I just stretched my limps and
kick off the sheets. The mobile which was sleeping with me somewhere inside the
sheets fell off the bed. It beeps at the moment when it lay still near my rug.
I reached for the mobile.
It’s my Birthday!
That took a while for me to read
few messages in my inbox and few missed calls from my little one and few
friends who still remember the day without fading their memory. I thanked all
of them who wished me with a message and returning calls postponed to after
breakfast.
I got up and moved to the door.
The floor and the air are still damp from the last night rain. I slipped into
my sandals. I was counting with some numbers when I searched for my tooth brush
and paste. Is it 45 or 46! I
tried to calculate it but that too I postponed to after breakfast. After drying
face with the towel I stared at me for a while in the bathroom mirror. Time has
done its art work over me. In my hair…and through the face. The latter was the
worst! The wrinkles to the cheeks a little depend. The little of mustache that
I still keep is purely salt n pepper now. I brushed my hair roughly with my
fingers. I don’t know its still have the baby smell once my parents used to say
but one thing was sure, the black is fighting with the white. The survival
seems tough for white’s side. I smiled over my face and turned to my kitchen.
To make my morning coffee and reached for the front door to get the news paper.
But as it’s another good day, I quit the reading
and put it down the table. I reached my bed again. Sipping the hot coffee and
watching the panoramic view of Trivandrum city through my long venetian windows
of bed room. I didn’t like the city since my first visit and never was
interested to settle down here. Once again the fate, which I called as my guide
to find the path in my life made me to be here at this late age. There was
someone… my mobile beeped before I proceed with my thoughts.
“Happy bday bro...” my little one
wished before my hello
“Thank you” I smiled but voice
seemed a little coarse
“I tried you all night but you
didn’t picked up”
“Yeah I was about to call you
back. It was in silent mode” I lied
“Hmm. Okay. Come home today.
Everyone is here today as it is Sunday. Birthday lunch is here”.
“I am not sure but let’s see. I
will call you” I lied again
“Hmm... take care...and call me
before noon”
She hung up.
It’s my birth day! Once
again I adjusted with the thought. Decades of celebrations! Completing 45(or 46!)
years on earth wasn’t an easy thing to achieve. I heard one train whistle. I
took my coffee mug from night table and open the door to balcony. One train was
heading to south. The day seems so dry and without any activities. My sister’s
plan is better, to join with her and her kids. It might make my day. I
searched through my mobile inbox again. No, there are no messages! It wasn’t
there since last few years. I didn’t ask for the reason neither made a call.
Sometime the voice from the other end wouldn’t be pleasing or it wouldn’t have
anything good to say or might be…there is no surety that she will be the one
who answering the call. Lets fate do its role this time too. I have nothing to
do. I spend a little more time with there in the balcony watching two more
training heading to south.
It wasn’t a routine for me
to check mails but before going for after noon nap something made me to turn my
laptop on. There weren’t many mails for me in my mailbox too. But one was
there! The very one that I always excepted. I re-read those two lines. My hands
were a little shaking so the heart too. I closed the screen and fell back to my
bed. I knew a drop made its way through my corner of eyes. It’s almost two past
fifteen. I have to decide in few hours. I held a hand over my chest and lay
still for few minutes.
Before she get into the train I held her hands. She tried to flinch
but my hold was that strong that few bangles got broken and formed red lines on
her wrist.
“Leave me… It hurts” she said scornfully
“I will but please give me a chance to explain” I begged
“There is nothing to be clarified. I know what future holds now. And
this will not work.” She stopped the effort to get off my hold
“But we can wait. They will change their mind. Our parents will accept
us one day” I tried to convince her and let go off her hands
“Its you saying who were yelling at me yesterday to get rid of you”
she was still furious
“I am really sorry for that. At that time the situations was something
really bad at home. That made me lose temper but please don’t leave me” my
throat were shaking
She kept silent this time
“Please” I repeated
“I am not angry at you. But this…this wont work and you know well
that. You might change your mind again tomorrow and will go for your parent’s
decision” She said
I couldn’t stand her eyes this time. I knew what I did last time was
wrong. On a moment’s whim I shouted at her.
“I promise I won’t hurt you the way I did. We together will wait for
our parent’s blessings. If you are with me I can...”
She interrupted me
“May be this has to end this way. I will be dropping from the college.
Sometimes next year I can continue there, at Ottapalam”
Without uttering a word I looked at her. Train whistled its departure.
Time to move on.
She get into the train and stood by the door. I could see the
quivering lips and sparkling eyes.
“Why doing this… you are hurting both of us” I tried to reach for her
hands.
“Let give a chance to fate” she said and her finger tips brushed past
mine.
I stood there for a moment, till her train scuttle my vision.
Till the red light melt in the January mist.
I open my eyes and stared at the
ceiling, I decided. Then I picked up my speed which I lost years back and I was
at my door in next 30 minutes to lock the apartment. I took the elevator to the
ground floor.
“Good after noon sir” The
security wished me when I passed by his table.
“Very good after noon” I waved
“Going out sir?”
“Yes”
“Without car?”
Then I remembered I forgot my car
keys. There is no much distance for me to cover, and a walk do much better.
“An early evening walk” I smiled
and left the flat’s pavement. His bewildered look gave me a notification on my
wider smile. May be no one in the neighborhood have never noticed me with such
an enthusiasm. The anticipation made me a little faster and I reached the
Trivandrum central in 10 minutes walk.
I stood at the main entrance a
little long and smiled. Someone frowned at me staring at the stone walls of the
station. I sat on the chair at the very front of the first plat form. I can clearly
see whoever passing by.
Tick Tick Tick…
It was about to rain again. I
wasn’t thinking about how to return to the flat without a car or an umbrella.
Once again I read the mail in my mobile in umpteenth time in that three hours.
But this time my vision was blurred when I read.
A very happy bday and congratz that you hav
survived a very long journey :-)
Try to be there...at our central station at 5 in the
evening…I will be waiting…
The announcement for Mangalore
express’s was going on when I stepped down at main entrance of the station. She
just told me to see here but not mentioned how she is coming. By bus or train? It
was heavily raining. Before stepping into it I stood there for a while. Along
with me a lots of passengers were waiting. The light from the north tower was
reaching the entrance to the parking lot, there I see someone running towards
the station entrance. I made a little space near me as the person was running
towards my direction. It was a lady and she and her cotton sari was soaked on
the unexpected rain of the late summer.
“Sorry… I was late” she murmured
I shifted my gazes from the
running water to the wet lashes which are looking at me. It was difficult for
me to identify her but she did. I was speechless but she continued
“I was at Cochin in the morning
and on the way to here…sorry I couldn’t make it on a time...”
This time I smiled.
“You were never late...just in
time” I said
She too smiled
“What about an evening walk?” I
asked
“Now?” her eyes widen
“Yes...before its getting late”
The people who stood
besides us will be definitely thinking that these old couples gone crazy when
we stepped out in to the rain. I didn’t feel the wind or the rain. All I could
feel was the hand which accidentally rubbed mine when we stepped out. It was a
touch after a life time. Slowly I put a hand over the shoulders which slightly shaking
in the rain. She didn’t flinch. I saw her face, it was smiling.
“Where we heading to...” she
asked when I turned to the near foot path
“A small place…where the dreams
are still in twenties…”
A thunder and the hand that tighten its grip on my wrist
wake me up to the reality. The three year old who mistakenly held my hands in
fear smiled at me. I patted his hair and looked back to the roaring rain. Its
seems like the monsoon came two weeks before. I checked the time once again.
No! Waiting may be pointless. May be on a whim she sent that mail or to tease
me or still angry at me. But a single mail made my birthday.
You shouldn’t
have sent that mail...
You shouldn’t
have wake me up with so much of hopes
You shouldn’t
have…
Without much thought I entered into the raucous rain. The
drops that rolling down from the sky mixed up with my own droplets that shed from
my eyes. I felt numb. She must be happy now. This day and the mail was just a
joke for her. Hurting the same wound once again. I stepped out of station’s
main gate. At distance I could see the light which is embarked in my apartment’s
name. I moved in that direction.
A silhouette emerged from the darkness at the other side
of the gate. The unexpected rain and the chill air made the fingers quivering
which held the sari end. With the same sari end she was trying to cover the
sling bang which was hanging on her shoulder. The eyes were sunken but still
luminous with the anticipation of coming moments. A meeting after 25 years. The
red bindhi was all washed out in the rain but it still left a shade of red at
the center of forehead and the rest was making its way to down. When she gets closer
to the entrance of the station she rushed to one corner through where she could
step into the first platform. She looked around to see him at the plat form.
The years must have changed him a lot but he will find me before I could. She
smiled and sat at the edge of a waiting bench…
***********************************************************************************
