Poster boy

Old Mahabalipuram Road was awake at 5 am, not groggy but warmed up. There was activity in all corners milk vans rushing, newspaper piling and tossing, vegetables arriving in crates, and the chattering at tea kadais. Suryan FM was blaring at the street corner and the DJs voice was competing with the Ayyapan songs playing at the temple further down. Fumes rose from the coal-black tavaas, along with the sushh of the spreading maavu. Ravi sneaked closer to it for some warmth, his eyes barely open he held out his fists and rubbed the warm fingers against his face. There was a burning feeling in his stomach, the watery black coffee his mother gave him every morning still didn’t agree with him. He fished out a piece of groundnut sweet from him pocket and munched away to the municipality office.

He was asked to wait at the steps outside, while the peon went in to fetch some posters. There were few dozens of them, big and small with huge prints and pictures of the MP. Ravi was pre-occupied with thoughts of the biryani at Kannan hotel he could buy for ten rupees. If he finished posting all the posters, he might be able to sneak in for the new Rajini movie at the theatre down the lane. He whistled aloud balancing the rolls of paper on one hand.

He mentally thanked the big man who was going to visit the locality the next day, these important events always brought many small jobs that paid well. Tomorrow he would come back and hover around the office, and see if he was needed for any chores. He didn’t know how to read the bold words on the poster. He walked from one wall to another shooing cows, and sticking the posters on lamp-posts, walls, gates and all corners. He wanted to finish the work quickly.

The clouds gathered all of a sudden and he looked at the sky with dismay. What if it rained? Will the fat man with the big purse pay him for the posters? There was bustle at the street corner as a group of youth struggled to put up the long wires studded with red bulbs on both ends of the street. The wind blew hard, and the poles where the bulbs hung began to wobble. Ravi saw the fat man shouting orders and looking at the sky with his fists folded on his waist.

Notes:
kadai- small stalls set up on roadsides
maavu- batter from which dosai a south indian dish is made