Today.
I will tell you a story of a boy and a girl. A girl and a
boy.
---
Back Then.
They walked on the streets. Long walks and shorter ones. Days
and Nights and Days. Cuddling up and dreaming of a life, together. Her shyness
and his anxiety. Their love. Days and Nights and Days. Her pretty face. The
most beautiful thing on earth. Her tears, the worst.
He remembers them. All of them and much more. And yet, he
often struggles to find the details of the moments revelled. Ask him, and he
would fumble. And deep inside his heart, in his subconscious, each and every
second of her time, all of it, is etched with vigour. He remembers the aroma of
her hair. The touch of her hand. The feel of her fabric. The sound of her steps
and yawns. God! She looks the cutest when she yawns. The pouting face of hers,
he remembers. And the baby voice she makes on the phone still stirs his soul.
He remembers the sight of her eyes. The cornea. And the taste of her labial
commissures. Morning rays were the best. Falling on her sleepy face, they made
her hold his hands, breathe calmly, open her eyes and prepare her to bless
another day of his life. He today lives to get blessed for the whole of his life,
every day. And he will.
I also know with great amazement how she made him fall in
love with the city. Her city. He calls it. He never liked it. No, nothing of
it. And she, slowly, with her magical demeanour and love, turned it to his
favourite one. He loves the many
streets. He loves the shops and the alleys. And the people and dogs of it. He
loves the markets, the malls and the bazaars. He wanders there to breathe the
air where once she laughed with him. He loves the yellow cabs. He gets into
them more often in the hope of getting into the one where once she tried to
open his fist. Or the ones where she kissed him. He even loves his own house.
He wanders lonely staring at the nearby lakes and the trees and the corridors
of his building. He eats the same food which she ate. And he leaves half of it,
because they ate together. Silly! The wrinkles of the sheet, he desires to
preserve. The wrinkles of the dance and the love-fights and the hugs. He shows me
a spot, on the table cloth, of ketchup. She dropped it while giving him a bite
of her sandwich. It was her sandwich, he
emphasizes. I remember him keeping a broom. His room was now a dirty mess. And
while he was at it, telling me his stories, he took a shirt off the hanger and
found a long hair. Must have worn it while she was here.
He is getting a call from her and he must step out of his
room. And beside his phone, there is a box lying. A simple box of cardboard.
Simple enough to get ignored. He goes out and I am at the box. There are few long
hairs, a pointed gravel just like the one that gets stuck on your sole, some
very old movie tickets, a Miss Lee
clothing label, a broken tip of what seems to me a Kaajal and two Kurkure
pieces.
---
Today.
I have a dinner invitation and I should get going. It’s
their eighth anniversary. I must also get something for their kids. A boy and a
girl. A girl and a boy.
---
Prior to Back Then.
He comes back to his room after dropping her off. Opens the
lock. Click. Tip. The light is on. Used plates of the sandwich that was love. They
had shared in the morning. A book he read to her. It was open. A pack of Kurkure she ate. He leaps at it.
Creeech-Crrrruch. The sound of the orange plastic bag. His hands dig into it.
Spicy smell of the two leftover pieces. Caressing his senses. He kisses them. Preserve
the love, shall we? In the box.
