a/n: My first ever fic on ParSh. This is dedicated with all my love to someone who deserves much more and much better than I can ever put together. Have an awesome birthday KishMish aka Mystique.Kishi.
She's gotten into the habit of carrying a picture from his modeling days around with her. It is stashed away amongst movie ticket stubs, receipts, scribbled tissues and visiting cards that she keeps safe in her notepad. It serves as a keepsake (and sometimes, as a reminder of sorts) and a safety guard - although Param calls it blackmail - for when he takes his teasing a little too far.
She's sitting this one out. They are shooting yet another Randhir-Jiggy dorm room scene and she's sitting at the back going over the new script. On most days she would be thankful for the break, would go and lean over the DOP to take a look at the monitors and see the raw footage as it was being filmed but today isn't one of those days. Today she carefully avoids looking up from the papers in her hand.
She doesn't have to see him to know that now he's become Randhir Singh Shekhawat. Knows how his almost black eyes would have turned golden under the bright lights. Knows his body will be rigid right now, his muscles bunched up, tensed. He'll be standing taller (which makes his collarbone peek out from his carefully selected tee - he doesn't know this but she does). His hair will be casually messy, his lips parched and his voice will have a hoarse edge to it. Deeper, more resounding. She knows all this yet that's not what throws her off.
What does isn't Randhir or even Param for that matter. It is Sanyukta Agarwal.
She loves Sanyukta, loves channeling her and taking her out like a prized possession from the recesses of her mind and testing her out. She especially enjoys switching between Harshita and Sanyukta when she's not on sets shooting - just to stay connected, to capture her essence and understand her psyche, her emotions, her reasons and reactions better. Has done it so often, it almost comes as second nature to her now. That's the only logical explanation she figures.
After all, he's in character and she's not. Yet sometimes, when she looks at him, she forgets.
It's a problem she doesn't like to admit. So she's devised a quick remedy for whenever she catches herself loosing her bearings and feels Sanyu's emotions for him clouding over her senses and it's been effective so far.
Quietly and cautiously, she puts the script down and reaches over for her bag. The pages turn quickly as she leafs through them, used to her fingers, broken in. When she stops, the picture looks bright and glossy and untouched - foreign against the browning pages.
He's a few years younger in it, his hair's longer and his face fresh and almost childlike. She sees wonder in his eyes despite the carefully fixed expression on his face. Dressed in a leather jacket, he's striving for the rough and tough bad boy look but instead comes across as foolishly naive and embarrassingly wannabe. He's trying too hard and it shows. She knows it's only one of the many cringeworthy pictures from his portfolio. Knows he abhors it. Knows all this because she has more than enough of her own too. It could easily be one of his worst pictures till date and yet it is the only one she keeps.
She looks at it long and hard until she's convinced it's seared into mind and she can see it perfectly even with her eyes closed before hiding it away again until the next time.
Lately she finds herself looking at the picture more often than she cares to count.
--
Anupamaa
