Robin was quite excited and he had all the best reasons in the world to be. After all, it was the first day of his new life in a new avatar. Robin was sure as hell that he was not gonna ruin this chance. Never ever in this lifetime.

He had wasted the good twenty five years of his life in doing nothing and had become one of the biggest scumbags of society that never wanted him to be a part of it. There were reasons too for Robin, what he had become. The abusing parents, being bullied at school were some of the prime factors. The divorce of his parents who never took up the responsibility of rearing up Robin made matters worse. It landed him into a nightmare that every child hates and despises, the foster home and it did no good to already distraught Robin.

Robin grew up exactly as what no one in the society wants, an antisocial person who started his thug career with shoplifting at age of 9 and finally turning to a dark alley guy who would run odd errands for the meth and cocaine dealers for a small stash of greens.

All in all, Robin was a real badass, whose day didn’t end at least without a street fight where he thrashed the other person so bad, giving vent to the ill childhood memories that had made him someone he himself disliked.

Every time the cops tried to crack out this filth of the earth, he managed to save his skin. However, with the last incident, Robin surrendered to the cops swarming at the place without making any attempts to flee the scene.

Nobody knew, what happened that night with Robin that turned him from an insane guy into a sane one. It was still a mystery. Even during his jail term, he remained calm, collected and a balanced person and stayed polite with everyone around. His inmates and jail guards who had heard of Robin were also stunned with this changed docile demeanour of him.

It was the day when Robin was going to walk out of his old world and step into his new world as a changed man. The jailer was also surprised to know Robin as everything that he had heard about Robin when he was brought to prison was quite contradictory.

“You have been summoned by the Jailer.” A prison guard came and ordered Robin. It was jailer who wanted to talk for a while with Robin before he stepped out of prison. Robin smiled and nodded to follow the guard. Today, Robin was without shackles. He was neatly dressed and all set for the day.

“May I come in, Sir?” Robin asked polity with a wide grin, standing at the door of jailer’s chamber.

“Yes, I have been waiting for you, Robin. Please come in.” Jailer placed Robin’s file aside that he had been studying and smiled.

“I was going through your records and it said you had quite a pile of felonies.” Jailer leaned forward, resting his hands on his old weathered wooden table with fingers tangled.

“I know sir and I have no words to convince you that I was not guilty of any of them. I was guilty of every damn charge that you just read a few minutes ago.” Robin said softly staring down at the table.

“I have not called you here for any confessions, Robin. I have something else playing on my mind with a bug of curiosity swarming over it.” Jailer smiled, drumming his fingers on the wooden table.

Robin understood what the reason was and he gave it to jailer 100 percent, the reason to have that on his mind.

“I know sir. And if I am not wrong, it’s my changed behaviour…” Robin smiled with a sigh of relief.

“I am all ears to know, what happened that night that changed a person like you, a villain into a hero.” The Jailer leaned back, resting his back on an old cranky chair it creaked. The grin on Robin’s face widened. Taking a deep breath, Robin began to unfold the events of that night.

“It was a rough day for me. I took a lot of shit from the dealers I was working for and with cops smelling my ass. Somehow, I managed to save my skin for the day.” Robin paused to let his words sink in jailer’s head.

“I am listening I said. You don’t need to stop in between, Robin.” Jailer leaned ahead in response.

“I had vodka and cocaine that evening and was pretty high. Didn’t realize that this combination can screw you from head to toe.” Robin closed his eyes for a while and then continued.

“I was still not done and so I walked to the bar where my drink buddies were drowning themselves in booze. I joined them and had few more pints of beer before things got out of hands and an argument turned into a bar fight.” Robin looked down, embarrassed with himself.

“Lucky enough that before it turned into a brawl, cops started swarming the place before someone got murdered. I managed to flee the site from the kitchen door into the dark alley leading to god knows where. I just kept running till my feet gave way.” Robin took a sip of water to calm down the anxiety pumping through his veins.

“I was catching my breath and tried to see around, my vision was beginning to get blurred. I was in a garden. My messy head was trying to figure out which area it was when my eyes fell on the old building, dimly lit with paint weathering out from its walls.” Robin said and taking another deep breath before continuing.

“It was a girls’ hostel. I saw a girl talking on a cell on the top floor balcony of her room. In that blurry vision too, she appeared to be gorgeously enchanting. The bug of lust bit me in no time and all I wanted to have was every inch of her body now.” Robin nodded sideways and smiled.

“I tell you Sergt, Vodka and Cocaine are the worst when together. They just play damn dirty with your head. They just prey upon your body, mind, and soul turning you into a puppet to your wanton desires of lust.” Robin smiled ruefully.

“I know that boy, I have seen it more than you would ever have had it.” Jailer gave a lopsided smile. Robin nodded knowing the experience of jailer with crack heads like him. He continued.

“I desperately craved for her body I saw a moment back then. At that moment all I wanted was to get rid of that bug of lust.” Robin sighed and continued. He knew that his story was music to the jailer’s ears.

“I sat up and rinsed my face under the water from a nearby tap in the garden. I was all set to charge with my Ka-Bar knife. The building was guarded by a slimy guard, who snored lazily in his old creaky chair.” Robin straightened his back.

“I reached the entrance of the building as stealthy as possible and shocked the guard with my knife resting on his neck. Before he could grab his shotgun idly idling nearby, I grabbed it and fired a couple of rounds in the air. The shots rammed like an explosion in the building that poor guard peed in his pants and fled away from the site.” A smirk appeared on Robin’s face with the memory of guard in wet pants playing in his head.

“I charged to the top floor with a shotgun in my hand. The shots fired were enough to create chaos in the whole hostel. All the girls started screaming and ran back to their rooms, shutting them behind.” Robin covered his face to avoid further embarrassment.

“Go ahead…” Jailer filled some more water for Robin and passed him the glass. Taking some more sips, Robin continued.

“The girl I saw was going for a late evening shower. She ran with a towel wrapped around her body and was about to close the door of the bathroom when I kept my foot in between and pushed the door that flung her away.” Robin was now reliving every moment of that night again.

“That was for the first time I saw her but my eyes were filled with lust. I failed to notice how beautiful she really was.” Robin took a deep breath trying not to get anxious as he was that night.

“Her name is Katherine.” Robin spoke softly with a tinge of blush in his eyes.

“I don’t know what was wrong with her but she was different from any girl I had ever seen in my life. She didn’t panic as it was not gonna help her. She stood her ground firmly dismissing any traces of fear from her face or body moments.”

“And…?” The jailer asked getting equally anxious as the curiosity to know more kept pricking him.

“I pulled off her towel and looked at her perfect figure in bra and panty, licking my lusty lips.” Robin coughed at his own words. Clearing the throat, he continued.

“Katherine decided to play the mind game with me. She was calm like ice which did not give way to heat in the hot summer of California. I don’t know how she managed it but she did, maintaining her calm and initiated the conversation.” Robin’s eyes widened as he could feel he was sitting in front of Katherine.

She asked me my name to break the ice and that made me more furious. I lost my rag. I was not there for any conversation or rather to reply to anyone. My head ached badly. Robin felt his temple throbbing begin at a gentle pace while narrating.

“I asked her to cut it out and pushed the barrel of the gun in her neck. However, she was not scared and I can bet my life on it. Her eyes showed no signs of fear with a gun pointed at her and a maniac like me at the other end holding the trigger.” Robin’s pupil dilated and his eyes displayed a glimpse of utter bafflement.

“I thought pushing the gun to her gut might scare her but hell no she was cold as ice. She still kept talking with a smirk on her face.”

“I think you might wanna know the name of a girl whom you’ll rape and finally kill when you are done.” “Katherine said that to me and I was more stunned than angry. It was quite bizarre, I would have never anticipated in my wildest dreams.” Robin said, exhaling the sigh he had been holding back.

“I kept the gun aside and pushed my blade at her neck and asked her not to play those mind games with me. I was barely an inch away from her now, breathing on her face. The smirk on her face did not fade for a moment.”

“I told her, that no matter what she says, I’m gonna rape her and slit her throat to bleed till death. I pressed the blade a bit more to her neck but not enough to cut her.” Robin was breathing heavily. He felt that he was back at that night, in that bathroom with Katherine.

“I clenched her neck sweeping her off her feet a few inches above the ground. She struggled to breathe but the smile on her face and the glimmer in her eyes did not fade even for a second.” Robin said with closed eyes, visualising those beautiful eyes of Katherine.

“With cocaine still messing every nerve of my body, I could not fathom what this girl is made up of. I let her go off my grip and she dropped down, resting her back to the wall of the washbasin behind her.” Robin began to regret everything he had done that night.

“Killing me won’t give you life ahead. Cops will be swarming the place in few minutes and you may be convicted for charges that you might have not committed.” Katherine spoke still gasping for her breath.

“I didn’t utter a word and kept looking furiously at her. I didn’t know whether I was angry or frustrated but there was something that I had never felt. I could not hold on to the realms of my emotions and finally give in. I broke down and cried like a kid who had lost his most loving pet.” With those words, Robin’s eyes turned moist.

“She walked to the door to bolt it tightly not to run outside. She sat next to me and waited for me to calm down. I don’t know how she could be so calm and patient without a sting of fear.” Robin wiped the corner of his eyelids and sipped some more water to swallow the lump that had built up in his throat.

“It’s ok… Let it vent out dear. We all have those battles in our minds that we keep fighting alone.” Katherine kept her hand around my neck and patted my shoulder as I kept sobbing. I laid down my head in her lap and kept crying.” Robin could not hold back his tears anymore.

Jailer passed the box of tissues to him. Robin dapped a few in his moist eyes. It took a few minutes before Robin could further continue his story but he was silent.

“What happened after that?” The jailer asked softly patting the back of his hand on the table. Robin took a deep breath, recomposing himself before he could continue.

“I asked her why she was doing it for me. I was there to rape her and possibly kill her. Why she did not fight back like any ordinary person would do?” Robin’s voice was still shaky with the knot in his tummy and lump in the throat.

“I am kind of weird, an out of the box person for this world. But right now it’s you we gonna talk about and not me.” Katherine spoke.

“The smile on her face and her soothing words cast her spell on messed up me. It was the first time I poured out my heart out in front of someone. I told her about my abused childhood, my family which never wanted me, the bullies I faced in my childhood. Every bad thing that had been a nightmare for me as a kid. I told her everything, no dark secrets of my life were confined within the box of my heart. I had her undivided attention just like you are listening to me right now.” Robin spoke with a heavy sigh.

“We talked and I don’t know how long but we talked. She kept counselling me and I absorbed every word she said.” Robin continued as he got up and walked to the window. The morning rays of the sun were more promising than the dark night in Robin’s life. He smiled with closed eyes and stood there for a while.

“So it was Katherine who brought this magnificent change in you.” The jailer walked to him and spoke, lighting his smoke and watching the morning sun.

“YES… It was Katherine who changed me.” Robin could not hold back the grin on his face.

“By the time we were done talking, cops were ready to break in. Katherine walked to the door and said that everything was under control and I wanted to surrender. She then looked at me and I nodded softly in approval to her words. She opened the door and I was taken into custody by cops.”

“Be gentle with him, he is a nice guy. Those were her last words to the cops. I turned to look at her and she ran up to me and wrapped me in the warm embrace of her loving arms and hugged me tightly.” This time even jailer smiled.

“And I am sure you are. Here is what you asked for.” Jailer patted Robin’s back and handed him the bunch of flowers that he had requested for.

Robin thanked him and finally walked out of the prison gate. The sky was clear and sunny. He looked up above and closed his eyes. Taking a deep breath and filling his lungs with fresh and pleasant air, he smiled. It seemed like eons, he stood under the clear blue skies.

While he was lost in a trance of nature, a hand rested upon his shoulder and a sweet soothing voice whispered his name.

“Robin…”

He smiled with those musically melodious words ringing in his ears he turned around to see the person he had been expecting.

“I knew you would come…” Robin smiled and hugged the Katherine who had the same mesmerising smiling on her lips.

“How could I not …?” Katherine too wrapped him in her arms and whispered over his shoulder.

“Can’t miss the first date with changed Robin…”And they kissed under the clear blue sky with birds chirping around, adding to the melody of the love in the air…

Written by: Hemang

Sketch: Paranj Sankdecha