Blitzkrieg.

When we were born we all were handed over buckets, buckets of joy, buckets of tears and an empty bucket too where you can fill in all that you want to, the happiest of you, the brilliance and the beauty, the chuckle and the memory, the deepest and the scariest of who you could be. While the other buckets are necessities, this special one is an elixir. Just remember that. Now half way through your journey, what do you do when you realize that the Joy bucket, the bucket which kept you going has gone dry?

I have had sleepless nights, nights when I have stared through the ceiling fan not knowing which direction to go when its morning. I have had moments when all I could believe that there’s no sun. I have started loving stars precisely because the darkness never left. It had happened few years back and it has happened again and I know it will happen again.

That night too, I stared through the ceiling fan trying to understand which way to run. I had seen through a future which was not mine, and the crashing of it hurt me. Hurt the hell out of me. Not because something did not work, no. The future I was rooting for had holes through which rain poured and I knew it. From the beginning of time, I did not like the mindless pouring of rain, but I tried, I pushed through, I rummaged through the smoked glass and I started reveling in it. I enjoyed feeling the cold drops washing my identity. I started rooting harder while the tiny little drops slowly morphed into thunder and a storm built around me. A bottomless emotion, the one you feel when the whole world is dancing in madness and you experience a sudden peace. The irony of it is you don’t realize that you are not looking at the storm. You are the storm; you are the eye of the storm. I danced through the madness in silent reverie while the wind blew past me. I wasn't hurt because I did not realize being the eye of the storm; I was hurt because the rain stopped pouring.

"It won’t work". It was as simple as this that someone could tell me and there came crashing my rhythm. I shifted my center and hit the walls of my tempest. I fell over and turned into a violent whirlpool. I started going higher, higher and higher as the wind tossed and turned me. It was time my madness consumed me, time to tear apart the eye of the storm into a million pieces.

Next morning I see two people standing in front of my door, tears welled up in their eyes as soon as they saw me. Were they crying over my broken relationship? I don’t think so, they were looking at midnight’s destruction and they could not fathom the fury of this devastation. All that had happened till now, the scattered pieces of my bad memories started to feel as a breeze in wake of the present. This was different; this was supposed to be light at the end of tunnel. But the light never reached me.

My mother of 55 told me to gather myself and ask one last time to the man in concern if he would want to try a little harder, hoping that he would not want to let someone go so easily, that he might not want me to fade in oblivion. But the answer remained a no. A million shreds of me splattered across my wish wall, showing me what my eyes did not want to. Moments I have shared feelings, emotions, smiles, tears, and the entire clock of 120 days flash by flash as if I am on a carousel which won’t ever stop. A carousel of happy memories in negatives.

So how do you feel when you are trapped in your own wonderland? Does it still remain your wonderland? Let me tell you how it goes once you are in it. You run, you run directionless trying to figure a way out. You check every single pathway, you knock on every door, and you thump the earth you are standing at, you also scream to the sky staring at you. And then, when you realize there's nowhere to go. You stop and let madness consume the whole of you one last time. It’s like the pagan bird diving into the holy fire of death to attain redemption.

That storm had died. My silent reverie had collapsed. That bottomless emotion of falling into an abyss could successfully drown me. Do you still feel the rain pouring through? Yes, you do. Do you still enjoy the cold drops of water washing your identity? No, you don’t. It’s just you and your wonderland with the bucket of Joy gone dry.

I know they say, but believe me when I do, closed doors don’t lead to open doors. It’s a lie. So all you do is stop running and stand for a while, breathe, catch your pulse, throw away that illusion known as the bucket of joy, take the empty one and search for a hammer. Start breaking your walls around. Start breaking your wonderland with a hope that the world outside is still rooting for another utopia, where it doesn't rain, where there’s sunshine, where there’s hope and where there’s a park bench.

Where you can sit and gaze at your empty bucket, flick through what is in there, one by one, peacefully, the happiest of you, the brilliance and the beauty, the chuckle and the memory, the deepest and the scariest of who you could be. Lay down each one of them around you, carefully, piece by piece, like shields and swords, engulfing you in a glass house of life’s best and worst memories...

Till you wait for the rain to begin. Till you wait for another storm. The Blitzkrieg. 

Bombay Diary ~ Amertume

My father was a mercenary; he left me and my sister when we were 3 and 2. My mother being weak and incapable of pursuing education took to house work. We were conditioned to less of money, an everyday meal used to be bread, just bread. Cold weather was usual to remind us that the woolens are thinning and shortening day by day. Such was my life and I knew only one definition of life, that which was shown to me. I was content and satisfied with what I had seen. I and my little sister were untouched by the worldly vagaries till one night my mother came with a man. He looked kind, and so was his prudence. He sat looking towards me with glim eyes and said,

“I will take your mother with me to a new land. I have a child of your age she needs a mother too. But I can’t take you and your sister. Your father has been informed; as soon as he is aware he would come and take you both”

Words started confusing me; simple conversation seemed to be complex and unbelieving. I looked intensely and the only thing that I could utter in front of him was

“I need a mother too”

As I said those words, she looked at me with moist eyes trying to convey a million things in million seconds. She packed her bundle of clothes and left. ‘How’ and ‘Why’ are the two words that took the utmost predominance in my handful of words dictionary. I was 5, my sister 4. I couldn't move for as long as I could think. I sat in the middle of my 1 room house, my sister sleeping on the floor mat near to me. I cried. A million tears a million seconds.

The next morning Abbaji swung open the door. He was old, very old and the only other human contact other than mother and Sairi my sister since my birth. Yes we lived in a farm, a farm which was far away from the world where people existed. He scorned at me, spitting on the lemon tree outside our hut he said,

“Your father isn't coming. This is his reply.”

He slapped hard a piece of paper on the floor which resembled the same on which my mother used to scribble every night. It had two words of whose meaning I was unaware back then. I still have that letter!

Abbaji took me and my sister to the nearby town, the name I hardly remember. To what I presumed as an orphanage was a home, where I was been kept to do errands. My sister was taken away by someone else, I wish to believe to a better home, and I have not seen her since then. In less than 72 hours I had lost the only human I ever knew. I was not scared or hurt to realize that I was alone. I was in a state of comatose. I was inhuman as I felt like an animal. An animal like the farm dog, whose mother left him hungry and alone, whose father left him at birth and swore never to return. I felt like the minute hand of a clock I could see lying on the cold floor of the house, I couldn’t be fast enough to run with my father, I couldn’t be slow enough to dissolve in the absence of my mother. I was small, and I could have never comprehended my feeling of being un-wanted back then, but I knew how exactly I felt every minute of that passing night with a memory of a leaving mother and a two word letter father.

...

Today I am 34, that night I ran away from the house I was given to, ran as fast and as mad I could, I begged, borrowed and lived on the streets. I became a daily hire, a laborer for cheap and then I worked as a garbage dump assistant. I went on to become known for doing small wrong things for all wrong people, pick pocketing, knife handling, passing bags full of drugs to unknown people at railway station. After living my entire life on the streets of a crowded city, I also went to become a mercenary.

Years, weeks, days passed in killing people for money. I didn’t feel anything. Uprooting people’s family for small time goons, I didn’t feel anything. Leaving young children crying, angry and hurt, I didn’t feel anything. Burning homes, huts and palaces, I didn’t feel anything. Running, crushing people, I lived every day like an animal and I didn’t feel anything.

2 days back Rashid my employer came with a man. A man who looked kind and so was his prudence. It ripped open the day, the last one, I ever felt human. Yes, it was him.

“My wife was killed by my neighbor, over the ownership of land. And now my daughter is in threat. I would pay you to kill him.”

As he said these words, I knew that the wife used to be my mother, the daughter was his daughter and the Man was the one who made me what I was today. I lay bare once again open to the wounds of a past, cruel, vengeful and sad. But she was my mother, giver of my life, my existence. Someone killed her, brutally with an object people can’t describe. Someone wronged her. My job made my instincts boil my blood to kill the wrong for money. I got up in fury, my anger pulsating within the walls of my heart, throbbing my veins a million times in million seconds. Sweat dripped my forehead as I heard Rashid asking me to hand him the promissory note, agreeing to slaughter for money, my license to kill. Blinded by the humidity of the weather and my fate I took my wallet, a torn piece of paper and handed over to him.

“This shall be my reply to the justice for your dead wife”.

Rashid looked bloodshot as he faced eye to eye.  It was the same piece of paper my father replied to Abbaji

“No, never”

I walked out of the small room to a broken door into the scorching sun, heat piercing my skin and drying my lungs like a desert. I cried. After 27 years of being the farm dog I was made to be, this was my first human experience. That day I knew what was that I couldn’t define when I was 5. That suffocation, that feeling of being treated as non-existent, the feeling of disowning, the feeling of lost, the feeling of anger, the feeling of isolation, the feeling of grief.

Can suffering be so long? Is human brain capable of holding something so hurtful for such a long time? Yes and that is the reason I write this letter to you, because I know, like me you would have searched the feeling that has not let you sleep for days. ‘How’ and ‘Why’ are still the two most important words of my life and for you to find your answers I write this to you my little sister. Someday hope you find this.

The story of our life.

....

Bombay Diary holds my experiences from the city of memories. The Jahangir state museum holds a room full of memorabilia of those who drowned, suffered and lost their loved ones in Bombay floods. This piece of letter someone found corked in a bottle, Its significance unknown. This was written in Hindi and a part of it almost smudged off. Not being sure if it is still kept by the curators I have written to convey the feeling I felt when I first heard of it from a fellow traveler to my office. She works as a French translator for the museum. 

Time Warp

Forget what we’re told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that’s bursting into life….

There are experiences you promise never to re-live, but right on a perfect day, it will come, wash your life away and make insanity the synonym to anything you feel. Is there a perfect world? Where there are people who fight and live because of you? Where there are those who would defy death because of their people who need them. Is there a kingdom where law provides for one to live for others?

I was 17 and I saw a shattered heart, broken into pieces one would not dare to count.

Heartbreak, to me the most underrated word on this lonely planet and the only planet where love exists. She used to close the bathroom door, walk across the other side of the shower and wash away her tears. Was the pain too much to show? Was the pain for losing a loved one? Or was the pain of an entirely different emotion not been touched yet. That pain which breaks the extreme bone of your healthy living is not because a man, a son, a mother has left you… The pain is the experience of a person who holds the significance of a world to you, not fighting for you. That one moment which defines life, not being able to fight back and win you.

The women I stated she lost a son, to a time which would never return. For her it was the pack of cards called life which came falling apart on a sunny afternoon to a history which no one would care finding out. The lady with long hairs living next to my flat after 10 years of waking up to the same person lost him to someone else. The man who holds the key to my existence lost his father. Just like a maple tree I saw the leaves around me shattered, torn, pained not because they have lost someone but because that someone failed to fight for them. Failed to fight the living hell and survive. The reason be health, suffering or love. He failed… They failed.

8 years later, the leaf was me. The girl behind the shower was right in my room, the lost person was mine. Was I angry that I lost someone? Was I angry for an incomplete story? Or was I angry to be a lost fight.

I liked walking, walking miles on lonely roads with no end. I liked the smell of talcum. Like all I lived with an emotion that yes I would be saved, I would be fought for and won over any difficulty I lay bare.

When I was five, I had a man who fought for me. I still have him and as forever will come and go… I have come to believe he would be the only one I will ever have.

He would be my only perfect world.

If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world.
Forget what we are told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that’s bursting into life.

                  – ‘Chasing Cars, Snow Patrol’

Atonement

I was travelling across the misty fields of water lotuses. wandering with random throughts that have been an inner world to a chaotic self, how else I would have taken my life just one year back. Amused, dazed, phlegmatic of almost everything. In a world which was an illusion for close to 21 years.

And then one friday night, changed everything.

Teleporting my self to 24th February 2011, I had worries of a broken friendship, a halted relationship. If that morning someone would have asked how do I feel, I would
have surely said "exhausted". With the dipping sun, the mist in my life settled.. my boat of a solitary traveller shored into a new land. A land where the first step seemed a million milestones far, where looking at a stranger with a hope of security defined insignificance. A place of knowledge or another animal farm right out from the unspoken words of Orwell's novel.

As I reached far across my hometown leaving a handful of folks who cared, for an education which promised to change me into anything but ordinary. for better or for worse is a question in a limbo, that night I lay watching the ceiling of my hostel room for as many number of hours as I cant count. Time seemed endless, life seemed empty, like a washed slate awaiting scribbles...

"Hey Hi, which room are you??"

That's how a sunny warm morning started, My first friend.. My neighbour..

Never had been room numbers so significant as the first few days of a hostel life. with time the jig started. The fight...of assignments, pre-reads, marks, friendship,
groups, partying, late nights, emotions and the entire of everything that one wants to experience on a road to freedom for the last time in his life. 100 days, 300 hours of sleep, 500 assignments, tests, grades, competitions; suddenly the meaning of life went simpler. No more moments were the memories of a happening past,no more they were of coping up, they were of survival, right in the middle of everything the animal farm nurtured itself into utopia. A utopia I call my second home; this very world, changed. Anything outside the four walls was a simile to an alien land and right here, withing the constructs of marketing strategies and financial ratios did I find comfort.

My comfort of great friendship, my comfort of support, of securities. My comfort of achievements, of goals I would have never dared dreaming, my comfort of care, of affection, my comfort of a second family where dreams were cherished, madness was rejoiced, anger was beheld, a comfort where all illusions broke lose.

No, Life did not stop being what it used to be, it had all its share, betrayal, unfaithful frindships, sadness, tears. Like everybody's from distress to glory this college life had all of it. but in all those mishappenings it did teach how to burn from your fading ashes. After a bitter discourse under a blanket of cold winter night did one of them spoke something which I would carry a long, long way

"A million year old friendship need not be one for the rest of your life, if aint realised, if aint respected, if aint deserved"

Another evening, another sky full of a silver moon, an amphitheater running amok with prospective mentors, CEOs, entrepreneurs. Emphatic it would sound, but never one would find a story from rags to riches so close to see. Never one would see so many unemployed turning millionaires over night. Never one would feel the angst, agony, passion, fight and glory unless one gets to be a part of it.

"Right in the middle of desert, one finds an oasis.. The traveler is just a passing moment.. That which realizes the glory of it is the desert" - Rumi

Today, after exactly one year I feel, Iv grown a million years, wised a million times, and redefined my understanding of how far can I pull myself before to call it
quits. For good or for bad, would tell the test of time. But this animal farm has rebelled and morphed into genuinity which was somewhere lost midst the long blinding beliefs. Amazingly the difference is only self realised.

"Remember, the beauty of intellect is never observed but only realised" - Harvard Business Review :)

Long Time..

"What day is it? And in what month?
This clock never seemed so alive
I can't keep up and I can't back down
I've been losing so much time

'Cause it's you and me and all of the people with nothing to do
Nothing to lose
And it's you and me and all other people
And I don't know why, I can't keep my eyes off of you

- Life house (You & Me)"


“This song, reminded a part of my life… and I am sure we all have shared plenty of such in ours. Sometimes music… novel or just a walk reminds you of an eternity… My pick… read it as you listen to the song : )“

Long back somebody told me over a phone call that he would want to meet me on a railway station. I thought that was crazy… Who would want to meet someone at a crazy railway platform where all probably you see are busy people running off and that too after 6 years!

But I did go, I went to meet him after so many years, after all my agitations and heartburn were at rest ... I went and sat in the bustling platform no 3 of a busy metro station and I waited... I waited

Long time…

----------

I waited to see a mom fidgeting her palms, sitting over a luggage for two and with every passing minute checking her wrist watch... Checking if the moments are passing by…

I waited to see two kids, holding hands and waiting alone at the far end of the platform with a pair of hollow eyes… watching every old man.. Shrugging at passers by offering them chocolates…

I waited to see, a girl of 30 wearing a deep neck thin blouse with dark red lipstick, checking out a pocket mirror and petite she sat cross with her trousered legs… and I wondered how easily all those walking around would label anything flamboyant with sleaze when I saw how men watched her…. Her anxious eyes were roaming with a bubbly with all the men who walked across with sky bags… some smiled … some winked…

I waited… to watch an old guy with his walking stick…almost leaning over the pillar and smoking a Marlboro… the chai wala behind ran up to offer him a tea… and with a bunch of newsletters under his arm… I saw the void in his search… a search for a life time….

I waited … to see “waiting” in all of them….

And then came a swoosh of cold December wind, a train from north came to a halt…
A split seconds that doors opened…

I could see a boy of 20 jumping off in his officer’s suit and crashing to hug his mom… closing a mothers wait... Thunder her heart beat… peace he sooths

And I see a man of 40 with lots of small packets de-boarding with a doll in his hand and worriedly gazing at anything running across… a sudden thud and two kids leaping all over him…. Tears in their eyes… tears in his eyes….

Far distance, a man in formals with a sky bag… watching a beautiful lady in red… waiting for him… thinking “does waiting enhances beauty?”... And as their eyes crossed.. That red lipstick… blushed her face with a hue of charm… and she just stood… watching him walk to her… turning every second into an eternity….

I see, an old lady with shivering legs, helping herself in a wheel chair… and just as she trips off… a man of 70 with a bunch of news papers and a smoke … Holds her hand and shares a smile…. A smile for an endless mile : )

--------

Probably… I waited … to feel the end of waiting,

And I knew why he wanted me to meet him on a railway station for the first time after so long…
After all what else could be a better place to believe in that tiny little space between meeting and departing…
my eyes filled with tears for knowing that he is still the same… who would have a reason for everything in life…. Those of the thinking sorts….

I just stood up and turned back …
to see him watching me and I smiled… could hardly say…

“Long time”

From Another World....

Do we all have two sides of us... are we all the same?? .. Or are we all very very different.. And the only similarity between us is just that.. The difference!!

Long back when I was young.... I knew a man who taught me how to whistle...curling my lips with a jaggy smile.. he used to hum tunes of old country songs while me on his shoulders.... across the roads of my old home we used to walk....miles after miles... feeling the cool breeze..one of my oldest friends...I used to call him my whistling Partner.

I don’t own a vehicle in this city of mine... and just like the old times my leisure turns out to be only walking..Miles after miles... yes sometimes.. When it’s a little cold... I call my “once in a blue moon” friend ... my brother... and go for a bike drive... I love that cold wind blowing over me.... between the strands of my hair... carelessly ... un- inhibited... there’s something about people who talk less... something magical... you happen to enjoy the moments more with them... than the distractions... Yes this bike ride I’m talking about is my feast ... A feast that lasts long!

I have always seen myself as two different people... the one that people know... and the one who I am.. n no this is not split personality... it’s just a defence mechanism to protect yourself from everything that’s alien to you... a kind of firewall... or the kind of forest fire...long back aborigines in Australia used to burn their boundaries... to create new boundaries for their existence ... and all those who wished to join them... those who were strangers and wished to be a part of them couldn’t get through without crossing that burning line... a line which burns a part of their soul and a part of everything that’s impure. That was faith. But we all have this burning line....
The line of fire which divides the two sides of us... which divides the fake and the real of us... the known and the unknown territory of our hidden hearts.. Where no matter how much u try.. You can’t step the other side without taking the heat of the burn.


......
It’s a story about 3 people.. Two guys and a girl.... Three friends, who happen to live in a city where traditions followed generations after generations.... yet they were not from the old school of thoughts... liberal yet a bit scared..Educated yet a bit insecure.. May be the time was so... or maybe they were so...

Late one 2nd of December 1970, the eldest of the guy desired to marry the girl... out in a shady road under the lights of a lamppost he proposed... he proposed a life to that girl. Her mind started racing... racing hard... for this was the time for her to cross that line of fire.... for she was human where love was concerned... she was human to know with whom she is suppose to hold hands with whom to leave. One was her best friend and the other an ideal she always dreamt to be with... and she was different to both of them.. Just like any of us... she was like a caged butterfly who kept on looking towards the flowers blooming out of those glass walls and waited for that one person to un-cage her.. So she could fly and behold the smell of those flowers.... To the other she was a fighter... like moth to flame... her hate and love both were of extremes... she could neither love him... nor hate him... he was her “no man’s land” ... where no matter how much she tried.. She couldn’t pretend... couldn’t react... he was her friend.. The best she ever had and could ever have...

That evening standing under the dim yellow light... she was being offered to get un-caged... to fly out of the glass bottle and blush in the hue of those flowers... the ones she adored always...her knight with a shining armour was right there .. Offering a world of happiness.... but he also knew he is asking her to cross the unforgiving line... where once if she steps this side.... That “No Man’s land” will be forbidden to her... that feeling of selflessness.. Uncontrolled emotion will be lost forever...he asked her to burn the part of her soul which belonged to someone else.


And she did. Amidst of a lonely street, beneath a halogen glow she said yes.... the forest was burnt... A part of her soul was lost... where nobody knew...


Three of them kept on meeting ... for getto’s .. Parties..Puja’s and for just casual coffee’s.. even after the two got married. And every time she sees him coming through the door of her lobby... those eyes seek that freedom in his eyes.... those eyes scream to open the door of that forbidden land which belonged to her... the lost friendship... the feeling where she could feel anything and nothing. But all that she found was a hollow man..With just nothing to offer anymore.


He became an inert piece of rock... who neither reacted.. Nor observed the loneliness in her eyes... the moment she crossed the line that one surreal evening.... he too did and chose to be the other side of him... the one everybody knew except her... the one that was inconsequential.... disturbed and alcoholic.... the one that no more lived... may be just breathed for survival.


30 years ..3 people... like three parts of a broken chain... which could never be fixed.... each an island in itself... closed...suffocated and inhibited....



An early dawn of the year 2009... One out of three passes out of time... alcohol takes the last breath of his lungs... an empty heart which simply breathed nothing.... with no one aside and no one to follow... no family...no neighbours.... he dies with an empty bottle and an open window facing a long stretch of land... with no boundaries.... barren and rough ... miles after miles.. he simply died.



After he was gone, the girl who was now more than 50 returned with a heart of 20 into the same house.. Where he spent all his life, which was now closed for nothing. Looking through the panes of a closed window facing the vast stretch of land...She opened the Chester that stood beneath the window sill and kept an envelope....An envelope dated one 2nd of December 1970.... An unacknowledged love letter written by an alcoholic to a girl.... who walked away.... far away... leaving him burning in the forest for 30 years.

.....



My skin gets cold and my feet’s start shivering and i have this feeling of flying.... slowly gliding over the lonely roads of my city... hovering over the closed doors of sleepy lovers... untold love stories and unresolved fights....that wind which tickles my skin kept on blowing.... closing my eyes... far from somewhere i hear a humming of “country roads take me home”....in a flash I remember his face... his ever dishevelled beard...his lonely alcoholic eyes...visiting our home often with a bottle of rum........ Who sat for hours sometimes talking ... sometimes listening...and sometimes simply gazing... watching me n my sisters play clay..... My dad’s old mate....

And my whistling partner ... my ever so dear whistling partner!

Blind Sight

"The feeling of love!
what is it? can you express it if you haven't experienced?"

...

Long time back someone asked me this question, and I said no. But the truth is you can.Its the only feeling you can express without feeling it yourself. You can define it, you can feel it for no reason and you can share it. And the strangest part is, it is beyond pain, sorrow, fun, anger any feeling that ever existed in your mind and that is because it can over come all of them at any age. Shelf them into a soft numbing cocoon, where you have the liberty to feel what you want to feel.

I had met him, cause he lived across my old home.Weird, intelligent and a bit intolerable and that is because we were two people very much alike.very different in capabilities yet similar in reactions. we never liked the same subjects, we never liked same people... but when hurt we were like sea turtles, hurdle down into our own warm space. We liked sports, he cricket, I football. We liked books, He non-fiction I fiction. We liked travelling, he on bikes and I on foot.You name it and you wont find a match. Sometimes when we were young we used to play together, as our friends used to be common. Never on the same team. With all, we used to fight like hell, never to support another. He was a scorer in maths, I was never. He liked chemical reactions, and i almost puked over it :).He hated poetry, I loved poetry. He was the quite one and I a riot.
Trust me,
If there had to be a tree, and i be the bloom, he would be the last leaf flying over the fall. Probably if you ask me, I would answer I know him better than myself :) and yet I have spoken to him only once in my life...

It was December 10th at a common friends birthday party. I was 16, he 17. I was sitting in porch and in middle of 40 people wishing birthday to one of our common friends. he came and sat in the seat next to me. I had a weird feeling... because though we knew everything about each other, we never wished to talk... we went on knowing about each other probably just cause we wanted to know why we hated each other so much... we were young the reason was beyond our understanding...and we kept on nudging ourselves.. stretching an extra arm to know.. whats thats so different in us and in nobody else. It was like that mad race.. where nobody is a winner.. but everybody ran just to know whats at the other end.. our mad race was a short one.. where he came to know whats at the end way before that December night than i ever did.

I gave him a hollow gaze with my mouth full of home baked cake... He waited... I started looking here and there.. finished my food.. drank water..spoke about a million things to a million people... He still waited.. Gave him an obnoxious look... ignored him royally but he still waited... I wonder if I loathed him so much why din I walk out... may be even that was an ego of "why should I go first" ... But he still waited....the party grew thinner and thinner... when it was time for all the girls to leave... I gave him a final look of "whats happening" ... and he said

"stop hating me for 5 minutes and answer me this...
why people like each other?"

I almost nauseated listening to this... I was bad as most of the times i used to be.. gave him a very dirty look.. stood up and said

"I dont know"

He stood up too, almost freezing in the December cold

"can you express it if you havent experienced?"

I was red hot with anger by listening to his guts.


.....


That was the last day I saw him, I learnt that he left for his college soon. I breathed a sigh.. but an uncomfortable one..I was ashamed of my behavior... I tried reasoning that his question was inappropriate at such a young age, that too to a girl next door... but at the core of my heart I knew, that he was different... different than all of us...
and he knew that I knew his difference!


After 7 years, and all that I fathom... I remember every single thing about him.. may be he was the only one I ever put any effort to know about... Today, I dont know where he is, what is he doing.. probably we wont even know each other even if we cross. But if someday he happens to read this.. he would know that it took me seven years to know whats at the end of the road, which he did that December night.

That surreal hate was because of the liking towards differences, That anger was to forget the underlying emotion..an emotion that maybe he liked me and I did not... and he knew that I did not. That soft numbing feeling, he could feel even at the age of 17 without experiencing any affection himself.

And of all the things I know about him... I know exactly how he would have felt the moment I walked out from there...Humiliated, lonely and broken ... broken not because of what i said... but maybe because he knew i missed a chance to grow up.. be tolerant to emotions.. be strong..way before than I can actually uncover myself.

....

"Il stop saying, if that would make u less sad" was the last thing he said when I rushed out of that party... I wish i could turn back and tell him... "only if you could know what made me sad"