It was evening and a steady downpour was making puddles all around. Reflections in the water from brightly lit shops looked like multi-coloured fairy lights. Jadu Sharma shuffled in his pocket for loose change and handed the fare to the bus conductor before squeezing his way out of the city bus. Though it was only five, the darkening hour belied the time in the clock.

In a while, the rain relented a little and reduced its intensity. Jadu Sharma got onto the footpath and walked purposefully. He was a man with a mission today.  An uncharacteristic enthusiasm in his gait was a surprise even to his own staid self.  Two young girls sharing an umbrella strode down, chattering happily. He sidestepped to let them pass. He often marvelled at the confidence and spirit   the young people exuded. His own youth had been marked by apprehension and uncertainty and he too cowered in the surrounding gloom.  Perhaps, the worry of where the next meal was coming from did not bear heavy on their minds. This was the stark reality of his growing up days.

Jadu Sharma started walking towards the dingy market area. This was the place where up-market businesses gave way to small retailers with their stand alone shops, selling wares of mundane everyday necessities. It was a transition from wants to needs, from splurging to surviving. The area housed ration shops, stores selling unbranded clothes and a sundry other things. This was a place Jadu felt comfortable in. His shopping list items were all to be found in these narrow lanes where the shops shared walls and sometimes lives too.

Jadu felt at ease here. A clerical job in a small private company, with retirement just around the bend, deemed that he live within his means. Modest as they probably were to others, he was calmly happy. Life had charted out its own course for him and he flowed along, wordless, stoical. He coveted peace of mind and this came with a myriad little compromises. Happiness was relative and he sought his little alcove within himself.

A shrill ring startled him to his senses. It was Minoti with her routine call. His wife of thirty years ruled his existence, chalking out his life with a cartographer’s precision. 

 ‘Have you started for home yet?’, the stern voice bellowed down his ear. ‘No, I’ll be a bit late’, he fibbed, aberrantly. ‘Oh! Then don’t have those extra cups of sugary tea’, snap came the order. 

O! Sugar, the one love and lately the bane of his uneventful life. Since the time, a couple of years back, the baleful affliction had cast an evil eye on his one weakness; it was doled out to him in pitiful measures.

 Sugar, they called it in common man’s terms, erroneously pronouncing it to match the ’s’ in ‘soothe’. Ironic, because it was not soothing and certainly not sweet. For a lowly paid clerk, taking recourse to medication was not an option, abstinence was. A strict sweet-less diet regimen under Minoti’s hawk eyes followed.  A measly lump of jaggery in his daily tiffin of beaten rice and curd was the only allowance.

Jadu Sharma smiled to himself. All the sobering thoughts could wait. Today he was on his way to conjuring happiness. He walked over to the nearby paan shop. “Meetha patti, with zarda and elaichi’, he spelled out his order to the vendor. On regular days, the humble two rupee raw betel nut sufficed. But today was special and the fancy ten rupee quid quickly went to his pocket to be enjoyed later.

Walking ahead a few metres, he found his destination. It was a bright sweetmeat shop that seemed to have been spruced up to give it a restaurant like look, but not quite. It still looked accessible to   nondescript customers who are otherwise overawed by swanky eateries and often squashed aspirations of entering one. An open entranced shop, like the ones whose shutters went down only after the day’s work was done. One need not wrest heavy glass panelled doors here to be allowed entry.

Clusters of closely packed plastic chairs and tables were filled to capacity. Serving boys expertly balanced steaming glasses of tea and plonked them at designated tables with masterful ease. Aroma of hot samosas wafting across made the air redolent with delicious headiness.

The awning of the shop extended to the couple of steps in front .A few people had taken shelter from the drizzle as also waiting for an empty sitting space in the shop. Jadu Sharma found a foothold on the steps and awaited his turn to enter. 

The manager at the counter was furiously jabbing his fingers at the calculator and handing over small change to customers paying on their way out. Jadu stared at the glass encased racks lined in front of him. Rows of delectable sweets of various makes held him spellbound. He unconsciously gulped down the saliva gathering in his mouth. Tearing his eyes away, he looked vacantly at the street.

The dusty red mud lanes of childhood flashed before his eyes. A time when the sweetness of life was not embittered by the struggle for survival. And though the assurance of the next meal was clouded by uncertainty at times, the breeze was fragrant, lustily filling the lungs, energizing, invigorating. Hot humid afternoons would melt into cooler evenings and after kicking up dust in boisterous play, the children would head home. 

Young Jadu, along with his siblings, carried out the ritual of cleaning themselves up by the well before entering their modest home. The falling dusk was eagerly anticipated. It brought along a much awaited treat. Sitting cross legged in their kitchen, small hands reached out for the little bell metal bowls  handed out by their mother. 

It was their evening grub, the same everyday fare with no unwarranted surprises. A frugal bowl of puffed rice with a small lump of jaggery.  The practice was to take in a mouthful of the crispy rice and then bite a tiny piece of the jaggery. This was routinely adhered to by his siblings but Jadu had his own unique way. He would tip the bowl and polish off the puffed rice in large breathless mouthfuls. Then came the most cherished bit, a ceremony of sorts. Popping in the jaggery lump, he would lingeringly savour the burst of melting sweetness. It would fill his heart with inexplicable joy. The sweet liquid trickling down his throat was akin to a sublime experience.

He was jolted back to the present. An empty chair at one of the tables prompted him to edge inside the shop. His thin wiry frame always came handy in times of jostling with crowds. He squeezed himself onto the chair and waited for the serving boy to approach. There was a curious mixture of trepidation and exaltation in his heart. He was about to relive his moment of bliss, rules be damned for once.

The boy arrived with Jadu Sharma’s order. Here was his ticket to heaven, a plate holding two of the most luscious, succulent, creamy white ball of wonder called rasgulla. He marvelled at their sight, heart thumping with the mixed delight and fear of an errant little school boy.

The phone in his pocket rang sharply. Minoti was calling again. He calmly looked at it and then, attempting the unthinkable, switched it off. The consequences, tirades, outbursts, and ensuing discord could all be dealt with later. Now was his moment of ecstasy, he meant to relish every bit. 

As he scooped in a spoonful in his mouth, a delicious sensation ran through his being. The burst of syrupy goodness in his mouth dissolved all inhibitions. Jadu Sharma blissfully closed his eyes in sweet surrender.