The Girl I Last Loved (2 page)

... I Love you Rachu ...

Dear Frnds pls spread this msg until its reach to my rachu

I thinks see knows my name

Book Downloaded from: 
EBOOK4IN.BLOGSPOT.COM

Preface

We always question destiny that it never gave us the chance on love…

But isn’t the real question whether we gave ourselves that chance?

Chapter 1

Present Day… Mumbai

Darkness all around. Vision getting blurred. It takes some time for the eyes to get adjusted to sudden darkness or brightness. Just like in life, we are always taken aback by sudden pleasure or pain, the same feeling of breathlessness, why does it always surround me. I am gasping for air and not getting much success. Someone pushing me from behind; in turn I am pushing the one in front of me. You’ve to impel others to get what you want; you can’t blame others as everyone including yourself is doing the same. I can feel the adrenalin rush. Everyone has to run as they have a place to reach, a place they call home – a home where someone is waiting for them, who will be worried if they are late. But me, I am just getting dragged along the crowd as I have no place to reach, no place to call a home, no family to wait for me. Look at the irony of the situation – life is making me smirk at my very own misery!

It’s really funny, even if you aren’t making any effort to move on, you will, as time never stops. You feel nothing much is going to change but it does, slowly and gradually without you ever noticing.

People who are important will cease to matter six years from now if they walk out of your life at this point. You won’t forget them but you won’t even recall them every ‘now and then’, even if it was the person you were once ‘madly in love’ with. You may still be in love with that person, but other things will get in your head and your lover’s memories will be locked behind a door you would rarely visit.

The time progressed a minute or few and I was out of that overfilled passage. Huh! It’s Friday, so I am travelling by locals. It feels great to be around so many people whom you don’t know at all but you can somewhere relate to their lives. A great place to identify yourself with several emotions, which either you can’t feel or no longer have the ability to.

I used to come here as a kid. Dad used to bring me here for a walk and get me my favourite cutlet which Bansi
bhaiya
used to make around the corner. That was till he got transferred to Lucknow… and then he never returned.

Everything has changed since then but nothing seems different. Except a few more lights, a few extra waiting seats, increased shops, more betel stains at nooks and corners. Increased security in an attempt to prevent another 26/11. Finally, jostling young crowd running between different tuitions and home, under the pressure of cracking various competitions – bearing very few seats.

Making my way further, having just missed the train, I was lucky enough to get a place to make myself comfortable. It’s a way of regarding the situation. Here it’s my weekly luxury to travel by locals which I am still enjoying even after missing my last train. However, for those whose travelling by locals is a compulsion, missing the train can be akin to annoying, something adding to their misery.

I stretched my arms and glanced around. There were three young guys in their late teens, standing closely in a circle. All of them dressed in funky vibrant T-shirts and on-purpose tattered jeans, vibrant slippers; big dial watches, spiked hair. I reflected back at myself. I’m suited up, black and grey, Rado watch, well-set black shinning hair. Is there such a thing like young at heart? But I was more than relieved that I no longer carry a student bag. One of the three boys lighted a cigarette and took a very comfortable puff. After two to three puffs, he passed it on to his friend. During its lifetime, the stick kept on rotating among the three of them. I couldn’t help but smile, remembering those good old days. Now I smoke sixteen a day and it’s not even near to the fun we used to have puffing from a single stick. I have absolutely no idea why smoking or drinking bring guys closer. Although hard to grasp, but it’s a truth. Most of the colleagues with whom I am acquainted, I met them at the smoking zone itself. Besides, it’s something that serves my loneliness well. Since the past few months I am quite content with my career growth. So I was able to take this immense leap in slicing down my intake from more than thirty-eight to sixteen as a New Year resolution.

What started as an infantile attempt to feel like an adult, is my most eminent companion now. I smoke to reward myself. I snap a deal, I smoke. I complete a report, I smoke.

I survive yet another day of this purposeless life, I smoke; but most important of all, it feels like being with a friend. When it glows in the dark, it assures that I’m not alone. Being in a station gives the very same feeling to me.

All these years I have witnessed various flavours of life here. A kid taking blessings from his parents before leaving home for the very first time. An innocent newlywed bride with all her expectations and fears upon entering her new-found world. Children running after vendors; parents running behind them. Lovers hugging each other while parting ways. Lovers passing smile on spotting each other amidst the entire crowd. Some promising new-bees leaving for work, hanging their laptop bags in one hand and newspaper in other, which probably they will read before reaching work. Some tired fellows unwilling to begin yet another day. Few satisfied faces reflecting they have embraced life in its every form. People coming. People going. Several unexpected convergence. Several unwanted divergence.

So many people, so many eyes – holding so many dreams, hope, anger, pain, desire. Those wondering, awaiting eyes!

Those eyes… those eyes that confirm you are not the only one with unfulfilled desires, you are not the only one who has assimilated this unusual mixture of emotions.

I have always been attracted to trains, especially the ones departing. I can’t reason out why it gives a sense of wellbeing. Watching them leave reminds me one day I can refuse to be what I am. One day I can run away to a very distant place where I’m unknown.

There is always a start somewhere else, if not here.

“Oh! I am sorry,” a stranger who just spilled half the contents of her bag over me uttered.

My thoughts or rather my repeated thoughts were interrupted.

I lifted my head, giving her an odd look and directed my sight elsewhere.

She bent down and some groceries out of her carry bag spilled again.

The feminine virtue!

Now I was crossing the line, uncivil on to rude.

I bent down, gave her a weary smile and started looking for and gathering her stuff. As they were expected to, nobody halted to join us. Even the person sitting just next to me didn’t even budge a little, absorbed in texting.

I picked a few tomatoes, some oranges, actually lots of them; she probably attended some ‘buy 1 kg, get 1 kg free’ offer and placed it her grocery bag. I often wonder if these market analysts know women better than anyone else. ‘Sale’ gathers women together, makes them run, snatch and fight; they erroneously feel like a winner if they emerge out with a bunch of shopping bags.

This lady standing in front of me, only she would be knowing what she would be cooking with three bags of tomatoes and oranges.

‘Thank you!’ she hurriedly responded to my gesture. Just then an orange slipped from her bag and rolled along the platform.

I took a brief look at her. She was struggling with two plastic bags in one hand and one in another, while adjusting her handbag to her shoulder… gripping her
dupatta…
managing her hair.

As she progressed towards that orange, I signalled to her that I will get it.

I took long firm steps in its direction. I crouched to lift it up. At that very moment some train arrived and the platform was overflowing with people. I hastened to get up, but was ceased. I stopped. My eyes moved aimlessly without any direction, but I definitely was in search of something – something which I haven’t seen but not unknown. All I could see were shoes, speeding feet following random tracks. It gets hard to scan especially when you don’t know what you are looking for. Subsequently familiar steps of someone walking struck me. There it is among all those unknown jumbled pegs. A flash of lightning and I retreated. I tried to focus. It was the mirrors. Small pieces of coloured glass studded in her slip-ons tangled in beautiful threads. That smooth skin texture. That shining pink enamel. Though what captured me was the silver-stoned toe-ring. A funky pink plastic toe-ring shaped as a Cinderella shoe, a flicker of memory from my past flashed back in front of my eyes. It may not be true… but every ‘no’ exists along with a corresponding ‘yes’. I tried to concentrate on it, as with so many people bubbling in, I lost it; maybe I lost her. I got restless. I drifted my eyes sideways and again she was there. I couldn’t see her in full but I was getting more and more attracted to her. In few more attempts I saw light blue jeans faded white at few parts. I froze. My heart started thumping. Is it? I was afraid to find out.

Still I followed her. In a few more glimpses, I saw her lemon-coloured
kurti
and purple-embroided
jhola
. I was nearing her. My speed continued to increase. I saw her hand, her sparkling multicoloured bangles, a red coloured thumb-ring, a sea-green ring on her little finger, when she tried to stop a man who was about to crash into her.

I quit. My feet were struck at the ground while my eyes were following her. Again there were several others between us. She tossed her stole up in the air and on to her shoulders. Everything was new but it wasn’t different. All the action, the grace was unlike her, yet there was a striking similarity. She wore a silver metallic watch with complimenting bracelets hanging just below it on her other hand. Her long sleek nails stunned me. Her stole now rested on her shoulder. It was green with yellow patches here and there, several plain mirrors shinning…blinding people. Enchanting sound of
ghun-ghuru
hanging from her stole tried to drag me to her. I was tempted to put an end to it. To know. To confront. To feel. Still the push and the pull were equal. Her hair was flowing away from her face, long silky streaked in red, coursing up to her waist. The chase was over. She turned towards me. Few strands of hair obstructed her face. She tucked them behind her ear with her long slender fingers.

A chill ran through my body. I was unable to move. I choked. My hands curled. I was ecstatic for a moment, nervous for the next and scared in the third. I struggled with myself. Half of her hair tucked behind her ear from which hung a rotating
jhumka
. Same beautiful hairline, few strands flowing on to the face but ending before her eyes began. Her enchanting eyes – ever expressive, ever transparent, always innocent.

‘Eyes are windows to the soul’ was so true for her. Her pure white face gives one an illusion that it will turn red if anyone touches her. No straight guy can ever take his eyes off her golden nose-ring. Her lips, pure pink, never needed any extra colour. But her smile was something to hold out for. So lively, so perfect, captivating, bewitching, delighting, enthralling… I never found enough words to describe it.

I reversed, scared to face her. I was even more scared to let her confront me. I sided. I saw her coming. She was then parallel to me. She halted. I hid behind a pillar. Then glanced back again at her. She searched her bag for something, then feeling assured on finding it, she smiled, typically her. Finally she passed.

The girl passed.

The girl I last loved…

The girl who used to look at me and I used to forget everything going around me and could not stop but smile back at her.