The One

"So..what are your hobbies?" he asked, trying to muster in as much enthusiasm as he could.

The restaurant was a dull clatter of shushed voices and expensive cutlery, the lighting was dim and a candle fluttered romantically between them, as if in childish excitement of the prospect of love.

She looked up while dissecting her chicken tandoori steak, an attempt to try American food while still maintaining her desi roots."Oh, well, I'm into photography!"

He smiled, it seemed as if a light bulb had switched on in her previously vacant eyes.
"Really? What kind?"
 Finally, a safe topic I can steer this sinking ship of conversation to.

"Into all kinds. I just lovvve taking my own pictures. Capturing every moment instantly and uploading it all on Facebook. I wish I could have a webcam taking pictures of me all the time, you know?"

Don't judge. Don't judge. Don't judge. He silently told himself.

"That..that sounds so great!" he managed to say.

"You think so? Wait." She fished out her gigantic phone from her glossy red bag, and then slid right next to him. "Smilee!" She took around a dozen selfies of the two of us. All of them looked identical, blurry shots of her pouting and him smiling politely. They were then uploaded immediately, instagrammed - as she enlightened him, with a million hashtags. The fluorescent glare from her mega-mobile illuminated her shallow eyes, zapping out any prospect of having a decent conversation.

Why do I even try? This was a date through Tinder, for god's sake. He couldn't believe his love life had plunged into such desperate measures. Who am I to blame this girl? She lives her life, her way. I am nobody to judge. It's my fault I still long for a generation that is no more. My fault that I'm 30 years old and still going on meaningless dates hoping to find that elusive thing called love.

"You don't talk much, do you?" she asked teasingly. "I know you engineer types, my ex was one."

You don't look up from your phone much, do you?! Screamed his mind. Instead the social acceptance filter ingrained in his brain modulated it to, "It's not often that I'm out on a date with such a pretty girl, I'm bound to get nervous."

She giggled and then started punching in her phone.
Oh no. Please. Please do not tweet that.

"Do you read any books?" he asked, as if to neutralize her labeling of him as a shy engineer creep.

"Books, not many..The last one I read was by Chetan Bhagat. But I lovve scrolling through my news feed. It releases all my tension from office."
Her tongue rolled luxuriously on the word 'love'. It made him feel a little dizzy. He was a social animal after all, he had needs that were being left unfulfilled for quite a long time.

She must have caught him staring at her because the next thing she said was, "Wait for the next date," winking invitingly.

He grinned like an idiot and walked her home. It was a pretty silent walk along the suburbs of the city, the silence interrupted by pings and rings erupting from her phone. Meanwhile, his mind started doing some calculations.

The population of the world was around 7 billion, if I narrow my 'one true love' to the population of Delhi, which is staggering in its own right, 18 million and say, half are females - 9 million (although that is an exaggeration, considering the capital's notorious reputation as rape city and the high sex ratio), out of them only a million are in the age group 25-35, and if we consider that half are married, the number of women I see as a potential partner reduces to 5 lakh. 
Out of those 5 lakh, I'd be attracted to only one percent of the women (this would be our success rate) decreasing the number to about 5 thousand potential mates. So if I start dating tomorrow everyday for the coming 5 years, that makes it 30x12x5 dates, around 1800 dates! Out of which probably only 18 dates will be successful. My chance of finding true love is very less - a dismal 18/5,00000 x 100 = 0.0036 % in the next five years. 
So, what do I do here? Do I compromise on 'the one'? Adjust? Like I've adjusted with my degree, my job? Follow the road map like I have all my life and have it arranged? Or do I give up and live a life as a hermit in the hills of Himalayas? Do I even believe in destiny, serendipity? That the one will turn up at one fortune moment and all of my failed relationships will culminate at these coordinates of space and time? What if, my 'one' is already floating in the universe, far away, holding hands with another speck in the universe, or worse, isn't even born yet?

"So, are you coming up for coffee?" she asked, fluttering her eyelashes seductively, her question like a bumpy shore to his flow of thoughts.

"Um, I had a lovely time today..but umm.." he hesitated. "Maybe some other time." He reached out for a handshake.

She shoved her phone under her arm, balancing her huge bag and shook his hand awkwardly.
"What is your full name? I need to tag you on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, Foursquare, Instagram.."

He smiled, shaking his head and started walking back in the late summer heat of Delhi.


  

Old Fashioned

Time and again, I’m hit with the realization that I’ve probably been born at the wrong time. I see myself belonging to a black and white era, devoid of the complex gradients of greys. My moods belong to the intense extreme ends of the spectrum. I love too fiercely, hate too strongly. There is no middle ground. No room for the grey drapery of deception or diplomacy. A sharp contrast to the world I'm made to inhabit.

Welcome to my world. A world where we constantly have to thumb and contract our thoughts. A world of pings, pokes and likes. A place where the only touch we feel is the one on screens, the laughter we hear muffled behind a stoic ‘lol’ and our annoyance contained in a monosyllabic ‘k’.

No, I’m not ranting. I’m happy, really. Just have a look at my 67 photos with me and 5 others.  Don’t you see me grinning at the camera? I mean, what spells happiness more than heavily filtered pictures of my dessert? Of course, I'm happy. My life is polished for others’ view, through the lens of the wrong end of the telescope.

We mask our personalities behind white and blue screens. Type unspeakable things on 5 inch screens. Yet our heart shivers to look each other in the eye and say what we feel.

I love you. You inspire me. I wish you would never have to leave me.

We tremble to mouth our sentiments.

Love is convenience, they say. This definition collides head-on with the one shaped by poets and singers, the authoritarians on love over the decades.

Love and leave. Come and go.

Monogamy is outdated. I think I’d be happier off as a prairie vole.  We would cling to each other’s tails and mate for life.

But then pair bonding is a sensitive issue.

Were we really tagged in pairs with someone out there in the universe, only to be separated after birth, so that we could find each other through some predestined fateful meeting after tackling a labyrinth of societal obstacles?
Sounds improbable. Nature is easy. We’re born with all the things we need to survive. Two eyes, a nose, a working digestive system and so on. Are we evolving in a way that love is no longer a social need in the world? So that we only need a partner for reproductive purposes to advance our lineages, with no emotional needs attached?

It’s complicated to delve into all that, for we don’t have the experiments or the statistics to validate any claims.

But certainly the needed for deep, face-to-face conversation has drastically reduced. They have dried out, though the dregs of small talk has increased in this cup called social etiquette.

‘Sup?’

I cringe internally when I hear this word being floated around to fill in conversational gaps and distances. The word is a classic 21st century steamroller; smothering out any prospect of a meaningful conversation.

What happened to good old ‘how are you?’

Too committal a question. Who has the time to actually listen nowadays?

Uncaring. Nonchalant. Sup.

I'm cool. Nothing much. You?

I'm too tired of the meaningless words, the useless nodding and the non-Duchenne smiles that fade as quickly as they appear. When did our social fabric turn so coarse and bristly?

When did silence become so loathed an entity? Why do we shy away from it? Aren't tiresome conversational fillers a lot worse than silence?
 
We have stopped living in the moment, we lead a life in constant retrospect. We capture momentary pleasures in a frenzy and post it to the world. Click-Click-Click. Each moment is preserved in a blurry photograph; a moment turned into a memoir even before it has been fully passed or lived. We are immersed in a wave of perpetual nostalgia, clutching at moments as they pass through.

Slow down.
Look at the sky. The stars twinkle tonight. The sun is smudged beautifully in the sky, splitting into pink and orange. Notice the smile of the little girl who passes by. The bird coos a haunted tune an early winter morning. Each moment is for you.

Stop the
jumping
racing
grasping
pushing
pulling
jostling
Calm down.
It’s all for you, not running away.
It’s you who must stop rushing.
Slow down, close your eyes. Hear the leaves rustle as they glide across the gravel, flirted away by the breeze.
It’s all for you.

Everybody Needs A Santa

                                          

It was that time of the year again. A delicious smell of bakery mixed with equal amounts of bonhomie and excitement pervaded the air. The entire city was draped with streamers of holly and tinsel. At night, it shone magnificently as if all the stars in the universe had lowered their ropes and descended towards earth. Christmas trees stood proudly, glittering with icicles and baubles. There was a certain glow on every face and a twinkle in each passing eye, illuminated by that wondrous thing called hope. The streets sparkled white with snow, chapels were lit up with candles and ears reverberated with the comfortingly familiar carols.

Things up at the North Pole were quite different. Yes, the streets were buried in sparkling white snow (like they are almost all year) but up in Saint Nicholas drive, there was an air of tension and fervor. Elves scurried about in the manufacturing department yelling out orders to each other.
 “One Kindle Snow White, coming up!”
“One icePhone4!”
“Oh damn it, you’ve produced the wrong version. We don’t have time for mistakes!”

The place was a blur of green, with elves running about, pushing levers and pressing buttons. Shiny gifts tumbled out of the whirring machine and darted past on the conveyor belt producing stacks of gifts before you could say ‘Santa!’

Meanwhile, Santa sat in his cabin, his glasses perched on his nose, peering into a bundle of letters amongst the millions scattered on his desk. He was punching in numbers on his calculator swiftly, his eyebrows shooting up every time he pressed ‘add’. After five hours, he was done with all the lists, of all the children from every corner of the world, he removed his glasses and stared glumly at the final number. He was one thousand five hundred seventy-two dollars and 60 cents short of the money needed from his budget. He buried his face in his hands and sobbed, “Oh! Oh! Oh!”
His belly rumbled feebly - he had skipped lunch. Few threads from his red robes were forming burrs and fell off like soft snow. It was such a disaster! It was downright embarrassing! A lot more than the most embarrassing event in his life; when he got stuck while climbing down a chimney owing to gorging on too many cookies. Children all over the world had sent in detailed wish-lists, he could not disappoint them! His workshop’s Six Sigma certification could not be compromised with, years had passed by and not even once had a child woken up to an empty stocking on a Christmas morning. How on earth would he face the elves? They were all expecting bonuses for all the hard work and overtime they were putting in, he would be letting everybody down. He shook his head at the prospect and looked at himself in the mirror - his hair though still a silvery white, was thinning, owing to the stress of the past few months. His usually flushed cheeks now looked sallow and little dark crescents had seemed to form under his wrinkled eyes. He did not know whom to blame - the inflating economy, the rise in demand and availability of luxury items or his own ill adaptation to the ever-fluctuating market. Nobody wanted a good old book or a wooden train any more, it was all about tablets and flashy remote operated cars. Maybe he had gone old in the business and maybe the times demanded a young go-getter guy with a fit body and a sharp mind - not a goofy old man with a rotund belly. This was the only job he’d ever known, his destiny. All his life, he had never known to do anything else. He sighed solemnly. He had already cut down all expenses and if he put the house on mortgage for the leftover amount, he would be plummeted into bankruptcy.

“Santa, Santa. Where are you? You must eat something!”

His contemplative trance was broken, Mrs. Claus’ light footsteps were approaching his cabin. Hurriedly, he hid all his paperwork.

“What? What is that you’re hiding?” demanded Mrs. Claus, her hands on her hips.

“Nothing. Nothing at all. Why would I hide anything?” he smiled sheepishly, his hand still trembling on the top drawer of his desk.

“Are you eating those fattening cookies again? You know they’re no good for you. I especially bought you low fat oatmeal ones. Remember what the doctor said?” Mrs. Claus said sternly.
“Yes, of course,” he agreed, extending his hand to hold hers, “Thanks for getting me tea, dear.”

She immediately sensed something was wrong. “Are you okay?”

He opened the drawer and showed her the paper.
Her eyes grew wider as they went down the list. “Oh, honey. I didn’t know we had exceeded so much...”

She knew that things were going rough on their household for quite a while. She had relied on store coupons to buy cheap casseroles, bought an artificial Christmas tree and had used a string of popcorn instead of tinsel - most of which the reindeer had chewed up. Globalization had affected them adversely and cutting off employees wasn’t an option - the elves were family.
“We will find a way, dear, don’t you worry,” she comforted him. “Finish up your tea, now.”

Outside in the snow, the carpenter elves were making some final touches on the sleigh and all the reindeer flocked around.
“Why can’t we get a new shiny sleigh? This one creaks quite a lot. When was he renamed to Saint Nickless?” a reindeer remarked sarcastically.
One of the other reindeer shouted, “Rude-olph is at it again!”
The others grimaced at Rudolph, clearly the fame had gotten into his head.
“I am sure the wheels will be as soft as a polar bear on an ice cap once I’m done with it,” said the Chief Carpenter Elf confidently.
“Yes, give it a rest. Get into the yuletide spirit! And maybe Santa is saving up to give us a fat bonus!” beamed another reindeer.
All of the reindeer cheered and lifted their antlers up happily in unison.

Inside the cottage, Mrs. Claus was pacing back and forth, her forehead crinkled with worry, her usually arced up lips now in a frown.
“There must be a way, there must be a way,” she muttered to herself.
Her phone beeped. ‘It’s snowing sales on Frozon.com! Delivery within 24 hours of purchases by artic foxes else guaranteed money back! Hurry till stocks last!’

Trust online websites to make you feel worse during times of distress.

“Mrs. Claus! I just had to tell your cookies are out of the world amazing!” squealed an elf, his mouth covered with cookie crumbs, his squeaking shoes rushing into the room.

Suddenly an idea lit up in her mind like an angel atop a Christmas tree.
“Why, my dear. Thank you. Thank you so much, indeed,” she said, patting the elf’s small square back.

She called a small meeting consisting of Computer Engineer Elves, Delivery Elves, Public Relations Elves and Manufacturing Unit Elves in her cabin.
“Hello, my dear elves. I have called all of you for a very important reason. I’d like to tell you a secret that Santa has been hiding for long. We are short of money from the budget.”

An air of gasps rippled through the crowd, their faces stricken with shock and panic.

“What are we going to do? Christmas is less than a week away!” yelled one.

“Will Christmas be cancelled this year?” quipped another.

A fresh wave of frenzy rose through them.

“Calm down, now. Panic will get us nowhere. We are going to save Christmas for Santa. He needs you now, more than ever. So I have come up with a plan. We are going to raise money for him.”

“How’re we to do that? Money doesn’t grow on mistletoe, you know,” said a pudgy nosed elf.

“I will bake and sell North Poles’ best cookies online. They will be hot and delivered fast by special reindeer service!” exclaimed Mrs. Claus, clapping her hands with delight.

“You mean your melt-in-mouth chocolate chip cookies? I would pay a bag of gold for those!” cried out a pot-bellied elf.

“All we need is a website, few extra pair of hands with me to be dusted in flour and butter, delivery elves and a few reindeer!”

“But what will the company be called?” said an excited elf.

“How about Claus Cookies?” asked Mrs. Claus.

“Or how about Frostbite? Like a pun. Bite..you know..because we’re going to eat it.”, chuckled a pointy-eared elf.

“Him and his silly puns again. Claus Cookies is a lot better!” said one of the Public Relations Department’s Elves earnestly.

“Claus Cookies, it is then! So much to do, so little time. Let’s go do it, let’s save Christmas!” cheered Mrs. Claus enthusiastically.

Mrs. Claus’ cabin was a humdrum of activity; her red robes were caked with flour and she worked with dexterous speed. There were elves to sprinkle chocolate chips, some of them were mixing the batter and a few were flattening the dough. The happiest elves were found at the final testing section who got to taste one cookie from each batch.

The cookies were packed in shiny red tins and a green ribbon was tied around each. The Engineer Elf who was furiously tapping away at his computer yelled, “We got our very first order! 5 cookie boxes!”

Everybody started applauding and Mrs. Claus said, “This journey is off to a great start! Let’s keep moving.”

“Oh! And our second order is up! A 100 boxes for a party downtown!” Engineer Elf shouted, thrilled at being the messenger of good news.

The whole room was a cacophony of hoots and whistles.
Mrs. Claus said, “Shh! Santa might hear us! It’s going to be a wonderful surprise! We must send our reindeer off to work.”

Reindeer carried glistening boxes of cookies with a pouch attached to their leg to collect cash. Their business ran smoothly and owing to the good word of mouth, orders mounted up high.

Mrs. Claus’ neck was in a crick but her confidence was shooting high. She had always dreamed of being an entrepreneur, finally that dream had come true.

It was two days before Christmas and Santa touched his gold buckled belt idly. He contemplated selling some of his stuff on Seabay. Tears branched through his wrinkled skin and dissolved into his soft white beard.

Just then there was a knock.

He quickly brushed his tears away and said, “Come on in, it’s open.”

A wide-eyed elf stood at the door and said, “Santa, will you come to the living room? Mrs. Claus has a surprise for you.”

Santa adjusted his belt, washed his face and trudged up to the living room.

The place was plunged in complete darkness.

“Hello? Anybody here?” Santa inquired suspiciously.

“SURPRISE! SURPRISE!” Mrs. Claus and about a fifty elves bounced up from the furniture in the living room, screaming and jumping with joy.

A banner proclaiming ‘We love you Santa!’ in curlicue letters hung above the mantelpiece.

Mrs. Claus came to him and held his hands and said, “Dear, we raised two thousand dollars and 40 cents!”

“But how?” Santa asked, a quizzical expression on his face.

“Remember, a day ago you were upset that a website was using the Claus’ name to sell cookies? Well, my dear that was our website. And we sold like hot cakes! Sorry, cookies.”
Mrs. Claus was grinning ear to ear, her fluffy cheeks pink with excitement. Santa was reminded vividly of a very young Mrs. Claus, when he had given her a penguin for their first anniversary.

“I’m so proud and so relieved. Did I tell you that you’re the best?” Santa kissed her forehead. “Thank you for saving Christmas and, thank you for saving me. You are my Christmas miracle.”

An audible round of sighs went among the elves and one particular emotional elf took out his handkerchief and wept with happiness. “I hope one day, I get a lovely pixie and our love is just like theirs,” he murmured.

“And all of you!” Santa turned to the elves, “You’re the best family I could ask for.”
He knelt on one knee and opened his arms into a wide hug wherein all the elves clambered on.

The fire crackled warmly and Santa slept snugly after days. The gifts were wrapped, the sleigh replaced with the latest model - Sleighzoom 4.0. Homes around the globe were decorated, adorned with flat stockings expectant of being swollen up the next morning, a glass of milk and cookies expected to be wiped clean off the dining table, sparkling Christmas trees and most importantly, a vibe of hope, compassion and merriment.

Mrs. Claus smiled to herself, as she browsed for presents from Frozon.com for she knew that sometimes Santa also needed a ‘Santa’.

The Bench

The air was sticky and still, ripe in the middle of summer. Thigh against thigh, shirt clinging to a wet back, electrified hair, damped moons peeking through underarms – yes, humidity had started to rear its ugly head.
As if to compensate for all the discomfort, the skyline was a vibrant orange with streaks of pink thrown in for good measure. Along the sidewalk, in front of an insignificant little garden lay a desolate bench, a seemingly ordinary looking one made of grey stone. Under the shade of a huge oak tree, it speckled with golden light.

On the bench sat a woman old enough to be called a grandmother. She came to sit on that very bench every day, unfailingly, knitting a pale pink garment, shaped dubiously like a sweater.
Her eyes twinkled with unbridled residual youth of yesteryears; a sharp contrast to her grey hair and shiny wrinkled skin. Life across that path was a blur, with people walking, rushing, moving, and knitting their own veil of busyness, the only constant was this old lady, floating in her own bubble, distant to the rest of the quick paced world.

One of such typical days, a young girl who must be in her twenties walked on that sidewalk. Her eyebrows were in a knot and her shoulders were hunched with tension. Nobody knew that the streetlights were blurry orbs to her. The moisture in the air had accumulated and condensed in her eyes instead. She kept on walking until she couldn’t anymore, eyelids didn’t come with windscreen vipers, you see.

She sat down next to the old lady, who didn’t look up from her knitting, which was good for the girl for she wasn’t currently in the mood for either small talk or sympathy. She sniffled and let the tears fall uncontrollably; her face in her hands. The cascading waterfalls slipped between the ridges of her hands, puddling her charcoal suit. Her sniffles slowly transformed into sobs. She knew this would happen, she never used to cry, always guarded, but when she did; it was as if an unstoppable faucet had been turned on.

The old lady stopped clicking her needles and finally looked up, confused. “What happened, child?” she said to the girl.

“I..um..he..I” she mumbled between moans.

“What is your name, dear?”

The girl finally looked up, her face a mess, like a fresh oil painting given in the hands of a toddler; her kohl smeared across her cheeks.

“I’m Suhani” she said, wiping her eyes. “I’m sorry to have disturbed you, it’s nothing. I’m fine.”

The lady put her knitting aside and said, “Have I greyed my hair in vain? You must tell me. There is no problem that can’t be solved.”

Some might call this kind of intervention into another’s life as intrusion but sometimes all you want in life is for someone to hear you out, to listen even if it is to just nod and pat your arm.

The girl looked into the lady’s eyes. They looked huge, magnified behind her cylindrical glasses. Her teeth were perfectly straight, being obviously dentures and her whole aura glowed with radiance mixed with some inherent sorrow associated with the past. There was something very comforting about her presence, as if you’d keep your head in her lap and all your worries will be forever hers.

She twisted her hands in apprehension and began, “Well, there is a boy. He loves me. And I love him. But we cannot be together.”

“Why not?”

“Well, it’s not that easy. He’s got a job posting abroad and I have my job here. So, I thought it’d be easier on us if we both broke up. I broke it off myself, he agreed too. He leaves tonight.”

“If you did it yourself, then what is the problem?”

“There is so much heartache. We live in a world of ephemerality. An age where profile pictures last longer than relationships. It is highly unrealistic of me to expect a love so old-fashioned, for it to go on forever. You know, what is the definition of love in today’s world? It’s called convenience.
Maybe. I’ve been born in the wrong world, the wrong time. I’d be better off in your age, Aunty. I can’t bear the pain.”

The old lady blinked twice at her sudden outburst and then she stroked her arm. “You didn’t have to break it off with him. You could have gone abroad too, gotten a job there and settled down.”

“Settle down? All these years together, marriage has never been the topic of discussion. Who has the time you know? And I know I won’t be able to last a relationship without being in the same city as him. It will fade. I’ll be suspicious and he irritated. Hence, I thought it’d be most convenient to stay apart. When you cage your heart, the more protected it will be right?”

“But how long will you cage your heart, as you put it? Do you think you’ll be able to live without him?”

The bluntness of the lady’s question made her shudder. She had known the answer all along.“I don’t know.”

“Beta, I don’t know why your generation has become so confused. You are given more freedom and you choose to listen to your brain. When I was your age, I used to work as a receptionist. A man used to take the same bus as me, every day. I’d catch him looking at me at the bus stop. One day, he finally got a seat next to me. The moment I saw him, I knew he was the one.

We used to sit together and talk every day. I still remember his lopsided smile. That time, there was no cell phone, no internet. All we had were those few precious hours.

 One fine day, he didn’t come to the bus stop. A whole week passed by, still there was no trace of him.”

“Then, what did you do?”

“I had no idea what to do. I talked to a few people and got his number. Imagine, in those days! I was quite the talk of the town, asking for a boy’s number. Eventually, I reached his house. Turned out his father was on his death bed and he had to leave town in a few days.”

“Then, what happened?” asked Suhani, wide-eyed, clutching at the lady’s hand.

“Well, I knew he was too shy to say it on his own. So I proposed to him and we were married off soon.”

“And all of this happened in a span of how many years?”

“About ten months. When you know it in your heart, time and space mean nothing.”

“Wow! Aunty, I never knew you were such a diva!” Suhani was almost laughing now.

“We have been married for 45 years now. All I tell you is never regret anything you do in life, especially if you do something out of love.”

“Aunty, thank you so much for your time” she squeezed her hand, a smile flooding her face and coloring her cheeks red. “But I have to go now and find him.”

“Good luck, dear. May God always be there with you.”

*** 

It was early in the morning. The sky was a turquoise blue today. Birds chirped in the distance but alas they were overpowered by horns blaring out of shiny cars rushing past the street.

The old lady was sitting on the bench again, knitting an overtly long sleeve; the ball of wool rolling on the floor.

A man walking by the street picked it up and handed it to her, he sat down next to her and started to read his newspaper.

“I still remember when they put his picture on the newspaper in the obituary section. It was heartbreaking.” The old lady looked as if she was about to cry.

“I’m sorry, what?” the man was confused, not to mention unprepared to handle the sentiments of an old woman.

“My husband. He was in the army. Our love story is one of those typical Bollywood movies. He was Sikh and I, a Jain. Our love was doomed from the day we were born. But you know what did we do? We eloped! It was quite a scandal.
We had three lovely kids and we spent our life in Patiala. But life had other plans. He was killed in the Kargil War, after just ten years of wedded bliss. I’m sorry, dear. Look at me! Crying and spoiling your mood right in the morning.” She blew her nose silently in the extended knitted sleeve of the pink sweater.

The man, unaware of the appropriate social etiquette, handed her a tissue and quickly finished the rest of his paper and caught his taxi.

***

“Did you have your morning medicines? It’s way past your lunchtime.” A woman in white clutched the old lady’s hand and walked her to the building besides the garden. 

    

**********

The Three Words

She shuddered in the icy air as a gust of wind ruffled her hair violently. Her eardrums were beating with the incessant hollow echoes of the breeze, hindering her ability to think clearly. She felt a sudden chill run up her spine, which had utterly nothing to do with the external atmosphere.

He’d said it. Finally, those words were out in the open, uncaged, prancing in the chilly air, flowing in the space between his languid mouth and her brooding ear.

Those three words which were so loosely thrown around in today’s age, stolidly in conversations with not-even-acquaintances, held a different meaning for her altogether. For her, it was almost blasphemous to think that these three musketeers were passed over so breezily amidst air-kisses in elite parties; flung out of the blue and thrust upon in telephonic conversations; assigned in Monotype Corsiva font as a footnote to the sweet chime of ‘You’ve got mail’ accompanied by a non-committal ‘See you soon’.

They sat apart, unmoving, hesitating to say anything, perfectly motionless in the swerving air, like some sort of a pre-duel ritualistic mad dance.  

Under the shade of her thick eyelashes, she chanced a glance at his face. His face was perfectly expressionless, revealing neither regret nor any kind of expectation. His brows were relaxed and he seemed to be a little too interested in his cuticles. The stillness clung on, intermitted by the hollow shrieks of gusts of wind, imploring the two to voice their opinions.

She gave up to the nagging grandmother of a wind and broke the silence.

‘You really mean it?’ she said.

He nodded slowly in response.

A tear silently rolled down her cheek. She had waited and waited for so long, that it felt surreal when it had finally happened. Things had seemed dark for some time and she had begun to think of surrendering to her family’s orthodox whims. She felt a sense of elation flood her senses and under her breath, began humming to the tunes of ‘Love Is Here To Stay,’ the tessitura of which seemed to increase with each passing refrain.

Their eyes met, his face partially covered in the white moonlight and their eyes crinkled in unison.

She touched his hand and whispered, ‘See you tomorrow.’

She hurried back home, skipping along the gravel, a crimson color flooding her cheeks, her jaws aching with happiness and burst into the warmth of her humble cottage. Her mother looked at her expectantly and as mothers sense every emotion brewing in their child’s heart, through an untold telepathic connection, she knew something had happened.

‘He said it, Mother! Oh, he said it.’

Her mother smiled and took her in her arms, ‘I’m so so happy for you.’

‘The pay is not much,’ her voice muffled in her mother’s hair, ‘but I get to sing every Friday with the Symphony Orchestra at the Churchill Theater.’ She bubbled and sobbed with tears concocted with the two cacophonous elements of ecstasy and pure disbelief and whimpered, ‘Mummy, This is it. Finally. I am hired.’