Disaster Tourism

Went to meet Sir yesterday. After eight years. After I boarded the return bus, I had this urge to wring my hands. Three hours of conversation and I was very confused, frustrated and worried. He knows L so I mentioned her academic life but I was wondering if she would've been glad to hear him speak. I could imagine both of them being on the same page and it made me jealous. I definitely wasn't able to understand where all that new conviction of his came from. He was eager to speak and he started from the moment I stepped inside his house. And unlike others, he said there was no solution. We were doomed. There was nothing I could say that offered any counter. I timidly put the books I had carried for him back into my bag, mumbling that he may not be reading those anymore. He just curtly said yes, barely glancing at them. He was angry that ignorant people sat in a bubble, ready to be sitting ducks when the day came, and I knew he meant me. And he made it worse by asking me sarcastically if I wanted to take some of his old American fictions. I refused. He was eager that I take Byrappa's Parva but I declined it too; I had read it already. I just wanted to run away at that moment.

After I left, he messaged he was sorry that we spent the entire time talking such an unpleasant topic and that he hoped my next visit would be better. It wasn't much of a solace, really.