Deadly injured mosquito

It’s the last week of August. Humidity tickles the nerves instead of the heat. The Monsoon is about to complete its trip. Once again, in this part of Haryana, it is leaving with lot many promises unkept. Deficit rainfall is the norm here. In any case, the Monsoon hardly abides by the law of averages. It’s either too much or too less. Nature has, after all, lost its equanimity, its level-headedness. It’s irritated and grossly impulsive. The nature, I mean. And rightly so.  

As the light peered through a humidity-soaked sky, I decided to make the most of this cool morning. Reading under the open overcast skies has its own charm. While the world got up, yawned, stretched its arms, got ready to dab into the birth-time energetic spirits to go jogging and exercising, I decided to pick up this nice book and use my time in the best suitable way I can think of, reading.

The light picked up from across the bluish dark curtain hung over the skies. A cool breeze blowing, carrying the invisible vestiges of the rain the previous evening still looming in thin air. It appeared like it stopped raining just five minutes back. The words and sentences had a lucid meaning. It was like writing on a clean slate. The brain, after all, is unclogged of extra garbage at this time. The book is touching. The sentences fetch deeper meanings than they carry at any other time of the day. I read with a trace of smile on my lips. In fact, I felt like I was doing a holy deed early in the morning, like a sage sitting over yagna. I got attuned to the phenomenon, of literature, of reading.

If there were sages in ancient India, there were demons also, the fabled rakshsasas, who threw meat and bones into the holy fires. They laughed with their deep, rumbling peals of guffaws. An avid reader is the most a modern human can come close to be a rishi, sage, of ancient India. And the demons? Well, there are countless. In millions, and of course, billions. Mosquitoes. The carrier of death, fever, dengue, chicken guinea and what not. They buzz with multiple layers of preening sounds that crawl over your skin, bruising and itching it long before it strikes with its bloodthirsty snout. It can be easily ultrasonic. You can feel the drone’s deadly hum from a distance long before your eardrum alerts you to the hurtling missile in your direction. On top of that they are blood thirsty. Who knows, all the demons of the past may have turned into mosquitoes of the present.

Here it droned to spoil my morning. Dengue-wallahs bite early in the morning, my alert system sent a warning against the poisoned missile. I saw it then. A huge one, almost as big as a house fly. I’m sure it must have bullied a few houseflies on the way to its mission. The chopper’s buzzing wings cut across the chorus of chirping sparrows on the courtyard wall. In a panic mode, I took a swipe at it. Guess with what? With my book man. What better weapon a bookworm can arrange on such a short notice? The elegant piece of literature turning into a weapon of defense! The rascal deftly dived, enjoying the catapulting rolls in the swirls of air sent down by my papery weapon. Even a mosquito is too good for a book these days. Uffs.  

I jumped up from my chair, knowing fully well that it will surely succeed in its mission if I keep sitting. Still eager to keep the meanings in sentences clearer like before, I started walking and reading in leisurely circles, pacing up and down the courtyard, sure that the deadly projectile is ineffective against shifting objects. I even took consolation that now it was doubly beneficial, reading-cum-morning walk. And here it was again. A super-mosquito, I recoiled with fear. I saw it just about to land on my hand decently holding the book. These are not the times of niceties after all. This time I saw it clearly. It had the ill-famed black and white bands across its hull, the deadly enemy, the dengue one.

Reading took a backseat and the revenge started. It was too big to get invisible into the cowardly mosquito anonymity in thin air. It had grown too big for its cowardly skin. Its confidence protruded through its bubble-strong body. I tracked it to the end of the wall. While I struck it against the wall, the instinct stopped me from using full force to avoid a dirty palm having a crushed mosquito carcass. The hand moved with the agilest movement, but struck with minimum force against the wall. May be I wanted to injure it critically and enjoy a slow death with no blood on my hands. It was too big to go into that last moment’s topsy-turvy dive to escape. And of course sometime you hit the nail on its head, hit the jackpot, win the lottery, win the best girl in the college in your favour. Similarly, you hit your target, the mosquito, in the second attempt only.

With the scared anticipation of a high school girl waiting for her result, I took away my palm. The feeling was worth winning a million in a lottery. My trophy lay against the wall. Not crushed. The force was perfect to send the idiot into a coma. One of its wings broken, the other jutting out, some legs broken, the rest swished together, its deadly snout projecting out as if in utter pain. One of its antennas moved a bit, to make it icing on the cake that it wasn’t instant death. I saw the black and white checked pattern on its body. What a kill man! Couldn’t believe my luck early in the morning.