Updating after a loooooooong time, people! I'm really sorry for the long gap in b/w...too many things going on. So without further ado...here goes Chapter 3!😉
CHAPTER 3: THE FIRST SMILE Evening at the Gupta Household: "Nani, could you pass me the dal please?" asked Anjali.
"Sure, beta. Here you go" said Nani, passing the dal over to her.
Shashank glanced over at Anjali, and watched her eating her meal mostly in silence. He wondered if she was still upset with him over their talk in the office. He was just about to ask her how the rest of her day went, when Riddhima walked in.
"Hi Papa!" she said, giving him a warm hug.
Hello Riddhima beta! How was your first day at work??
"It was fantastic, Papa! It was so nice to finally have real patients to work with…"
Anjali watched Riddhima chatter on about her day to Dad out of the corner of her eye, and felt familiar resentment building up inside her. She got up from the table, and turned to leave.
"Kya hua, Anjali beta? Why didn't you finish you meal?" asked Nani
"I'm totally full, Nani…I ate something at the cafeteria in the evening as well…can't eat anymore." Said Anjali
Riddhima finally stopped her chatter mid-stream and ran over to Nani and Angie. "Hi Nani! Hi Di!" she said, hugging each of them in turn.
"How was your day today, Di?" "It was good" replied Anjali with a small smile, I'm going to go and sleep now, ok Ridzie? I've got an early shift tomorrow. G'nite Nani! G'nite Dad"
"G'nite beta" replied Shashank, unable to read the expression on her face fully
"Ok, di! I'm going to go to sleep soon too, I'm just going to finish telling Dad about my day right now. G'nite!"
Anjali and Riddhima's room: Anjali lay awake, unable to sleep. She kept replaying the scene with Dad in his office over and over in her head again…the way he'd said 'Dr. Gupta' to her in the corridor kept echoing in her mind, contrasting with how happily he'd been listening to Ridzie telling him about her day. Was she so unlovable?? All her life, all she'd ever wanted to do was make Dad proud of her, and to see the same love shining in his eyes for her that she always saw for Ridzie. But apparently, nothing she did was ever enough! She turned to look at Ridzie sleeping peacefully in the bed next to her. "Look at her! she thought to herself, Sleeping away so peacefully! Daddy's perfect little princess. She never even had to TRY! She was perfect, regardless of anything in Dad's eyes!" Anjali stared at Riddhima for a moment with all the bitter rage in her heart, and then she sighed to herself. 'What was the point in directing all the anger at Ridzie? It wasn't really going to solve anything. The only person whose love she had ever craved in her life was the one from whom she never seemed to get it. Maybe that's just the way it would always be.' A tear escaped from her eye at the last thought, and she brushed it away. Turning to the other side, she tried to will herself to sleep as usual.
Next morning "Subah Subah yeh kya hua…na jaane kyun ab main hawaoon mein chal raha hoon!" sang Atul to himself as he biked his way over to Sanjeevani. 'Such a beautiful day! he thought, clear blue sky! And the early morning fresh air!' He took a deep breath in appreciation of the weather. Suddenly, he felt his bicycle start to wobble and he braked to a stop with a jerk. He glanced down at the tyre and noticed that it was completely flat.
"Dhat tere ki! Yeh puncture kaise ho gaya?? Ab main Sanjeevani time par kaise pahunchoonga? He looked around and noticed for the first time that he was on the little lonely 5 mile long stretch of road on the way. "Ab to main gaya! Dr. Keerti mujhe sach mein kaccha chabaa jaayengi aaj!" He suddenly got a visual of Dr. Keerti glaring daggers at him, and jumped a bit. "Nahin Nahin! Mujhe time par pahunchna hi padega! Par kya karoon ab?"
Suddenly he noticed a car driving up the road. "Car! Lift!" he thought to himself, and made a motion with his thumb for a lift, but the car just zoomed past, leaving a cloud of smoke in its wake. Atul coughed and tried to clear the smoke away by waving his hand, and stared at the car angrily, "Ek to pollution faila rahein hain, aur upar se insaaniyat naam ki bhi koi cheez nahin hai!"
He turned and saw another car approaching. "I've got to catch this one!" He hurried into the center of the road, and started waving his arms for the car to stop. The car screeched to a stop in front of him. He hurried over to the driver's side and knocked on the window, "Could I please get a lift? I'm getting really late to work, and I need to reach on time!" The window gradually lowered down, and Atul's smile collapsed when he saw who was driving the car. "Tum?"
Angie gave him a withering look. "May I ask what you are trying to do by standing and waving your arms about like that on the road, Dr. Atul?" "Uhh…woh…uhh…canigetalift?"
"What???"
I mean, "Can I get a lift to the hospital?" "Please" he added. "My tyre…I mean, my bicycle's tyre just got punctured, and I'm getting late also, and Dr. Keerti…"
"Ok Ok…You can stop talking now." She gave a disdainful look to the bike lying along the side of the road, and then looked back at him. "Ok, get in then…but I'm definitely not taking your bike along." Atul started to say something, but decided to just nod his head instead. "Thanks" and he got into the car.
"First I barely manage to get a wink of sleep all night! And now I have to suffer this idiot so early in the morning?? You're having fun with me this morning, aren't you God?" Anjali thought to herself, while staring straight ahead and driving.
"Hey Bhagwan! Atul thought to himself, Subah Subah YEH kya ho gaya?? Bas ek yeh AnJALI hi bachi thi jise aapne is waqt yahaan par bhej diya??" He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye at her, and watched her staring straight ahead with the generally sada hua expression on her face as usual. "Did the woman EVER smile?" he wondered.
They had finally reached the city now, and were stopped at a red light caught in snarling traffic as usual. Angie rubbed the side of her head as she felt a pounding headache building up. She glanced out her window, and saw a father and daughter attempting to cross the street. The little girl would try and just run forward, and the father would hold her back, and give her a stern look and tell her to wait. This happened a couple of times before they were able to cross the street. Finally the father turned to his daughter with a look as if to say, and THAT is how it's done! The little girl looked at him for a second, and then started giggling, and he started laughing with her, and picked her up and tossed her once in the air before setting her down again. Angie watched them walk away, unaware that she now had a wistful smile on her face.
Atul watched the crazy early morning traffic outside the window, and made a face at the amount of fumes that were being expelled by all the cars, buses, and other vehicles on the road. He suddenly saw an autorickshaw pull up next to their car and saw the black cloud being expelled from the back of it. "Oh god! he thought, WHAT are these ppl using for fuel these days?? Kya waise hi pollution problems kam hain, that these autowallahs are making it all the worse??!" He turned to the other side, and was totally taken aback by what he saw. Anjali was looking out her window and smiling…actually SMILING!? Were his eyes deceiving him? "Anjali?" he asked? She didn't respond. "Anjali, what are you looking at? He tried again. She started, and suddenly seemed to come out of a trance. "Huh? What?" "I was asking you what you're looking at outside the window…it must be something really nice, cuz you were smiling" he said with a smile.
"Nothing that concerns you, Dr. Atul," she said in her usual cold voice, leaving him wondering for a second if he really had imagined the smile. "Oh" he said. The light turned green, and they drove off. He glanced at her surreptitiously again. She had her usual closed and stuck-up expression back on her face. Looking at her now, no one would've believed that she had been smiling 5 minutes back. And it had been such a soft and beautiful smile too! He would never have imagined ever seeing such an expression on her face! It definitely had not been his imagination. "Well well, he thought to himself, lagta hai Dr. Anjali ko smile bhi karna aata hai. Maybe this AnJALI is not as "jali" as she appears to be after all.
Edited by nureat01 - 17 years ago
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