28.
What does it take to fall in love?
Even the most confident of people get a little confused when suddenly stuck in an unknown situation. Like finding a particular room in a huge palace with no proper guidance. He was going through that.
Udayveer stopped and gave out a frustrated sigh. He had been roaming in these huge corridors for at least 30 minutes with no fruitful result whatsoever. All he saw was long corridors, closed doors and many stairs. He was getting tired now of all the walking and searching. He cursed the moment when he agreed to his friend's plea of accompanying him to his grandmother's palace.
Now his friend was down with his family having a merry time and he was stuck in the huge palace trying to find his allotted room.
"Na banda hai na bande ki zaat. Kya museebat hai!" He muttered to himself, now getting more annoyed than tired as he turned another corner in the corridor. All he had been told down was to go inside, take the stairs on the right, walk in the corridor and go in through first door on the left. That was his room. Well, that door had been locked. So were many other doors. Now he was just wandering in the palace for any open door which had a bed. He wanted nothing more than a good sleep now.
He passed through a door and stopped. The door was ajar. Taking a peep through it, he saw it looked like a bedroom. Feeling a little hesitant at first, he decided to ignore it. But then his tiredness and frustration got the better of him and he pushed it open gently.
"Agar koi bed na bhi mila tou koi insaan hi mil jaega jisse main apne room ka pooch sakta hun." He muttered the reassurance as he walked in.
The room was majestically decorated. Beautifully painted walls, fancy lights, some breath taking landscape portraits hanging on the wall; the room told of the owner's exquisite taste. He was so lost in the beauty of the room that he failed to notice someone's presence. When he finished looking around, he looked in front of him and came to an abrupt halt. While doing so, he knocked over a vase on the carpeted floor.
A girl with long, dark hair was standing a few feet ahead of him with her back turned on him. He was so shocked to see someone else in the room that he momentarily forgot about the knocked over vase. She turned her head slightly to glance at him. Her face was shielded by her hair so he couldn't see her face. Feeling awkward, he bowed down and picked up the vase.
"I'm sorry...I didn't know someone was here." Holding the vase in his hand, he said just to remove the awkward silence in the room. He started taking small steps towards her. Strange girl she was, she didn't turn around to greet the guest.
"I didn't mean to intrude lekin main sirf ye janna chahta tha ke yahan guest room kahan hai?" He asked her as he approached her. She didn't move a muscle. Now that was rude.
"Hello...talking to you here!" He said a little sternly and touched her shoulder from a little distance. At his touch she turned around swiftly, hitting his face with her long hair. Instinctively, his face moved sideways but his eyes were set on her. She had been standing near a curtain and now she was behind it. The girl had hid herself behind the white fabric of the curtain. He couldn't clearly see her face but whatever he saw was enough to mesmerize him.
She was at least a head shorter than him, looking up to him. Her eyes were fixed on his. Despite the barrier between them, he could feel the sternness of his eyes. Yet, he could feel the softness of her features. Round cheeks, rosy lips, small nose; she most definitely wasn't the most beautiful girl that he had seen but there was something about her which caught him and made him want to look at her forever. As if caught under the spell, he reached out and tried to pull away the barrier between them.
"Leave."
Her voice broke the spell. He blinked and shook his head. What was he doing? Getting scared of his own racing heart, he turned around and put the vase on the table and quickly got out of the room.
The door slammed shut behind him, making him turn around to look at it. He placed his hand on the door. He stood there like that for a while before shaking his head and walking away from there.
An accident, a glimpse, one word.
Indian Mythology
