The End | Fiction

By Guest
Total views: 9
Word Count: 611

The End

Uneasy as he was, he stood calm. Totally hapless though. There was nothing he could have done about it. He was poor. He knew it. He knew it, very well indeed. The only ones he had were still a mile away, down the Chatham Lines, by the first turn. They could have gone there as well. They could have harmed Ceria as well, but they didn’t. The end of Chatham was the beginning of poverty, the most dingy of slums. For a second, this thought made him happy. He was at least doing his services for his own family, for his own blood. What else did matter? Why was this cause of humanity still troubling him from inside? After all, who was he, other than a worker, a penny to mouth survivor in this world of glamour? Nay, nothing at all. Still, there was a voice harkening from deep inside. He went on to stay, but could not act. He could only watch.

“Kurt,” Stephanie shouted, as the men held her ferociously, in grasps as if of iron, in looks as if of the devil. There was anticipation, and an underlying passion in her voice, as if revoking the past, as if summarising everything he never wanted to listen to, but he had to. His limbs moved, shivered rather, and stopped again, as if jarred by thoughts of Ceria; jarred by the vows he had taken with her once, but had skipped the same many times. Why did her thoughts never vanquish when he spent days with Stephanie? Those long days of innumerable memories and desires, that fragrant quench of lust... yes, it was nothing more. For a servant as Kurt, it was nothing more. It was nothing more than the impotency of a rich man of business, to whom Stephanie was married to. But then, he took her out of that high sense of emotional drain, he had as if held together the marriage of convenience. He summed up her anticipation in such a way, heartless but practical. Socially, Morally, and Ethically practical.

Stephanie was now not speaking. Her face was held so tightly, that the fragile feminine elegance just looked subdued. They were not there to steal. They were not after the riches. They were just a group of men, common men, who run around in the look for something beautiful to destroy. It gives them pleasure. It gives them ecstasy. Really, men are animals, if let loose. And there they were, totally let off their reins. Perhaps wine had made them do so. Perhaps, something else, say, an opportunity?
Kurt was still immovable. Even the lone man holding him at a gunpoint moved away, realising that he was just standing at nothing. They were masked. Indescribable, no proof. What could a servant of such little education have done? At least he was worried about his own family, his wife Ceria, and the ones he loved. The only thing he didn’t know, were the ones who loved him. And there lied Stephanie... just a puppetry in the show of a tarnished hunger, the masculine hunger.

As he stood alone, he somehow gathered courage to look up to Stephanie. They were, on the contrary, laughing at him. He felt for an instant, for the first time, more impotent than her husband. He looked to her eyes. Her eyes still carried hope. He could just not bear it anymore. He was torn beyond the rationality of thinking, and an impulse pushed him forward. He jumped on them, attacked them ferociously. As he choked one, a bullet stopped him forever. It was too late to do anything; it was foolish of him indeed.

About the Author

Shashank Kumar Currently a second year student at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, pursuing the degree of Bachelor of Technology (B.Tech.) in Civil Engineering.

You are here Articles > Writing > Fiction