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Tarak got the call from Charan around 1:30 at night.
During the afternoon recording, he felt Charan was not in the right state. Although he was usually very quiet, he would make a quick remark during the interconversation, but Charan was worringly quiet today. It's like something sapped his energy away completely. Sitting on the sofa beside Tarak, he was as quiet as if he was not there.
To make matters worse, Tarak actually found that Charan seemed to be ill, but he had not mentioned it to Tarak since they met. Perhaps because he didn’t want him to worry, Charan greeted him as usual and joked with him. But several times during the interview, Tarak noticed that Charan turned his head away and coughed low over his mouth. Charan coughed tensely, but softly, with an effor of repression, and he could feel the sofa vibrating beneath him. For a long time Charan frowned in patience, but only coughed gently when he could not restrain himself anymore. As the interview ended and he got up to leave, Tarak swears he caught a glimpse of Charan's forehead sweating.
But Charan didn't say, so he didn't ask anything. They were all grown men, they knew how to take care of themselves, and if Charan didn't say anything, it was no big deal. So Tarak accepted the fact that Charan had hugged him outside the studio and then hurried off in the car without holding his hands for the usual long talk, trying not to think about the puzzling discovery that Charan seemed to have lost a lot of weight since the last time they met.
But the brian is an undependable organ that tends to defy the will, and if you tell it not to think something, it will think exactly of that.
So Tarak began to recall his innocuous, insignificant, even inconclusive finding, searching for clues in his memory, such as Charan's unusually thin wrist as it moved with the gesture of his speech; Like when he laid his hand on Charan's knee, he felt the empty trousers, and the prickly bones beneath them; Like the brief moments when he felt that Charan was meek, just enough to fit in his arms... It's all these nonsense.
That's it. Charan is Charan. Besides, he had already left.
After turning the pile of thoughts over and over again, Tarak arrived at his hotel before he knew it. He lives in President Mumbai in South Mumbai because it has the best serviced apartments in the city. Despite it’s during the publicity period, he still prefers to live in an apartment, where it's easier to cook. Charan's hotel was to the north of the island city, around Buck Bay, and it made sense for him to live there, with its beautiful coastline and nearby temples.
Tarak sat in his room, turning on the television as a habit, using the noise to cover up the clutter of his thoughts. When the excitement of speaking openly to the camera passed, the memories of the past during the shooting period were chewed to the point of boredom, and the deadly logical reflection began to prevail again. Tarak worries if they've gone too far. But he couldn't help himself. He was too fond of Charan. Like as long as Charan appeared in his side he will not be able to stop getting close and touch Charan. And he knew that Charan had done the same, because he had given the same response to the actual, in words, in actions, in whatever way they could. This made Tarak feel assured. He's the kind of person who likes things that have a sense of validation.
The question for Tarak now was whether to send Charan a message to ask him how he was doing, and maybe ask him out for drinks. However, they had other promotion activity scheduled for the next day, and have to leaving early in the morning. And if Charan was as ill as he thought, it would not be good to disturb his rest. On reflection, far from being his own style, Tarak, discouraged and confused, had to shower, cook, watch TV and send messages harassing their director, Rajamouli, in an attempt to pass the time by annoying him.
Somehow it lasted till midnight. It was strange because he was usually one of those early sleepers who gets very sleepy after eleven o 'clock, but this night he just couldn't fall asleep, as if he was waiting for something to happen. By some sort of god’s arrangement, at about 1:30 in the morning, he got a call from Charan.
To be honest, Tarak didn't know what he was expecting when he picked up the phone, since Charan probably wouldn’t ask him to hang out this late. But as soon as he heard Charan's voice calling his name, his heart sank.
Because Charan sounds really, really bad. His nose sounded stuffed, voice was hoarse, barely able to make a sound. The phone seemed to be pressed to his mouth very close because he does not have any strength to lift his hand.
"Tarak… I’m not feeling very well."
"What's the matter? Have you take any medicine? Did you talk to the assistant?"
"I don't want them to see me like this. Besides, it's very late."
"So that’s why you can only trouble me is it?"
"Rajamouli lives too far away..."
"Hey, I'm just kidding. Send me your hotel address and room number and I'll be right there."
"Ok. Be safe on the road. Oh and... Thank you."
After hanging up the phone, Tarak, distraught, took out the car the team had rented for him and set off without giving notice to anyone. He detours to a 24-hour pharmacy to buy some medicine, he is not happy also does't know what's happening to Charan, he can only buy some over-the-counter ibuprofen and antipyretics, grabbed a tola of ashvagandha anyway, because he remembers when people at home have a headache or sore throat the elders often take this plant and boiled tea. Got a big bag and rattled, ignored the sympathy from the pharmacist’s eyes, he quickly got out of the door, jumped in the car and continued rushing on to Charan's place.
When Tarak got there, he knocked softly on the door, and after some time heard a rustling in the room. Charan got up slowly to answer the door, opening it a little, and before Tarak could get a good look at his face, he turned and slammed back into bed.
He must be really not feeling very well.
Tarak let himself into the room, put the medicine at the nightstand, and sat down worriedly on Charan's side of the bed, turning Charan's body to face him. Charan looked terrible. His hair was wet and untidy, his eyes were red and swollen, and he was abnormally warm. Still worried, Tarak tried Charan's forehead again with his hand. "Damn it burns." And quickly retracted his hand, go to the bag to search for antipyretic medicine.
Charan's eyes never blinked as Tarak gave him his medicine and water. When this was done, Tarak climbed into bed and lay down beside Charan, face to face, outside the covers.
"Get some sleep and you’ll feel better when you wake up. I'm right here." He said, reaching gently out his hand to dab the sweat from Charan's forehead.
Charan's eyes were clouded with a sickly heat, even his blinks were slow and weak, but he would not remove his gaze away from Tarak's face, as if he were afraid that Tarak would vanish in one blink.
"I can't sleep." Charan sniffed aggrievedly and whispered.
"That’s not a good idea, you need to rest..."
"Could you talk to me for a little while, Tarak?"
Tarak was two years older than Charan, but many times he felt that Charan was his mentor. The precocious young man seemed to know what he wanted from the start, or perhaps he had been so perfectly sculpted and clearly defined by his family and elders that he was mistaken for having an idea of his own. All he does is try to prove himself, to have a goal and not let go, because being lost may be his deepest fear. For Tarak, it is the norm, and it is also his posture of opening to the risks. He will always seek something unknown in life, and only in this way can he feel practically alive. Tarak wondered sometimes whether Charan, his dear brother without ties of blood, longed for freedom or feared it, or perhaps both. Charan loves so many things and so many people, and though it exhausts him to satisfy them, he cannot stop because he sees it as the purpose of his existence. Tarak was the only one who saw it and said it to him. Tarak was thus the only man to Charan who he could unburden himself towards. For he had told Charan, "You will never have to prove yourself to me. I have loved everything about you from the moment I met you."
It's like I've been yours since we first met.
So Tarak leaned over and spoke to Charan. They are always one to talk and one to listen. It's their own way of communicating to each other. Tarak goes from family trivia to some of the outrageous pranks they've done on set, to how Rajamouli once lost his temper and made Charan laugh by mimicking Rajamouli in a low voice with an exaggerated face so as not to alarm the guests next door. He and Charan talk about their past; the silent, melancholy years; how their younger selves lost their place and found their way back, the past and future of the Indian film industry… And finally, inevitably, life and death, the temporary and permanent separation they will face.
Tarak told Charan all this. The syllables of the words fell into the pool of the somber narrative, echoing in the room like the sound of rain drops falling into the water. Finally, he dimmed the lamp on the nightstand, got underneath the quilt, lay down very close to Charan, and found Charan's feeble fingers, which he had hidden under the covers, and took them into his hand.
Charan was wearing a thin undershirt, and the air around him was moist and warm, giving off a meek, tired feel. Tarak was so close that the tip of his nose almost touched the tip of Charan's, Charan had to bend his head and turned his face toward the void between Tarak's neck and chest. Tarak ruffled the back of his head dearly, and brought him close, deep, deep into his encompass.
Now they are lying down face to face in an embrace.
Tarak puts an arm around Charan's waist and felt the thin, tight muscles there. Chest against chest, thigh against thigh. Tarak's breath was full of Charan. It was as if he breathed an air called Charan. No one started it between them; it was an act they both initiated and connived at. It was as if an invisible force had pulled their beating hearts closer and closer to each other, until the two flesh-and-blood organs were so close, the chest and bones being all that stood between them.
Charan was too quiet, his silence broken only by an occasional cough. And he wasn't trying to sleep neither. As a cloud of worry gathered in Tarak's mind, he considered whether to call and cancel tomorrow's event with the producer. Suddenly Charan lifted his head from Tarak's chest, and Tarak saw his face and instantly read its expression: it was something they had both longed for and missed for so many days and nights, the longing that went down like silk cuts into bones, even when they were facing each other they missed each other. Tarak felt as if he was falling inexorably in some direction, descending, sinking.
"Tarak, can I... May I kiss you? I want to kiss you so much. It means the world to me right now. I really need to kiss you, is that okay?"
Charan held his hand almost in prayer. Tears welled up in his eyes, and his eyelashes were completely wet.
Tarak felt a sharp downward tug on his stomach, and the connected nerves at the tips of his fingers ached. He wanted to kiss Charan's eyes. Those beautiful eyes, should not cry for anyone so distressed. He wants to put his lips on that, he put his lips on that, on Charan’s warm eyelids from the fever, strains out those tears with his mouth, then moved his lips, salty liquid residue on his lips, he licked with his tongue, as if to do so can put Charan in his mouth, savouring him, and tasted his bitterness, fragile and despair; It was as if he had taken these things away from Charan, eaten, digested, deformed. He wanted to actually be able to do that. But be looked down at Charan, and then, to his heartbreak, saw that Charan’s eyes were wet again. His effort was to no avail, for the tears had not come from Charan’s eyes, but the heart.
"Charan, Charan," he said. When spoke again, Tarak sat up in bed. Charan was barely able to rose but managed eventually, and sat opposite him. Tarak could only hold Charan's face in his hands and keep calling his name. "No, I can't, I can't." He pressed his forehead against Charan's. It's feverish in there. The moment he uttered the word "no," Charan trembled uncontrollably. Tarak knew it was his reaction to suppress his crying. He knew him well enough to have seen his body's natural reaction to any emotion. Because they've acted against each other pretty much with every emotion in the world. And they had seen everything the other could show before that: they had already gut themselves open to show each other.
"Oh, Charlan, my brother..." Tarak spoke, shocked by the pain amidst his voice. Charan's downcast eyeline rose, drifted for a moment, and then fixed on Tarak's eyes, like a drowning man clinging to the only piece of driftwood by his side. In the dim light of the incandescent bulb and within this intimate range, Tarak could now see clearly. It was not his delusion. Charan was indeed much thinner than before. The cheeks covered under the stubble were noticeably sunken, around the eyes were marked by traces of deep fatigue, the lips were dry and grey, and the silhouette of the neck, which had been concealed at the margin of his clothes, were unusually tenuous. Some kind of strong feeling flooded through him, and he wanted to lean in at once and give Charan the kiss he wanted, as if it were the only thing in the world that could save him from this impasse, the only thing he could give at that moment.
But he didn't. He couldn't. No, because he loves his wife, too. Because he said those vows. For someone had come into his life before Charan, and had possessed and taken away what he could, and longed for, to give Charan with a pang of heart.
"I can't kiss you, Charan."
Charan finally let out a weak sob, whimpering shakily. His body was no longer trembling, but was also completely lifeless. Tarak held him by the shoulders with both hands so that he could sit before him and not fall.
“There's no turning back for any of us, Charan.”
“I don't want to and I can't. I don't want you to do it for me neither.”
“Charan, I love you. I love Pranathi, too. Don't you love Upa?”
“I'm sorry, I really can't. I love you, and I can love you even more than I do now. I can love you more than I can love anyone in the world. But I can't kiss you. Do you understand?”
“Charan, say something Charan... Charan?”
Tarak gently shook Charan's shoulder. Charan was like an inanimate muppet, his eyes clearly still filled with tears, but they were no longer sparkling and bright, but inexplicably gray. It was as if a fire which had been burning inside, had gone out.
Tarak was getting really worried. The apprehension is becoming overwhelmingly noticeable. He ducked down, trying to get into Charan's downcast gaze and find what he hoped to find in his eyes. He even squeezed Charan's chin in his hand, forcing him to look up at him.
Charan's empty expression, with a slight frown, made him ache more than anything. He wanted so much to hold him in his arms that he would have done so in normal times, but in this case he feared that this sudden intimacy would give Charan an unrealistic promise. As Tarak hesitated, Charan turned his head, trembling, and coughed so violently that his whole body shook, his lungs made a terrible hissing sound as he breathed in. For a few moments, Tarak feared if he might suffocate.
Tarak held Charan after all. Letting Charan’s cough sink into his chest, his neck, between his arms and shoulders, Charan’s breath leaving a moist touch on his skin. Tarak wrapped his arms around Charan, feeling that he had never embraced anything as fragile as this Charan right here. He was taut with pain, ribs on the side of his body pressing against Tarak’s forearms, spine on the back pressing against Tarak’s palms that held him. Tarak remembered Charan has never been more macilent than this. He remembered Charan as someone who loved and knew how to use his body, rather than the frighteningly weak he was now. Tarak was sad. He felt sad for Charan, and for both of them. For a moment he felt desperate. It was like watching Charan drown and being the only one who could save him, tied to the shore and struggling so hard that the rope cut into the flesh of his wrists, but his toes could not touch the edge of the abyss where Charan was in.
"Charan, you must understand. I don't know what to do... You are so... I can't see you like this anymore... I don't know what to do, Charan."
Tarak cried, too.
His weeping pulled Charan from his muddled nightmare. Charan found Tarak's eyes again, this time, he saw within where the pain is going to overflow; as well as love, the unspoken love; the straightforward and eager attention and concern; the sustain of their love and reluctancy of letting go; more than one thousand memories of the day and night spent together; an elder brother's kind of grief; and that pure kindness, only thing you can find from the sentient beings in this nature, are filled in those eyes, and then, without reservation, completely fell on Charan with a gaze.
That was all Tarak could give him.
He could not kiss Charan, but he could give Charan all these things.
Charan suddenly felt like an unreasonable, cruel child asking a homeless man with nothing for the only piece of candy he had in his pocket, when he had all the candy in the world. And the last thought that broke him was that this man, without even thinking about it, took the candy out of his pocket and handed it to him. He had done so with the condemnation of the world, but he was loved only by the one he had forcibly demanded -- his Tarak.
His furrowed brows were suddenly unfurled and re-frowned by the realisation of what he had done to Tarak and to themselves. Perhaps no one in the world would ever love him as much as Tarak does, or in the same way as Tarak did.
But only from this one person, with this one kind of love, like everyone can only live just once.
He wants to stop Tarak's tears, tell him how selfish he is, but the pain and illness let him feel very grievance. He was still groggy and chest dripping wet, felt like he could collapse anytime, the body has no energy, he can't find his voice, throat hurts from day and night of coughs, cuts him every time he tries to make a sound. He could only fall towards Tarak, sank in his arms, his body pressed against Tarak’s shoulder, his fingers inserted in Tarak’s fingers, clasping the back of Tarak’s hand, his face in Tarak’s neck, his lips pressed against the arteries of Tarak’s neck, feeling the tremor there. Every inch of skin that touched was an apology he wanted to say to Tarak, and he wanted to say as much as he could.
Tarak's sobs trailed off and died away. In a trance, Charan felt vaguely that something resembling an end was approaching them. He blew it. He knows it. But if he started it, he brought it on himself, and he can't blame anyone else. Tarak, his only brother, his dearest friend, this love, chaste as a white nenuphar, was destroyed beyond recognition by his capricious whim. But there was nothing he could do. At least he tried. Now it was not up to him.
Charan felt a sudden, deep fatigue, as if the last strength he had squeezed from his bones had been drained. He wanted time to stop at this moment and the planet they were on cease to spin, dying off. He wished that he would die right now, torn apart by the sleepless days and nights of parting with Tarak, like a piece of wet paper torn by the salt air, collapsing and disappearing into nothing, so that he would not have to face what was to come.
Suddenly Tarak pushed Charan away from him. Charan came back into Tarak's sight, the look of terror on Charan’s face made his heart ache again. The result of this feeling was that Tarak looked at Charan with a very serious expression.
It was a quarter to four in the morning, outside the window, there was a faint shadow of the pale clouds before the sunrise, the air was filled with a kind of empty silence as if everything had settled.
"Tarak, no." Charan pleads, with a heartbreaking softness and resignation in his voice. But he saw with despair that Tarak was shaking his head.
A strong itch built up in his throat, he wanted to cough, his lungs were so tight that it almost stopped working, and his weary body could not pull him back together for another second. He was not sure what Tarak would say or do next. He could only pray, pray that he would not hurt him again. He really, really could not bear one more inch of pain. He looked at Tarak with imploring eyes.
And Tarak, as if he had just found a long-lost treasure from some distant place, silently raised his hand, put his forefinger and middle finger together, and then, covering his lips, printed a deep, long kiss between the first and second knuckles of those two fingers on the inside.
Tarak kissed his own fingers ecstatically, his eyes closed, his frowning brows slowly unfurled as the kiss went on, the corners of his mouth turned slightly, his face changed, suddenly became soft and intoxicated, like a young lover kissing his partner with all his world.
A moment later, he opened his eyes and saw Charan staring at him blankly, utterly stirred up the tenderness in his heart. Then he turned his fingers and pointed the pulp at Charan's direction, then imprinted on Charan's lips those warm fingertips he had just kissed. Charan gave a shudder, slacken completely, closed his eyes with relief, and a large drop of tear ran down his eyelashes and landed in the upturned purlicue of Tarak's hand, breaking into small sprays, and becoming the only thing that’s glimmering between them.
Outside the window, the dawn of the new day was already rising up, illuminating Maharashtra's sprawling south-eastern coastline. The busy, bustling city was now waking up beneath their feet. Far away, the morning prey of Shree Siddhivinayak Ganpati Mandir, through the windswept city, had somehow reached a hundred miles up in the air, and reverberated at their windows, like the blessing and acquiesce of the secret that was going on in this room, from the gods.
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