So, how are you today, Arnav?' Dr.Anjali Jha is a conventional psychologist when it comes to starting a session with her patients.
"I am okay, doctor. I didn't feel like punching a hole in anybody's face today." Arnav replies with a dry laugh.
"Have you considered there might be a cause for such change of heart?" Anjali Jha is a pro when it comes to getting through Arnav Singh Raizada.
"I guess now I am just satisfied to see them already suffering. Why hurt my knuckles in vain?"
Anjali laughs at that.
Arnav has issues, more than anyone can guess, bad temper being one of them. His disturbed childhood had instilled a deep hatred in him. Hatred and rage at the world in general. He had come to her as a post traumatic stress disorder patient, after his mother's gruesome murder. A child of 11 he had been then, now a handsome young man of 22. Even then he had the ability to retreat into a shell which no one could crack. Arnav, at the age of 11 had been calm, collected and unfeeling but only seemingly so. A storm had been raging under that exterior. He hatched plans after plans to murder, to kill in his tender mind. Kill everything and everyone bad, kill those who made him suffer. The world is full of such people.
His uncle Manohar Raizada, had discovered a bottle of cyanide, stitched in between the flaps of his school bag with a piece of rag. The man was devastated, thinking his nephew wanted to kill himself. He had brought the kid to Anjali and she had been doing what she promised his uncle. Helping him. Arnav had confessed to Anjali, much later and not to her surprise, the bottle of poison was not for himself. Rather it was for Vikram Malik, a mahajan of their locality. Arnav is intelligent, way above average. He could have seriously harmed who he intended to harm, even as a child. How else one could explain a mere kid with no means whatsoever possessing cyanide? Anjali dealt with him knowing his abilities and she tried to channel his intelligence in a positive direction. He could still have that darkness inside, could still turn into a sociopath with provocation. But Anjali Jha is not one to dwell on what ifs. And that is why when Arnav, for the first time talked of someone else's suffering instead of their faults, she is the happiest person on earth. But who is the unfortunate person who suffered so much to move even Arnav Singh Raizada?' Anjali frowns at the question.
"Arnav, do you still imagine how it would be to be rid of those who angers you?"
"I know what you are really asking, if I am a potential murderer? Isn't it?" Arnav laughs a self depreciating laugh.
"Aren't we all? Potential murderers, I mean. I could kill someone tomorrow, you never know."
"But I am not like you. I am not a normal person. You know that very well."
"Ahhh, normal. Interesting term, don't you think? Norm, who decides what is the norm? People like you and me. Now, any person with stomach ache is as abnormal as you if we go by your definition of normal."
Arnav doesn't quite believe himself to be normal, Anjali knows that.
"Now Arnav, I want to know if seeing other people suffer, especially those who you think should suffer, make you feel better?"
"You make me sound like a sadist sociopath. To answer your question, I don't know. I guess I don't feel anything. If at all their suffering makes my own despair seem more real, truer. The world is not a good place, Anjali. Not for anyone." His voice is resigned.
"Don't you think you have been too quick to judge? You have assessed just one side of the proverbial coin, Arnav. What about when people are happy, content or just living, truly living?"
"Strangely doctor, I don't recall seeing anyone happy in a long time."
"Have you wondered why?"
Arnav leaves Anjali's chamber feeling queasy. Try as he might, he could not remember seeing anyone happy for as far as he could see the past world clearly in his mind. All he could recall of happiness was a hazy picture of a woman, untamed as a wild flower, laughing with her face aglow with something akin to unadulterated joy. And then the picture shifts to another face in the pit of despair, clear and fresh to his memory, with bottomless hollow in her eyes. Khushi' He whispers.
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"Hi"
Arnav's fingers stops playing the strings as he hears the tentative greeting. He turns to find Khushi Gupta staring at him. A nod is all he spares to reciprocate her greeting. That seemed to have gained her some confidence as she strides towards the rock he is sitting on.
"I am on time" She says taking a seat next to him.
"So?" He asks, nonchalant.
"You said you would help me with my thesis"
"I didn't say I won't."
"You are just confusing at times."
"Did you bring the collected data?"
"Yes, It's all in here" She holds out a tape recorder towards him.
"So, this respondent here says the only space outside her home she frequents is the community well. Not only her, quite a number of female respondents say the same. You seem to have omitted this fact in your findings. The well undoubtedly represents a feminine public space. Do you get me?"
"Yes sir, Prof. Arnav Singh Raizada Sir." She mock salutes him.
They laugh surprising themselves and then the evening passes, at ease as they work together engrossed in things they passionately love - coding interviews, analysing scenarios, connecting dots and understanding the world a little better.
When they call it a day, Khushi is in desperate need of coffee. She thinks of asking Arnav if he wants some. But they are not exactly friends. Rather he sees her as some kind of trouble to be avoided or pierce with his hurtful words. She is still puzzled as to why he agreed to help her. They are just two people who have in common only their love for discovering what is not visible on the surface, they loved depth and learning about the world they live in. May be that is why he is helping her. She drops the idea. Asking Arnav Singh Raizada for coffee, Huh' she rolls her eyes at the thought.
"I uh.. I should get going."
"So? What's stopping you?"
"I was just informing you. It's called courtesy, not that you would know anything about it." Khushi huffs. She doesn't understand this person called Arnav Singh Raizada. How can someone be so arrogant?
"Forgive me, princess. I didn't have a blue blooded father to teach me the etiquettes of high society. Coming to think about it, what are you doing with a bas***d here, princess? Enjoying the society of an outcast in secret? I don't think your high class boy friend will approve of it." Arnav despises the hypocrisy of phoney diplomacy of so called elites. They are fake as their minds are. And Khushi is one of them. He keeps forgetting that. Refined mannered, soft spoken Khushi Malik Gupta is one of them.
"Who do you think you are? Shakespeare in a crappy version of tragedy? And what boyfriend?"
"Oh come on, enjoy what you came here for. No amount of insult can make you stay away, can it?"
"You are the one who said you will help me with my thesis"
"And who came running, asking for help at the first opportunity she got. You are another one of them. Incompetent, who can't do anything right."
"I am sorry I asked for your help, but if I may remind you that is only because..."
"Just leave Khushi, you know you can't win"
"You..."
"Go, just leave." His voice is a forbidding whisper.
He turns away, not wanting to see her face, her eyes, with bottomless hollows. They all could go to hell. He plays with the strings of his guitar, a familiar tune wafts through the wind. His fingers with a mind of their own continue playing and he trying to drown the world humms along.
zindagi ke safar mein guzar jate hain jo makam,
woh phir nahin aate,
woh phir nahin aate!
Khushi halts her hurried steps, her attempt to get away from Arnav as soon as possible.Good music has always been her weakness, but she never knew it is to this extent. She walks back to him as if drawn by his voice or may be it is the desperate plea in his voice. She sits there unable to move. 'May be I attract all manifestations of pain' she thinks absentmindedly.
phool khilte hain,
log milte hain magar
patjhad main jo phool
murjha jate hain
woh baharon ke aane se khilte nahin
kuchh log ek roz jo bichad jate hain
woh hazaron ke aane se milte nahin
umr bhar chahe koi pukara kare unka naam
woh phir nahin aate.
(Zindagi ke safar me, by Kishore Kumar)
His voice seems to have transformed from scathing hatred to unbearable pain. She feels at peace, in spite of herself. She can't help but wish it would last forever. It is at very rare times like this when she finds even a semblance of peace. And now that it is in her reach, she wishes could die right at this moment so that she can make a lifetime out of it. Khushi sits still feeling all the despair in the world stopping her breath. Her breath gets uneven as she fails miserably at keeping her anguish at bay.
Arnav stops abruptly as he feels more than he hears her soft sobs. He looks at her, sobbing as if her heart is breaking, her eyes now luminous. A world of misery on her knotted face makes his breath hitch for a moment. Khushi makes no attempt to stifle her cries of agony, knowing she had always mourned the tears that never came. So she cried, she cried for herself for never having a purpose to live, she cried for Arnav, his ruined childhood and his shackled self, she cried for sufferings of people she knows and she didn't know, people she could do nothing for. All this while Arnav stays beside her. Not a word of comfort or a touch of reassurance he could bestow upon her. He doesn't leave her either. He listens to her sobs, fascinated by the raw anguish that is her and the beauty she is.
Khushi's sobs turns into hiccups as the evening sun hides beneath wide horizon splashing the sky with amber. Arnav gets up and stands his back facing her. He is giving her the space to pull herself together. She understands. She is surprised at the lack of uneasiness she thought was bound to follow after falling apart in front of him. She, with puffy eyes and a runny red nose, joins him where he is standing, watching the sunset. He feels as if they had been doing it since forever, watching the sunset together. Him, in stoic silence and her with an occasional twitch and a sniff.
Later that evening, Arnav walks her to her building. He can't figure out the reason. He can't string two words together to say to her either. He finds silence more comfortable anyway, he shrugs at himself.
As they near her building, he plans to leave without a word. But she surprises him by enveloping him in a clumsy hug. She bumps her head into a startled Arnav and hurts her wrist on the guitar slung across his back. But she doesn't seem to care as she hugs him with all her might. Arnav finds himself frozen unable to process the sudden change in the air. "Thank You" he hears her whisper against his cheek. He looks at her as she untangles herself from him and walks away, towards her house. Arnav stands there feeling the air shift. He knows, he could feel it; something has changed in that moment, forever.
Next:
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Hola!! Just wanted to clarify that the os' in this series ARE RELATED to each other but you can read them individually also (I hope). If you wish to continue reading the coming os' then I suggest you read it chronologically. And your comments mean a lot. But if you don't want to, that is also fine. Just hit the like button so that I know I am not wasting my energy on this tale or that you are reading. May your weekdays be bearable.
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