Dead Ends: Episode 9

(This is a lengthy story based on actual facts. The final episode is here! For Episode 8 click here. Enjoy!)

Episode 9

(Part – 1)

Maheen is sitting behind her desk. Her skin is very pale almost yellow. Her eyes are sunken into their sockets. She is signing some papers. The veins on the top of her hand stand out against her skin like a blue spider web. Saima, the secretary, comes in looking rather irritated.

“Madam there is a mad hijra outside. He is insisting on seeing you. He says that you know him. He tells his name as Laila.”

“Send him in.” Maheen replies without looking up.

Saima looks surprised. She walks out of the door.

“You can go in.” Saima informs Bahadur.

Bahadur claps once loudly, “Fitay moun!” He mocks her.

Bahadur enters Maheen’s room and sits down in front of her. He is in his usual womanly attire of shalwar kameez with the duppatta dangling on his shoulders and make up plastered on his face.

“Salalekum!” He greets Maheen.

“Walaikumasalam. I don’t want you using such language in my office again.” She looks at him, scrutinizing.

“Oh ji don’t worry.”

“So… Do you need my help in something?”

“I just came here to see your fancy office. By the way, you don’t look very well.”

“I am alright. So how did you like my fancy office?”

“It’s not very fancy.”

“That’s good.”

There’s a pause.

“I told my girls to see your doctors at the clinic.”

“Excellent!” Maheen beams at Bahadur, “So are there improvements in any of them?”

“Yes.”

“What about you? Did you go for your check up?”

“No. I… I don’t need to see them. I’m a HIV carrier you see. So I don’t have AIDS.”

“That doesn’t mean that you can’t get it in the future. And you can transmit the virus to other people.”

“I no longer offer my services to people.”

There is a long pause. Maheen stares at the papers in front of her and Bahadur shifts his eyes nervously.

“How did you… Umm how did you get here?” Maheen feels awkward asking something that had been troubling her since that day at the clinic, “I mean, why did you opt to be what you are?”

“There are no other options for people like us… We have to be like this if we want food to eat, a bed to sleep in and a roof over our heads. There is no choice. Do you think that I like being what I am?!” Bahadur’s eyebrows knot together, years of despair is clear in his tone; “no I don’t. I would love to work like a normal person, with a normal job. But nobody would accept us. Being a hijra is a curse! No sane person would want us to work for them, except just satisfy their urges.” Disgust is apparent on his face; ‘so all of us come together and live like sisters. We support each other financially… emotionally.”

“That’s true.” Maheen sighs resignedly. “But what if somebody offers you a job now? Will you take that job?” She raises her eyebrows.

“If you are thinking of offering me a job, then don’t.  You have done many favors for me. I’m already in your debt. And I’m my clan’s leader now, their guardian. I can’t abandon them.”

“I understand… But, but,” Maheen stammers, groping for words, she wanted to change one life for the better, in the short span of time that she was left with, “if you really want to lead a normal life you will accept my offer. Can’t you make someone else in charge? Yes! You can easily do that, I bet you are training someone to be in your place when you are gone. Like the Guru before you. Didn’t he train you to be like him?”

Bahadur fiddles with his finger, his nail paint has chipped off at places; “my Guru Ji was like a mother to me. She taught me everything I know today, from dancing to applying make up… Do you remember when we first met; the day of the accident, I was very upset at something?”

“Yes I do remember. You kept crying.”

“My Guru, my Saleema was stabbed to death by one of her regular clients that day.” 

A peon brings them two glasses filled with black cola. Bahadur takes his and gulps down half of the glass, trying to undo the knot that had formed in his throat.

“I’m very sad to hear that.” Maheen says, “Is there anything that I can do for you?”

“No. You have already done too much.”

Bahadur drinks the remaining cola and stands up.

“I should leave now. Thank you for seeing me.”

“You are welcome.” Maheen looks at him and feels pity. She thought she was the only one on whom fate had been cruel, “you never told me your real name.”

He looks at her hesitating, “Bahadur.”    

“Well you certainly are very brave, Bahadur, as your name indicates.”

“No one has called me that in years.”

Bahadur leaves the room. The door is still open and Maheen can see Bahadur walking away, his gait very girl like, hips swinging and his hands adjusting the duppatta on his head.

Bahadur slows down and then stops walking altogether. He turns and looks at her. He re-enters her office. Fixing his gaze on hers, he asks:

“How much will you pay if I work for you?”

“That depends on what type of work you can do. Can you drive?”

“Yes.”

“We pay our new drivers 10,000 Rs. and we increase it on a yearly basis.”

“I make triple of that in what I do per month. Tell me one good reason why I should do this job?”

“You will not be ashamed of it Bahadur.” She says quietly.

Maheen opens the door to her apartment and steps in. She switches on the light. It’s a small apartment. Things are cluttered every where. The furniture looks old and ordinary.

She takes her shoes off and goes into her room bare footed. The concrete beneath her feet feels harder than it used to. Is it just her?

She collapses on her bed, exhausted. She presses her forehead and massages her eyeballs lightly. It has been a long tiring day. And she has been feeling more and more fatigued.

She gets up again and walks into the kitchen. She opens the refrigerator and takes out last night’s take away and warms it in a pan. She goes back to her room with her plate of food and water bottle and switches on the TV.
She eats a few bites while watching the news. The room is dark, illuminated with only a small lamp and the TV. Suddenly she puts her hand on her mouth. She gags and vomits on the side of the bed all over the floor.

Tears pour down her eyes as she cries. She sobs heavily thumping her fists on the mattress. She throws the plate of food on the wall angrily. The plate breaks into pieces with a loud crash.

The next morning when Maheen wakes up, she still has the taste of yesterdays vomit in her mouth. She composes herself and after Wazu, spreads the prayer mat for Fajr Salah. She has become very regular in her prayers, praying five times each day as is compulsory for a Muslim.

At her office she is pleasantly surprised to see Bahadur sitting with the other chauffeurs in men’s clothes. She smiles at him. He has no make up on.

The day before when Bahadur was returning to his home from Maheen’s NGO office, he was confused. His heart was torn between his urge to lead a normal life where there was no ridicule, to earn a living of which he was not ashamed of and the other part of his conscious told him that he was betraying those who had welcomed him with open arms. Even though he was in an outcast community, he had found a new family there. He felt as if he was deceiving Saleema the Guru of the Hijra community before him, deceiving all of his sisters who now depended and counted on him for guidance and protection.

And so he announced the decision to his adopted family. After a long and emotional night of tears, chest beating, protests, heartbreaks and then finally with prayers for a new beginning the Hijra community let Bahadur go. The dupatta was replaced by a traditional Sindhi cap; as a new dawn started to break on the horizon, their Laila seized to exist with the night.

In the office the drivers sitting beside him look uncomfortable. Bahadur stands up and comes near Maheen. He perches his hand on his hip but suddenly realizes what he was doing. He then folds his hand behind his back where they couldn’t betray his new identity.

“I thought that I should come to my job from the very next day!” Says, a smiling, Bahadur.

“You thought right.” She smiled back, “come with me.”

They both enter her office. She takes her seat behind her desk and intercoms a colleague. The colleague enters.

“Bahadur is our new driver.” She introduces him to the colleague, “he will take you to the project site today.”

“Ma’am with due respect I… I’m not very comfortable with the new driver.” Says the colleague.

“Why not?”

“He is uh… not like a usual man.”

Maheen stands up in a rage.

“If I hear one word from yours or anybody else’s mouth against this man, that day will be the last day you’ll ever stand in this office!”

“Yes ma’am.” Says the colleague timidly.

Stay tuned! (I know I'm being unfair not posting the entire thing :p But I think you guys wouldn't mind hanging in a bit more!)