Removed - Page 4

Beautiful story to date

Love the bond Anjali and Khushi share, so enjoyed them talking about what they wanted their future to hold.

Hazel eyes hmmm wonder who that could be?

Is Khushi setting herself up for heartache?

Will Anjali fulfill her dreams?

Then, she saw him. Her stranger, walking towards her, directly towards her, through the crowd. Her heart thudded loudly, so loudly that she no longer heard the shouts of the vendors and noise of the crowd. Just her pounding heart and the blood racing in her eardrums. She glanced at Madhu Ma who walked ahead, looking at the fruits on sale.

What if she saw him?

His eyes were fixed on her as he neared. He gave her a dazzling smile and her hand clutched Anjali's tighter. He came closer, closer and closer, until they were side by side. By then, Khushi was already feeling dizzy. Her stranger pressed a paper in her hand and walked on.

Startled, she turned back to look for him, but she had already lost him to the crowds...

***

She ran to her room as soon as she got back home. She closed the door and sat by the window before opening the piece of paper he had smuggled to her. Khushi broke into a smile. She read it all over again, at least a hundred times, her heart leaping.

***

"Anji!"

The girl looked up at her sister with a frown.

"Ki Khushi? You know I don't like to be disturbed when I'm reading!"

Khushi closed the door behind her and sat beside Anjali on the bed. Anjali noticed the radiance on her face.

"Kya hua, Khush?" (What happened, Khush?)

Her sister giggled and bit her lip shyly. "I know his name!" she whispered.

Anjali's smile evaporated. She was still thinking of that man? If she wasn't wrong, she had seen him slip Khushi a chit of paper in the market. She felt apprehensive about Khushi's feelings for him. They knew nothing of that man. He was just someone they had crossed coincidentially and, in her opinion, he had pushed them into a deep mess.

It was because of him they had been caught that day, she thought. And it was because of him Khushi would not go to university with her next year. She wondered how the girl could fall for him. Life was certainly not a fairy tale.

Did Khushi expect him to sweep her away from all misery and shower her with happiness? She didn't even know what conditions the guy lived in. He could make promises, but would he be able to keep them? And supposed he did, would Rama Ma agree? She was one really choosy person.

Anjali shook her head and brushed the bad thoughts away. Maybe she was just being pessimistic and, somewhere, selfish. She loved Khushi more than anything else and she wouldn't bear to be separated from her.

"He wrote that in the letter he gave you?"

Khushi nodded with a smile, handing the paper to her sister. Anjali looked at it. There were just two words written on it.

His name.

Barun Ghosh.

Anjali's head snapped up at Khushi, who was beaming. The paper slipped from between her fingers and floated to the ground, her eyes wide in disbelief and shock.

"Khushi!"

She had jumped from the bed to retrieve her first love letter and she stood above Anjali, her eyes accusing.

Anjali held her hand. "Khushi... Achha hoga agar tum iss aadmi ke baare mein sochna band karo... kahin aage jaake tumhein chot na pohunche..." (Better your stop thinking about this man... In the future, you might get hurt...)

"Kyun?" Khushi asked, slightly pained by her confidante's displeasure. "Tumhein aisa kyun lagta hai ke baad mein humein chot pohunchegi?" (What? Why do you think so?)

She stared at Anjali who was avoiding her eyes to look at her toes.

"Khushi..." she started, going red in the face. "Khushi, don't take it wrong, but... uska naam... Ghosh... Khushi, he's... he's low caste Khushi. Humein aur tumhein shaayad koyi farak nahin padta, magar Rama Ma? You know her, na ?" (... You and I can ignore this, but Rama Ma?...)

Khushi had teared up but she stood against Anjali firmly.

"Aisa kuchh nahin hoga! Jab hum unse phir milenge, hum unse kahenge ki humaari maa humaari shaadi karvaana chaahati hain. Barunji humaara haath maang lenge. Voh bhi humse pyaar karte hain. Aur rahi jaat ki baat, to voh sab puraane zamaane mein chalte the, ab yeh sab nahin maana jaata hai!" (No such thing will happen! When I meet him next, I'll talk to him. Barunji will ask for my hand. He loves me too. And about the caste, it's no longer important nowadays!)

She turned on her feet and ran off to her room, crying softly. Anjali knew she had hurt Khushi but she could not add to her false hopes. Manorama would never agree that her daughter married in a low caste family, however rich those people might be, and she was sure that in this matter, Garima and Madhumati would both side the mother.

People, the world and Kolkata had certainly moved ahead in time, but not the mothers and their ideals. They would make sure to raise Anjali and Khushi as they had themselves been raised, to enlighten their family's name.

And Anjali knew right away, that even if this was simply an innocent love, her sister would have her heart mercilessly broken...

***

It was finally the day of their graduation. They would go to the convent school for the ceremony then come home when the preparations for the night's banquet in honour of the girls were on since days ago. Everyone was excited in the Gupta house.

Apart from the one lone girl, dangerously close to her first heart break. Khushi sat silently on the rooftop, hugging her knees to her chest. She was not crying, though she wanted to. Strangely, the tears were not very willing to surface. With this day would begin a life she at the same time wanted and dreaded.

Wanted because she had always dreamt of a happy family, a loving husband, beautiful children. Dreaded because she somewhere knew she didn't know who she would marry.

Barun Barun Barun

She prayed her Devi Maiyya every day for the person she loved. But uncertainty grew in her, budding gradually, like an incurable cancer, eating up her trust in love. What she had imagined in the beginning, she realised now, was just a dream, a fantasy, a fairy tale, which would never happen. Anjali was right. The mothers, all of them, not just her own only, would opposed to this alliance only because of his surname, his caste.

But why did that have to interfere with her happiness? Was family honour greater than her joy? But then, she should know better. The mothers would always act for her own good, wouldn't they? But she and Barun could give it a try. She would try to talk to him today. Every day, he waited for her at the same place, on the roadside, so that he could get a glimpse of her whenever she passed in her car. That did show his love for her right?

Khushi tilted her head back in the first rays of the day. It was five in the morning already as she heard her neighbour gargle loudly in his yard. He was very punctual. Just as she was about to gather herself to go get ready, she heard the soft tinkling of Anjali's payals. She looked up at the girls to walked on the terrace, her arms stretched out.

Anjali twirled around, her laughter ringing, scattering like pearls. Khushi was happy for Anjali. This day signified her freedom. Now she would go to university become a writer like her favourite authors as she dreamt. But her heart was also breaking because this meant their separation.

Silently, she crept back to her room without letting her sister see her. Why stain Anjali's bliss with her gloominess?