The Green Light on Bondel Road

THIS IS A WORK OF FICTION

The sweetshop on the corner of Bondel Road had its shutters down at four in the afternoon, which was absurd, because Mr. Sen never missed the school rush, and the smell of hot oil and syrup still hung in the air, thick and sweet and wrong.

Ananya stood on the pavement, her cricket bat under her arm, and stared at the metal shutter. She had five rupees in her pocket, two of which were meant for a packet of kucho nimki for her mother, and three for a lime soda for herself. The soda wallah was there, his cart gleaming with bottles in their wire frames, but Ananya did not feel like a lime soda without the crunch of a nimki to go with it. She had been looking forward to it all through double maths. The sum of her morning had been: cricket practice, then nimki, then lime soda, then home. Now the sum did not work.

She stepped closer. On the lower edge of the shutter, someone had smeared a handprint in bright green paint. The fingers were too long and too thin to belong to anyone she knew. The paint was wet. It glistened in the afternoon sun.

“You’re blocking the sun,” said Bijoy.

He was sitting on the low wall of the house opposite, peeling an orange with his thumbnail. Bijoy was Ananya’s cousin, ten years old, and he had the knack of appearing exactly where you did not want him. He lived two streets away and treated Ananya’s street as his own.

“Mr. Sen’s shut,” said Ananya.

“So? He’s old. He sleeps.”

“At four? And look at that.”

Bijoy crossed the pavement, flicking orange peel onto the ground. He looked at the green hand. He sniffed it. He touched it with one finger.

“Wet,” he said. “Done today.”

“Who has green hands?”

“Gardeners. Holi revellers. Aliens.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

“I’m not. You’re the one staring at a sweetshop.”

But Bijoy stared too. The street was quiet. Even the dogs had stopped barking. From the flat above the shop, a curtain twitched. Ananya saw Mr. Sen’s face, pale and round, peer out for a second, then vanish as if someone had pulled him back.

“He’s frightened,” said Ananya.

“Of what? The health inspector?”

“Of something that makes him hide in the afternoon.”

Ananya felt a small, cold knot in her stomach, the kind that felt like excitement and fear mixed together. She liked that feeling. It usually meant something interesting was about to happen. But she also felt a pinch of annoyance. She had earned her nimki. She had bowled three wickets in the net. It was unfair that the shop should be shut.

They walked down to the phuchka wallah at the end of the lane. He was frying his rounds of dough in a huge black pan, the oil spitting and hissing like a living thing. The smell of tamarind and chilli and roasted cumin made Ananya’s mouth water. A crowd of girls in blue uniforms stood around him, but they were quiet, not laughing.

“Two,” said Ananya.

The wallah looked left and right. He usually joked, asking if they wanted extra spice because they were so thin, but now he was serious. His face was sweaty.

“Eat quick,” he said. “And go home.”

“Why?” asked Bijoy, his mouth already full of potato and chickpea.

“Bad things on this road. Last night, Mr. Sen had a visitor. A green one. With eyes like a cat’s, but wrong. It left a mark.”

“Green paint,” said Ananya.

“Green magic,” said the wallah. “It knocked on his shutter after dark. In a voice like a drain, it asked for money. Fifty rupees. Mr. Sen gave it. Now the other shopkeepers are talking. The tailor on Lake View Road shut at noon. The cycle shop too. The green one moves.”

“Moves where?” asked Bijoy.

“Wherever money is. It knows.”

Ananya swallowed her phuchka. It tasted of fear, which was not a taste she enjoyed. She paid the man. He gave her an extra potato ball, which he never did. That frightened her more than his words. When a phuchka wallah gives you extra potato, the world is truly upside down.

“I want my nimki,” she said, as they walked back. “And my lime soda. And I want to know why a grown man is scared of paint.”

“You’re going to look into it,” said Bijoy. It was not a question.

“Yes.”

“Then I’m coming. You’re useless alone.”

They were not friends, exactly. They were cousins, which was deeper and more complicated. They walked back to the sweetshop. The green handprint had dried to the colour of a parrot’s wing. Ananya tried the shutter. It rattled but did not budge. She knocked. No answer. She called up to the window. No answer.

“We could come back at night,” said Bijoy.

“And tell our mothers what?”

“That we’re studying.”

“They’ll check.”

“Then we don’t tell them.”

Ananya considered this. Lying to her mother felt like swallowing a whole chilli, but the thought of never knowing what had frightened Mr. Sen felt worse. She nodded.

They agreed to meet at nine, when the mothers were watching their serials and the fathers were dozing over newspapers, and the street was governed by dogs and watchmen.

At nine, the street was a different creature. The tram clanged past in the distance, its sparks falling like tiny stars onto the tracks. The pavement was warm from the day’s heat, and the air smelled of jasmine and exhaust fumes. Ananya wore her oldest trainers, the ones that did not squeak. She had a torch in her pocket, but she did not switch it on. Bijoy was waiting by the gate, his face pale in the streetlight.

“Fatima’s coming,” he said.

“Why?”

“She has a better torch. And she knows about the jeweller.”

Fatima appeared around the corner, twelve years old, wearing a dark blue kameez and carrying a heavy black torch that looked like it belonged to a policeman.

“My father is a member of the residents’ association,” she said, as if that explained everything. “He says the jeweller on Rash Behari saw the green thing too. But he had a dog. A big Alsatian. The green thing ran.”

“So it’s scared of dogs,” said Ananya.

“And it knows who has money,” said Fatima. “It never went to the cobbler. He has none. It went to the sweetshop, the jeweller, the tailor. It knows the neighbourhood.”

“That means it lives here,” said Bijoy.

They crept along the wall of the sweetshop. The green handprint glowed faintly in the dark, which was impossible because paint did not glow, but Ananya saw it all the same. They reached the corner. A dustbin clattered.

Ananya grabbed Bijoy’s arm. They both froze. A stray dog, thin and grey, trotted out of the alley with a fish bone in its mouth. It looked at them with mild contempt and vanished into the lane.

“Just a dog,” said Bijoy, his voice too high.

“You’re shaking,” said Ananya.

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

“Well, you’re breathing like a train.”

They turned the corner. The lane behind the sweetshop was narrow and smelled of drains and jasmine. Above them, the windows of the old post office were dark. But in the window of the storeroom above the sweetshop, someone had left a light on. It was not a yellow light. It was green.

Ananya’s heart thumped against her ribs. The light pulsed, like a heartbeat. Then it moved.

“Did you see that?” Bijoy whispered.

“It moved.”

“It’s a person.”

“With a green head?”

The light vanished. They heard footsteps, heavy and quick, running away from them. Then silence.

“We should follow,” said Ananya.

“You’re mad.”

“We came to look.”

“I came to look from a safe distance.”

But Ananya was already moving. She ran to the end of the lane. The street beyond was empty. A single Bata chappal lay in the gutter. She picked it up. It was a man’s size, worn at the heel, ordinary. The sole was cracked.

“An alien with one foot,” said Bijoy, catching up.

“Or a man who lost his shoe.”

They heard a window open above them. Mr. Sen’s voice, trembling: “Go home! It comes at night! It knows!”

“Mr. Sen, what is it?” Ananya called.

But the window shut with a bang.

The next morning, the cycle shop was closed. The tailor’s shop was closed. The newspaper wallah had not turned up. Bondel Road looked like a Sunday, except it was Wednesday. Ananya sat on the veranda, eating her breakfast of luchi and aloo dum, and watched her mother frown over the telephone.

“Three shops,” her mother said. “All saying the same thing. A green devil. Asking for money. Nonsense. It must be a dacoit.”

“Did they call the police?” Ananya asked.

“Mr. Sen did. The constable laughed. He said it was probably a Holi prank.”

“It isn’t Holi.”

Her mother looked at her sharply. “How do you know?”

“I saw the paint. It’s not Holi colour. It’s different. And the hand was too big.”

Her mother sighed. “Stay away, Ananya. Grown men do foolish things when they are frightened. And frightened men do dangerous things.”

“But it’s not fair. Mr. Sen works hard. He shouldn’t have to pay a devil.”

“No,” said her mother, softening. “He shouldn’t.”

Ananya felt the unfairness like a stone in her shoe. She had to do something. She found Bijoy at the cricket net behind the church. He was bowling to himself, which was a sad thing to watch.

“Fatima has a plan,” he said.

Fatima was sitting on the wall of the church compound, reading a book, her legs swinging.

“I heard my father talking to the chemist,” she said. “The green thing goes to shops that have cash boxes. It knows which shops do well. It never goes to the cobbler. He has no money. It went to the jeweller on Rash Behari, but the jeweller had a dog, a big Alsatian, and the green thing ran away.”

“So it’s scared of dogs,” said Ananya.

“And it knows the neighbourhood,” said Fatima. “It knows who has money and who has dogs. That means it lives here.”

“Pradip Dada?” said Bijoy.

Pradip was the electrician’s son, twenty-two, unemployed, always sitting on the steps of the market, smoking cigarettes and complaining about America. He had failed his exams three times. He wore Bata chappals with cracked soles.

“He bought something last week,” said Fatima. “My brother saw him carrying a large box from the foreign parcel shop near New Market. He said it was a mask. From America. For Halloween.”

“Halloween?” Ananya had seen pictures in a magazine. Pumpkins and witches.

“An American bhoot,” said Bijoy.

“A plastic one,” said Ananya. “And he’s using it to steal.”

They sat in silence. A crow landed on the wall and looked at them with one eye.

“We need proof,” said Fatima.

“And a dog,” said Bijoy.

“We don’t have a dog,” said Ananya.

“But the street does,” said Fatima, smiling. “And I have chapattis.”

They did not sleep that night. They met on the roof of Fatima’s house, which gave a view of the lane and the back of the sweetshop. They had a torch, a ball of string, a packet of Marie biscuits, and a plan that felt brave in daylight and foolish in the dark.

The plan was simple. The stray dogs of Bondel Road gathered near the dustbins at midnight. Fatima had saved her mother’s chapattis from dinner. They would feed the dogs at the back of the sweetshop. If the green thing came, the dogs would bark. And if the dogs barked, the creature might run. And if it ran, they might see its feet.

“And then what?” Bijoy asked.

“Then we see who runs,” said Ananya.

“And if it doesn’t run?”

“Then we throw the biscuits at it,” said Fatima.

They waited. The roof was warm beneath their elbows. A lizard darted across the wall, its tail twitching. Bijoy told a joke about a teacher and a frog, but nobody laughed because it was not funny and because they were listening too hard. Fatima had brought a flask of water, and they passed it around, each taking a small sip so it would last. The city hummed below them, a low, warm sound of generators and distant trains. The air smelled of rain that had not yet fallen. Ananya’s stomach growled. She ate a biscuit. Bijoy ate two. Fatima ate one and saved the rest.

At half-past twelve, the dogs began to bark.

Not the lazy bark of dogs who have seen a cat. A fierce, frightened bark, the kind that makes your hair stand up. Ananya peered over the parapet. The lane was dark. Then a light appeared, green and steady, floating above the ground. It moved towards the sweetshop.

The dogs stopped barking. They whined. They ran.

“That’s not right,” whispered Fatima. “Dogs don’t run from light.”

The green light stopped at the back door of the sweetshop. Ananya saw a shape. It was tall, too tall, with a head that bulged at the sides like a fish. The eyes were large, black, and empty, but the skin glowed with a sickly green light. It raised a hand and knocked on the door.

Mr. Sen’s voice, muffled: “Go away! I have no more money! Please!”

The thing spoke. The voice was low and gurgling, like water in a blocked pipe.

“Pay. Or the green one takes your luck. Pay, or the lights go out forever.”

Ananya felt ice in her veins. It sounded real. It looked real. For a moment, she believed in aliens.

Then the thing shifted its weight. It scratched its side, the way a man scratches when he thinks no one is watching. It yawned, and the yawn sounded exactly like a tired man on a bus.

“It’s a mask,” Ananya breathed. “A stupid mask.”

“How do you know?” Bijoy’s hand was clutching hers.

“Aliens don’t yawn. And look at the feet.”

The creature wore Bata chappals. One of them was missing a heel. The same chappal from the gutter. And beneath the glowing green chin, she saw a strip of ordinary brown skin. Human skin.

“Pradip Dada,” mouthed Fatima.

The back door opened a crack. Mr. Sen’s hand appeared, shaking, holding notes. The creature took them. Then it turned.

It was coming back down the lane. Towards the houses. Towards the roof.

“Lie flat,” hissed Ananya.

They flattened themselves against the warm concrete. The green light passed below them. Ananya smelled something. Not alien. Not magic. Agarbatti and cheap hair oil and the sour smell of a man who had not bathed. The smell of failure.

The creature stopped. It looked up.

Ananya held her breath. The black eyes stared at the roof. They were empty, painted, but in the dark they looked like holes into somewhere terrible.

Then a bicycle bell rang.

The creature jumped. It stumbled. It ran down the lane, its green light bobbing, and vanished into the dark.

Fatima lifted her head. “Who rang the bell?”

Below them, on the street, stood old Mrs. Banerjee in her nightie, holding her cycle and looking furious.

“Thief!” she shouted. “I see you! Green or not, I see you!”

She rang her bell again. The sound was sharp and ordinary and wonderful.

They caught him the next evening.

They did not mean to. They were walking to the library to return Fatima’s books, and they took the short cut through the market. The market was closing. The vegetable wallahs were folding their awnings, and the smell of coriander and mud filled the air. A radio played an old film song from a shop that sold spare parts. The tune followed them down the lane. In the courtyard behind the electrician’s shop, Pradip was sitting on a broken chair, peeling an orange. The American mask sat on the wall beside him, staring at nothing with its black eyes. The green paint was chipped. The battery pack for the lights dangled from a wire like a broken lung. He had not bothered to hide it.

He looked up. He saw them.

For a long moment, nobody moved. Ananya felt the unfairness rise in her chest like a wave. She thought of Mr. Sen’s shaking hand. She thought of the closed shops. She thought of her nimki.

“Why?” she asked.

Pradip’s face was thin and spotty and miserable. He looked at the mask, then at them.

“My uncle sent it,” he said. “From America. For a joke. I thought… I thought if I scared the shopkeepers, they would give me money. I am twenty-two. I have no job. My father says I am useless. My mother asks when I will marry. I have nothing.”

“So you became an alien,” said Bijoy.

“It was easier than being me.”

“Mr. Sen is crying,” said Ananya. “The tailor has shut his shop. The cycle man is hiding. You made everyone frightened because you are too lazy to work.”

Pradip’s face crumpled. He put his head in his hands. The mask toppled off the wall and landed in the dust with a plastic clatter. One of the black eyes fell out and rolled under the chair.

“I am sorry,” he said. “I am so sorry. I will give it back. All of it.”

Fatima looked at Ananya. Ananya looked at the mask. It was ridiculous. The green paint was peeling. The eyes were just painted ping-pong balls with lights behind them. It was not magic. It was not even clever.

“We are going to tell,” said Ananya. “But first, you are going to give the money back.”

“Every paisa,” said Bijoy.

“And you are going to apologise to Mr. Sen. Without the mask. In daylight.”

“And then,” said Fatima, “you are going to fix my bicycle. The chain keeps coming off. And Mrs. Banerjee’s front doorbell is broken. And the streetlight near the phuchka wallah flickers.”

Pradip looked up, surprised. “I can do that.”

“I know,” said Fatima. “You are an electrician’s son. You are not useless. You are just not an alien.”

The shops opened the next day. Mr. Sen gave them three packets of nimki, two lime sodas, and a handful of jalebis that were still warm and sticky. The tailor clapped them on the back. The cycle man offered to fix Bijoy’s puncture for free. Mrs. Banerjee gave them each a hard boiled sweet from her handbag.

They sat on the roof of Fatima’s house as the sun went down over Calcutta. The sky turned the colour of a ripe mango. The tram clanged in the distance, its bell singing. Ananya drank her lime soda. The bubbles fizzed against her tongue. Bijoy had crumbs on his shirt and a smear of jalebi syrup on his chin.

“Do you think he’ll be all right?” Bijoy asked. “Pradip?”

“He has work now,” said Fatima. “Mrs. Banerjee wants her radio fixed. And Mr. Sen’s fan is broken. And the phuchka wallah needs a new light for his cart.”

“And he gave the money back,” said Ananya.

“Still,” said Bijoy. “An alien. In Ballygunge. Who would have thought?”

Ananya looked at the street below. The lights were coming on in the windows. A man walked past with a basket of marigolds. A dog barked. A child laughed. Everything was ordinary and bright and full of possibility.

She stood up and brushed the crumbs from her lap.

“Come on,” she said.

“Where?” asked Bijoy.

“To look for something.”

“What?”

“I don’t know yet. But if an alien can be an electrician’s son, then anything can be something else. And I don’t want to miss it.”

She climbed down the ladder. Bijoy followed. Fatima followed. The sun sank behind the rooftops, and the three of them ran down the warm pavement, past the sweetshop with its shutters open and its light spilling out, past the phuchka wallah who waved his ladle, past the corner where the green handprint had been scrubbed away, into the humming, waiting dark.