Henry

The square was bustling with the weekend crowd. Families were out to enjoy a rare sunny day. After a few days of incessant rain, the sun was finally out and it was a weekend. Everyone was making the most of it. She sat patiently on a seat in the city centre, surrounded by a bunch of shopping bags. She felt tired as she’d had a hectic week at work. But they had promised the kids a fun weekend. The drive to the city centre from their small town was a good hour and a few minutes. And she had driven all the way because he said he was too tired to drive. “I’ll look after the kids once we reach the city” he promised. She sat watching people all around her, as her husband had taken the kids for ice cream and games nearby.

 Amidst the regular noise of the bustling square a faint tune drifted towards her. At first she couldn’t place it but the familiarity of it got her attention. She tried to figure out where it came from.

 At one corner of the square was an old record store which had closed down. Retail music was as good as dead in the age of digital downloads. The tune seemed to be coming from there. As she looked in that direction she could see the stem of a guitar and a bony hand playing it. She was intrigued and picked up her shopping bags walking towards the guitar player. As she came closer, she found another empty seat and sat down with her bags, listening to the familiar tune. Because she was closer she could hear that not just the tune, but even the voice sounded very familiar. She got up from her seat to go and take a look.

 He looked well over 50. His unkempt long hair was mostly white just like his flowing beard. His skin was pale and sagging and his lips were heavily tobacco stained. His blue denim shirt and faded jeans seemed to complement his face almost perfectly. And it was then that her eyes went down on his shoes. Those blue and white keds with the laces tied in that distinctly odd fashion. Almost instinctively she looked up at his face again. Those deep steel grey eyes which already seemed to hide some unknown sadness so well. Those eyes…

 It was him !!!

 She couldn’t believe the man she was seeing in front of her. He seemed to have aged way beyond his years. As always he seemed lost in his music, oblivious to her presence or anyone else’s for that matter. From time to time he shut his eyes whilst singing… just like the old days.

 As she stood staring at him, transfixed, an era of memories swept through her. Of times they spent together, moments they shared together, a life they had lived together.

 “I want to travel the world and sing. Just me and my guitar. And you”. She felt he added the last line just to appease her.

 “And what about my job” as always, she was amused at his ideas being completely impractical.

 “You have your laptop don’t you. How will your work get affected” he seemed so convinced and so blissfully unaware of the unfeasibility of his “simple plan”. 

“Yeah right” she realised how difficult it was to discuss these things with him

 She couldn’t help but feel sad for the way he had become. The last time she had seen him was at a pub where he was playing. He seemed ill at ease trying to cater to the demands of the audience playing the popular tunes of the day. She knew how uncomfortable and angry it made him. Being asked or instructed to sing something. He always sang from his heart. And that’s what he wanted to do. She wasn’t still married at that time but was engaged all the same. She didn’t feel comfortable walking up to him and saying hi. She was relieved he too hadn’t noticed her.

 Now after so many years seeing him in that city square jolted her at some level. Her eyes swelled up as she stood there listening to him sing one song after another.

 Her thoughts were broken by a gentle tap on her shoulder and a simultaneous hug from behind. Her husband and kids were back.

 “Mama let’s go home now we’re tired”

 “No mama we’re not tired it’s just that he wants to go home and play his new Xbox game”

 “Mama I’m really tired you know…”

 She wasn’t really paying attention to what her children were saying as she put her head on her husband’s shoulder listening to the “old man” sing.

 “He’s good isn’t he? Hey he’s even selling some of his own CDs. Why don’t we get one”; her husband said, almost as if he read her mind.

 The younger of the two boys took the crisp note from his father and went across to hand it to the man in exchange of a CD. The old man looked surprised, handed the CD and ran his hands over the young boys face in a moment of gratefulness. She made sure she was away from his sight and he could only see her husband and mouthed a silent ‘thank you’ to him in appreciation.

 As they headed homeward she requested her husband to drive. He wasn’t thrilled but eventually agreed to sit on the driver’s seat. The children bantered with each other on the back seat as she had her head resting on the side window humming an old tune, the CD clutched in her hands.

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