This story begins with a dream. “A beautiful dream” as Keshu puts it.
Keshu aka Keshav Vago is a simple tailor who lives in a house passed on to him by his late father. Unfortunately, the house isn’t the only thing he inherited, he was also burdened with the responsibility of paying the debt taken by his father. Keshu did not know what his father needed all this money for, still he took this responsibility of repaying no matter how long it takes him. Consider his daily earnings, he won’t be able to pay back in his lifetime. Still this doesn’t stop him from trying.
One afternoon Keshu is working on a torn shirt given by his neighbor to fix. Suddenly while stitching his palm gets a cut on it by one sharp needle. Keshu doesn’t realize that and so he continues to work. After some time he notices some yellow powder fallen on the fabric. He dusts it off, but then after some time more powder gets collected. He tries searching for the source but doesn’t find any.
One probable reason for that would be because Keshu has a blurry vision. To correct that he uses thick lens high-power glasses which at this moment have become all dusty. Realizing that he quickly takes them off, wipes and puts them back on.
Now his vision is clear, still he struggles to find the source of the powder. Although one thing he sees clearly is that the powder, now scattered all around the sewing machine, is not yellow but golden. Pure powdered gold!
Keshu is shocked and surprised. His eyes grow big. He has a wide smile while he keeps on searching for that packet of powdered gold some rich customer left for him in his shop. He keeps on looking but doesn’t find any that is until he looks at his hand. There is a thick long cut wound on his palm exactly where his money line should be. Unknowingly a lot of golden powder got settled in this opening.
To clean this wound and carefully collect the powder (that must be worth a lot of money) he starts cleaning his palm while keeping a clean stainless-steel utensil underneath. The more he tries to clean, more irritating it feels. So he started scratching.
More and more golden powder keeps on falling in the utensil. Strangely the powder refuses to leave his palm. The more he scratches, more gold gets collected. At one point this half a litre utensil is filled up to brim.
This is not something normal, yet he continues to scratch his palm more vigorously than before. Never once does it occur to him to ask himself this one question, “Am I dreaming?”
Keshu continues to scratch his palm until a few more utensils get filled. His eyes sparkle with all the gold in front of him. Quickly he shut and locks his shop’s door with a board on display that says ‘CLOSED’. Then he does this secretive process of melting all the powder and shaping them in form of small biscuits. Keshu is sweating during this process. Partially due to excessive heat required to melt gold.
Another reason being that in some corner of his mind he fears what he is doing is illegal. “What if I get caught? How will I justify all this gold kept in my house? This gold must be worth hundred if not thousand times more than the value of the house I am living in.”
These thoughts fade away as Keshu finds himself walking towards a jewelry shop far from where he lives. He has tied a cloth around his palm to hid the wound which is the source of all this gold. The process of exchanging money is scary for him.
“What if they thinks I am a thief? What if they calls the police on me? Is this gold really real?”
Fortunately, no such thing happens. He gets a fair price value against this gold and then he steps out. Keshu goes to different jewelry stores to exchange gold for money. He spends some of it on new branded clothes and visits an expensive salon so that his appearance is of someone who can own this much gold.
By the end of this week Keshu has sold all the gold biscuits he made from initial powder collection process. Lucky for him the source of gold, his palm, hasn’t dried yet. Over time Keshu’s expenditures increase as he buys a house, a car and a garment shop of his own where he has many tailors working under him. By then his open wound has closed and he can’t get any more gold. Keshu doesn’t regret that. He’s fine. Actually he is happy that he has all what he needs to live a rich man’s life. Finally he is free of all the inherited debt while still having a couple of decades more to live a comfortable life. Keshu never thought this would ever happen.
One evening he dawns his traditional khaki (brown) suit with golden print design, gold plated glasses and a golden pocket watch. He then sits in the lush green lawn of his luxurious huge bungalow and stares at the endless acres of land he owns.
Watching this scene he smiles saying, “I have no more regrets in life.”
That very instant a face flashes in front of his eyes. The face of a girl he had a crush on, that very girl whom he loved, the same girl who was willing to accept him as her husband despite his not so good looks and poor financial condition. Still Keshav didn’t ask.
“Meera…” he whispers.
Then as if he just cast a summoning spell, the love of his life appears at the gate of his bungalow dressed to look like a rich man’s wife, Keshu’s wife. She is wearing a beautiful greenish-yellow sari, ornament of gold from top to bottom and a matching expensive purse. He sees her smiling and so he smiles back. After all the pleasures he had received in the past few weeks earning all these riches, seeing Meera, Keshu’s contentment is on the new level of the happiness scale.
In that moment Keshu finally utters those words, “This feels unreal, I hope I am not dreaming.”
As a storyteller I hoped he wouldn’t say that because we could have continue with this beautiful fantasy as long as Keshu wanted. Now that he said it, Keshu’s vision gets foggy as his luxurious bungalow and the property starts to disappear. Keshu gets scared, he panics, he wipes his glasses to see clearly. Sadly he can’t hold on to his inevitably collapsing dream.
At one point the entire place goes dark and the next time Keshu opens his eyes, he finds himself in his old life. Disheartened Keshu takes a deep breath. It’s already six in the clock so he decides to wake up. He begins with his daily chores but his mind is still obsessing over this “Beautiful dream.”
Remembering the dream Keshu has a sudden urge to scratch his palm again. This time in the real world. As he rubs his fingers on the other palm he looks closely but there is not leaking golden powder, obviously. Still Keshu get’s excited.
That is because there is a silly superstition among the people of his community that if you feel like scratching your palm means that you are destined to get a lot of unexpected wealth in the near future. Believing that Keshu smiles and then continues with his daily activity.
Now, whether this is a just a silly superstition or is there some logic to it, only time will tell.
TO BE CONTINUED
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