Panting. Sweating. Racing.
The sun was scorching down on him. He kept running and running, feeling his throat dried up. Devoid of sound, the big fat container on wheels moved incessantly making itself unreachable to his feet.
One glimpse. One last glimpse of her face, is what he wished for.
Trying to get hold of her life, her heart yearned for his hands. His little finger, which she first met.
Finding his pace on the road surprisingly steady, he sped up. As he got closer to the ambulance, he heard the voice of Alex, his work-help. He turned behind, but found nobody.
"Juan! JUAN!" he heard the voice again. Tripping on the run, he smashed his face to the road, not hurting himself. With a jerk, he opened his eyes partially, allowing the sun rays to drill down to his senses. Alex was standing in front of his bed, annoyed.
"Juan! Wake up!" Alex shrilled, "It isn't that early to rise, isn't it?!". Juan heard the hooting sound of a train, as he released his voluntary muscles from rest. It was the sound of the local passenger train that passed the nearby station in the afternoon.
12:15. Cursing himself, he rose up and swirled a bed-cover over his clavicles. Standing on his room slippers, he walked to the left corner of the huge glass window and pulled the curtain as he walked the length of the room.
"Is there news?" he asked Alex, turning to him, breaking his knuckles and brushing his thin beard on his shirt. Alex said nothing and walked down the stairs to the ground floor. Juan watched him for a moment in disbelief and strolled to the restroom in a hurry.
Within a minute, he bathed and brushed concurrently under the shower, wiped his face with his old T-shirt and crushed his little finger in the process of getting out of the shower. "What the heaven.." he muttered and slipped his T-shirt on his abs.
Picking a cap with a symbol S in italic while inscribed in a circle, from the top of his mini-cupboard, he dusted it and fixed it on his head as he ran towards the staircase. Running down the steps, his screen of display extended to an open space with tables and stools designed out of coconut bark in two rows, fourteen in number.
Alex was on the right side, in a medium-long compartment, juggling between half-empty cans of sugar and cinnamon. As Juan went near Alex, he noticed a man sitting on the last table. "Expected it.." he said to himself in worry and looked at the cup on the compartment still empty.
"Alex! Why haven't you.."
Alex interrupted him by banging an empty glass cylinder with the label 'Coffee' on the compartment. Juan felt screwed. He knew that it was his duty to fill in the groceries when required, but he had missed on it last week because of a college-mate's promotion party.
"What did he order?" Juan asked in a low voice.
Alex turned a small notepad to him on which there was a scribbling in green ink. Juan looked closer to decipher what it spelt.
The Dieu Special.
Juan's forehead muscles tightened as he read the name. Why did he add this one to the menu? I never asked him to! He thought and frowned.
"And now you would say that adding this recipe to the menu is also my fault, right?" Juan scoffed.
"Look, I don't care about that. You announced the recipe two months back, and if you're still trying to perfect it.. you can't expect the shop to wait till then. The business has not picked up yet, and if we don't add something exciting and new to the menu then... the fate of this place is going to be as your well-wishers expected"
Juan lowered his eyes to the notepad and looked helplessly and the green calligraphy.
"What are you going to do now?" he questioned Juan, resting himself on the stool behind him.
Juan zipped his lips and tore the page from the notepad, glancing the other way. "I'll handle this".
He walked towards the table where the man was hammered to for the past thirty minutes. As he neared the under-varnished piece of rough-surfaced material, his confident steps slowed down in apprehension.
"Sir.. I'm the owner of this café" he said, looking at the grey-haired man in his eyes. "We're very sorry to let you know that we have run out of stocks at the moment.."
The man looked back at Juan sternly. "You must have informed me that before thirty minutes, gentleman." Juan was word-struck.
"I am really sorry for discomfort sir." he said and lowered his head slightly.
The man levelled up and placed his hand on Juan's shoulder. Juan looked at him confused.
"Do you remember who I am?" he asked Juan after a moment of discomfort, tightening the grip on his shoulder. Juan nodded a no.
Pushing his hand into his trouser-pocket, the man stepped out and faced him trying to help him recollect. The weak lights of the café threw spotlight on him, enhancing his figure and his facial features. Juan tried very hard, but failed to notice anything else other than his green eyes.
Blueish-green eyes. Juan corrected himself. Familiarity with this shade of eyes had only been with a particular clan of their community. The Nadia Clan. Sounding a very serious name, there just underlay a small story of leadership and humanity behind it, for Juan.
Two hundred and more years back, a French officer, Arthur Nadia, who worked for the East India Company during the Cotiote War, resided in this small town of Kerala, consisting of just forty-six citizens. The ten-acre land did not have the privilege of even a name, back then, was completely ignored by the authorities because of the lack of any profit-making resource.
Liking the place and overtaken by the beauty of the green-blue-brown shades in everyone and everything he witnessed, the little town was often called 'Beauty In Modesty' and 'Land Of Hope' by Arthur. The land and the people were always true to their words and shared a beautiful chemistry. Their relationship was a testimony to hope in life.
He felt extremely humbled by the morale the land itself carried and questioned his ethics. Withdrawing from the company, he wished to live with the people of the town in harmony and follow their way of life. Even though initially the people weren't comfortable with him, they accepted him after his next generations continued to live on the land.
Following his footsteps, his great-great-granddaughter Sascha Nadia, named the town 'Dieu Esperance' and worked hard to make the town developed by all means. At times, they wanted Dieu Esperance to be a secret so that, it does not lose its beauty at the sight of influential pawns. Comparitively tiny, but large in race.
Hence, the fourth generation of Nadias wished in bringing in more worldly knowledge to the town, keeping the outer world away. They built schools, hospitals, parks, post-offices, cafés, restaurants and spread the word of equality, feminism and rights. The town gained an external silver lining because of the Nadias. Ten acres became forty acres. Dieu Esperance became registered in the books of the government. A village to a town.
The man held his hand out to Juan and said "Alphonse Nadia, your father's school-mate." Juan shook his hand with him while he kept his head lowered.
"Your father was a great cook. I expected the same from you but.. well, you are exactly proving what you're father claimed you to be. Honest, but hopeless."
Juan's cap loosened grip and fell to the floor. As he knelt down quickly to grab it, he caught a glimpse of his shoes. It looked hand-made and obviously.. like the one he received in a courier once from Paris. He assumed that it would have been gifted by his father.
"Well, you still have that chance to catch the next flight.. sorry.. this town has only railway stations right," he smirked and placed a flight ticket on the table.
Juan frowned at his arrogance.
"You can catch the next train to the nearest city and then board a flight to your easiest destination, Paris. You are no good here. Just a facade, trying to prove something worthless"
With that said, Alphonse left the café.
Juan, his ears red, in distress, sat down on the chair and processed his mother's and father's face in his mind. It took him a long time.
I don't think this café will help us in anyway. Her words resonated in his mind.
Emotionally drained, he looked around for Alex. Alex looked at him in despondence and walked out of the café, switching off its lights.
Juan absorbed the darkness, in a practice.
TO BE CONTINUED