Someone.

“I. Have. Told. You. A. Gazillion. Times.” Maa marched towards him, splitting the word gazillion into syllables to harmonize with her every step. And by the time she stood behind him, she’d lost her breath and patience, so she didn’t split the words. “Don’t pluck off those petals!!”

    “But they’re just there!!” he closed his eyes without turning back. His mother was blocking the sun rays that were falling on his back. He was just there, plucking those flowers and their petals off. It’s not that he loved plucking off those petals but he just did. Like he did a lot of other things. Like go plough the backyard, or clean the kitchen, or arrange his room, or sit in the living room like his mother, just to look at the news that burnt his eyes. He never saw the point in any of them either, but he just did, not because it had to be done, but something, for something, he just did it. Maybe because they existed like them and he was the one with life.

    He realized Maa wasn’t walking back, so he turned with the flower half-plucked. He didn’t see her face – she would look furious, and the sun was too bright behind her to look up. “I am bored, okay?”

    “They have pain too!” Maa placed her hands on her hip, and it took all of his might to not roll his eyes. “You make no sense! It’s high afternoon!” He was about to look up at her – he decided to steal a few moments of courage and get hit by the sun on his eyes – his eyes were stinging anyway, but then pulled him up by his ears. He shrieked and stood there in front of her.

    “Well I do too!” he rubbed his ear. The flower that he had held in his hand now was on the floor.

    “This is how it hurts for them too”, Maa said sharply, and he couldn’t hold it back. He sighed.

    “Yea sure, let’s not walk on this grass ever”, he threw up his hands and began walking past her. “Or breathe this air! Or even exist!”

    “You don’t get it do you!” she screamed behind him, and he didn’t stop. He was furious now. He’d been bored, and he’d wanted to do something, something he didn’t plan, like usual. He didn’t plan anything specific, but he wasn’t planning on losing his mood. He’d just wanted to sit through the afternoon plucking off some flowers and leaves and think nothing or everything he was thinking, and stare at nothing or everything he saw. He didn’t even know what those flowers were. They just grew there, amongst the grass and weeds. Sometimes he picked the flowers, sometimes he picked the weeds. And the sun rays hitting his back also made him feel good. It burnt, but that pain felt good. He’d been sweating, but he hadn’t minded. Now he’d have to go back in, and lie there, doing nothing, a different nothing. “Tear papers!” he heard her coming back in, closing the door. “Tear papers if you want to tear something!”

    “I was just plucking some nobody flowers Maa!” he couldn’t believe that Maa was making a big issue out of this again. She didn’t like him tampering with the garden. She didn’t like him tampering with anything, but that didn’t stop him. Nor things she’d said. He wasn’t even touching the potted plants or those little different fruits saplings his mother had planted. He didn’t know what they were – he wasn’t there when they were bought or planted. But then suddenly, they were there in his garden – or the garden – and his mother warned him to not mess with it even before he even saw it. He’d been scolded for picking those weeds and grass for two or three times, but he never understood why she lost it every time he plucked those flowers. They were just dull, yellow, weak, and just there in the corner, as if they were planted only to be plucked.

    “Just don’t do it!!” Maa rose her eyebrows. “As simple as that! Why is it so hard to understand?”

    He didn’t say anything this time. He was bored, tired, and sweating. He looked past through the window, and either he really saw that flower lying there, or his mind made it up. Right then, he found something to do. He walked past her again to the door towards the garden, and turned back to her, who kept staring at him, ready to tell him to not pluck those flowers. “I am not going to”, he said, and opened the door.

    He walked to the place where he’d been sitting, and found the half-plucked flower. He put it in his pocket and walked back in. By that time, Maa wasn’t there. Perhaps in the kitchen or bathroom? He didn’t go look, for he now had something else to do to pass time.

    He walked upstairs to the attic-room, and sat on the floor after switching on the fan. He felt like he’d forgotten that it had been sweating, or he was too lazy to change his shirt. He missed the burning sensation on his back, and the sweat irritating his eyes. But going out would mean Maa coming behind him again, and though he didn’t react, he didn’t want that. And he’d found something now to do anyway.

    He crawled over to pull out a paper, and after digging under the desk, he found the old crayon box. He went downstairs to the kitchen and looked for the cellotapes, and took back the smaller one with him so that even if the forgot to bring it back down, the house wouldn’t go through a ruckus of things not being where it’s supposed to be. But as of the scissors, he’d have to bring it down without forgetting.

    He sat on the floor again, and stared the empty paper for a few minutes. He snickered at himself for this, but as usual, he just went ahead and did it. He pulled out the flower from his pocket, which he didn’t expect to be crumpled by now, and carefully pasted it on the sheet. He checked his crayon box – there were 24 shades he had, and he mustered one that resembled the petals, and began drawing.

    He sat straight and stared at the paper when he saw a full flower – now complete with the rest of its petals. As he stared at it, and placed his shaky fingers on the slippery cellotape and slowly touched the colour that he’d shaded, a small smile crept on his face, and he took back his fingers. He sat back in the silence of the realization that he actually liked doing this. He didn’t know which part of it he liked, but he liked it. He let out a sigh, and that released some heaviness that he didn’t realize was holding.

    He forgot to bring back the scissors downstairs.

    The next day, he plucked a flower, saw his mother rummaging the kitchen for the scissors (for some reason, she didn’t ask him), went back to his room, picked out the paper he’d carefully tucked away, stared at it for some time, and then placed it beside the new sheet of paper. He plucked off a quarter of the petals, stuck the flower on the sheet, and coloured the rest of it. He began doing it for different blades of grass, and flower, and he didn’t get under the eyes of Maa. And also, surprisingly, there had been no ruckus, a new scissor was just bought.

    Two weeks later, he had another idea. He dug out an old box from under the rusted iron shelves, and dusted it. This time when he plucked out the petals, he put them into that box. They stuck on his hand, or combusted into dust, but either way, whatever the rest of it he had, even if it was close to nothingness – he realized he didn’t like the smell of it – he collected them in that box, and tucked it away safe too. He didn’t know why he did it – it’s not that he liked this, but he felt he had to collect them. And he was bored, anyway.

    He collected one item per day, tore it, stuck it on paper, and completed the rest of it in colour. He vaguely noticed that the older flowers were getting drier, and simultaneously but unrelated, he decided to start naming them.

    When they were having their dinner, Maa watched the news, muttering inside herself as if she spoke a different tongue that he knew he’d never understand in his entire life time – a language she spoke to herself when she watched the news or when she thought she was alone, and that’s when he had an idea. He didn’t go back up that night to execute it, for Maa would ask what his business was upstairs. The next day, he plucked a weed, went upstairs, pulled out all the papers he had, and sat for some time with the first one, wondering if he should really do this.

    But let them be complete.

    He felt that naming those flowers would complete them – those half life-lifeless flowers and colours that looked brighter and better, sometimes matching, sometimes worse, but a perfect mismatch that soothed the eyes – giving them names was as if it would make them human, and being human was as if they’d be complete.

    He named those flowers after names he saw on television and newspapers about people like him but people who were not alive, people like him but people he’d never seen caught up in scenes he’d seen only on the television and newspaper, people slightly like him but people who’d be murdered for who they are, people not at all like him but rather people who spoke out and people exactly like him who were just minding their business, existing as someone.

    Or perhaps, he realized, he could just, name the flowers with whatever names that came into his head. It’d still be someone.

Bhavini.