The End of A Story

BSM Murty

It’s rather intriguing. I have been trying to write this story for the past so many days. I discarded many of its half-finished drafts, but as if it will not let go of me. Or, perhaps, I myself was under an obsession to have done with it. Awake or asleep, I have always been thinking of nothing else – as if I am caught in a labyrinth; as if I don’t remember how I got into it, or how I can find a way out. That itself is like a big conundrum – how it began or where it will end.

But I haven’t given up yet. Although even after several attempts, I’m unable to visualize its form or shape so far. All around myself I find a fog wrapping round me – something like vapour or haze. My pen would write a few lines and suddenly stop and go no further. But in a vague manner this would go on intermittently.

Today I have started writing that story again. Let me see how it goes forward, and how far it will go now. I have a deep conviction that I will soon be able to write it to its finish, and rid myself of this obsession. Still I have no clear idea of what will happen, or what shape my story will ultimately take. Or even whose story it will turn out to be.

To tell you the truth, the idea of writing this story came to me on a day when I, by some strange chance, met short story herself. It was a totally unexpected  randevouz. She looked like a shy, fragile and sad-looking young woman. I faintly remembered, she lived somewhere in my neighborhood. And I thought, perhaps, I had seen her somewhere. I wondered how she appeared before me - so suddenly on that particular day.

“And,where do you live here ?” – I blurted out to her in my amazement; “ I think you live somewhere in nearby in our neighbourhood. But today, after a long time, I see you here. Hope you are quite well.”

She gave a faint smile but would not speak. There was silence for a while.

“ I have been trying to write a short story for the past few days” I told her; “a short story just like you. Though I know, I wouldn’t ever be able to write such a short story – your look-alike.”

She kept smiling all the while, but would not speak. I knew, she would rather not open up. I had an instinctive feeling, that she would not be freely communicative. How could she be on a first meeting. And yet, it seemed she had known me all along. Hesitantly, I kept speaking to her, but she remained silent without uttering a word.

But after a while, she spoke in a very soft voice – “ Actually, I had heard about you, but didn’t know that you also write short stories.”  Hastily I mumbled – “No, no, I don’t write short stories, though now I want to write one; but, perhaps, it’ll be my first short story. Luckily I met you today, which surely augurs well for my story. I now feel confident – I can write my story which I’ve been trying to do for such a long time.

She smiled again but still remained silent. I could see, she was quite reticent. I kept thinking about her.

Suddenly she said - “I, too, am thinking of writing a short story nowadays; and, perhaps, it could be your own story, may be; though I haven’t started it yet. But now that I’ve met you today; perhaps, I may start writing that short story soon.”

This instantly got me alarmed and slightly nervous. Worrying a little, I wondered whether she knew everything about me, and may be she would write something unpleasant and bizarre about me, who knows ? Sensing my uneasiness, she smiled broadly and said – “But I have not yet decided, how true it could be about you.”

That put me slightly at ease. And I thought, may be, the short story she writes about me could give a fairer account of myself. Because she doesn’t seem a person who could vilify anyone’s character for the heck of it. May be she wouldn’t like to write anything disparaging about me. Nonetheless, I involuntarily started hiding my frailties and dark thoughts within my inner self. And I saw her looking away to another side.

 “Do you know everything about me?” - I dared myself to ask her. 

At this, she broke into a laughter and said – “ Do we know everything about anyone? Leave alone myself – Do you think you really know all about yourself? Can you say this with full conviction?”

 Totally flummoxed, I saw the bare truth in her incisive statement. True, I couldn’t claim to know my own self completely. Did I understand fully whatever I did, or should have done, or might do at any given time – no, I didn’t.  In fact, to understand oneself is, perhaps, much more difficult than to understand someone else. I did immediately realize that there was much truth in what she was saying. And as I saw, she was still smiling as before. At that moment, I found myself sinking more and more in my own perplexities. Her sky-blue pool-like eyes seemed to plunge and explore my utter bafflement.

 Just to distract her intent attention, I said – “But I see nothing in my life that could be of any use in your story. I am a very ordinary person – only a bundle of human frailties and flaws, with no attainments in life worth any mention. I am at best a vain and valueless being. Though, I know, even in that trash, you could find something for your use. Being short story yourself, you could give a significant form to anyone’s story. It’s my good luck that I met you today just by chance, and I’m now quite hopeful that my story that you are going to write must turn out to be a good short story.” I said all this in a single breath.

I noticed that she was listening to my words intently all along. Her eyes now seemed deeper and bluer than ever – like a deep and transparent pool.

Suddenly she said – “No one knows everything about anybody. It’s almost always a futile attempt. And that’s why the real story lies hidden behind all that remains unknown and unsaid. Like the life of a human being, all short stories, too, end before they can be finished. We have just to take them as finished, even with their unfinished end. Perhaps, that’s why no story, in truth, is ever finished, and we have to accept it as it is – a perpetually unfinished story. I myself, as you can see, am scarcely complete yet. The truth is, I know, I am yet incomplete; though I’ve no grudges. I’m fully aware of this hard truth, and couldn’t care less, too.” 

 I don’t know why, but it seemed to me that she may have been talking about the complexities and confusion of my own mind which always lay in a haze.

But she had been saying all this in her own excitement. And I myself was wrapped up in very similar thoughts. Then, intervening in her flow of thinking, I said – “ That’s true, but just tell me - because you must have written many short stories by now – how do you write a successful short story. Though, of course, I would rather agree that all stories, in a way, remain unfinished even in their completeness; but, after all, they have a clear moment of beginning as well as their definite end, and between the beginning and the end, there is also a palpable midriff, so to say.

She looked rather pensive at this point, and with some gravity she said –“You are, perhaps, right; or may be, perhaps, wrong, too! A short story doesn’t have a physical body, as it were. It is more like an invisible spirit. It cannot – and should not – be seen in any physical form, like you see a human body, or some concrete object. And otherwise also, you can never see the soul or the spirit like you see the physical body the soul inhabits. It always remains free, always somewhere beyond its physical boundaries. You can only visualize it with your eyes closed, and not with your eyes wide open. That’s why you cannot visualize it at all, in the midst of worldly commotion. If ever, you can meet it only in solitariness – when you are in a total void, half awake and half in sleep.”

Her words seemed somewhat intriguing to me, because at this moment of our meeting, I was feeling exactly like that. We were all alone, with no one else there. And I myself felt like in a blue daze. Indeed, all that she was saying appeared to me to be so true! I had never thought, I’d meet anyone like her today. In fact, as I had come out for a stroll, I was only thinking of the story that I wanted to write -  till suddenly I came across her. And she, at that moment, seemed to be lost, deep in some thought. It was, indeed, a strange coincidence. She herself appeared before me, though I had been searching for her for so long, as I had kept working on my short story.

Lost as I was in my thoughts, she smiled again, and said – “What are you thinking? Didn’t you like our sudden meeting? In fact, it was just by chance that I came to this side for a walk. And stopped here when I found you coming my side, lost in your thoughts. Though I seldom come out for a walk. May be, I walked to this side searching for myself or, perhaps, looking for you. And that’s how we met.”

All her words sounded very enigmatic to me. Why would she come to this side searching for herself? Or why should she be looking for me? Hardly anyone knows me in my neighbourhood. So how would she know that I was wandering here – in this lonely area? Her words seemed to me like a intricate puzzle, but they were extremely enchanting – pulling me close to her. Particularly her liquid, pool-like eyes, which would lighten up whenever she would speak.

Suddenly I realized it was getting dark and I should go back now. But all my doubts and misgivings were still swirling in my perplexed mind. And instead of thinking about the short story I wanted to write - now I grew more concerned about how she would write my story. And as she had been saying - I wondered - would that also be an unfinished story?  Another point for my worry was – where would she end my story. Trying to give our conversation a different turn, I asked her – “But would you kindly tell me, or would you when we meet again, please tell me, how is the story you are writing about me progressing. And the next time when we meet, I also would like to discuss with you the short story that I am trying to write – how is it developing. I now feel there’s no harm if - when we meet next - we should discuss the stories both of us are trying to write. And in the one that I am trying to write – I think, at least I shall learn something from you; and I believe, I shall be able a bit better to see how you view me in your story.

At this she broke into a full-throated laughter and said – “ Yes, it’d be nice meeting again; though who knows by then what shape our short stories would have taken, and what we shall gain by a  discussion about them. Because one thing I know about short stories that they can change their path any time, at any point, and in any direction. We will have to go along with our stories in our own different ways. Going our separate ways, face to face with them, we shall have nothing – or very little - to discuss. These short stories are very fragile, extremely delicate things. They would hardly have anything to say to each other. That way they are very reticent, very secretive beings. They would like to walk their own separate ways in silence. We can only walk behind, following them. They’d brook no intrusion or mediation. They are no physical beings; only a spirit. They’d vanish so instantly that you would not be able to see them even with your eyes closed.

 And - how true of her words? - the very next instant she disappeared from my vision. Even when I closed my eyes, I could not see her. And I was left brooding on how she will write my story and how it will end.

   © Dr BSM Murty

Painting : Courtesy, Pratyaksha

The Hindi original short story ‘Kahani ka Ant’ can be read on vibhutimurty.blogspot.com: 2015, March 9