Molotov Cocktail

For the folks at Manipal;take it away :-)

“Dude, I swear…if Mexico wins today, I’ll give up Vodka.” I said looking up at BD. The guy was hardly listening.

“Fuck you. You’ve been saying that from Kindergarten, arseole.” Lodde shot at me.

“No man. This time, I’m serious. It’s like this umbilical chord that runs through me, Argentina and Vodka. If ‘Tina loses, we all 3 fall.” Evidently, I had been drinking too much.

“Make a cocktail for me, bro.” I asked to no one in particular.
“Yeah, right! How about I make you a Molotov Cocktail to bring you back to your senses?” BD took a good attempt at humour.
“Hey, what’s in a Molotov Cocktail?” I asked very innocently.
“Oh! That would be a mix of, let’s see… 25% beer, 3% milk, and 65% Cerelac and 7% of your intestines.” BD gave an ‘answer’.
“Are you, serious?” now I was playing his game.
“Of course not, you idiot! It’s a home made explosive used to start arson.” Lodde’s IQ ran into the 4 digits when he was not in his senses. But on the flip side, I was too scared to ask what ‘arson’ meant.

It was Tony’s idea to go watch the FIFA World Cup Quarter Finals at his Uncle’s estate house. 6 guys, Kingfisher, football and Vodka are always a package deal: like the 4 legs of a tripod. 23 minutes after kick-off, it was still 0-0. Obviously, the TV was getting out of focus with every passing minute. I looked around for some smokes. Hell, all the packets were empty. Wasn’t that bastard Bogu told to get 6 packs?

I looked around. BD was staring at the fan and smiling at it. In that corner of the mind reserved for girl friends, he was probably making out with her in the loo at Barista.
“Oye, what’s so funny with the fan?” Pavan asked BD.
“I love her man…I fuckin’ love her.” BD looked down and nodded.

“Man, you know this girl for like 2 weeks. You’ve already become her dedicated doormat. I mean she’s walking all over you. And now, you love her? You obviously need more pot to smoke this shit out of your rear.” Pavan said. Lodde was rolling on the floor on hearing this. Pavan continued-“Look at Lodde’s shirt for that matter. What does it say,huh? LOVE-Loss Of Virginity Early in life. Don’t you ever learn anything, man?”

It was all getting too boring for me. I had heard this girlfriend bashing before. And frankly, it sucked. I looked at the TV for some time. The half was almost over.

“Bh-o-ys. Three minutes to go for the half to end. And guess what’s official? I need a Navy Cut RIGHT NOW.” Pavan stood up and made the announcement.

“Your freaking nuts. It’s 1:15 in the morning. The nearest shop is 3 kms away.” Tony screamed back at Pavan.
“I give a shit. I’ll take my bike and go. Wanna come, anyone?”
Since no one seemed too inclined to go, I volunteered.

5 minutes later, we were riding on the kuccha road on a Black Pulsar. As the mud tracks met the tar, I asked Pavan-“Hey, do you think there might be cops on the road?”

“Bollocks. They must be too bombed to be at work now. No worries bro.” Pavan said reassuringly.

At a distance on the road we could vaguely spot a Jeep. It was the cops.

“Man, what if they catch us? Fuck, we even left the bike documents in the house and came. And we are drunk and driving. Shit” I was praying.
And sure enough, they stopped us. One of the constables asked us to pull the bike over to the side of the footpath. The other went inside the jeep, pulled out a walkie-talkie and started mumbling into it. I could see Pavan was feeling nervous here.

“Sir, we have caught them.” The constable was saying into the walkie-talkie. “The bike is also there.”

“What bike? And caught us for what?” I said to Pavan. He knew as much as I. The other constable was looking away from us. Pavan immediately took out his mobile and dialled Lodde’s number.

“Lodde, listen. Cops have caught us. The bike documents are on the fridge. Get them and reach near the Temple Arch soon. Or else we guys are screwed.” Pavan whispered hurriedly.

The constable stood there looking at us. We were too nervous to go up to him and open our alcohol-laden mouths. Nor did he say a word to us. 5 minutes went too slow. Finally, we could see the head light of Bogu’s Black Pulsar. I heaved a sigh of relief. At least the documents had come now. Bogu and Lodde stooped their bike right in front of us, took out the documents from the cover and gave it to Pavan.

Suddenly, the constable who had been on the walkie-talkie walked up to us and produced two handcuffs. And all 4 of us were rounded up.

On the way to the Police Station, sitting at the back of the jeep, I looked at Lodde’s face. He was puzzled way beyond human reason. All they had done was come to the rescue of their friends with some stupid bike documents. And now, all 4 of us were riding to jail. What the hell was going on? The constables wouldn’t answer. The mute dummies just drove.

“Sir, we caught these 4 guys with 2 black Pulsars. It’s definitely somebody amongst them”, the constable told the inspector as he lined us up.

“Tell me who did it and I’ll be nice to you. Mess around with me and you’ll become dog food. Bastards, tell me who did it?” the Inspector thundered at us.
We kept our heads down without understanding what was going on, but knowing for sure that trouble was just around the corner. It seemed like 4 different thieves had broken into a house at the same time.

Mustering all energy I could I looked up at the Inspector and said-“Sir, there’s been a mistake. We haven’t done anything. We are software engineers working at IT Park. We have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Shut up, Son-of-a-bang. Tell me which of you two raped the girl?” the Inspector screamed again.

WHAT?! It was getting crazy. “Sir, we have no idea what you want from us. We don’t know of any rape. We can show our ID cards. There’s obviously been a mistake.” Lodde was pleading.

After some persuasion, he saw light. Pavan called on Tony to get the ID Cards from the estate house.

15 minutes later, a confused Tony walked into the Police station with the ID Cards. We were released from the whole mess. The Inspector apologized to us and explained the whole confusion: earlier that evening, a girl had been raped near the place where we were caught. Eyewitnesses had seen 2 boys speed away on a black Pulsar. Unfortunately, we were also 2 boys on a black Pulsar twice over.

As we were walking away from the craziest experience of our lives towards our bikes, I looked at Pavan and said-“Isn’t it funny? We got caught and had no documents. Then they could have booked us for drunken driving, in which case you would have lost your license. Shit, what a close shave that was!”

Pavan smiled back at me and said, “Do you want to know what a closer shave is?” He took out a packet of grass from his back pocket. My tongue almost fell out.

(appeared in Srijan 2006, the annual magazine of NIT-H)