He looked at the mirror and a stranger stared back. “God help me! I have become the dreaded caricature of the sibyl – a soothsayer” he muttered taking in his appearance. Receding hairline showing off a wide forehead perfect for the vermillion and sandalwood paste dots dutifully applied. Shock of unnaturally black hair peppered with white with a mustache to match. A white shirt and dhoti. Stiffly starched and ironed.  He added the final touch, a gold-rimmed spectacles now sat neatly on the tip of his nose.

He was morphing into the character like a well-attuned actor. In fact he had been turning into the character since the phone call came last evening.  He wished there was someone around to mock him. Laugh at him and to tease him mercilessly. Like those days from the past. He could hear Mayank mocking him “Oh! Panditji! All this stars and planets and positions and crap – to attract girls na?” Well it did attract the right girl. His wife. Sita. “Rest in peace dear” he whispered. She would have laughed at his attempts to look more like an astrologer. “Be yourself” she would have chided him.

He wished he could be himself – the retired schoolteacher with a passion to plot the journey of the planets. He had always been interested in astrology. “A divine gift” his grandmother had proclaimed. “My prodigy” his uncle, a renowned seer had declared. He grew up balancing science and pseudoscience. He continued doing it for years. Classroom physics during the day, special tuitions at home during the evenings and passionate encounters with planetary positions at night.

He calculated and predicted the probable path life can take in the future based on birth time and location of birth. He was able to foresee things he did not expect. He didn’t consider it a special gift – it was just logic and a detailed knowledge of planetary powers and positions.  “It is not reading tealeaves and I don’t predict things” he had declared more than once. A few members of the family and some friends came to him every 2-3 years, at the time of births, marriages, hardship and death to see if there was hope.

“Life is all about hope. What is life without hope?” he advised them just like he would do to kids who had failed their exams. “Try harder. Ofcourse there will be bumps along the way but you will end up in a better place. Pray to God. Believe in him but special charms or pujas are not the way” he always said giving the much-needed shot of confidence.

Over the years, his fame in accurate predictions had grown and there was always someone asking him to read their horoscopes and he always did it. He enjoyed the process. It filled up those empty hours between sunrise and sunset. It was fascinating. He had pulled out his horoscope last week to take another look when something popped out – he was in a zone of transition. Jupiter had entered the 10^th house and it meant change. A career change. He had laughed at it.

Trrrrring trrring. The sound broke his concentration. He thought about not answering the phone and immersing himself in the calculations that seemed to predict doom. “Maybe it is an omen to put away this horoscope” he thought as he grabbed the phone. “Hello Panditiji, how are you?” boomed Maynak’s voice – a voice he hadn’t heard in over 30 years. “Maynak Sir! How are you? Still going strong with TV production I hear?”. “Yes Panditiji . Listen – I wanted to talk to you about this astrology stuff. You free tomorrow evening around 6? I can come by your place and we can catch up in private”. An omen – a sign of things to come he thought as he said yes.

This post is a part of the April A to Z challenge. 26 days, 26 letters and 26 short stories. Come back tomorrow for more.