In the morning, much too early to have been woken up, the man unloaded coconuts under my window. He stood in the truck, amidst the brown spheres that could have passed off as smooth rocks, and dropped them in the hands of his colleague. The colleague was a thin man with arms like sugarcane sticks. He put the coconuts in cartons.

There was a constant plop sound; the sound that woke me up. It went from being annoying to pleasant, like a rhythm you discover around you. The trees around them rippled and there were faraway vehicle sounds. It was all comforting in a vague, distant manner.

After they unloaded what they had to, the man packed the cartons and jumped into the truck with his friend. The two just lay there on the coconut bed sharing a beedi, that seemed to be fizzling away, and making small talk. I wish I could hear what they were saying, I am sure there’d be a story in there.