12 - 3
We were sitting in this uni restaurant called Xananas. It was close to the auditorium. Needless to say we had bunked the guest lunch arranged for us. Once again Manas was filling in for me and a reluctant Arjun was filling up for Pragya.
"Did you know I was coming - from the list?" I asked curiously. After all chashmish was just the kind who would go through every list that would ever be given to her.
"No, Arjun went through the list, I didn't" she replied. I couldn't help notice, that maybe time couldn't play it's magic on her figure or charisma, but it definitely moulded her personality. She was this reserved woman, quiet and deep.
"You've changed. You've become serious, now you perfectly fit being Suresh's wife"
She didn't respond, but she smiled a little.
"And you've become a little inattentive I see" I tried talking again, the quietness was tiring me out.
"Inattentive?"
"Well, near the bridge I called you chashmish, yet you thought I was Arjun"
"He calls me chashmish too sometimes"
I didn't like hearing that. I thought I had the sole authority to call her that.
"You haven't improved as well, you are still as inattentive I see" she smiled.
I smiled a little to see the past wasn't completely dead for her.
"How can you say that?"
"I was introduced as Dr. Pragya Arora, still you assumed I am married"
"You're not? Well, sometimes you do keep your maiden surname hence I thought" this was me just defending myself, she had caught me right.
"Well let me try once more, when you met me at the bridge you frowned at Arjun's name. You thought I was married to Suresh, but when I called someone else, you frowned at that too, you forgot your own assumption that I was married - inattentiveness?" she asked testily.
"As always, you win chashmish" I laughed, feeling relaxed at her old way of getting back at me. All wasn't lost I guess.
"So you're married?" I enquired, trying my level best to keep my voice calm.
"No"
"What happened?" I asked understanding that my masked calmness wasn't convincing enough.
"Just realized he wasn't the right guy for me, in the long run we couldn't be happy together?"
"So, when did you realize it? Before or after the sex?" I smiled slyly and internally cursed myself for being so tactless.
She stared at me aghast before that age old laugh came to her lips, "Sheee Abhi! Grow up!"
"Sorry"
We talked about various other things that afternoon. About my career, her job, our families etc.
"I must say running away from your marriage wasn't a matured act" she brought up
"While I was about to run, I remembered your stern disapproving face, and what I feared the most was how you would think of me when you read the headlines next" I confessed in embarrassment.
"After all this while you were worried about me?" she asked, I couldn't help notice there was a certain edge to her voice. At this point I couldn't help asking the inevitable question.
"Chashmish, why did you sent that message with Purab?"
"I didn't want to be a thorn in your path of success"
"What do you mean?" I asked as my heart thumped treacherously inside me, in the ten years I have thought of many possible reasons, but finally I was getting the real one.
"I saw it in your eyes, you were going to leave everything and move to Delhi. And I knew in your attempt to protect me from Suresh, you'd be far away from your goal - I had seen the rockstar in you Abhi, I could let you lose it".
I stared at her in shock. Of all the reasons I thought of, sacrifice wasn't one. I felt like a cog in her plan. It seemed like I had taken upon myself to lose the rockstar in me for Pragya, but Pragya didn't let me - Suresh hadn't come between us, my ambition did.
"So, why didn't you come to me when you saw I fulfilled my ambition?" my voice was shaking now, almost fearing the next answer.
"I did Abhi, I did come. Right after I came to Mumbai"
"You had come? Why didn't you meet me?" I asked scandalized.
"I met daadi, she told me you had chosen Tanu for yourself." Replied Pragya with a smile.
"WHAT?" I screamed out almost this time.
"It's okay Abhi, it's not like I expected you to wait for me when I went off to marry someone else - I had come to congratulate you on your success - I couldn't come earlier, I was in the States for four years for my doctorate"
"Wait, where have you been so long?" I asked utterly confused.
"I completed my final year of college in Delhi and got myself a scholarship for an integrated masters and Phd at Stanford -I wanted to go, but Suresh didn't want a long distance marriage, he didn't even want to wait for so long. I thought to myself, will my pa be happy if I left such an opportunity for him, I knew he wouldn't, so I broke up with Suresh. I left. I returned four years later to find an entire nation dancing to your tunes. That is when I came to meet you. I met daadi and even after she told me, I thought I will meet you - but Purab told me not to. He said you have moved on in life and you were better off without this encounter, it would weaken you. Hence I requested daadi to keep my visit a secret and left Mumbai again moved back to the States. Since then I am at NYU."
I stared at her in horror, chashmish had come back to me five years ago! But my best friend stopped her from meeting me.I understood Purab's perspective too. Afterall he was the one who nursed my broken heart when chashmish was gone. And he knew I had chosen Tanu - I wish I told him how silly that relationship was, then he wouldn't have protected my well-being from chashmish.
"Chashmish, Tanu and I weren't ever serious, I have no idea how we took it to the alter almost"
"Daadi was surprised too - in fact she found your running away more believable" she laughed.
I was surprised, "And exactly how do you know it chashmish? How daadi felt? This didn't happen five years back, this happened some three weeks back"
"Why I have been in touch with daadi ever since, and I was even present at your wedding! In spite of Purab's resistance and on daadi's repeated insistence, I had come. I thought if you were marrying Tanu, you must really have moved on, my meeting you couldn't change anything."
I stared at her blankly. Chashmish was present at the venue of my wedding? Once again we were destined to meet? I myself stopped our meeting this time? What was destiny playing at?
"Why didn't you meet me after that?"
"I thought, you just ran away from your own wedding, I didn't want to jump on you at the first opportunity." She laughed.
"Seriously say" I piped in
She looked at me a bit embarrassed this time.
"I thought, maybe not Tanu, but it still didn't mean its me - I mean, I don't expect you to hold on to feelings that you had ten years back" she turned into a light shade of pink and she refused to meet my eyes. I smiled.
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
Debate Mansion
Parineeti
Chakravarti Samrat Prithviraj Chauhan
