Chapter 8: Chocolate Gayab (The Chocolate Disappears)

The chocolate vanished on a Tuesday. The vanishing being: not dramatic, not sudden (not like the fireflies, which had stopped in an instant). The chocolate vanished gradually — the gradual-vanishing being the supply chain's particular expression of the anomaly: cocoa beans failing, crops collapsing, the collapsing travelling through the supply chain at the speed of commerce.

Charu noticed first. The noticing being: the nurse-wife's grocery observation. "Bhushan, Dairy Milk nahi mil rahi. Tanmay ke liye chocolate leni thi — dukaan pe nahi hai."

Dairy Milk is unavailable. I needed to buy chocolate for Tanmay — the shop doesn't have it.

"Supply chain issue hoga," Bhushan said. The dismissal that was the ecologist's particular blind spot — the blind spot being: when you study ecosystems, you forget that ecosystems include the human supply chain and the human-supply chain was the delivery mechanism for everything, including chocolate.

But it was not just chocolate. Within a week, the grocery absences multiplied. Coffee — the instant coffee that Bhushan used as backup when Charu's chai was unavailable — gone from shelves. Specific fruits — bananas, the particular Indian banana that Tanmay ate every morning — scarce. Rice prices rising — not dramatically (not the doubling that indicated crisis) but measurably (12% increase, the 12% being the increment that shopkeepers noticed and customers felt and the feeling being: the wallet's sensitivity to the increment).

Bhushan connected the dots on a Friday morning. The connecting being: the ecologist's pattern-recognition applied to the domestic sphere. Cocoa beans were a crop. Coffee was a crop. Bananas were a crop. Rice was a crop. Crops depended on: pollination (insects, which were 96% declined), soil health (mycorrhizal networks, which were at 41%), rainfall (which was zero for 60 days).

The anomaly was not just environmental. The anomaly was agricultural. The anomaly was: the food supply.

He called Tarun immediately. The immediately being: the urgency that the connection produced — the urgency of "this is no longer about birds and fireflies, this is about food."

"Tarun, food supply pe impact shuru ho gaya." The food supply is being affected.

"Kya matlab?" What do you mean?

"Chocolate gayab. Coffee gayab. Banana scarce. Rice prices up. Sab crop-dependent products hain — aur crops depend on pollination aur soil health aur rain. Teenon collapse ho rahe hain. Matlab: food supply collapse shuru ho gaya."

Chocolate gone. Coffee gone. Bananas scarce. Rice prices up. All crop-dependent products — and crops depend on pollination and soil health and rain. All three are collapsing. Meaning: food supply collapse has begun.

The sentence that made Tarun set down whatever he was holding (his phone was in his hand, his other hand was holding a pen, the pen dropped onto the notebook). Food supply collapse. The two words that made the story not an environmental story or a science story but a survival story.

Tarun wrote the article in three hours. The three hours being fast even for a journalist who wrote fast — the fast-writing being the urgency's particular fuel: the fuel that bypassed the normal editorial process of draft-revise-polish and produced instead: draft-file, the filing being: the story was too urgent for polish, the polish could wait, the publishing could not.

WESTERN GHATS ANOMALY HITS FOOD SUPPLY: CHOCOLATE, COFFEE, BANANAS DISAPPEARING FROM SHELVES AS CROP FAILURES MOUNT

The article that produced: national attention. Not the regional attention that the previous articles had generated (the regional being Maharashtra and Karnataka, the states directly affected). National. The national-attention being: food supply affected everyone, not just the Western Ghats residents, the everyone being: 1.4 billion people who ate food that was grown in soil that was connected to the ecosystem that was collapsing.

Television news went full coverage. NDTV, Aaj Tak, Republic — the channels that found in the food-supply angle the particular story that television required: visual, immediate, affecting viewers personally. The visual being: empty shelves. The immediate being: your next grocery trip. The personally-affecting being: your food.

Bhushan was invited onto three talk shows in one day. The inviting being: the professor becoming the public face of the anomaly, the public-face being the particular role that media assigned to the expert who was available, articulate, and correct — Bhushan being all three.

"Dr. Kulkarni, yeh kitna serious hai?" — the talk show host's question, the question that every host asked because the question was the setup for the answer that produced the ratings.

How serious is this?

"Bahut serious. Agar current trend continue hua — agar pollinator populations recover nahi karte, agar monsoon wapas nahi aata, agar soil health improve nahi hoti — toh six months mein Western Ghats region ka agricultural output 50% se zyada gir jayega. Six months ke baad — worse. Yeh gradual nahi hai. Yeh accelerating hai."

Very serious. If current trends continue — if pollinator populations don't recover, if the monsoon doesn't return, if soil health doesn't improve — then in six months the Western Ghats region's agricultural output will drop by more than 50%. After six months — worse. This isn't gradual. It's accelerating.

The number — 50% — that produced the panic. The panic being: the particular Indian panic that manifested in: hoarding. Within 72 hours of the broadcast, supermarkets in Pune and Mumbai reported panic-buying. Rice, dal, cooking oil — the staples being cleared from shelves not because the staples were scarce but because the panic made them scarce, the panic-scarcity being the self-fulfilling prophecy that the panic produced.

The government responded with: a statement. "The situation is being monitored. There is no immediate food security threat. Citizens are advised not to hoard essential commodities." The statement that was designed to calm and that the designed-to-calm failed because the statement's existence confirmed that the situation warranted a statement and the warranting was the confirmation of the concern.

Mansi called Tarun. The calling being: the first non-professional call between them — the first call that was not "I have data for your story" but "I'm concerned."

"Tarun, mere centre pe jo clients aa rahe hain — unko anxiety ho rahi hai. Pregnant women — already vulnerable — ab food scarcity ka fear. Miscarriage rate already up hai. Agar anxiety aur food quality dono kharab hue toh —"

The clients at my centre — they're developing anxiety. Pregnant women — already vulnerable — now fear of food scarcity. Miscarriage rate is already up. If both anxiety and food quality deteriorate —

"Mansi, main kya kar sakta hoon?" The question that was the reporter's particular frustration — the frustration being: I write stories, stories produce attention, attention produces action, but the action is slow and the slow is the gap between reporting and resolving and the gap is: people suffer in the gap.

Mansi, what can I do?

"Likhte reh. Tera likhna hi tera kaam hai. Aur — Bhushan se bol, fieldwork mein human health angle bhi include kare. Pregnancy data, nutrition data, anxiety levels. Agar yeh sab connect hai — toh connection document honi chahiye."

Keep writing. Your writing is your job. And — tell Bhushan to include the human health angle in his fieldwork. Pregnancy data, nutrition data, anxiety levels. If it's all connected — the connection should be documented.

"Karunga." I will.

The conversation that was — the conversation was the shift, the shift from professional to personal, the personal being: the tone had changed, the tone-change being the particular frequency that concern-for-others produced when the concern-for-others was shared between two people and the shared-concern created: the bond. The bond that was not romantic (not yet) but that was the precursor to romantic and the precursor being: shared purpose, shared concern, the particular intimacy of two people who cared about the same thing.

Bhushan, meanwhile, was dealing with the farmhouse's water crisis. The crisis being: the bore well was now 3.2 metres below normal. The 3.2 being the number that approached the bore well's limit — the limit being the depth at which the pump could no longer draw water and the no-longer-drawing being: dry.

"Bhushan, do hafte ka paani hai bore well mein." Charu — the calculation delivered with the nurse's clinical precision applied to the household's survival. "Uske baad — tanker mangana padega."

There's two weeks' water in the bore well. After that — we'll need to order a tanker.

Two weeks. The countdown that was not about ecology or journalism or research but about: the family. The family's water. Chitra's water. Tanmay's water. The water that a seven-year-old with a heart condition needed to survive and the needing being the priority that outranked every other priority.

"Tanker order kar deta hoon," Bhushan said. The ordering being: the concession, the concession that the ecologist made when the ecology became the personal — when the drought that he studied became the drought that his family lived in and the living-in being the transformation from academic to existential.

He picked up the phone. Called the tanker service. "Ek tanker chahiye. Mulshi. Haan, pata hai — sab ko chahiye. Queue mein daal do."

I need a tanker. Mulshi. Yes, I know — everyone needs one. Put me in the queue.

The queue. The tanker queue that was 43 households long — 43 families in Mulshi waiting for water, the waiting being the drought's particular democracy: everyone waited equally, the equally being the drought's only fairness.

That evening, Bhushan sat on the balcony. No chai — Charu was conserving water, the conserving meaning: chai once a day instead of twice, the once-instead-of-twice being the rationing that the household had begun.

He looked at the Sahyadris. Brown. The brown that was no longer "turning" but "turned" — the turned being the completion of the transformation from green to brown and the completion being: done. The Sahyadris were brown. The Sahyadris that were the green spine of peninsular India were brown and the brown was: the anomaly's signature on the landscape.

Chitra came to the balcony. Sat on his lap. The sitting-on-lap that was the seven-year-old's particular comfort position — the position that said: I am here, you are here, we are together.

"Baba?"

"Haan, beta?"

"Jugnu kab wapas aayenge?" When will the fireflies come back?

The question that she asked every week. The question that Bhushan answered with the same answer every week: "Jaldi, beta." Soon, sweetheart.

The answer that was becoming harder to say. The harder-becoming being: each week without fireflies made "jaldi" less credible and the less-credible made the answer more of a lie and the more-of-a-lie being the father's particular burden: lying to protect and the protecting being the love and the love being: the thing that made the lie necessary.