Smoke and Steal

This past Saturday I was sitting outside Barista at SDA, when a friend of mine passed by. I called out and he came over, all smiles and surprised.

“Hey man!" he gushed. "Long time. What’s up?”
I put my coffee down and stood to shake his hand.
“Nothing much,” I said. “Care for a coffee?”
“Yeah, sure.”

So we ordered another cappuccino and came out to the smoker’s area again.

“So, don’t see you around too much,” I began, “Sick of me already?”
“Nothing like that,” he said, as we sat and produced a cigarette each. “Been busy, that’s all.”

We lit up and smoked silently for a while. I watched the smoke trail away into the bright morning, amused at how much I loved my screwed-up existence.

“Good thing you got there,” I said, pointing at his Zippo.
“Yeah, and here’s the moment I wanted. You got to see this.”

Here he slipped a hand inside his pocket and came up with a slim object wrapped in black. He handed it over to me. In another second I was looking at a brand new iPod Touch 64 GB, complete with an expensive leather cover.

“Holy cow. When did you get this?”
“Today,” he whispered. “In fact, I was on my way for a beer. Celebration, you know, before the trip.”
“Hmm. Very nice.”

At this point his coffee arrived.

“So how has it been lately?” I enquired once the waiter had left.
“Umm, pretty good. Income’s on the rise.”
“Great. And how’s the family?”
“Happy. Wasn’t always this well off, you know. They like the new house. I even got a maid for the chores.”

This, by the way, is quite a big deal for people like my friend who have seen times when they lurked beneath highways looking for a day’s worth of alms. I was happy for him.

“So,” I said, eyeing the iPod, “Where?”
“Nehru Place,”
“Safe?”
“Got a line.”

Now if you are wondering what that was all about, I must reveal that this friend of mine is a professional thief.

“And the catch is from?”
“Jwala.”
“You are kidding me.”

Thing was, the guy had scalped a laptop from the very same place barely a week back. I had sources to be sure of that.

“No, seriously,” he said with a smirk. “Those losers fuck up like hell.
“Haha, ICs. So when do you plan on stopping this?”
“Stopping what?”
“This bullshit, man. This iPod guy, he might be a friend. Enough, really, for God’s sake. IIT’s not all you got.”

As expected, he burst into laughter. No one takes my indignation seriously.

“Ah, all right. To each his own.” And really, what did I care about a man’s honest-to-God livelihood?

He finished his cigarette and lit another one. I was close to the end of my own.

“You tell me,” he said. “IIT being good to you?”
“Totally. Am up to fifteen,” I said, referring to my daily smoking frequency.
“Hah. Great. So any news on your laptop yet?”

We laughed together this time. This was a private joke between us. I had had my laptop, my phone and my iPod stolen from my room a couple of months back. The thief had not been caught, and presently, he sat sipping coffee and puffing on a cigarette at Barista, SDA. And looking smug, for good measure.

“Okay, enough,” he said, putting up a hand. “So you got anything for me?”
“Always.” And so we flowed, right on to business. “Big fish ,” I continued, “Volley court side. First floor. Fourth window from the left. Time of day, your call.”
“Perfect. When?”
“Why wait. Make it today.”

And hence began our latest plot of debauchery, which involved Nilgiri, my hostel, and as a matter of fact, the room two down from my own.

I wished him goodbye and returned to the morning paper I had been perusing before this interlude. As planned, I found the room empty, bolted it from the inside, unbolted the window and tossed the laptop down into the waiting arms of one of my friend’s associates. Plop. Just like that. And off I went, feeling a desultory pang of sympathy for the owner, a pal and a Counter-Strike buddy.

And now, as I sit tapping away at my laptop, I am pleased at another job nailed to the bone. The whiff of moolah begins to seduce me again, and I think about the day I started out: a week after my tragedy, when the search for my things had turned cold and dry. Some of my not-so-hot contacts had helped me out, and I had struck upon the perfect little way to turn my pain into constant gain.

I had become my tormentor’s very own inside man.