A Short Thriller from Dubai

by icarus

It was the Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Lights. It’s a celebration that rivals Christmas in pageantry and color – at least in Dubai where better than half of the population are of Hindu descent. Although Christians, most Filipinos in our office join the celebrations. We get invited into the homes of Indian friends and officemates and we partake of the foods and sweets and delicacies prepared to overflowing. For this particular Diwali night, we sort of agreed to gather in Hari’s flat for dinner. His flat has a quite spacious living room equipped with a Videoke, ideal for such social event. But the more compelling reason for him to host a party was to show off his newborn baby boy.

As arranged the previous day, I will have to pick-up Rituh from her apartment so we could ride together to Sharjah , where Hari lives. Rituh is our office receptionists, a young Mumbai lady who won’t have any trouble charming a lift from any of the bachelors in our office who are all smitten by her stunning beauty. But she chose to hitch a ride with me because she feels most comfortable with someone whom she considers a harmless older brother.

At six o-clock on the dot, my car was parked just in front of Ritu’s place. I went straight to the residential building’s lobby. In front of the lobby, on the sidewalk are grade school boys playing and horsing around rowdily as I passed them by. They remind me of my sons when they were younger. All were loud and excited except for this young handsome boy of ten or eleven who was just sitting on the lower steps of the stair case inside the lobby – holding his skateboard. Ah, my Jay-ar used to be very good at skateboard, I remembered, when he was at the same age as this boy. He was alone and silent, almost sad. I winked and smiled at him trying to cheer him up. He looked into my direction but he seemed to gazed through me – no reaction. I stop by the building guard’s desk to ask for entry permission and directions on which way is to flat 919. He politely gestured me to the right lift lobby so I walked past the staircase and the sad boy wasn’t there anymore. maybe he’d joined the others.

There are six elevator doors, three on each opposing side of the lift lobby. I pressed the up button on the very first door but the chime sounded from the last one at the end of the lobby so I ambled towards it and stood facing the stainless door, waiting for it to part. When it finally opened, I quickly dashed in. And he was there, the boy with his skateboard.

He pressed for the ninth floor even before I could lift my hand. Maybe he overheard us when I asked directions from the Guard. “So you live in the ninth floor?” I attempted for small talk. Silence. He just stood there and stared at the mirrorized sidings of the lift cabin. Something peculiar strikes me with the way he looked but at that moment I could not tell what it was. “Do you know Ritu?”, I asked again. He turned halfway and smiled slightly. I took that to mean yes. The lift shuddered to a stop before I could follow up on my queries.

I stepped out and looked at the door numbers along the corridor. 908, 907, …906. The numbers diminishes towards my left – I walk to towards my right. Perfect logic. As I do so, the elevator door started to close, the boy remained inside, gazing through me, still with that slight smile. “Hmmm…”, I thought to myself. “He was a friendly lift operator, after all.”

Door 919 is just around the third bend. I realized it would have been nearer to walk towards the left rather than the right after the elevator. “You and your lousy logic”, I chided myself. Maybe the boy was smiling because I took the longer direction. What a helpful brat!

Ritu’s refreshing face appeared on the doorway after my second buzz. “How nice of you, Mr Sunni. I think you’re five minutes too early though. I still have to be in the powder room. Come and have a sit inside. I’ll have Shahin prepare some drinks for you”.

Ritu, despite her cosmopolitan looks and outlooks, still speaks with a distinct sing-song accent revealing her origins. But her living room is completely contemporary, no hint of ethnic decors and tapestries and hard colors that usually dominate Indian homes. The sofa and sala set including the center table are straight out of IKEA. The entertainment stand frames her full-HD Flat screen, Blue-ray player, mini-theater components, and a docked ipod; the stand-up speakers providing harmonized counterpoints on either side of the stand. A desktop computer sits on a reading table beside a book cabinet. The walls and the curtains are color-coordinated. A cubist style painting hangs by the wall. Very contemporary indeed

On top of the book cabinet, a picture framed in clear plastic caught my eye. I approached it for a closer look. It was the boy in the lift. Now I know why he looks so striking to me while I observed him in the elevator. He actually has Ritu’s eyes and cleft chin, even the long eye-lashes. They must be siblings.

“That’s Tahir, my younger brother. People tell me we resemble each other.” It’s Ritu emerging from the passageway.

“Yes, so much.” I agreed. “I meet him a while ago in the lift. He was a little shy, isn’t it? I think he’s sad about something, too”.

“Let’s go, I’m ready” she said. “Finish your tea.”

“Ok, its finish.” I put the tea cup down.

This time, we proceeded by the shorter route to the lift.

“So you met my brother, too?” she asked quite laughingly while on the way down in the lift.

“Yes”, I said. “But why are you smiling?”

She just smiled her knowing smile some more. “A number of people have told me the same story. Is he holding his skateboard?”

“Yes.”

“My brother was riding that thing in the street when he got hit by a speeding SUV. It was a horrific accident!”

“Oh, he recovered very well”, I said.

“No, he did not survive it. He’s dead since three years ago.”

My hair stood up. Now I realized why he looked so peculiar while we were on the lift.

He did not have a reflection in the mirrorized wall!

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