. Everything that you readers already know. She hears me out patiently, nodding her head now and then. She smokes up one more joint and when I am finished, she is rolling another one.

‘I had Anirban. And you have The-light. Don’t you wish to hurt her for doing this to you?’

‘Think about her every day. Have her hallucination and voice in me.’

‘Same here. I see him in porn movies as well.’ She laughs that laugh again, hands clasped, back bent, and no sound, just her mouth open.

‘But your case is serious. Not because of The-light. There was no romance between you too. But your delusions and hallucinations. Call that woman a bitch and move on.’

‘But her behavior?’

‘She was fishing. And she didn’t like the catch. It’s so simple man.’

I get angry at this. I want to hurt Sabina.

‘So why don’t you move on with Anirban?’ I wanted to see tension on her face.

‘My case is different. We were a couple for four years. The whole society knew about it. Even my parents knew that I was going to marry him. They were mentally prepared. The hurt in me is deep Kabir. You and The-light spent normal time with each other. That is nothing in comparison to what happened to me.’

This woman is heartless, I think. She does not care about my emotions. ‘Your eater of shit, disease born, you give people so much pain all the time. You are a man of trouble. Spreading trouble all around. You do not deserve to live.’

‘Nice talking. Will leave. Dinner.’

‘Have it here no. The maid has prepared extra food. She cooks well.’

I am reluctant. But I stay.

 ‘Yes toh I was saying. No let’s forget it. These things are always complicated.’

‘You said you wanted to hurt Anirban?’ I did not want to let it go. I did not like her analysis and wished to change it. A wish is stronger than truth. The wish that The-light was in love with me was so strong that it foreshadowed the truth Sabina was telling me.

‘That common failed love anger, you know.’ She sighs, then looks at me straight and says, ‘I do want to hurt him bad.’

‘Do something.’

‘They are married. I have to move on.’

‘You can do one thing.’

‘What is that?’ her eyes lit up.

‘Prove him wrong.’

‘Prove him wrong,’ she repeats it taking her tongue out and showing it to me. ‘Anirban is the god of economics. He was already working with the Reserve Bank of India as a PhD student and he is sure to rise high both at the Institute at Bangalore and RBI. I cannot compete with him.’

‘What god Phod!’ I mock.‘Prove you are better than what he thinks.’

She laughs rambunctiously. What incompetency! But then I notice tears coming out of her eyes. She stops laughing and comes close to me and hugs me.

‘I love you, Kabir. But what you are saying looks beyond my reach. Let me move on and live in peace.’

‘The hurt will be there forever.’

‘Stop it,’ she shouts. ‘I love him. He will come back to me.’

‘Fine. Keep waiting for him.’

I had taken my revenge.

‘Will leave now.’ This time she did not stop me.