Man with the black hands

It was a hectic day at school after making necessary arrangements for the science exhibition which was to be held tomorrow. I never had time to make a little science project of my own as I was the head of the organizing committee which was something everyone else nominated me for as no one was interested in doing those stuff.

Everyone wanted to show their colours by putting forward some marvellous science project to impress others. I started walking towards my lane after getting down from the bus which was crowded with sweaty people smelling bad trying to get the home, the trademark smell making the start of evening rush in Colombo. In the morning, it is the smell of the perfumes in buses which marks the start of the rush hour.

“Get this man out from here, you bastard comes every day to make me lose my temper,” Subasinghe uncle who owns the kottu shop opposite to our lane was shouting pointing towards some man lying next to the shop. Everyone was gathering to see Subasinghe uncle shouting while I was also watching it from the opposite side of the road.

I could see a man with a long beard wearing a black torn trouser and a white turned brown shirt was trying to put his hands together and beg while the two boys working at the kottu shop dragged him from that place. He was pale in colour and had some sort of bag hanging around his neck. The two boys have dragged him by grabbing from his shoulders while he was still on the ground.

But the whole scene made me feel nothing, I just stood and watch it for a while and started walking home again but stopped again to watch when Subasinghe uncle started yelling in filth. The man was dragged to the bus stop and the two boys said something I could not hear pointing fingers at the man and then it was all over. So I started my walk towards home, thinking about the possible curries my mum had prepared today.

The next day was the day I never wanted to go through, thinking about the science exhibition gave me endless headaches. How was I going to get all things done? I was already late and running to catch the 6.30 bus although I had set my alarm to 5, my mum was the saviour who finally woked me up at 5.45 am. It was mum who I always believed to get me out of trouble, once when I was in grade 7 I lied to my maths teacher saying that my mum was sick and I had to attend to her and I was unable to my homework.

It was a lie I used for at least two weeks straight to save myself from the beating and scolding for my laziness. And when my teachers asked my mother how she was feeling on the parents day she went along with it. She never asked me why I lied or beat me up for saying such a lie. Even though I felt guilty for making her part of my lies I never apologised to her but I did not want to be my father.

As I was running towards the bus stop I saw the man who was dragged along the road by the two boys working at Subasinghe uncle’s shop yesterday was picking up leftovers from the garbage bin and eating them. Seeing that made me feel disgusted I was so mad at him doing that early morning when people are busy getting into their day’s work. All the people were turning away their heads when they see him doing that, “How disgusting is it to do that,” I thought to myself.

There were bits and pieces of paper stuck between the nest-like hair of the man while his beard was more brown than grey, there were wounds in the exposed parts of his body by the torn cloths. He had black hands which remind me of my hands covered in dark colours when I used to meddle with watercolours and draw on the walls in the house when I was 6 or 7 years old.

After the usual prayers by our Principle, Father Bosman, our chief guest an old boy of the school who is a renowned professor of physics marked the opening of the exhibition by visiting the stalls. Many of them admired the science projects in the exhibition especially the multi-tasking robotic arm which was able to write and draw and the huge black hole demonstration. Only I knew the turmoil I went through to organise all from decorations to lightings to power and getting all the stuff inside the hall without any damages.

The exhibition itself was my science project considering the little time and funds available, getting all the things to work smoothly to give an effective and efficient output. I only had milo for the entire time at school as I lost my appetite because of what that man with the black hand was doing near the garbage bin early morning. It made me feel like vomiting every time I think about that.

At the end of the exhibition, Father Bosman met the members of the organising committee not to thank us but to see the collection of donations given to the soo called chemistry lab for the science section which is being built for the past five years. Father Bosman was a religious man of two faces, he was always concerned about the donations made to the school whatever the event was, one face would say to the parents “God will provide, we have faith” but his other face would always search for donations.

There are friends of mine at school whose families were baptised just to get admission to the school and to avoid the huge payments that should be made by non-christian students. Although we were Christians from birth and although I went to Sunday school for 11 years, I never was a believer, maybe because I saw and heard things from religious leaders such as Father Bosman that made me think there is no God.

On my way home, I saw the man with the black hand was sleeping on the pavement, his face seems somewhat peaceful after causing my loss of appetite. At that moment I felt some kind of hatred towards him.“How could he sleep soo peacefully when I can’t get that image of him eating from the garbage bin?” I made up my mind not to even look at him after that.

That night I dreamt about the man with the black hand offering me leftover food from the garbage bin saying me to just take a bite, the food his hand had worms and other insects coming out of it. They were looking at me with a disgusted face and said, “ We don't want to go inside you, this man has all our relatives inside him. we want to be with them not inside your clean stomach,”

Next day, Saturday was the beginning of the tuition weekend, I woke up early morning and left home. I had Maths and Chemistry the whole day and Physics on Sunday. As I was the on the way to my first tuition class of the day I was soo nervous that I would see that man with the black hand which would lead to me losing my appetite in that day. But even thinking bout that had already made be lose my appetite as I skipped my breakfast in the class.

I was never a fan of tuition, I got through Ordinary Level exams without tuition and never would have gone tuition for Advanced Level if not for the sudden realisation after my first term exams in the A/L.I was the only one who did not go to any tuition in that term but when I became the 23rd out of 26 children in my class my friends were telling me that I should change my tuition classes to those well-reputed tuition classes in Colombo. They always thought I was lying when I said I never went to tuition, according to them you can't perform well without going to tuition classes.

So accepting defeat in front of the mental games of tuition class paradox I started going to those well-reputed classes in Colombo. I was good at drawing, especially with watercolours, I wanted to choose Arts for my A/L but the pressure of my relatives and neighbours forced me to choose science because of the fear of not being able to get a job in the future. They said even getting simple passes in science will help me to get a decent job unlike with Arts.

In the first year of my A/L, I realised that its okay to miss school but not the tuition classes although we pay a considerable amount of money to the school every four months. I also realised its kind of prestige to go the classes of those reputed tuition masters, once I said the names of the tuition masters I go, they started looking at me and talking to me differently. Apart from the true geniuses who always score high in the exams, educational performance of others was assessed by the reputation of the tuition master they go to.

Then on the second year which is the year I am in now, non-geniuses were assessed on the number of tuition classes they go, everyone went to at least two tuition classes for each subject. Some had classes early morning and after school till midnight and they slept in the school. So in the second year, I was not looked at the in the same way as in the first year. I never found it important to go to more classes, one thing was I never wanted to burden my mother even more by paying for more classes and because I never understood this second-year concept of tuition classes.

Most of the students think (except for true geniuses) that going to more and more classes will along help to get through A/L with high colours but every time I asked them whether they studied for an exam they would simply say they didn't have time to study because of tuition

During the lunch break, I managed to eat something with my friends and we came outside to have a cool drink, it was our custom to have a nice cool drink just to refresh ourselves before the next class. Then I saw the man with the black hand sitting by the garbage bin eagerly waiting till the other students throw their leftover lunch to it. I thought that I was lucky to see him after having my lunch rather than seeing him doing that before I had lunch, which would caused to me to lose my appetite again. I remembered the dream I saw last night and just swept it away from my head.

“Dude, that man is always eating from those garbage bins, I couldn’t properly eat yesterday and today morning because of that man,” I said to my friends not expecting anyone to say something about it. “empty bellies make you do crazy things to just fill them with something. Chris, hunger triumphs all sane things,” said my friend Shehan.

I thought has he suddenly become some philosopher, I felt kind of angry with that response, how can he understand what others feel. He is the one who has two or three affairs with girls in each tuition class when he is already in a serious relationship with another girl. What does he know about how others feel when he himself is playing with the feelings of others. But I decided to just grin and nod along with what he said because I did not want to make a fuss about it or maybe because I wanted to show I have a soft heart for those people.

In the evening, I was waiting for a bus to return home at the bus stop with my friends, then I saw the man with the black hands was sitting by the bus stop with his back resting on the white wall of the big house behind the bus stop. My friends started to leave one by one and when I was alone waiting for my bus, I turned and looked at the man with the black hands a couple of times until I realise that he was staring at something the whole time.

Then I looked at what he was staring at, my inner voice started laughing in a sarcastic way. so this man is just not a crazy man but a crazy pervert who eats from garbage bins. The man with the black hands was staring at a girl at the bus stop who were wearing tight jeans. After a while, I saw a boy who was standing in front of the man with the black hands and grabbed from his collar making him stand up.

“Do you like watching the backs of young girls, you pervert? Don’t you have daughters? go watch their backs,” said the boy while grabbing his collar. But the man with the black hand was staring at the boy which made the boy even angrier and frustrated. “What are you staring at you crazy pervert? I will pluck your eyeballs out and teach you a good lesson you will never forget,” said the boy.

But the man with the black hands kept on staring at the boy which was it,the boy started beating the man with the black hands, while others were just watching him. At that moment it felt a kind of satisfaction within me, the man who made me lose my appetite since yesterday and almost made me look like a fool in front of my friends is getting beaten up for being a prevent. Now I will finally be able to get over the image of leftover food in the garbage bin. I got onto the bus while the people tried to stop the boy from beating the man with the black hands to death.

That night I slept peacefully without any dreams about the man with the black hand and for the next few days, the man with the black hands was nowhere to be seen and my life went on as before.

After three months I was one month away from A/L exams and after scoring three credit passes in the last term exam at School I made up my mind to settle for three simple passes because of the conception that A/L exams were much harder than school exams.

I was on the bus going to the paper class which I have three days a week for the three subjects, paper classes are rough not like normal tuition classes. All of them starts early as 7.30 in the morning and goes at least till 8 in the night.5 hours to do the papers and then discuss each and every single question for the rest of the day. All the paper classes were not done in the same place where tuition classes were held.

Today I am on my way to the physics paper classes which was furthest, about an hour’s journey in the bus from home.

The paper class went on till 8.30 in the night and I just missed the 8.40 bus home, I was in the bus stop waiting for the 9.10 bus while my friends who were with me at the bus stop started leaving one by one when their parents came to pick them up or when their buses came. At last, it was just me another two men at the bus stop, a round bellied man and another man lying down in the dark at the bus halt.

After a while, the man with the round belly came close to me, I couldn't clearly see his face because it was dark but I saw he was wearing glasses and had a thick moustache. “ what is the time kid?” he asked. “It's 8.55,” I said. “Going home after the class kid?” he asked I didn't expect him to get into a conversation with me. “Yeah, I am facing A/L next month,” I said. Just then my phone rang and it was my mum, “where are you son? are you getting more late to come?”

“I am still at the bus stop mum, the class got late to finish, couldn't catch the 8.40 bus, now waiting for the 9.10 bus. Don't worry I will be there in an hour,” I said. “Okay son, be safe,” and my mum kept the phone. As soon as my mum kept the phone, the man with the round belly asked, “where do you live kid?” I answered him and then again he asked me whether I have a girlfriend which made me just look at for a while before answering it. It was an unusual thing for a stranger to ask.

I felt a kind of uneasiness and took out my phone and started checking WhatsApp for any material tuition master has added to the group to study just to avoid further conversation. Then he started talking about the weather, to which I didn’t listen or replied. Then he knew I was not interested in any conversation. He came close to me but I didn’t look at him, just ignored him. All of sudden he grabbed me by my back and came really close to me and pointed something to my belly.

I was stunned, I couldn't say anything. I didn't even look at him, I just stood looking at the road. “Don’t make a noise boy, the knife in your belly will get inside you if you start shouting, I have been following you for weeks, you look soo fresh. If you come with me now and allow me to enjoy you I will drop you home safely and will also give money,” he whispered to my ear.

He was soo close to me and I was speechless, I could not imagine what to say or do. “What do you say boy? I tried to get your consent nicely but you didn’t show any interest,” round bellied man said grabbing my back harder. “Are you alright kid? is anything wrong?” a voice came from the bus halt. it was the man who was lying in the dark. I just looked at him and turned towards the road as I was unable to speak with the shock.

“ Mind your business old man, this is my nephew. we are waiting for our taxi to go home,” said the round bellied man while pressing the knife even harder at me. In order to make me quiet. “ I asked the kid, not you,” said the man at the bus halt. “ Hey old man, do you want to die early? just shut up and mind your own business. I am taking my nephew home now,” the round-bellied man said.

“Let the kid go or I will teach you a good lesson which will remind you the taste of breats milk you drank from your mother,” said the man in the bus halt. The round-bellied man let go of me and walked towards the bus halt to confront the guy. A noise came and I turned to see the round-bellied man was lying on the ground and the man that was in bus halt was lifting what seems like a crutch to beat the man lying down.

The round belly man stood up with a little moan and suddenly a three-wheel came out of nowhere, he got in it and started swearing to the man at the bus halt, “ Watch yourself, you old bastard,” he said while the three-wheel started racing into the night. “Are you okay kid? where do you live? Beware of those kinds of men, they are worse than murderers” he said while stepping outside the dark into the light of the nearby light post.

I was even more stunned by the seeing this man in the light more than when a knife was pressed against my belly. It was the man with black hands, he was having bandages in his left arm and right leg, the same torn clothes were now with bloodstains and was having a crutch to support him now. Even before I could answer his questions I asked whether he was okay. “Yeah I'm fine kid, there is no more pain for me to go through,” he asked.

“Waiting for the 9.10 bus when that guy came to me,” that all I could manage to say. Then the bus came and I got in. “Take care kid,” he said. I just sat down and kept on staring at him while the bus started to move. The man I kinda hated a few months back who made me lose my appetite, the man I was disgusted to see, saved my life today from being physically violated and possibly being killed.

At that moment I realised I was like Father Bosman, a two-faced man. For three months I didn't care whether he lived or died and now after he saved my life I suddenly started to care for him. I should have told him that I know him that I had seen him being dragged out by the boys at Subasinghe uncle’s shop and seen him eating from garbage bins and also I was there when he got beat up by that boy at the bus stop. My inner voice which laughed at him for being a pervert three months back is now silent. That crazy pervert today saved me from a real pervert.

It was that crazy man with the black hands who showed me finally what kind of person I really was. It was the first and last time in my life that I felt disgusted with my ownself.

That night I dreamt again about the man with the black hands after three months. He was offering me the same leftover food from the garbage bin with worms and insects coming out of it. This time I did not hesitate to eat that and the worms and insects coming out of the food were happy, they said, “ We have found a new home, you are family now,”

Then there was the round-bellied man to my left with his face in the dark and the round belly in the light. His hands were clean white and he was getting inside a young boy from the behind in the same bus stop, while the young boy was crying blood tears. Two-faced Father Bosman was in my right, one face calm and peaceful out in the light while the greedy face was in the dark. The light face of Father Bosman was giving food and wine to a group of round-bellied people standing in a queue while his dark face was grabbing everything including cloths from a queue of slim and thin people.

Next day, I left my maths paper class during the lunch break after doing the paper to find the man with the black hands at the bus stop near my physics paper class. I watched my back while going in the morning and returning to that bus stop for that round-bellied man, knowing that I could only recognize him from his belly. The man with the black hands was by the garbage bin near a shop eating leftovers when I arrived at the bus stop.

For the first time, I was not disgusted at the sight of him eating leftover food from the garbage bin. I approached him, he could not recognise me. I told him I was the boy who he saved last night at the bus stop from that round-bellied pervert. “How are you son? Did he bother you again? I knew something was wrong when that man was suddenly standing close to you,” he said.

I offered him the packet of rich I had made my mother prepare especially for him, saying that it was for one of my friends from the paper class. The man with the black hand got up and took the packet of rice with a gratitude look in his face and started walking towards the bus stop. He sat down in the shade of the big advertisement board displayed in a small building near the bus stop.

As he started to eat, I told him that I know him before from the day he was dragged by the boys at Subasinghe uncle’s shop to the day he was beaten by a boy at a bus stop close to his tuition class. “I was there when that boy beat you calling you a pervert, I am really sorry I could have saved you that day but instead I was glad that you were beaten up in that way,” I said. “It’s okay kid, I am not mad at you for not saving me that day. That boy did beat me up but these bandages were not his fault, I met with an accident. I was in the hospital for two months,” he said.

“Oh my God, are you okay now? Is your leg broken?” I asked him, but I shouldn't have asked about his leg, it was clearly broken. He just looked at his right leg covered with bandages and said “ I don't know what is wrong with the leg, But I don't think it is broken otherwise they would have amputated it,”

“Do you have family or relative you could go to?” I asked him as he was not in a condition to live on the road with all the bandages over him. “ My family is long gone son,” he said. I asked him whether they are dead, he said “ Our families don't leave us even if they are dead, most of my family is alive but they are just gone,” “I don’t understand, if they are not dead how can they be gone?’ I asked him.

“Son, once I had a good family, brothers, sisters, parents, a good wife and a daughter. I was an accountant working in a leading company in Colombo but my daughter was suddenly diagnosed with a tumour in her brain. She was just 15-years old back then, we spent all our fortunes on her treatments, my wife sold all her jewellery, our car and finally, we sold our house. After fighting cancer for two years my daughter passed away. By that time we had sold all our properties and we were living in a rented room,” He said.

I asked him what happen after that, he said, “ Soon after my daughter passed away I was arrested for committing financial fraud at my office. I stole money for the treatments of my daughter. They sentenced me for 10 years for stealing 100,000 rupees from the company books,” “ Then what happened to you wife and the other family members?” I asked him.

“My wife left me soon after I was imprisoned, I do not blame her. She lost her daughter and husband all within one year. I don't know where she is now. My family refused to accept me after I got released from prison. So I decided to live in the road knowing that no one will give me a decent job for my past record,” he said.

“I tried to kill my self twice, one time tried to drown myself in the sea but a lifeguard came and saved me. All these bandages and the possible broken leg was not due to an accident actually. I tried to kill myself by jumping in front of a van. All the things I had done had ended up in failures, I could not even kill myself to leave this misery,” the man with the black hands said, his eyes were filled with tears.

“During the early days of my life on the road, I started begging for money to have my meals. Then people asked why does a man in good clean cloths beg for money and they stop giving me money. So I tore my clothes to look like an actual beggar but then they said I was a cheat and asked why does a man with no physical disabilities beg for money. They said I should find work to do instead of begging,”

“Then when I found work in various places working for daily wages, But my employers delayed paying me just because I was a person living on the road. There were instances where I worked for a week without pay just having the tea they gave. So I decided to quit and you know kid hunger makes you do crazy things just to fill your belly. So I finally decided to eat leftovers from the garbage bins near the shops. But some shop owners did not even approve that saying that I litter the place. So the only pain I fear now is the pain of hunger,” said the man with the black hands and started eating his parcel of rice.

I felt sorry for him, he was not the person I thought about but I did not have any definition about him before, for me he was just that crazy man with black hands eating from the garbage bins. “What happened on that day when you got beaten by that boy?” I asked not trying to make eye contact with him.

“It was all a misunderstanding, I was not looking at the back of girls with pervy ideas. Seeing those girls, it reminded me of my daughter. She never got the chance to experience the things those girls in their 18 and 19s got to experience. She suffered till her death. Her life was over when she was 17 years old. I cannot remember her face now, I don't even have a photo of her. They had buried another person on top of her in the cemetery due to lack of places to bury the dead,” he said.

“Son, never trust in life, 15 years ago I was the happiest man on the planet but now I am eating from garbage bins,” he said looking straight into my eyes.

I left the man with black hands with tears in my eyes promising to return to him once my A/L exams were over. I promised I would take him to my home and introduce him to my mother. When I was on the bus returning home, I thought about the things that had happened in the life of the man with the black hands. He had gone through many sufferings and still, he is living even after trying to kill himself twice.

“Is this proof that there is no God over us? But then how was he there to save me yesterday from that round-bellied man. Was it a coincidence? I started to think. That day I told my mum about the man with the black hands and his life story. I asked mum why he has to go through that kind of suffering? was that because of the sins of his past life? but how come a person suffer for their sins they did in a life they don’t even remember now.

But if he is a Christian then there is no past life for us. My mum just simply said “That's how life is,”

After about a month and a half, when I was done with my school life and exams. I went to that bus halt to keep my promise to take him to my home. But he wasn't there. I asked the shop owners near the bus stop and they said they did not see him for days. I started to get worried, I called my mum and said that the man with the black hands is nowhere to be found. My mum said to come back home and that she will come with me tomorrow to search for the man with the black hands.

Next day, my mum and I searched for him the whole day and for the next one month period I went out every day to search for him but he was nowhere to be found. The only thing that was on my mind was to fulfil my promise to him and bring him to my place. During those days I dreamt of the man with the black hands, him eating with me and my mum at our place, he lyimg dead on the road, him being stabbed by the round-bellied man and his family accepting him back.

After two months, I was returning to Colombo in train after a trip to Nuwara Eliya with my school friends. We got down at Fort railway station was waiting for my friend’s father to pick us up. My friend and I was standing outside the railway station waiting for his father. We saw a large group of people gathered in a circle and there was a police jeep nearby. “Seems like one of those protests that happen regularly here,” my friend said. but more and more people were now gathering around. So we both went to see what was happening.

“Some beggar had died,” said a man coming out of the crowd. “Oh I am not in the mood to see a dead person now,” said my friend and turned away and I was also turning away to go with him when I saw s crutch and bag which looks familiar was taken out by a policeman. I turned around in an instant and went through the crowd to see who was dead.

My heart sank, the man with the black hands was lying dead, his eyes half open and his face without emotion. He still had those bandages on him. I don’t know but I started crying sitting beside him, I cried soo loud, it was like some pointy object is stabbing my heart, it hurt a lot. my friend and his father could not get me out of that place, finally, they both dragged me to the vehicle just like those two boys from Subasinghe uncle’s shop dragged the man with the black hands.

I could not stop crying while I was in the vehicle, I called my mum and told her what had happened, she also started crying because I was crying so much. I said to my mum that I could not keep my promise to him and now he had left me forever. “How can I ever forget about him mum? he saved my life and opened my eyes,” I said. When I went home I hugged my mum and cried for hours. When my friend’s father asked for his name to do his final rituals. I realised I never asked for his name.

That day I slept crying, thinking that the man with the black hands would come in my dreams but he never came in my dreams again.