N- In Search of his Niche


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“I feel so empty, Arjun, the emptiness swallowing me, taking away whatever is left in me.  Why should I burden myself with handling this failing system taking the spat from all these lairs, murderers, and crooks?  Should know when the time is right to level.”
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The scene continues from the previous one.

Kovoor stood up from his seat and took to pacing in the room.  Seconds matured into minutes.  Arjun waited patiently.   He is now used to his boss’s quirks--sometimes, he breaks off a hectic conversation in the middle to rise from his seat to stare at the world through the window behind him or pace in the room in the Sethuramayar style in the CBI movies.  “People consider me Ill-mannered, rude, even haughty,” he would complain about himself.  “I have to relieve the valve before it explodes.”

“Arjun, I called to share with you something important also. I'm Retiring in three months.”

“But you have two years left,”

“I do.  Not worth staying in this seat—the bugs will eat you alive.   

Arjun, well-disposed to Kovoor’s concern, didn’t speak anything more.   Not for the first time, they had rambled into personal matters taking bits and pieces of the time allowances between the official chats. 

“I feel so empty, Arjun, the emptiness swallowing me, taking away whatever is left in me.  Why should I burden myself with handling this failing system taking the spat from all these lairs, murderers, and crooks?  I should know when I have reached the end of the tether for better.”

Arjun considered his impressions of Kovoor at the time he joined the force. He was just his senior—more than discourteous, rude, and arrogant. He learned slowly that You cannot survive in professional circles without allegiance to a side, be it communal, political, caste, region, vocabulary even slang, but he wanted to stay away from everything.  As time passed by, he came to a new realisation—he and Kovoor—are two parallel lines in the system-the man had a sense of righteousness in the debris of the harshness. 

“I have nowhere to call my home.” The man inherited immense landed properties on top of the bank balance. 

“Do you mean you need to buy a home here in the city?” Kovoor’s family home is in a remote area. 

“A house is not a home, Arjun.  I am a loner having no attachment to anyone.”

Arjun thought about his son, who got graduated in medicine in Russia.

“He is going to the UK for higher studies," Kovoor responded as if he grasped Arjun's thoughts.  "Children are not for you or your time but for the future.  He is planning for the higher studies in UK. There, he will find a woman, marry her, give me a phone call, asks me how I am, and am happy.  That emotional connection-nothing more I should expect from him.  I don’t want to impose myself on him."

That was different from what Arjun had kept about his parents—his mother.  Would she be thinking the same way—satisfied with the emotional connections she derives from his phone calls?

“We live without knowing life.  Had I thought as a young man about my older self, would I have lived differently?  I don’t know.  I know we always need people with whom we can communicate.  I communicate with you because we can connect.  People always take it for granted that relationships connect people.  I have learned in my life that is not right.”