Summer was towards its end and Changaswami was out of his hut early morning to water the plants and weeds growing nearby. Ahmed was passing by and saw Changaswami watering the weeds. Ahmed hurried towards him and shouted from a short distance.

"Pandit! This is not right. Weeds are supposed to be uprooted, not watered. They use up all the nutrients meant for the plants and stunt their growth. You must stop at once."

Changaswami stopped and looked at Ahmed and then looked back at the weeds again. Before Ahmed could say anything further, Changaswami grabbed a plant and pulled it out of the ground.

"Why did you do that? I said weeds are supposed to be uprooted. Not plants." Ahmed screamed, shocked at what he just saw.

"Were you going somewhere?" asked Changaswami with a smile on his face.

"Yes." replied Ahmed in a calmer voice as compared to the earlier screaming. "There is a political rally at the stadium today. I'm going a bit early to see the preparations. Do you want to come along?"

Without answering Ahmed's Question, Changaswami went inside the house and brought back a camera and a lock. He put the lock on the door of his hut which was made of recycled plastic and soda cans. Ahmed wanted to ask something but chose to keep quiet as he had still not received a proper response for the Two questions, he had asked earlier.

Without talking to each other, both of them walked for a mile to the stadium. There were only Three people there. One of them was near the centre of the stadium, talking on the phone and the other Two were jogging next to each other, along the stadium boundary.

"It doesn't seem like there is any rally here." Ahmed said to himself out loud.

Changaswami took off the lens cap on his camera and started playing with the camera settings. The Two joggers came close to where Ahmed and Changaswami were standing. They both exchanged glances with Ahmed while Changaswami was busy with his camera. One of them slowed down a little but the other One paced up immediately. Ahmed was about to ask them if they had any idea about the rally but looking at their body language, he chose to keep quiet as they both just passed him by.

"What are you doing? There is no rally happening here. Let's go back!" said Ahmed looking at Changaswami who had already started walking towards the centre of the stadium without acknowledging Ahmed's remark.

Ahmed was feeling annoyed at Changaswami since the time he had met him that morning. So, he decided to let him go alone, turned around and started walking back in the direction that they came from. After taking only a few steps, Ahmed heard a voice behind him, coming from a distance. The voice was of someone shouting. Ahmed spread his legs and bent over to see behind him through the gap between his legs. The man, who was on the phone just a few moments ago, was now running away from Changaswami, shouting for help. Ahmed was both surprised and confused. He wanted to turn back around and see what it was all about but since he had already decided to leave Changaswami alone and since he was a man who stuck to the promises that he made to himself, he brought his torso back up and continued walking.

After walking for a mile, Ahmed was about to cross Changaswami's hut, when he saw a group of people far away, coming towards him from the opposite direction. He paced up his steps in hope to ask them if they knew anything about the rally. As he got closer to them, Ahmed saw that there were Ten people who were all dressed exactly like Changaswami. More surprised and confused than before, he grew impatient.

"What are you people up to? Is it another One of Pandit's pranks?" Ahmed shouted from a distance. None of them seemed to have heard him and they kept walking towards him. By the time they were in audible range, he had reframed his Question.

"Could someone please tell me what's going on here? And does anyone know about the rally that was supposed to happen today?" Ahmed asked again in a more normal and pleasing tone.

All Ten of them passed him by, without as much as even looking at him directly in the eye. Ahmed tried to test them by not saying anything, thinking that they would probably turn around. But after they failed Ahmed's mental test and covered quite a distance, he began shouting again from behind them. After he was out of words to make sense of it all and he witnessed his curiosity overpowering his will to keep promises he made to himself, he dropped his shoulders along with a sigh of disappointment and started following the group all the way back to the stadium to find out what was happening on that strange summer day.

Once Ahmed reached the stadium, he saw hundreds of people all over the place. Wooden planks were Being unloaded from trucks to set up the stage. White flags with the symbol of a Shoe, outlined with black, were Being installed along the boundaries of the stadium. Chairs were Being laid out. Pamphlets were Being distributed. More and more people were pouring in. Within the next few minutes the stadium was packed with people waiting for the President of the political party to enter and start the speech. Ahmed looked around for Changaswami but couldn't find him anywhere.

On seeing an elderly man in his late fifties getting up from a chair near him, Ahmed hurried to occupy the vacant seat. As soon as he reached the chair and was about to sit, imagining the relief it would bring to his legs which had grown tired from all the walking, everybody stood up.

"Swami! Swami! Swami!" the crowd chanted in unison. Their voices echoed in Ahmed's ears as he stood next to the chair, with his jaw dropped, staring through a narrow gap between thousands of lifted hands moving in sync with the rhythm of the chants.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Pandit Changaswami entered the stage with folded hands and a smile on his face. Ahmed couldn't believe what he was seeing. "Is this a Dream?" he asked himself and then repeated the Question out loud to the old Lady standing next to him, with her wrinkled hands up in the air.

"Yes! It has been everybody's Dream. But today it has turned into Reality. One of us has finally reached there. Now all will be well again." the old Lady replied in a quivering voice with hope in her eyes.

Ahmed looked back through the hands again to confirm what he was seeing. He even brought his right hand up to his left arm and pinched it really hard just to be sure. But this was no Dream. It was really him. The man who had the worst reputation in the village. The One who would say anything that came first to his mind without considering the feelings of others. The person who never even lifted a stone in the name of doing some work. The unrealistic dreamer. The arrogant advisor. The good for nothing Pandit who just knew how to talk and would never deliver even a fraction of what he promised. He was walking on the stage with thousands of people chanting his name. While the others had settled, Ahmed was still standing, stupefied. The old man gently pushed Ahmed aside and sat on the chair he had earlier vacated.

After an hour-long speech by Changaswami, about the process of taking the local elections to a global level which was the objective of Global Shoe Party since its inception, everyone quickly vacated the stadium. Ahmed hurried towards the backstage. He saw Changaswami from a distance but as soon as Ahmed started to move towards him, he was stopped by a security guard.

"Where do you think you're going?" the Guard asked rhetorically.

"He is my Friend, Changaswami. I wish to meet him." Ahmed replied pointing at a distance, towards the half-naked, saffron clothed Pandit who was handing over something to a man in a black suit. The Guard looked at Changaswami and then back at Ahmed but his facial expression did not change even a bit.

"If he is your Friend, why don't you call him and ask him to come to your home to meet you? Now don't force me to use this laathi and make you find your way out of here." concluded the Guard, with an expressionless face.

Ahmed quietly went back to the area where the chairs were now Being stacked, One on top of the other. Multiple layers of white, glossy pamphlets covered the ground, reflecting the sun's light and radiating heat from down below. It was quite hot. Ahmed started walking back home.

As he got out of the stadium, he was looking carefully all around him to make sense of what had happened. As he kept walking, a variety of thoughts ran through his mind. "Changaswami is the President of a political party and nobody knew it. Well, it seems like it was only me who didn't know. The way everyone was cheering for him, they must have known for a long time. But how come nobody mentioned it before? And how come a man of that stature lives in such a small hut in the outskirts of a village? Could this just be an elaborate prank? Or is something wrong with me? Am I Being forgetful or losing Memory? I wonder why that person was running away from Changaswami in the morning. If only I could meet Changaswami once and just clear it all out. Maybe I should find someone in the village and see what all they know." he thought.

As Ahmed reached Changaswami's house for the third time that day, he saw that there was no lock on the door of the hut. "Did Changaswami return?" he asked himself as he started walking towards the hut. He pushed the door a little. The cans at the joints of the door crackled. He knocked the door. There was no response. He knocked again and put his left ear against the door.

"Is there anybody in there? Pandit, are you there?" he enquired suspiciously and heard someone's footsteps approaching the door. He took a Step back as the door opened outwards. The door opened. A man dressed as Changaswami stood in front of Ahmed.

"Enough is enough! What drama is this!" exclaimed Ahmed as he barged into the hut, pulling the man by his hands and looked around for a chair to sit on. But there was no furniture. Just walls. Walls with layers of neatly stacked soda cans of different colours, reinforced with recycled molten plastic that had solidified over time. The floor was just dry mud with arc-shaped impressions on it, probably formed while sweeping the floor with a broom. There was a watering can next to the door and a broken lock next to the watering can. The same lock that Changaswami had put on the door before going with Ahmed earlier that morning.

"Who are you? What are you doing here? Tell me the truth." Ahmed demanded with a stern voice and a serious expression.

"I am Changaswami. Who are you?" The man replied with a smile on his face, unaffected by Ahmed's behaviour.

"You would have known me if you were Changaswami. I'm a good Friend of his. You're not him. You're an imposter. You broke into this hut and you're stupid enough to think that I will believe you. Tell me what is happening right now or I'll call the police."

"You're free to call whoever you like, Ahmed. But there's only a..."

"How do you know my name?" Ahmed asked as if he had found a big clue to the mystery he was trying to solve.

In the next moment, the man made a run for the door but Ahmed was quick and caught him by his lungi which almost got ripped apart. Ahmed held the man down on the floor with their legs locked together and each of Ahmed's hands tightly grabbing the man by each of his wrists.

What would have been considered a highly compromising position by anyone who entered Changaswami's hut in that moment was now the only way for Ahmed to find out what had been going on since that wretched morning.

"This is the last time I'm asking you. Who are you? Where is Changaswami? And what happened at the political rally?" Ahmed asked all the questions he had in mind and studied the man's face for clues.

"Let me go! I can't tell you anything."

"Why? What is the big secret that you are keeping from the world?" Ahmed asked while he pressed hard his knees down against the man's thighs causing the man to scream out of pain. He started talking at once.

"The secret is not for the world. But only for you."

"What? Don't think I am a fool that I will believe any Story you make up." Ahmed said as he continued to press his knees even harder.

"I'm not making up any stories. I am telling the truth. Just get off me."

"No! Both of us are going to stay like this until you tell me what's going on. And until I believe every word you say."

"Changaswami was right. You are all heartless. You are taught to kill animals since a very young age and that has made you incapable of feeling anyone's pain. You heartless, emotionless, soulless animal."

Hearing his words, Ahmed's grip on the man's wrists loosened. The man pushed Ahmed aside and made a run out of the door. Ahmed still laid on the floor in his white pathani suit which was now covered with mud while his eyes, outlined at the bottom with kohl, stared directly at the ceiling. The ceiling had a painting drawn on it. A painting of a blue skinned man, playing a flute while Being surrounded by Seven girls who were dancing around him, all of them seemingly mesmerised by his music or probably in love with him. He laid there for a while, absorbing the painting in his head, to a point that he even forgot what had just happened.

After a few minutes, he picked himself up and walked outside the door, towards his own home. Something had suddenly started to make sense to him.