The report of her life

“What’s news today if it’s not sensational? The crimes are the same- murder, rape, robbery etc. but they can only keep you glued to the newspaper if they turn out into a huge spiced-up whodunit that doesn’t revolve around a couple of strangers but someone from the inside who kept a record of everything to plot it and make it look like an ambush. As long as the culprit isn’t unveiled by law, media mustn’t abstain from garnering a certain heat to the case even if it involves disclosing the names of the witnesses or related people and making little stories around them. A cold-blooded murder of a girl, allegedly culminated in perfect stealth by her own parents, sounds more like a news people would like to read.” On her way home, Namita kept rewinding her boss’s words in her head. It was hard enough to live up to her expectations let alone competing with other writers for it. She had taken a break from a terribly hectic day at work as usual. Everyday rebukes had pushed her to the verge of losing her job. She reached home to her 10-year old son Krish. Only a persevered wish of seeing him in the middle of the day could keep her going in her tough times. Normally he’d scream at the top of his voice and run to the gate to greet her, but that day he had a dismal look on his face. Namita hadn’t seen this coming.

 He took her by her hand and led her in. Each step made her more nervous as to what (else) was wrong that day. She scanned left to right, from one corner to the other suspiciously; everything looked the same except for the kitchen. She entered in. There was a shiny golden cloth kept on the slab and she cowered away a bit when she saw what was placed on it. It was an 11-inch large blood stained knife. It looked dreadful enough to let its own wrath wield it. She felt her heart beat starting to race. She turned to Krish, held him by his shoulders and hastily checked him head to toe. He was fine. Then in a squeaky voice she asked him, “Where did you find it?” Apparently amidst a quiet locality in Delhi that Namita lived in, this drunken goon who had stabbed a kin over a money issue with a knife, had thrown the knife wrapped in a cloth under a tree, an hour before Krish returned from school and, intrigued by the flashy cloth, picked it and brought it home. “But why did you bring it home? It’s a bad omen!” Namita asked vehemently but she knew there was no answer coming.

 “You are not going to tell anyone about this knife and mom will throw it away on her way back. Promise me.” Despite Krish’s assurance she had to drink a glass of water or two to gulp down to her gut what had actually happened. After feeding him lunch, picking up a bunch of items (including the knife) and dropping him at her sister’s, she headed off on her scooty to home, but realising it had been too much for the day and she needed to think things through at a rather lively place, she drove ahead towards CP which was 15 minutes from her place.

She reached CP and parked her scooty. She began strolling about for a while looking at the busy city life breathing around her. Memories from her marriage flew in before her with the pleasant breeze. Life had been so beautiful and full of happy surprises then. Even amidst the busy work life, the little family time she could get would be so worth the wait. And how blessed she felt that little Krish was born when life was so cheerful and wished that with the sweetness of days that passed by, he’d grow up into a wonderful person. If only she had seen a bitter divorce coming, she would have lived those days with more enthusiasm or perhaps repaired the faults before they could ruin her marriage. Dramatic was the way how happy surprises turned sour. But she had made her peace with it and didn’t let it make her life, as her boss called stuff like that, filmy. It had been just another nail in the coffin of “lived happily ever after”. Post divorce, she moved to Delhi with her son when he was just 5-years old and had ever since struggled to keep up with the vicissitudes of city life.  “You can only enjoy it till it sucks you in.” She said to herself. But she had to disperse away the thoughts. There wasn’t much time. She had a deadline to meet and a knife to dispose.

She entered a Starbucks cafe nearby and ordered a coffee. It was work time, time for the notepad and the strongest weapon at her disposal, a pen her father had gifted her on her first day at her new job, to come out of her bag. And out came the notorious knife, if only there were a weapon to stab this one with, but to its luck and might, just a cover. She sat in the Starbucks cafe, sipping her coffee and staring out of the window. The blood stained knife lay next to her handbag, covered with her blue silk scarf. She had to clothe an incident she had to report, in the most pretentious, scandalous and deceptive words possible. She opened her scarf to the point where she could wryly gaze at the knife. It felt like peeping into the mind of a criminal. What could he be most scared of while in absconding? What twist could make this the most coveted report? For a while she meticulously dug the brains of the criminal and her boss to find the plausible solutions. After a few minutes of extensive contemplation and drawing inspiration from the knife, she started writing the crime she had to ‘sensationalize’ for the next day’s print, highlighting overtly intricate details of the weapon (also a knife) that went missing and could lead to the culprit. This was her last shot and it had to be the best.

After writing and reviewing it a couple of times, she packed up everything, scooted off to her office and handed it over to her boss. She took out the portentous knife, still covered with her scarf, and imitating her boss, spoke to it, “you better make it sensational!” If only the knife could smirk back or hide a little better behind its cover when a few suspicious eyes pried around. But her bossed looked quite impressed and even though she (like most working people) hated her boss, for that moment her happiness meant the world to Namita. She came back home picking up Krish in the way.

“So how was your day?” Krish popped up the quotidian question that usually Namita would ask. “Pretty hectic. Did you have fun at your aunt’s?”  She didn’t want to scare Krish by telling him that her career, his future and their shot at leading the same happy life they used to years ago were hanging on the verdict that will be narrated by the next day’s print. They had dinner while watching news on TV. If she was lucky maybe her report could make it to the news channels, she thought to herself. After the dinner they went into their respective rooms. She washed her face. All she needed was a good sleep to prepare her for the next day. She called out to Krish, “Good night sweetie.” “Mom!” he called out. “What now?” She rushed to his room. “Why didn’t you throw the knife away? You said it was bad omen.” Little Krish held the bag containing knife in his hand. She took it away from him and assured, “I’ll throw it away tomorrow.”

The next day her wish came true, the story did make headlines and was even printed on the front page in huge letters. The knife that was barely meant to make it to a hideously small section of the paper till the previous day, stabbed its way to a news report that little Krish would have never expected to hear or read. And yes, it was all over news channels too. The news read: In a first of its kind scenario and a fresh twist to the ongoing schoolboy murder case, a newspaper editor, Namita Sharma has been taken into custody for allegedly possessing and hiding the murder weapon she was to report about.On and on it sparked off a series of ‘filmy’ allegations that could lead to solving the murder mystery that had been bemusing the investigators for over weeks and triggered a plethora of possible motives and connections of this controversial editor, who couldn’t explain the knife, to the biggest murder mystery. Even Krish was questioned about the knife but he kept the promise he made to his mother. Somewhere at the bottom of that report were hints of a plausible DNA test of the blood found on the knife to be conducted by forensic experts that would eventually ascertain the truth. But for all Namita knew, saving her job came at the cost of losing her job and much more.