When did simplicity go out of fashion?
Is innocence no longer a virtue? It's gone out of style? Trust comes easily to me. I trust easily and you can trust me.
My world used to be pure. Bright and full of people I could trust. People I was happy with. People, who I thought, were happy with me.
But apparently not.
I have never been a brilliant student, never came first in my life. I have been an average student all through school and college. I always knew that I would be going into my family business..and would be trained accordingly.
My Cousin Sanskaar was always more of a brother to me than my elder sibling Adarsh. Sanskaar and I are just a couple of months apart, and we used to be as close as peas in a pod. We shared everything growing up. He was always the brilliant one. He has always helped me along in class, and I have in turn coached him through extra-curriculars, so he could manage a passing grade. He was never very good at sports. He never had many friends either like me, because he is an introvert. So I was his closest confidante. Hell, I was his only confidante.
When he fell in love with this Bengali girl, Kavita...nobody at home supported him. We are, as a family dead conservative, mistrusting everything which is even slightly alien to what we stand for. My father is not much less than a dictator who would kill to uphold his reputation. He may bend the rules for me, occasionally, but never for Sanskaar I'm afraid. You see my father is deadly partial to me. He has always known that I'm not as good as his brother's son, so he has always protected me, spoilt me...and tried to thereby raise me in the family's eyes. So has my mother.
Sanskaar was a rebel. He knew the rules would interfere with what he wanted, so he worked around them. He worked at setting up his own business, he did not give up the girl he loved, and was secretly getting married to her, he wanted to leave home and find his own life outside these rusted, age-old and obsolete boundaries. But I did not want him to have to leave. I was the only one he trusted enough to reveal his plans. I wanted him to not lose his family while seeking freedom. So I wanted to somehow convince my father to accept him with his differences. But something backfired. Someone murdered Kavita due to societal unacceptability, we think, we never knew exactly. And I lost my brother. He went missing. I thought he was dead too.
His place in my heart went hollow. For years after that whenever I had something I wanted to share with him, I would go to the our gymnasium where there was a sandbag, which he had brought for himself and given away to me when i said i liked it...and pour out my woes to it. But he was not there. It was just a stupid symbol of my brother. So, I started partying hard, making other friends, settling into a lifestyle which had lots of peers. Free bird.
Years passed. And one day, I learn I'm about to get hitched. My family had decided upon a match for me. I met her. Ragini. She is a pretty, demure, old fashioned girl. Shy and kind. But she's just not my type. At least she never used to be. Anyway I agree. Until I meet her half sister. A Bengali chick. A firecracker. Swara.
I knew from the very beginning that Swara was too good for me. Smarter, independent, more balanced. She was Bengali and off limits. But through some stuff, we became friends. And although i knew that swara did not really think me up to par with her...although i knew that ragini was my fianc, I still fell in love with her. She was somewhat like the female version of my brother...though she used to be an extrovert.She has always told me I'm immature and she thought me rather weak. But she said she loved me. maybe because she was protective for me. she fought for me.
And then he re-appears. Sanskaar, back from the dead. I was giddy with happiness. Although he was supposedly unbalanced, he was back.He shies away from everyone except ragini. And then he threatens to kill himself if I don't get married to ragini. What the hell do I do? I know..I should have left ragini alone...and not lift her hopes again. But I'm sorry I could not. I got affianced to ragini. And I was still in love with swara. Pathetic, i know.
My family, after a lot of trouble, accepts swara. I told you they were partial to me. and also, my father has always wanted a daughter like Swara..bright, standing for what is right and independent. Ragini seemed to understand. She became friends with me. and I trusted her. She is a nice kid.
Some stuff starts going wrong with swara. I have no idea what. It seemed like she took drugs. But she swore she did not afterwards. Swore she was being framed. I believed her. Believed her until the day of my marriage. She eloped. Left me at the altar, leaving me no explanation but a bloody video of how she never wanted to marry me.
And I come to know that my brother is not mad. He has been plotting to destroy me by pretending to be mad all this while, because he suspects I had a hand in the death of his love. Ragini outs him. And then she, poor kid gets blamed for all the shit that swara has stirred up. She tries to commit suicide...and I marry her. It was a whirl. All i knew was that since ragini was the only one at present who seemed trustable...I did not want to lose her after swara and sanskaar. She was, like me, a scapegoat. We were both collateral damage, so to speak.
And Swara comes back. She does not explain anything, mind you...not even when I ask her. It was too late, i was already married, yes. But I got no explanation.
She admitted everything. She admitted everything. I'll say it again, she admitted everything.Then she says she will leave. And then she suddenly ends up married to sanskaar.
And suddenly, just like that, Swara and Sanskaar, the two people I trusted most, my lover and my brother...are villains to me.
I have always liked a quote in the movie..The Hollow Man. Genius is the ability to get from A to D without having to go through the B and C.'
Well, not being a genius, but a mere mortal...I did not get my B and C. Someone just plonked me from A to D. With no thought as to how much it hurt to get to D so suddenly, all alone.
I am lonely. I have no idea what just happened...and I'm sorry I cannot believe in anything that duo says. Sanskaar and swara.
And I'm lost. No matter whether they say that they are going to help me out of here...that the only person who seems to actually care for me, my wife Ragini, is evil, is a plotter who did all this to get me...I just am lost. They want to help me. Why should I take the help of people I cannot trust?
Sanksaar and swara admitted their guilt. Sanskaar told me the entire backstory. Provided me with witnesses. And told me that Ragini is an Evil plotter who tried to kill Swara to get me.
Swara once admitted that she had indeed eloped and had indeed used drugs...and now again, she is trying to prove that she did not. She changes colours like a chameleon. She also seems to have no interest in ME anymore. She also seemingly seems to support the theory that ragini did all this to her just to get me.
Now both Sanskaar and swara have admitted a common thing. That Ragini, whether or not she did anything at all, wanted me. Throughout the entire convoluted story I can make out only one damn thing which is also quite clear to me at this point.
Ragini is the only person who truly cares for me. Even if she did do wrong things to get me, which I for one do not believe that she did(i mean look at her face, its so free of any guilt), she is the only person, who is still there with me.
Sanskaar and swara, Lord knows, what is going on with them...a fake marriage...a love confession from my brother to my lover, who is supposedly his wife...I mean...like what? So much confusion?
I am still not over swara. But ragini happens to be in love with me. its clear to even a person like me, who is , i'm afraid, not as smart and sophisticated as my brother or swara. I want to show her some reciprocation. Want to move on in life with her. I'm lost...and she is the only path I can see so far which seems ok to follow. A path I can trust.
You know those birds who dash their heads against the windscreen of a fast moving car? and if alive, dazedly fly away in the first direction they see, just to get away from the car which hurt it? thats me. still re-adjusting.
My trust on those two has been broken. I never know when they are lying and when they are telling the truth. Truth seems like lies and lies like the truth. Swara gives me proofs...and I ask you...I may be dumb, but is trust so fickle? I can see proofs. Can believe them, even if unwillingly...but i'm afraid that one proof of innocence will not win my unconditional faith anymore.
You can call me dumb, deluded, misguided, paranoid and weak.
But I don't believe you either. Because right now, the only things I can trust are my senses, facts and my wife. Backstories are too convoluted for me to understand without footnotes and explanations.
I'm sorry. But I need something more to go on. I'm the victim here. Only whose I don't know.
I will have to relearn trust, faith and my way of seeing the world.
Just like a child, who trusts his Father dear,
and who delights to feel his presence near,
just like a child whose mind has not a doubt
and whose heart is never proud.
here i come O Lord, here I come just like a child.
Debate Mansion
Anupamaa
