It Wasn't Love at First Shalini and I

by Prashant Sharma

  He understood, put his hand around me and said that I was going to miss a miracle- his batting. I laughed it off and he nodded, smiled and left. I rushed out as soon as Hari left. I had to get something for Shalini. And I knew the perfect gift. I ran till the main gate and took a bus to a place near the main terminal. I got off a couple of stops before and the child was still there. He was selling small flutes. I had noticed them yesterday when I was with Roshini and I just knew how much Shalini would love it. I bought one and came back to the hostel with a big smile plastered on my face. I took a small little nap and then started to get ready. I used Hari’s hair gel for the first time. I tried to get a dishevelled look, but then thought that it would appear that I was trying too hard. So I washed it off with water again and got back to my usual style. I wore a black shirt, blue jeans and white sneakers. I was looking charming if not handsome. I shaved for the second time in two days and at 10:30 was ready to go.

  I reached the auditorium where the event was happening. The participants had already arrived and I tried to spot Shalini. And there she was, in a blue salwaar kameez, hair neatly tied up, her face devoid of any nervousness but having a confident feel to it. I waved at her and she waved back. The next thirty minutes passed by looking at her.

  The focus and importance which she exuded made her look even prettier. And the competition began. All the participants were sitting on the stage. As the prelims were over, there were ten of them and each one of them was given 7 minutes to sing. Shalini was the first to go. She sang a beautiful medley, starting with ‘Ae mere watan ke logo..’ then changing the mood to naughty with “Piya tuu, ab to aaja..” then going sensuous with “Aap jaisa koi..” and then rounding it all off with Raag Bhairavi. There was thunderous applause when she finished. It was breathtaking. It was beautiful. While singing, I could feel her getting into the song, feeling the emotion, feeling the pain, the joy, the lust, the melody in each of her performances. She was beyond words. Her singing was beyond words. Slowly, the other nine also completed their performance but no one matched Shalini. And then it was time for the results. Our director was the special guest and he came on stage to give away the prizes.

  Third prize goes to Raj Malhotra. I was a little relieved. I did not want Shalini to come third. She would be devastated. I looked at her when the prize was announced, she still had the same serene look on her face. Second prize goes to Rajvir Singh. Again a little relief for me, Shalini only deserved

  the first prize, nothing less than that would do. But now the relief was mixed with a little fear. What if she did not win?

  And the first prize goes to Saumya Sharma. That was it, I was heartbroken. I could not lift my eyes up to meet Shalini’s, but when I did, not a hint of remorse in them. She still had the same serene look. The director gave a little speech and that time helped me get over the fact that Shalini had not won. As the speech got over and people started to move away, I walked over to her.

  “Sorry.”

  “For what?”

  “You were the best but still you did not win, for that.”

  She smiled. “I came here to sing, not to win. And I did that. I came here for myself, not to get a trophy to be showcased. I am perfectly fine.”

  She said this with such conviction that either she was a very good liar, or she actually meant it.

  “So no regrets?”

  “Well, there is one regret.”

  “What?”

  “That I did not throw you out of the train that day.” We both smiled and then all of a sudden she said. “It was really nice meeting you but one of my relatives is coming to pick me up and drop me at the station. My train is in 45 minutes. I have to go home.”

  She said it just like that, with no emotion, with finality. I tried to oppose.

  “So when do we meet next?”

  She smiled and said “I don’t know, but I really hope we do meet.” “You still live in the same town?”

  “I do and I would really appreciate if you do not come down to where I live. Middle class parents, you know the rules.”

  Know the rules, I could write the rule book.

  She took my hand and said again “I really do hope we meet again.” “Can I have your number?”

  “We don’t have a phone.”

  That was the end of the conversation. I took out the flute and gave it to her. She took it and left, just like that. No looking back to see if I was still standing waiting for her. No tears, no promises, no melody on my gift. Just a hope, that she wanted to meet me again. I followed her for a distance, always trying to hide myself but I knew that she knew I was following her.

  One of her uncle’s was already at the ladies hostel gate in his car and she got on with her bag. The railway station was a thirty minute ride by car. But I had no vehicle. I ran out to the bus stop and waited for the next bus. The bus would take me 45 minutes to get there. Nevertheless, I got on, praying to Indian Railways to have a delay on her route. I remembered in which town she lived from last time and when I reached the railway station I heard the announcement that the train to her town was ready to depart from platform 13. I was on platform 1.

  I ran. I ran like I had never run before, pushing some passengers and going around the others. By the time I reached, the train had already started moving and slowly, it passed me, coach by coach. I went down on my knees looking at it going past.

  I did not see her for 7 years after that.

  7 YEARS LATER 2005

  I

  t was a lazy Saturday morning. I was on my couch, where I had dozed off after coming back from a party where I had too much to drink and did not remember much after. What the heck, I did not even remember how I got home and on my couch. Wait, was this even my couch?

  I somehow managed to raise my head and saw the familiar looking wall with photos of me and my parents on it. Yes, it was my house. I again lay dead on the couch.

  It was a regular Saturday morning. Regular for the last 4 years atleast after I had passed out from college. The sun got the better of me around noon time. I had given the curtains for dry cleaning after Hari, in one of his days of stupor, had gone on and on about how he could have been Sachin Tendulkar but how the engineering degree had pulled him down. His frustration, along with all the alcohol he had consumed, along with all the food he had eaten along with a lot of unidentifiable things had come out on the curtain while he was trying to run to the toilet. Well, that is what he said because in reality he was running in the opposite direction of the toilet. Not a pretty sight, I guess you can imagine. In fact it had been a month since I had given them for dry cleaning. I think I should have got them back by now. I made a mental note to check.

  I remembered that last night’s party had a reason to it. I remembered because I had foot the bill. I tried to remember what it was and slowly got up from the bed to put some water into my system. Yes, vague memories came back. I was being sent to the United States of America by my software company for a six month project. A lifetime dream was finally being fulfilled. Life was good.

  I ambled through to the refrigerator and gulped down around half a litre of water. It tasted weird, it was tasteless and not the sweet bitter like beer, but I guess it was ok. Life started to make sense again. The weird twitchy feeling in my throat gave way to hunger. I looked around the fridge, saw some bread, stuffed it in my mouth, stuffed a cheese slice and again got back to the couch which would be my companion for the next hour atleast.

  So this is how my life was then. I was 24, going to be 25 in some time. I looked my age, was still five feet something. People say you add a couple of inches during college but honestly you don’t. I still had the natural and typical Indian skin color, still the same hair, the style obviously was different- lots of gel, but, I was way cooler than what I was seven years ago. Or this is what I would like to believe. I still had the same friend Hari, but unlike earlier, had some people who bordered on acquaintance and friends. Okay they were my friends but Hari was the only one I was close to
. The others were like ok ok friends. People I used to hang out with, watch movies with, get drunk with. Basically chill out with. Life on the whole was pretty different from what it was in college, and was pretty awesome. I had started to live my dream of having decent amount of money in the bank. And girls were no longer something to be afraid of. In fact I had gotten over their fear quite early. I was no longer the small town boy who could not figure out his way in the big city.

  I was now a city dude. I know it sounds lame, but that was the way I was back then.

  In the first year, I was close to a girl Roshini but completely blew it away when I saw Shalini. After Shalini disappeared from the face of earth, I was a little lost for a few months but then, I was 17, how long can a 17 year old be in love? By the time the first year ended, I had managed to have a steady girlfriend, and had completely ignored what my mother had told me about young girls and young boys.

  Surprisingly, her presence had a very soothing affect on me. I started to do better in college, got involved in some extra curriculars, and even stood for vice president when in the third year. I lost the elections but that is a completely different story. The result was much closer than what Hari would tell you.

  The years at college past and I got a job within the first week of entering the last year. My grades were good, I was decently presentable, and I got one of the best jobs offered on campus. I think that is what led to my break up. My then girlfriend, Rakhi, had better grades than me and was certainly more presentable than me, but she got a job a notch lower than mine and then there were the fights of me using her for my own good etc etc which got a way bit too much for me and I dumped her. We did not talk for a good 2 years after that but now it was fine.

  So yes basically, I had transformed from a small town boy who listened to everything his mother said to a city boy who still cared about his parents, but did so as he pleased. My job placed me in the capital itself and the last four years had been a roller coaster ride. There were the drinks, there were the girls, there were the friends and there was me. Office just happened to be a part of my existence. A big part in fact considering that I used to spend 10 hours a day, five times a week in office. I was working in one of the biggest international software companies and was getting paid decently enough. But it was the weekends I craved for. The two days filled life with hope, with meaning.

  Life had been devoid of any steady girlfriend for the good part of the last four years. There were a few brief affairs bit nothing serious. In fact I had recently started flirting with one of my clients from work. Oh shit, I had to meet her for lunch today. Damn. I quickly brushed my teeth and showered. My company had been kind enough to give me a mobile phone and I saw only one missed call on it. That was a relief. It was already 1 pm. I checked the call, it was from office. I ignored it. Who works on a Saturday? But then like a good employee I called back. It was nothing urgent and could be handled on Monday.

  I was always honest to my work, work was what made the weekends possible. I pulled out a blue jeans and a cotton tee and teamed it with semi formal shoes. As an afterthought, I put on a jacket. I looked at myself in the mirror. I looked charming if not handsome. And I had been selected to goto USA for six months atleast.

  I quickly applied the daily dose of gel and was ready to go.

  I called her, her name was Pooja by the way, and we decided to meet at one of the new coffee shops which had opened in South Delhi. I then had planned to take her to the Partha Sarthi rocks at JNU. That still remained the place where I took girls for a first date and it never failed me. We decided to meet in thirty minutes and I happened to reach there a little early.

  I was browsing through the menu and was wondering how many people would want to buy a coffee for 60 bucks in India. This chain had started following the American model of cafes in India but India was so not ready for it. Who would pay that much money for a coffee? I by the way, could afford a coffee so I ordered for an iced coffee and settled down with the newspaper. It was the month of November and the weather had been pretty pleasant when I had left home but now all of a sudden it had started raining. Pooja called me and told me that she would be running a little late as she was stuck in the traffic due to the rain.

  Delhi roads, Delhi rains, and Delhi girls.

  The more you want to understand them, the more confused you get. I made peace with the fact that she would be a little late and ordered another iced coffee to get rid of the lingering hangover. I browsed through the newspaper and then through the cartoon section. It had been thirty minutes since she had called. I looked out of the glass facade and that is when I fell for her.

  This was the first time we were meeting outside office. She worked in a company that had given us a small contract and we had met each other quite often in the office settings. The project was a small one and was nearing its end. It was I who suggested that we meet on a Saturday so that we could close it on time. I basically just wanted to have lunch with her outside the formal confines of an office space and outside the formal confines of a weekday. And there she was. Her hand with a newspaper covering her head from the sudden burst of water, the other hand frantically moving as to make way.

  She was wearing a white salwaar with a yellow kurta on top. It was early November and Delhi was just entering the winter stage. She had a shawl wrapped around her in place of the chunni and her short wet hair stuck all around her face as she moved. We had had coffee before, we had had lunch before, in fact we had even had dinner before but it was never the way it was today. Maybe it was because at all earlier points in time we had a laptop in front of us and were discussing how to speed up the project. Or maybe because she was looking so pretty today. She made the final dash to the coffee shop from under a bus stop and had a big smile as she saw me and entered the cafe. She pulled the door but somehow the six inch pencil heels could not support the slippery floor and she slipped and fell with a thud. To add to it, she sneezed. All eyes were on her.

  The other young girls giving her a ‘why do you wear heels when you can’t walk in them’ look. The young guys giving her a ’Oh I want to help you but my girlfriend would kill me if I do’ look. The older aunties a ‘I don’t understand why girls are so hooked onto fashion’ look. The older uncles a ‘what is wrong with the young men of today, had a girl fallen when I was young I would have picked her in my arms’ look. And in between all these looks, there was me with a ‘I should do something, she is here to meet me and it has not started well’ look.

  She was pink with embarrassment. It had been ten seconds since she had fallen and so far she had not even tried to getup. She had a scared look on her face analysing the reactions of everyone sitting in the cafe. Everyone was staring at her and she was staring at everyone. The kajal from her eyes had slipped onto her cheeks in the rain and the water had made her eyes go red. Her hair were pressed against her forehead covering parts of her face, her dress was dripping wet when she had entered and falling due to a puddle near the entrance had not helped her cause. I could see water trickling down her cheeks and I was pretty sure it was not the rain. Something had to be done. Someone had to play a hero and who else but me to do it.

  It had now been twenty seconds and no one had moved. Time seemed to have gone still. Then, I got up. I walked up to her, gave her my hand and pulled her up. I then lifted her in my arms, my eyes staring down hers, and took her to our table and placed her on the chair amidst a thunderous applause of the people present there.

  Well, that is what I should have done. Instead of that, I opened my coffee container and spilled the coffee on the floor of the cafe. Then I sat on the spilled coffee, looked at her, waved my hand and said a sheepish ‘Hi.’ I don’t really know why I did that. Both of us now had a wet ass and I don’t think the fact that even I had one made an inch of an difference to her. If anything, I guess she was more embarrassed by my antics that pleased.

  No thunderous applause, everyone got back to doing what they were, but I changed the tears into a smile. A g
oofy smile but nevertheless a smile. She saw me and realised that she did no longer look like the stupidest person in the cafe.

  She settled down in the cafe, still wet but atleast not overly concerned about it, and ordered one more of the sixty bucks coffee. She added some chocolate sauce and other things as well making my wallet lighter by 40 bucks more. These cafes were very soon going to go out of business. Who pays 100 hard earned Rupees for a coffee?

  We started talking. I made it a point not to talk about what had just happened. The conversation was first the formal self starting about the boring project, but gradually shifted into a friendly banter with office politics and gossips taking centre stage. We went on and on talking endlessly about things which would seem so redundant if I mentioned them now, but seemed so very interesting at that point in time. After around a couple of hours we decided to leave the cafe. Our clothes had sufficiently dried out even though there was a stain on my pants. I put my jacket around my waist to take care of that. The rain had now stopped and the smell of the first rain had enveloped the city leading to a very romantic feel about everything. This time I decided to go with her for a walk rather than the Partha Sarthi rock routine and we strolled in a park close by for 2 hours. She started telling me how much the city had changed over the past few years and the talk, even though boring, seemed interesting to me then. There was something about her which drew me to her. Maybe it was her beauty, maybe something else, but slowly I could realise that I was losing control over myself.