The Empathy In Their Eyes

By Ritujoy Biswas

As he went about fiddling with the rusty old lock upon the front door, I looked deep into his eyes- into those cold, grotesque, glassy beads, beaming emotionlessness to the furthest, despite the constant nagging of my insides that such a gaze would not go unnoticed. As usual, he didn’t seem to take offence, or perhaps, the inveteracy of my solemn, sympathetic stare had simply stuck with him to the extent that now he would be quite unsettled without it. I looked on as he continued fumbling with the lock that after a few more tries, he secured with a satisfying grunt.

The late afternoon sun had snugly blended into the crisp autumn air when we set out on our daily stroll. Though howsoever bizarre the time may appear to you, this eccentric routine did have a rationale to its aid, for my friend here as you shall see, was old enough to be a grandfather by now, and he could not stand the cold at all. For him, it was the spring of the day, which he could not afford to allow to slip through. Nevertheless, he received the warmth with the same, icy cold air of thanklessness that might even mortify the sun some day.

We walked up the driveway and reached the road, from where, we straight away made for the canal. As I followed close behind, he began recounting memories back in his time when the days were yellow. I, of course was not the least bothered but somehow it felt proper to be just so.

We reached the canal where he recollected a particularly vivid memory of his childhood. He spoke of his first school, and of the time when his grandfather came to pick him up after it was over. That they would go walking back home while he chucked stones in the canal; for whatever reason he fancied. The canal waters ebbed softly and my friend, with his eyes closed, seemed to be lost below the waters, where perhaps he believed his past still lurked, waiting for him to return, to venture back into his own days.

However, he soon came round, and thankfully so. We began walking along the canal and quite silently this time. I followed him past countless houses, shops, and people who went about their businesses, which might’ve included anything but substantial. A group of elderly could be seen sitting on raised platforms with grave expressions on their faces and discussing quite importantly as my friend reckoned, perhaps the reason for the sky being blue.

His face showed no tinge of comical amusement. Apparently, having known the reason himself had not helped him much in his life. We walked on and passed the school he dutifully stopped in front of to peer through the gates once before commencing.

We walked until we reached the age-old banyan tree that stood flanking the road into two. One road circled back to the house with a park en-route that was to be our last visit for the day, albeit a very short one. The other that seemed to run into a distant alleyway was unknown to me, for my friend refused to alter his path by even a yard; that one would fancy what lay beyond. We sat down on a raised platform close to the tree for perhaps the most precious moments of his day, and the most mysterious ones of mine.

Hardly had he sat down, when his hands felt the inner pockets of his overcoat and extracted from its depths, two time-aged photographs. I moved behind in the shade of the tree from where I observed him as he examined the first photograph, which seemed to be of five people, each of them smiling widely back at him. His face however, remained cold as ever, and quite appropriately, so I felt.

After a few moments, he shuffled the photographs behind the second one that he was now contemplating. For some reason, I had never been able to clearly make out the people in it. No matter how much I squinted, or moved closer, the picture never seemed to oblige. I could only vaguely make out two people it, and that the picture was very old because unlike the first one, this had a brownish hue to itself. As usual, he sat there looking at the photograph for an awkwardly long time. He seemed to be watching it as if it was speaking to him and I could’ve sworn I heard him whisper to it under his breath. His eyes were not moving, but fixed unusually at one spot all along, refusing to yield to monotony.

It was nearly half-past five when he finally pocketed the photographs, and quite unwillingly so. I joined him from behind the tree as he got up with an ominously sad look on his face, and we embarked on our way towards the park. We passed a drunkard on the way who was swearing out loudly at the passerbys and shouting at the top of his voices about how unfair god had been with him. My friend turned his head to look at him, with a faint trace of pity on his face, and walked on without breaking his step or giving the issue a second consideration. We turned round a corner and the park loomed up into view.

Once inside the park, we simply made towards our usual bench beside the rose bushes in a particularly grassy patch that overlooked the entire park. For some eerie reason, everyday, when we entered the park, the frost in his eyes seemed to melt a bit, the forever there creases on is face eased down a bit, he looked, amazingly, younger a bit; the stony expression though, was omnipresent.

As we lowered ourselves on the bench, I saw my friend, already in his world, apparently trying to exploit each tenth of a second of the short time to imbibe his surroundings. As I looked around, I found the park thriving with gleeful toddlers interspersed between slides, swings and seesaws, chasing each other, falling down, staggering up, and go chasing again. Here and there, mothers and fathers could be seen beaming, as their daughters and sons went about rolling in the dirt, innocently mocking the death of the day with their hysterical giggles.

Leaving my friend rapt in his thoughts, I turned to see the sun reaching out to touch horizon, when I noticed a large yellow ball rolling gently towards us. It rolled under our bench and stopped right under us. My friend didn’t seem to have noticed anything at all, but as I looked up, a small child, hardly five, came running down towards us, his arms outstretched in front of him, palms and hair covered in dirt, and wearing a curious smile on his round, plump face.

He stopped right in front of my friend and looked up at him who clearly, had still not realized what was going on. He simply stared into the distance.

“Can I have my ball back?”

At this, he finally seemed to realize the boy’s presence. Ever so slowly, he shifted his gaze down to look at the boy who was now staring suspiciously at him.

“Can I have it back?”

He was now pointing at the ball below the bench and then, suddenly realizing his lack of rehearsed politeness, hastily added,

“Please?”

My friend finally seemed to have understood, as he bent down and scooped out the ball from beneath the bench and handed it back to the boy.

All the doubts that ever appeared on the boy’s face vanished in an instant, and was replaced almost immediately by an uncontrollable elation as he grasped the ball with both hands and held it tightly close to him, as if clinging on to the world’s greatest treasure.

He mumbled a few words of thanks and to my surprise, my friend reached down and held the boy gently by his shoulders, looking straight into those tiny glittering eyes. I turned my gaze from the boy back to my friend; well, I must say, I’d had less shocking moments also.

A smile started to cross his face with an unsuspecting exertion. His involuntary self seemed to be resisting with mammoth force, this long forgotten reaction, something it perhaps took to be too childish to exhibit. Somehow, he managed a few words.

“What is your name, son?”

This certainly hadn’t gone down well on me. His voice was unmistakably warm and shockingly soft. Such terribly smooth those words appeared that the hardly seemed to come from him. The boy started. Unsure of this sudden interest in him. Then perhaps it occurred to him that it won’t harm to tell the person his name that had re-united him with his prized possession. He obliged.

The barrier that had been struggling to control the smile was not only breached, but also crushed under the magnanimous smile that spread itself on my friend’s face, as I simply looked on, awestruck. It wasn’t the first time, definitely not, but definitely decades had passed since I last saw that particular smile. Quite certainly, it was the first time when my friend had met the boy, and though I didn’t hear the name properly, I was sure it was not exactly what you’d say sounded melodious. There was no reason whatsoever that should’ve made my friend react so inappropriately. But then, again, I’m not all for such ludicrous things they call feelings. Therefore, I simply sat there staring ignorantly, wondering how much more intricate this affair could get.

The day, it seemed, somehow reluctantly drew itself up to dusk. Scattered flocks of crows, after a tiresome feast in the fields, were now retiring to their homes, fed and watered. People went about, bustling with renewed excitement as the evening walkers, and young couples snuggled up against each other, joined the throng and added to the din. The time was fast approaching, when warriors of the night would come out to celebrate their daily conquests under the street lamps that had just sprung alight, illuminating the faded earth below. Just then, the town clock nearby chimed six, marking the time for our departure.

The smile that had so valiantly fought to conquer the cold on his lips faltered slightly before fading into oblivion. He was still holding the boy gently by his shoulders, his eyes, intently fixed upon the boy’s; lost. Eyes that reeked no more of the frost, but swimming in emotions instead. For the second time that day, when I looked deep into his eyes, I found a vaguely familiar stranger, staring down hungrily at the boy, who had by now, started shifting nervously under the abruptly transformed expressions.

In the distance, a concerned mother could be seen calling for her son, who, without the faintest trace of hesitation promptly jumped back from the strange and rather weird old chap and ran back to his mother, laughing, as if his brief meeting with the frail, old soul had had not in the slightest significant implication.

Things, however, were different on our side. As my gaze turned back to my friend, I found his eyes still gazing at the place where the boy had been standing a few moments ago, arms still outstretched, clutching what I assumed he imagined to be some spiritual fragments of the bone, flesh and soul that the boy had left behind for him; was nothing but thin air. Arms still outstretched, as if it finally occurred to him, he slowly looked up towards the spot where the boy had ran but found nothing but an empty park. Leaves rustled on the trees and the fallen ones on the ground as the wind started biting everything it could pierce its cold fangs through. The jostling crowd seemed awkwardly silenced for a moment. The world had once again turned pale.

Of course I should’ve felt none of it; so imbecile to think so. Nevertheless, having lived with a human as him sometimes seriously makes me doubt the material of my foundation. For it was one of those ridiculous moments when I felt something flowing towards me from him; something overwhelming. It felt choking, and though I knew what it was, how in the world can anyone expect me to have understood it; being what I am?

“Time to go.”

We got up and as he turned up his collar against the bitter wind, I braved another look at his face. This time, his eyes were obscured by his hair, which somehow appeared shaggier. For a moment, he stared down at his hands, and then up at the heavens where a battle between defeated red and victorious black raged. The uncountable lines seemed to have multiplied manifolds, and each one many shades darker. Heavens knew how much older he could have gotten. His eyes were fixed at a point in the sky, as if trying to catch sight of a particularly early star at this hour.

And then it happened; very slowly, as if in a dream, he closed his eyes, and at the same time, with the humongous strength of the monsoon flood breaking free through an ever lasting dam, a solitary teardrop escaped his eyes, trickled down his skinny cheek, pure and pristine as a pearl, and fell silently, but heavily onto the grass below. A faint, sad smile appeared on his lips; the worst of its kind, and he motioned to walk.

“Time has its own set of funny games…”

And so, he very politely left me to wonder what, if something at all, was funny? How did time fit in? Or rather, why he even told me things I’m not meant to comprehend.

However, it was different this time. It was as if I almost touched the boundaries of those verbal wells; and having experienced nothing such before, doubts soared afresh. It felt as if I almost understood those lines across his face, the corporeal smile upon his lips, his eyes… those eyes… those glassy beads, now beaming something completely hieroglyphical; I can hardly be blamed.

And for the first time, he looked back into my very eyes; as if perusing my thoughts. He stood there gazing at me for a long time before finally speaking.

“Don’t push it. You might turn into a human. And I bet you won’t like it.”

I was hardly surprised. We walked back to the house with myself in the lead this time and the sun at his back. Once he stopped on the way, and I saw him pulling out the photographs again. He stood there for a minute or two, staring intently at them, feeling them at the tips of his fingers and often saying something softly under his breath. Having satisfied himself, we ambled back slowly.

Once outside the door, he unlocked it with quite the usual unease and made to enter. At that exact moment, I paused. I didn’t know whether my purpose that day had been served or not.

So now, I turn towards you. Yes of course you! The person to whom I so vividly introduced my friend today. My purpose will have been served if you can answer a single question for me. This question however, is about neither my cynical friend, nor his abominable perceptions of life.

My purpose will have been served, if my significance in here has been clear to you; in other words, whether my presence, if at all, has made any difference. What I ask of you is whether you’ve been able to recognize me or not. That shall, as I see it, suffice to let me know that you’ve spotted all the details that I wished to express here, not to mention also the very reason for them being there.

So I ask you, do you know who I am?

By Ritujoy Biswas