A tryst with smoking

 

“Light the incense sticks…quick” whispered Rana, my roommate, on hearing the knock on the door.

I hurriedly lit a couple of incense sticks. Before stepping towards the door I stubbed out the cigarette in a broken cup and slid it under the bed. So did my roommate. Fanning with hand the trailing smoke spewing out of my mouth, I opened the door. Ajay stood at the door smiling.

“Were you sleeping?” he asked looking puzzlingly at us.

“No question of sleep, we just have few hours left for the exam to begin” chirped Rana taking his face off from the book he was reading. As the examination was approaching we had resorted to hours instead of days. With ten days remaining, a wall calendar sized paper was stuck prominently on the corridor wall with numbers up to 240 filled in small boxes and every hour someone or the other struck the hour gone. Only if we would have realised the value of time early!

Ajay sat in the wooden chair. It was a cramped room, two beds on both sides- leaving a narrow passage between them, a pair of table and a chair. Books, clothes and other possessions filled every corner of the hostel room. A ceiling fan wheezed above us, the air just sufficient to not make us sweat. The room was stuffy. Geography chapters in school taught us that March is spring season but practically it was the onset of summers.

“Why are the windows closed?” Ajay asked gazing at the closed windows. We had closed both the windows of the room so as to avoid the curious glances of the passing inmates. After all, it was unthinkable to be caught smoking by anyone especially when you are a class XII student. We had taken all possible steps to evade getting caught. Even the timing was chosen with care. It was the wee hours but with examination knocking the doors, almost all the hostelers were up till late and few the entire nights.

“Arrey waah, you have lit incense sticks but where are the gods?” Rajesh quipped while entering our room.

The incense sticks were burning and filling the room with a sharp sweet smell. There was no trace of any representation of gods in our room. Unlike few rooms where miniature idols of deities were prominently placed or picture of a blessing god in large wall calendar, our room walls were bland except for a picture of an actress. It was a picture cut out from a newspaper and pasted on the wall, time had withered the sheen but it simply remained there.

Ajay sniffed like a German Shepherd who could sniff out substances, and his eyes widened behind the thick glasses. The cigarette stuffed in the cup, under the bed, was still smouldering. The battle was now between the woodier smell of the tobacco and the sweet fragrant smell of the incense. Rana was as swift as an arrow to push open the windows.

“Only 72 hours remain and here both of you are snuffling others’ room” I scoffed to distract. It worked. We were almost caught but the power of fear especially when the examination preparation is insufficient saved us that night from being branded as ‘bad boys’ who smokes.

Earlier during the day, Rana and I, woke up late, as usual, and felt guilty at the way our preparation was progressing. During the night we would go to sleep promising to wake up early. The sound from the modest alarm clock would remain unattended in the morning. We even tied strings in our legs so that one could feel the pull every time one turned sides. In the morning, to our despair, we would wake up to find the string snapped. Nothing was working.

“What about smoking?” Rana had suggested.

“But how would it help?”

“Smoking can keep one awake, don’t you see people smoking while doing late night work”

People in important mission smoked, that is what we saw in movies. There was no reason to question such demonstration. I pondered over it and believed that there was no harm experimenting for bettering our studies.

We had walked far away and discreetly purchased a pack of cigarette. It was decided that we would smoke late in the night when feeling sleepy. We even picked up a packet of incense to repress the smell of smoke. However, our plan was muddled by Ajay and Rajesh as they chose to visit us during that time.

Days went by, the examination started and then finally it was over. We could not even dare to touch beyond the two sticks that we smoked the first night. Finally, it was time to leave the hostel. While packing our possessions, a peculiar problem arose. What to do with the packet of cigarette which was lying hidden amidst a heap of books. It was a stumbling block in our leaving the place clean both in terms of reputation and tidiness.

“Let’s leave in behind in the room” I suggested.

“Mad or what. Anyone can make out that we smoked” Rana spoke with a tinge of irritation.

After due deliberation, we finally knew what to do with the packet. While bidding goodbye to the hostel I slipped the packet in the room of the warden. It was done deftly when the room was locked from outside.

We walked out of the hostel premises smiling slyly and hoping that the ‘khadoos’ warden would be happy with the parting gift from anonymous benefactors.