Just Another Love Story

The first time I saw her, I fell in love or at least I thought I did. I was with her for three days, three whole mad days. Three days in which she had touched me in a way no one before ever had. Three days when she had taken me into her stride and accepted me as her own and shown me how big her heart really was. Three days were all it took for me to form a romantic image about her in my heart, give her a high pedestal, think of her as the flawless goddess only love laden eyes can see. Everything about her I found fascinating. I found the beat of her heart exciting. I found a nervous energy about her which fascinated me. Most of all I think I was head over heel about her spirit and her spunk. I had heard a lot about her, even read quite a bit, but nothing could describe how effortlessly and in how short a time she had captured my heart, made me her slave. Some had said she was ugly outside, maybe I had seen her inner beauty, but frankly, I didn’t care. When I left her that night to catch my flight back home, I made a solemn promise to myself that I will come back no matter what and claim you to be my own. Needless to say the dalliance started occupying less and less mindspace as time passed but in my heart’s canvas she remain etched like the way I had first seen her, gorgeous. And most importantly like the honorable lover I had not forgotten my promise. I came across others too during those years after meeting her, and I must say that I did like one of them enough to want to stay for a little longer than I usually did but somehow none of them seemed to be the same as my secret sweetheart. I still got to hear about her from friends, acquaintances and every time I heard, there was a funny feeling in my heart. Destiny had brought us together for those three days in May 2007 and I trusted destiny to find a way to quench the longing of my besotted heart. And this time destiny didn’t disappoint me. After three years destiny threw me a gauntlet and dared me to take it up. In these last three years a lot of water had passed under the bridge and a lot of things had changed. I was apprehensive, anxious and scared even, what if she was just a dream. What if she was only ordinary and the flush of young love had deified her in my eyes. What if? There were a million of these ifs which clouded my mind but despite all the ifs I still looked forward to meet her. Eagerly, expectantly. Those dreams of idle Sunday mornings and busy Tuesday evenings came back and danced in front of my eyes. I felt like a teenager again. I went about my work with twice the usual grit to take my mind off her and slowly the days rolled by till the day I had marked in my calendar arrived. I was fidgety and restless that day. I had funny feeling not only in my heart but also in my tummy, in my throat, everywhere. I couldn’t wait for the few hours to pass when I would see her again. The hours went by painfully and I finally set eyes on her again.
I couldn’t understand at first what I was feeling. I was confused. I was finding it hard to believe my own feelings. There was none of that elation, that ecstasy that I had expected. There was a nothingness at first and then finally a feeling of disappointment set in. I was disappointed with myself. I was disappointed that I didn’t feel the same. I found it beyond comprehension that the world of perfect romance I had built in my mind around her had come to this. I felt nothing of all that I had felt all those years ago. I was no longer fascinated by all those things which had made me romanticize my feelings for her in my mind during those three years when I had lived away from her. This was my perfect love story coming to a disappointing end. Now that the veil of romance had mysteriously been lifted, I could really see her for what she was. All her flaws now got magnified in front of my eyes. I could see that she was old, grimy, loud and ugly. All of a sudden all of this overpowered me and I felt totally dejected and lost. I tried hard to get along with life as it were but it was getting more and more difficult with my dream world having recently crumbled around me. I no longer knew what to perceive of things, what to believe, and now a days I was finding it very difficult to trust my feelings.
But one thing was getting clear to me as the days were passing by; my dislike for her was increasing by the day. And the current situation was getting more uncomfortable for me with each passing day. I had to do something. I had to release myself from the web my own mind had spun. I had to release myself and find peace again. Friends were curious, family was concerned and I was well, dejected, disappointed and confused, all at the same time.
Life never stops. Hearts break, illusions shatter, the world may come crumbling down around you, but life goes on. And as they say time is the best healer. No my heart here had not been exactly broken; the romantic in me had taken a beating at the turn of events. The cynic had started to slowly raise its head and I was not happy with any of these developments.
As the days passed one of my friends came visiting me. I was excited about his visit, Vishal was one of my closest buddies and I was looking forward to his visit. I tried to wrap up my work and keep my weekend as free as possible, given that I had to work on Saturdays and having started living alone, the best part of my Sunday went in numerous household chores, the bonds of domesticity are not only mundane but also very time consuming. The week whizzed by and finally I met him on Saturday. He was very excited at meeting me and when we sat down with steaming hot cups of chai and vada pav at the neighborhood eatery, he told me this was doubly exciting for him as he too would get to finally see what the fuss I had created all those years back was about. I looked at him and smiled. I was in a bright mood today and didn’t want to get into the saga of my disillusionment and also I wanted him to form his opinion without any help from me.
We decided to go around the city in the evening. Our first stop was Juhu, followed by Bandstand. The two places he was the most excited about seeing. We took a long time leaving my pad, as it happens; old friends catching up after a long time lose track of time and both of us being the quintessential chatterboxes. We reached Juhu around 9pm and sat down by the sea and talked some more, about how life had shaped up since we last met. How innocent were the dreams we had once seen and how we had traversed along the way. All this while we had a constant companion, the ever present and ever restless vast expanse of emotions, the Arabian Sea. It was in a very joyous mood today or so I thought. It kept hungrily lapping up. As if it wanted to come rushing to meet its long lost friend. It had the enthusiasm of a six year old rushing to get its new toy. Something about its relentlessness, the sound of mirth in its waves and the hungry passion to live life rubbed onto me. I was fascinated by its never ceasing activity and its verve. I felt drawn towards it. I wanted to lie down and listen to all the stories it carried in its heart. Listen to all that it wanted to say and more importantly let it into the inner precincts of my private world. It seemed as if it badly wanted to come in and stay for good. As if it wanted to tell me, let me in and we will explore a wonderful journey together. I was snapped out of my reverie by a shove from Vishal, he was miffed at me having lapsed into another world of my own. We got up, it was pretty late in the night, almost nearing 1am. We looked around, there were not many people about, but the beach was still brightly lit and the sea had crept up a considerable distance. Naughty and boisterous. Laughing and mocking us in a childlike playful way.
We took an auto back. The roads were crowded even at this time of the night. Filled with gaiety and life. People went about their lives, living it. My friend kept saying how lively is this city, does it ever get tired of being so alive all the time? I looked at him and mulled over his question, did it get tired? I don’t know but it strangely quieted my nerves a lot that time.
The next day after a lazy day at home we ventured to bandstand towards late afternoon. Vishal was as usual jumping up and down with joy at finally getting a chance to steal a look at Shahrukh’s bunglow. If he had looked that sincerely for nirvana I think he would have found it. It was my first time at bandstand too. The rocks were slippery and very timidly we started inching closer towards the sea one slippery rock at a time. I was still afraid of going any further, the same naughty and childlike sea seemed very mature and powerful today. It was not trying to creep up, it was beating against the rocks with the all its pride and haughtiness. Just then I saw a group of small boys playing at the very edge of the rocky bed. They must have been around 10-11 years of age. There were three of them, I could make out they had to work to earn their bread and were not amongst the privileged few for whom the biggest worry in childhood was class work and not an empty stomach. One of them took out a small wad of notes, 1 rupee, 10 rupee notes and put it inside a polythene wrapper and gave it to his friend. Then he went about getting splashed in the waves. He welcomed it with gay abandon that only a young mind of 10 is capable of. Soon his friend who looked to be a little less adventurous than him also joined him and they got engaged in a play of venturing out onto the sea, getting drenched by the waves, falling down and then getting up again. It was as if the mighty sea was humoring these little kids with fun and frolic to ease their daily drudgery. I had been observing them for quite some time and had not realized that a smile was playing on my lips. The timid kid looked back at me, smiled and patted the stone right next to where he was now sitting, right at the mouth of the sea. He could sense I was scared and he held my gaze with that smile. I do not know what happened then, whether I gave in to my impulse, the call of the child or the pull of the mighty sea, I marched right ahead, forgot about my fear of water and sat beside those kids and just then a huge wave came crashing down. Before the impact of what I had done sank in, I suddenly realized that Mumbai indeed had that spirit and that recklessness and that hunger for life and that fearlessness to face life’s challenges no matter what shape and size they came in. That was when I knew, my instincts about her had never been wrong. She had captured my heart when all those years ago I had come to stay in Mumbai for three days and had fallen hopelessly and madly in love with her. My disillusionment with her was not because she was not beautiful; my disillusionment was because I was not willing to take the pain to look beyond the obvious.
That was the instant when I had that tingling feeling one has at the onset of a romantic relationship. I knew it would have its share of problems , I knew there would be times when I would be angry with her, frustrated, think it was all a mistake, cry myself to sleep at night. But I also knew that this was the beginning of a love affair that would last a life time. A beautiful journey we would take together. Mumbai and I.