This tale was born on Colva’s premier beach. I cut the umbilical cord with the buzz that accompanies copious amount of beer on a cold February night. The story has been since stewing in the recesses of my mind, unable to see the light of day until another story pushed it out.
It has been, personally, one of the toughest weeks of my life; I think I did it well this time. No breakdowns, I didn’t give in to temptation and I kept my head firmly in place. But this isn’t the story of my bravado it is the one I narrated on a beach while chewing on a wonderful chocolate chip muffin.
Three friends, a fishing boat and the secret to levitation
The three lights were constant on Colva's horizon. People had stopped questioning who those bobbing lights belonged to. Many years ago a geology grad had explained, to the locals, it was the reflection of a methane eruption usually seen when garbage is dumped offshore. "In a few million years it will be oil," he said brightly. A few god-fearing fishermen had ascertained it was where damnation and earth met. "It is all described in those missing pages that the Vatican doesn't want us to read," they concluded. The lifeguards dismissed it as a whale with a tag that reflects when the moon shines on it. No one knows of a whale in South Goa; if there was one, it would have been on our tables.
Old man Crab said he knew. No one paid heed to the old man. He was old, wrinkled, had long arguments with dogs, was a vegetarian and looked like a hermit crab. No one listens to someone who ties their house—a cardboard box—on their back. But Crab knew and when Crab died, the secret died with him. Crab died in peculiar circumstances, he was as strong as a horse, the three bouncers from the posh beach shack up the beach can testify to that. He had once wrestled the three men, a fourth his age, beat them into submission and then bought them beer. Crab, witnesses said, was seen screaming—he is back—while pointing at an even older man, he then kneeled over and died. I met that mysterious old man, and here is that story…
I
A young boy, not more than thirteen, his shirt unbuttoned, his school shorts dirty with wet sand and sea shells ran the beach with abandon, he ran everywhere, he often hoped, if he ran fast enough he would take off. It was his dream to fly.
We all have dreams in which we fly. These flying dreams, according to popular psychology, tell us about the state of mind. We fly over cliffs and over monuments, we fly out of tough situations and some of us fly into tough situations—if you have a messiah complex. But not this boy, when dreamed off flying he could smell the salt and he could hear the cries of the sea gulls, he felt the wind ruffling his hair. He saw his hair, it was long and curled, and it also had a few beads in it. He always woke up when he saw his hair. He had these dreams in the afternoon in an abandoned boat, where he would rest to escape the white heat of the sun.
This day, his boat was the home to an old man.
He was certainly not a local, his accent was different. He had wrinkled skin, his shirt so baggy it covered his fingers, his pants were held up, gracefully, by a piece of cloth tied around his waist. His shaggy beard covered his face, his hair—dark—dropped to his eyes.
“You love to run, don’t you?” the old man asked. The old man looked familiar, the boy didn’t reply. “Have you tried to fly?” the old man asked. The boy nodded.
“Come with me, Abe and I’ll teach you.”
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