Pritam's Blog
Being Alice In A Fucked Up, Homophobic Country
The phone rang. It was an unknown number, and yet I picked it up for some unknown reason.
“Is it Pritam?”
“Yes…”
“I am Reema. I got your number from one of your friends. I need to talk to you about something very important…”
“Sure…”
“You know Alice, don’t you?”
Alice. The name activated the memory cells in my brain, and I felt a sudden jerk in my heart. Alice. Where is she now? What does this girl want to say about her?
“Yes, I knew her. We are not in touch though. It has been years…”
“Doesn’t matter. You can still help me. You guys were close, right?”
“She was my friend…”
Alice was my friend and we shared the same flat few years back. No, there wasn’t any ‘lovey-dovey’ kind of feeling from either side. But we were like really cool buddies. Both of us were from the North-East, introvert, and felt ‘out-of-place-and-time’ in the crowd. That brought us together. And we decided to take a flat together. Our immense love for food was another reason why we liked each other. And so my initial days in Bangalore was quite happening because of her.
But things changed. She left the course, and the flat, not Bangalore though. And it ended with bad terms. And we lost touch. We didn’t even have any common friend…
But I never stopped missing her.
And now, after all these years, someone called me to talk about her. It felt so “inexplicable”…
″ Not just friend… You were close to each other…, ” she said. “You shared the same flat. And so I guess you have her parents’ contact number… Could you please give it to me. I need to talk to them…”
I didn’t have their number. We were close, but we were introvert too. I never asked her about anything that’s not my business, nor did she… We had kept our families out of it.
“I don’t have their number. And even if I had it, I wouldn’t have given it to you. You are a stranger. Why do you need it anyway?”
“Well…” She mumbled…
“Say it…”
“She is bothering me… She is, kind of, stalking me … It has been years. My parents want to go to the police. But I told them that they should at least talk to her parents before that…”.
I couldn’t believe what I just heard. At the same time, I knew she wasn’t lying. There wasn’t any reason for her to lie.
And it explained why she left… The course, the flat… The life…
Stalking someone from her own sex for years could only mean she was something she is not supposed to be in this fucked up, homophobic country…
Also because of her introvert nature, she never shared this with anyone. She just …suffered… She couldn’t move on… She couldn’t get in touch with someone like her. And she ended up stalking the one person she loved…
I told Reema to wait for some time before taking any drastic steps. If Alice’s parents come to know about it, they will react the way homophobes react to situations like this, and Alice will probably do something stupid…
I asked Reema to talk to Alice if it’s possible. She said that that’s not possible. She doesn’t even have her number, nor her address. That’s why she got in touch with me… before going to the police.
But she said she would wait …
Meanwhile I will keep looking for Alice… I know I can help her if only I can talk to her just once… I need to talk to her…