Tiny Bullets

Though the sunroof was partially blocked, a few stray raindrops managed to trickle in from time to time. I prayed that this evening held no more surprises for us, but God wouldn’t listen to the pleas of a man like me.

The man to my right had his back turned towards me. He peered through the rain splattered glass of our SUV, at the cars that followed. From time to time, he turned his attention to the petite young woman balancing herself on the armrest of the passenger seat and the slippery leather of the backseat. Her sari stayed neatly tucked in on her right side, as she sprayed our closest pursuer with the AK47. Traditional indeed.

I remembered her from the old days. She always took the bus to college. She always took the same bus. I had been promoted recently. Pick pocket to delivery boy. This young girl getting a college education was way out of my league, but it never hurt to dream big. To an ordinary passerby, she’d seem like a harmless college student, ears plugged with her favorite music, bobbing her head to what it fed her. What an easy target, weak and pretty. Pretty girls were usually a pickpocket’s favorite. They wore unreasonable shoes. They’d rather lose their money than snap a pair of their precious ‘Jimmy Choo’s. Not Sonali though. She wore cheap shoes. Running shoes of the poor. Not Nike. Not Reebok. She wore shoes that she could afford to break.

I heard JT’s car crash into the divider. Score! Four more to go. What a chase! The sound made Karthik uneasy. Never before had a routine meeting turned into death race. It was a rainy day, wasn't it? Just like today. The day Santo met Sonali at the bus stop. The roads flooded later that evening. Oh the deluge! I was overseeing my new pickpocket’s progress. Sonali wasn’t wearing one of her favorite flair skirts that day. She wore a pair of cargos, rolled just above her knees, a yellow t-shirt and carried her black jhola. Her ears plugged. Her head bobbing. The bus stop was nearly deserted. It was just her and Santo. I watched from the opposite side as he slid his clumsy hand inside her bag.

A victorious smile spread across his face a little too soon. As he withdrew his hand, she grabbed hold of his wrist and looked at him over her shoulder. He tried to break loose but her scrawny grip refused loosen. The bus crawled up the steep slope. He struck her in the back and she began to fall forward, as the bus was meters away.

Sonali sat beside Karthik. Were we finally out of ammunition? Karthik got off the phone with Sanjog. Back up was here. Sonali didn’t have to defend the fort all by her lonesome self now. Karthik put his arm around her as she rested on his shoulder, dozing off. I caught myself staring at them and looked away.

That day, at the bus stop, I swore I could have run across the manic monsoon traffic and split open Santo’s head for throwing her in the bus's path. In the nick of time, she regained her balance, spun around and her foot caught Santo at the corner of his jaw. A moment later, she climbed the bus and left. I moved Santo to delivery thereafter. Sonali had been permanently blacklisted on the pickpocket list.

We were safe now. JT and Manmohan would we wiped off the map by midnight. Sonali was in the clinic, getting stitches while Karthik and I decided between beer and champagne. Beer it was. “I thought Tiny was bulletproof” he said pausing between gulps, “I keep forgetting that she has a human side too.”

“Deepak’s gonna have a ball clearing this mess with the media tomorrow”, I said, desperate to change the topic. He was the last person on this planet I’d want to discuss Sonali with. ‘What kind of a nickname was ‘Tiny’ anyway? You don’t name a girl ‘Tiny’, you name the huge, ex-con, bald hulk ‘Tiny’. Doesn’t this moron watch any movies? The lucky b*****d’, I thought to myself. “That’s what we have cops for, isn’t it?” he smiled, but it quickly faded away as he turned his barstool to face me. After he was satisfied that there wasn’t anyone else within earshot, he spoke – “Arjun, I’m tired of being the middle man. I’d like to go into the main production circle. With JT gone, there’s only Titan standing between us and the reigns of Bull Mechanicals & Co. You do understand what I’m driving at here, don’t you?”

I raised an eyebrow. ‘How drunk are you, Karthik? How drunk?!’ I wanted to ask him and had it been any other day, I would have, but I decided against rubbing a man in “high spirits” the wrong way given the pumping adrenaline and ease with which bullets flew by our faces. “How do I know that you’re not Titan, sitting here and testing a drunk, microchips’ supplier’s loyalty?” Karthik burst out laughed nearly knocking himself off the barstool, “I’m just messing with your head”. He set his beer mug down and wobbled towards the door yelling something about ‘not keeping the women waiting too long’…

I wondered whether Sonali was one of the women he was referring to. ‘No!’ That was the last thing I needed playing on my mind before I went to bed. Sonali was only his bodyguard.

Meanwhile, our guardian angel lay down on the roof of the warehouse. It had begun to drizzle but the rain was the least of her worries. She had received disturbing information via satellite. It was, but a matter of time, before chaos ensued.

To be contd.