‘Love is strange, but women are stranger’

“Whatever you do, don’t fall in love with a reporter,” the officer said. His fourth beer was over.

“She broke my heart. My wife got to know about her and things at home were difficult. Love is strange but women are stranger,” he said, staring at the empty bottles on the table between us. 

“In Delhi circles everyone knew. But I didn’t care. I was in love,” the officer continued. “Bete, beer lao,” he shouted.

I had met him two days ago for the first time. I had just flown into Goa and had accidentally bumped into him at the Goa police headquarters in Panaji. We were both from Delhi and connected instantly.

A week before I came, the body of Scarlett Keeling, a 15-year-old British teenager, was found on Anjuna beach. The police initially called it a suicide but retracted after the autopsy confirmed sexual assault and drug use. The girl had been drinking at Curlie’s – a shack on the beach. She had popped a few pills and smoked a few joints, and had last been seen hanging out with a waiter.

That day I had reached his office early. My trip to Anjuna had been a failure. No one wanted to speak about Scarlett. “This Scarlett story is a waste of time. Forget it. Bloody junkie. Come over. My wife’s not home, we’ll drink,” the officer said. It was 10:30 am.

We began drinking as soon as we reached his official residence in Panaji. After his second beer the officer started talking about his love affair with a reporter. How they fell in love; how he was middle aged (and mature) and she was young (and vulnerable); how she manipulated him; how he was married with children; how his wife caught him. Soon I got bored and drunk. I began thinking of Scarlett. How vulnerable was she? And how mature were her killers?

By 1 in the afternoon we were both hammered. “I have stopped trusting women. They just use men,” he said, and started reciting Urdu poetry. I don’t know why, but for some reason, I started laughing loudly. The officer was affronted.  He pulled out a bunch of papers from his briefcase. I thought he was going to show his ex-lover’s letters to prove what a confused, depressed and manipulative woman she was. “That girl Scarlett wrote this. That’s how women are,” he said and threw a copy of Scarlett Keeling’s personal diary at me. I could not believe my luck.

Scarlett was confused and depressed. Her life was complicated. Scarlett had been dating someone in England but she wasn’t sure if she would be faithful. In India, she fell for a man in his 30s, a man her mother was friendly with, and started dating him. He looked after her; bought her booze and drugs. She felt he was using her.

“I went to a party lst night, got drunk, stoned and was trippin on mushies. Im goin to wait for jordi But I went 2 days without sex the other day and I started getting stressy so I dunno what Im gonna be like after six months (sic),” she wrote. Her childlike sentences were heartbreaking.

By the time I had finished reading, the officer had polished off two more beers. “So?” he asked. I didn’t know what to say. I drank some more. I was thinking of the officer and the reporter he had loved. I asked him if he had ever thought of murdering her. The officer laughed and called me an immature boy. Then the two of us passed out.

Mayank Tewari is a writer. He can be contacted at mayankis@gmail.com