It’s a love story?
I’ll let you draw that conclusion. I failed.
On an average summer afternoon, home alone, camping in that same 1000sqft, Ronny craved home. Until now home was the city of Tagore. There was a tinge of boredom paired with an aversion for work that week. We will ignore that because we like Ron and it’s immensely irrelevant to the story I am about to narrate.
Evening rolled in. Steamed rice, a dead bird and potatoes turned into Bengal’s heartthrob. Biryani.
There is this thing about people who have breathed through the lanes and streets of Kolkata. They all possess two things for sure: an ardent love for cha & a fearless mind full of opinions.
It was the month of May. Welcome Mademoiselle April.
(of-course those are not their real names. We are talking Kolkata not California).
He vouched for Arsalan. She had an opinion. Au contraire.
It felt like fresh breeze after a day of haggling with the sun. They played the game of choices.
Chicken cutlet vs Fish Fry. Drenched in the rain vs Sex on the beach. Whiskey on the rocks vs Beer. Puri sea beach at 5ams vs Darjeeling in the month of May.
The two lived in the same place. For years. Talked to the same people, walked the same footpaths, took the same routes to similar destinations, ate the same food at the very stalls. Cursed the same dudes and bitches.
Clicked display pictures under the same shamiyana.
While one put on a kurta and played cool under the sun. Other draped on a sari and prayed “kuul please”.
Split seconds and choices of left-and-right. Time knows how to play it smooth.
Time, your work is stunning.
April had a knack for knowing humans. Romanticized the concept of strangers becoming heart inmates. Her heart always looked for a friend in every passerby and the ones who proved worthy of that title, she kept them real close. She would protect them. She would smother them with annoyance, demand without reason and love without question.
Ron was refreshing. New colors. New songs. Newer albums. A different genre for her in all aspects. April was commanding. He enjoyed her annoyance. Relished hours she was happy and chirpy. Said all possible things that would annoy her some more and laugh his filter-free ugly pitch. They never saw eye to eye. The delta was often outrageous. Staying up late and early, goofy eyed and sleepy AF! Both hardworking kids, spend 16hours working in the system. Excelling in class. Work drained them. The nights of endless and pointless debates brought back life into weary minds.
He turned out to be a keeper. They were in love. Maybe. There were silly ups and downs. Not one was a grown-up issue. Then you would say, it’s always some silly feud. I’d say, lay your eyes on love for time longer than a while and you will notice how silly it’s not.
Then there was a fallout. Conflict in their principles.
Ron-April entered the circle of screw-ups and immature moves. There were incidents of crying on the night pillow. Of helplessness. Long growling messages of disappointments. Undefined pauses. Some nights both hearts were poured out. So pure and such was the intensity, it could make hearts ache.
One day of all the days, while she wasn’t waiting for a notification, she fell out of love. In a manner of saying it was the deprivation that kept the fire burning after a while. The love was not lost. Love is never lost. Every person gets assigned a pocket in your heart and they stay there. The memory fades away. Some incident here and there, now and then acts like a gentle reminder and ergo comes the hurricane of times gone. Only this time your first reaction is not to take your phone out and text your unique version or the plain “I miss you”. You let it wear off.
Funny how some people manage to channelize fallouts into hatred. Some manage to keep it intact and never regret a line. Ron-April became the latter. I love their existence for the very reason that they took the high road.
The fault in their stars?
You know how they all say, “Your gut knows”. The gut did know.
The heart ached for some weird reason. The brain tried to reason, dipped in the usual oxytocin-estrogen-dopamine-serotonin imbalance.
The truth is, those untied threads gradually got lost. Every new person you meet gives you more perspective and that is why having a healthy social circle is important. You get new perspective, especially out of those you’ve watched with intricacy and care. You understand your needs, objections, morals, thresholds and the most desirable of all-obtain higher clarity on what you don’t want.
That’s what the gut knew.
Hey! It’s your turn now. Fair to say, “It’s a love story?”
