A Flicker from the Past

 ‘The sales have been decent so far. If I could figure out how to convince more doctors to suggest my shop to their patients, the loan could be squared off faster. And then, the second store can’t be too far away…’

Like a typical lazy early evening, Sharad’s pharmacy had very few customers at this hour. To an onlooker, the forty-something-year-old owner would appear lost in watching the news on the small television set mounted on a corner shelf. Yet, it was the dream of conquering the bank loan and opening a second store that had kept Sharad’s mind busy.

It had been only twelve days since the opening of his pharmacy. Having slogged in a big city for the past twenty-odd years, he had earned enough to buy the shop next to the one that was once run by his late father. Laden with his father’s inventory and papers, the old store's cleaning seemed to be a never-ending task. Since taking over, Sharad had moved all the old things in the shop’s backroom. Now, the combined area of the two stores easily outdid most small pharmacy shops in Malapur.

In the first few days, Sharad was usually marred by doubts about having returned from the big city. His father’s sudden death – ironically a fatal heart-attack right in the store – was the root of suspicions among relatives and friends about Sharad’s return. (“At least do a pooja at that wretched place,” “Always keep a lit diya in the shop’s East corner,” and so on.) Sharad paid no attention to these mindless suggestions. His only concern was the looming shadow of the loans. However, his meetings with the doctors in the neighbourhood and the subsequent rising sales had replaced these doubts with the musings of opening a second store. And Sharad knew exactly where his second store would be. Wasn’t that the whole point of his return?

The current location was not where Sharad’s father had first started his pharmacy business. Around forty years ago, he had started in a store adjoining the clinic of Dr. Khadse. He had bought the store fair-and-square from the Khadse family with an unwritten agreement about the mutually beneficial arrangement between the doctor and a pharmacist. As Dr. Khadse reaped the benefits of being among the first few doctors in a small town, Sharad’s father’s pharmacy bloomed as well. Yet, the thorns of misfortune were not far for both the families.

Sharad paid no attention to these things from the past (or so he said to others). The number of doctors in Malapur had increased gradually, and along with them, the pharmacies too had witnessed a stiffer competition among themselves. He trusted his selling skills from the big city experience to outdo his peers. Throughout the day, his relatives’ inputs about the shop and his father kept lingering on in his mind.

The Khadses had only one daughter – Vaishali. Unlike her father, she was not cut out for the medical profession. After graduation, she was married off to a businessman in a bigger city. Unfortunately, the marriage fell through and Vaishali returned to Malapur.

To accommodate her better (“It was only to pocket the pharmacy’s profits!”), the Khadses had asked Sharad’s father to vacate his shop. When he refused, Dr. Khadse used his connections with the town’s higher ups, got a notice issued regarding the shop’s illegality, and had it confiscated. A year later, Vaishali was promptly seen running the pharmacy, all the legal hassles now taken care of.

When he returned to Malapur, Sharad knew he had to approach a bank to be able to set the shop up and procure enough stock. But to his surprise, he also had to seek help from a few friends. Though they were kind enough to support him, he knew that it did not take long for a business to dip and people to turn foes. He wondered how his father would have approached the period of uncertainty back then.

After the setback of the first shop’s seizure, Sharad’s father had moved his shop to another locality, where he had breathed his last. Though Sharad did not know all the details, he knew how people said that it was the Khadses who were responsible. (“His life was still in that first store. Once that was taken away, he had no reason...”) Years had passed. Dr. Khadse and his wife were themselves no more. Yet Sharad wanted to buy that particular store. It was just Vaishali living in the Khadse house now and she had even closed that pharmacy shop. Whenever Sharad had cravingly passed through that lane, he noted the dead look that the house bore along with a board arrogantly saying, “Not for sale or rent.” (“Why would she? Her father has earned so much from the clinic and the pharmacy. Your dad’s pharmacy.”)

Just as Sharad continued to stare at the television, he realized that Chatpat was already sitting in the store’s modest visitor bench. A silent kid of 10-12, Chatpat had started coming to the store right from its first day. The kid had refused to answer any of Sharad’s questions but had taken the Chatpat candy Sharad had kept on the counter. Sharad couldn’t help but notice that the child always carried a kite string wrapped around the fingers of his right hand. Amused, Sharad had named the kid after the candy itself.

“It’s quite hot today, isn’t it?” Sharad tried.

Chatpat kept looking at the television.

“Why do you keep that kite string in your hand? Where is the kite?” Sharad tried again, this time with a small chuckle.

Nothing. Sharad realized it was futile to get a word out of the kid. Almost out of habit, he took a candy out from the jar and kept it on the counter.

It was quite usual for kids in the neighbourhood to walk into stores to watch television. Yet, Sharad wondered whom the unfortunate kid belonged to. Though his neat clothes hinted at affluence, the lack of footwear made a contrary suggestion. Just then, Chatpat had decided that he had had enough of the news, picked the candy from the store counter, and walked off.

As more customers buzzed in later in the day, Sharad was lost in the tedium of reading the prescriptions, dispensing the medicines, printing the invoices, and receiving the cash. A glance at the day’s collection at the end of the closing hour suggested that it had been a good day’s work.

Sharad kept the day’s last half hour to take a walk down the memory lane of his father’s papers. Every night, he switched on the backroom’s only lightbulb and went through the now dusty records. He trusted to find some sort of enlightenment hidden in his father’s experiences – a way out from his anxiety. He had no interest in the invoices, purchase orders, and tax receipts and trashed them out daily. But he was thrilled to read the handwritten notes randomly filed here and there. Seemingly keen to keep a thorough record, his father was clearly not an organized man (or was there a method to this madness?) Some notes talked about his musings (“Pharma factory?” “Bigger house?”) while others were wicked confessions (“Talked to Mrs. Gupta today. She liked my shirt,” “Sold expired cough syrups. Good riddance!”)

Sharad stumbled across a file with newspaper clippings. The first few were small articles about the inauguration of his store and testified to how much he loved his business. After a lean period of a few years, the clippings talked about his legal case with the Khadses. After the clipping about his inauguration of the new store, Sharad found a written note, unmistakably in his father’s hand. (“Bribed their housekeeper to keep an iron rod on the terrace next to the electric wires. Sweet revenge!”)

Though Sharad was taken aback by this note, he turned it over to find a folded newspaper clipping. “Sadness loomed large in town’s renowned Khadse family as Jayesh, the 11-year grandson of Dr. Prakash Khadse, passed away in an accident last evening. Jayesh was playing on the terrace of the house and apparently used a metallic rod to get a kite stuck in the high-voltage electric cables…” Sharad unfolded the newspaper clipping. The smiling picture of Chatpat stared back at him.