PART ONE.
The year is 2020, the pandemic never happened, and time hasnt moved much since 1977. The path to the RH is deserted except for a few early morning stragglers who insist they find the sunrise invigorating.
Daisy Jones rolls her leather-bound suitcase on the perfectly smooth asphalt of the running track. Her agent insists that she needs an undergrad degree to be taken seriously in her next interview. Her docu-series is all set to drop in the next year or two, and PR thinks, a Master’s in Lit and Music from Ashoka University would add an academic edge to her image.
She couldn’t care less. Under normal circumstances, she would tell them to shove their corporate BS up their asses, but there’s something different about this Ashoka place.
All red bricks and pretentious course names, out in the middle of nowhere, a thousand miles from Pittsburgh.
She is intrigued.
She looks down at the slip of paper in her hand: RH2, Room 116, it reads.
She eyes the geometrical buildings and the perfectly rectangular windows peeping out of each floor, two by two. Her gaze fixes on the netted balconies, wavers for a moment and slides over to the lady at the front desk. A tall beanie-clad boy slunks sulkily before her, insisting he didn’t stay the night in the girls building. Two metres away, a pretty girl in a bohemian skirt smiles shyly and their eyes meet for a moment before he breaks into a goofy grin.
The lady at the desk hrphms (harrumphs) in frustration.
Another girl kicks the vending machine hard and cusses it out as it holds her granola bar ransom. “Fuck this”, she mutters angrily, hiking her bag onto her shoulder and stomping out the gates. The couches are littered with laptops and pens, an odd combination. Daisy spies a light-haired boy with glasses bent over a textbook, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration.
She grins. This is going to be fun.
It takes Daisy another 10 minutes to figure out how to navigate the maze of doors and windows and identical-looking hallways before she stumbles into room 116. The room is small, clean and minimal. She can’t wait to plaster it with colour and texture. Her roommate hasn’t seemed to reach yet so, she plonks her muddy suitcase onto her bed and grabs her little journal, wondering if she can illicit a song out of this emotionless room. The walls refuse to talk, the words dont budge.
Daisy dips.
She finds herself in a strange, cold, white library. She scans the perfectly lined bookshelves, in all their decimal dewey perfection,
Daisy chugs her Fuel Zone orange juice and pops an Ice Breaker, her only resort after they checked her bags at the border- this will have to do for now.
She deshelves the books one by one, until the entire front half of the library is devoid of structure, a messy mass of books piling atop one another, spilling over carpets, crinkling starched papers.
A small, hermit-y-looking man in an Ashoka shirt emerges from one of the glass offices, he takes in Daisy, her massive flared jeans, gossamer halter top and unruly blonde hair, one look at her blown pupils and glossy-rimmed eyes and he knows better than to argue.
“Clear out the other shelves as well” she calls out, all sing- song, “it’s time for a reset. “
The librarian surprises himself by complying and Daisy grins, a melodic shark.
It’s almost 5 pm as Daisy stumbles out of the library she has practically disintegrated, and she is ravenous.
Where can one find something to eat around here? She asks an awkward-looking first-year. He adjusts his spectacles, hikes up his massive backpack and points vaguely in the direction of the Dhaba.
Daisy shoots him a little smile and makes her way to the Dhaba side. She scans the little stalls, and finds Dosai boring,the Dhaba avaricious.
She settles on Rasandanda, cute and classic, like a desi American diner.
The old man at the counter doesn’t flicker out of character for even a moment, taking in Daisy in all her rockstar, flower power, blonde locked glory with the gentle ease of a man who has seen it all.
“Kya loge? (What will you have?)”
Daisy is charmed.
“What do you recommend?”
A grumpy-looking girl stands behind her at the counter, “ go for the omelette and bun maska”, she mumbles.
Daisy grins at the angry-looking girl and orders two. She heaps the steaming omelette onto the bun maska and takes a massive bite.
It’s better than Coke.
She might just make it here.