When the Wind Burns

I used to spend my summers in Thalassery, a sleepy, windswept town that rolled from the hills to the Arabian sea in one lazy turn of green. It used to be a place untouched by progress, a pretty little postcard suspended in a time capsule all its own.
Anand used to be my companion of the summers -- first cousin, friend and fellow conspirator of my teenage years. He was closest in age and temperament to me among a gaggle of younger pests who came to town come April.
The problem with sleepy towns is they aren't made for teenage hormones. After the initial thrill of the sound of rain and the smell of earth, we spent hours watching the grass grow. Anand and I found inventive ways to beat the boredom. One trick was to walk along the railway track which ran parallel to the farm land that my granny owned. We walked along the steel lines all the way up to the single track railway station. The station was the busiest place in town, noisy, smelly, dusty and alive. We would sit for hours on end on wooden benches, watching the trains come and go, bitching, laughing, plotting and dreaming. It was even more thrilling because we sat there ticketless; the danger of being caught out on the trudge back home was supremely exciting. And of course, no one at home, had any clue where we were.
We would walk up to the football stadium sometimes and watch the locals kick the ball around in their lungis or swagger up to the seafront promendade to check out the local beauties. We were 14 and 11 respectively (and looked about 8) and didnt get a second look from the girls but we strutted around believing otherwise.
The boldest thing we ever did was to smoke our first cigarette. After much plotting and planning we gathered enough courage to walk up to the store where our fathers bought their stock, and demand cigarettes. Our nervousness was a dead giveaway but the old man behind the till didn't ask too many questions. The tough part was lighting a cigarette on a man-forsaken bridge that was blustery as hell. We couldn't risk lighting up on an open road, so it had to be on the bridge. Let's just say we burnt more fingers than cigarettes.
Thalaserry has changed much since then. It even has Chinese restaurants. The main station block, however, remains the same. When I walk into its post-colonial portals, it feels warm and familiar, like an old friend. So does the wooden bench on which Anand and I had a 100 cups of sickeningly sweet tea while we checked out the humanity that tumbled in and out of trains.
And I miss him. My brother, my friend and my partner in crime, who left us when just out of his teens. This one's for you dude, I think of you everytime I light up in the wind.