A FAMILY THAT WAS NOT TO BE

A FAMILY THAT WAS NOT TO BE

Mendez Fernandes was bend with concentration trying to fix the old ford deposited by the owner two days back. The ramshackle of the garage was slowly getting respectability. Mendez a meticulous worker had learned his trade a hard way. After ten years of apprenticeship under inhuman condition with tyrannical masters, Medez had picked up the trade slowly and surely. He now was proficient in his trade in spite of no formal training. Learning, to repair any vehicle with a couple of wheels and engine.

He had a quick eye to discern the spurious and the original and he always felt his duty to forewarn the owners and educate them about the malpractices of the trade though in the bargain he ended up loosing tidy sums which very few in his trade will miss loosing.

However his honest ways were gaining currency. His garage “Roma Garage” opened four years back in his mother’s name was fetching him enough business to take care of his aging drunken father and two younger brothers Joey and Jacob.

“Mendez Mendez” he could hear his father calling out feebly in half drunken state. This has been the case ever since his dear mother passed away.

Thinking about his mother even now brought tears to Mendez eyes. His mother had seen very few happy days ever since she married the fiend Fernandes. Those times Fernandes was a robust figure full of life, which he imposed crudely on Roma. Always full of liquor, but which he could hold then, filled with all the basest vigor for life, he expected Roma to be in attendance always with fun and frolic.

When the boys came in quick succession and Roma could not cope with his demands, Fernandes had no patience. He never failed to give a sound thrashing when any of his demands were not met in time. Mendez was a poor victim to witness the going on. He had taken after his mother soft and sentimental. The scenes left a lasting impression in his mind.

Mercifully Roma had an escape from the tough life. She passed away when Joey was just two. Mendez remembered the incident vividly. His mother was bleeding profusely after one of his father’s violent display of temper. He couldn’t recollect what was the crux of the matter. The next two days she was burning with fever lying curled up in the corner of the hut. All his father did was give his wife a couple of kicks to get her round to action. The third day morning they found their mothers limp body. His father had made a big show of grief crying and howling. The neighbors and many unknown relations stormed in. Next ten days the place was alive with grief. Mendez was stoic all along, a kaleidoscope of uncontrollable emotions welled in him. TYhe scenes of hostile inhuman beating meted to his mother etched in him.

When the mourning subsided Fernandes his fiend of father changed to a totally different human being. Gone from him the robust vigor, bouts of violent temper indulgence with life, calling out for rich fried rice with mutton curry. He suddenly seem to have become a non entity, like a hot air balloon getting deflated and he started clutching to his dear bottle for life.

The onus fell on Mendez. He was big enough to understand but still small to act. He had to grow up overnight, since he just could not bear to see his family falling off like a pack of cards. He struggled with his pittance of mechanics job at Larry’s garage. Larry was kind, with out much ado he used to spare him additional sums to run the house. However when Larry moved off he was left with no other kind soul to look upon. By then Fernandes was booted off from his load mans job in the factory.

Hard days fell upon them squarely. Fernandes was oblivious of everything except his bottle. Jacob and Joey were fast growing up.

Jacob was very much like his father. Vagabond, with vigor, always at loose ends Jacob in a short time got into trouble. When the News came Jacob was behind bars for bootlegging, it was Mendez who ran from pillar to post and bailed him out. However today the same Jacob is steeped in bootlegging. He has learned the trade well and keeps the law by his side. Mendez is again a mute witness to the going on. Mendez is most happy with the extravagant ways of Jacob especially he can now have his booze with out much problem.

Mendez had pinned his hopes on Joey. Joey was a delicate child, fair with curly hair, with his round helpless black eyes; he had always tagged behind Mendez for both need and comfort. Mendez literally had mothered him. Taken pains to educate him. Mendez always felt proud seeing Joey, and called him the decent speck in the family. He had grown to be tall, lithesome lad of fourteen in his school finals.

“Mendez, Mendez” the feeble call continued. Mendez had been steadily ignoring the call for last half an hour intent on completing the ford. Invariably such calls must be to supplement the empty bottle. His father must be too sizzled up to get up and replenish the stuff. Mendez has found ignoring such calls is the best way to deal with it, though Dr. had warned a prolonged deprivation might stoke the violent streak in him.

He had seen the old flashes of temper a couple of times, when Fernandes in a fury had vented it on himself. Tearing his dresses like a mad man he had rolled uncontrollably in the mud plastered floor, kicking his hands and legs. Mendez had to quiten him with good dose of opium. Of late Mendez had made it a routine to give his father small does of opium time to time to quieten his frayed nerves and to buy some peace in his living.

When Mendez finally could get himself out of the Fords bonnet and looked around, it has almost become dusk. The sun had set and the lights of the street were on. The houses in the buildings around them were simultaneously getting lit one after another. In fact in the concrete jungle around them theirs was the only structure hugging to the ground. The busy metropolis had changed rapidly over years. When they had arrived twenty years back, the place was still virgin with boulders, rocks and thick growth of bushes. With the arrival of couple of factories in the vicinity, the contractors arrived in hoards and erased the wilderness to ground rapidly erecting one building after another.

For quite some time they had been luring the Fernandes family to sell their stock for a tidy sum. But Mendez was always against it. He felt the cash won’t last them even for a while and soon they will be out in the street with out their moorings or money. Further he had his dreams of the family staying together.

But his determination and dreams took a volt-face the other day. It was purely by chance he discovered it. He was urgently looking for a pencil and opened Joey’s school bag containing the instrument box. Neatly packed in the corner were two small packets. As soon as Mendez opened it, it was like he was struck by a heavy volt of electricity. They were small doses of cocaine. Mendez was besides himself with grief. It was like some one gave a blow in his vitals, nos. he could connect the vacant looks of Joe.

Perhaps he had no right to dream. Who was he to change or make some one else’s life when his own was in the rough sea?


Now when the next bidder of the land walked in with smooth talk and hard cash. It was decided once for all to say good-bye to the family heirloom, ‘the four twisted souls’.


The piece of land changed hands for few crisp notes. It was divided into four equal parts and distributed, the last acts of unity, before putting out four individuals no more bounded by the ties named family.