Love

“Nina”
“hmm” I mumbled
“I am so sorry”
“For what?” I looked at his eyes trying to see why he said he was sorry? Was he saying sorry, because he felt sorry that I have the weirdest family on planet earth?
“When I came back after the holidays everyone at the men’s hostel was speaking bad about you. I didn’t want to believe it, but when Jomon told everyone that he went to Dr. DG’s clinic to verify the facts and everything in the letter was true and”
“And you believed it? Oh my goodness! How could you?” I was so mad
“I didn’t say I believed it”
“Right, you didn’t. Do you think it is possible for someone to walk in to a clinic and find an information about a patient just like that? Do you think it is possible for a Doctor to divulge patient’s details just like that?” I was screaming
“Wait Nina,I haven’t finished explaining”
“There is nothing to explain” I got up.
“Sit down Nina, I need to tell you” He grabbed my hand and pulled me down to sit
“It is getting late. I need to go back to the hostel” I pulled my hands out of his grasp.
“You are not going any where till you hear my side of the story”
“There is nothing to hear. I know where I stand”
“Oh no you don’t. You don’t know that each time I see you talking to Arjun, I want to kill Arjun”
“What?”
“You heard me”
I looked at him again. What exactly is he trying to say?
“From the first day I met Caroline, I have been trying to date her. She never showed any interest and when I came back home, she send word through the canteen guy that she wants to see me. The canteen guy told me, apparently she was asking for me every day since the college reopened after the holidays.”
“hmmm, you came 15 days late!”
“My God, you counted the days?”
“Nah, I counted the seconds”
“Oh Nina”
“Don’t Oh Nina me”
“Why not?”
“Every time I did something wrong or I didn’t know how to do something the right way, my grandmother would shake her head like this” I showed him how Ammachi shakes her head
“Then she would say Oh Nina”
“So?”
“I don’t know why, when anyone says Oh Nina, it makes me feel very inadequate”
“Oh Nina” He shook his head just like Ammachi does
“I said don’t do that”
“Oh Nina” He did it again
“Go, I am not talking to you anymore”
He was quiet too. I looked at the river in front of me. I hoped I would find a kingfisher. I haven’t seen one for such a long time. May be if I see a kingfisher, I might get some Halcyon days! Nah, I told myself, Halcyon days are in December, a week before and a week after winter solstice.
Kingfishers, river, green grass, they all reminded me of only one thing. My home. My Tharavadu(ancestral home) and the lady who lives there, waiting each day for me to come back.
Suddenly I felt something is stuck in my throat. The guilt of abandoning my own grandmother over a matter of principle. Oh God, when am I ever going to pay back all the bad karma?
I remembered my favourite malayalam poem
ottum cheythilla sukrutham
otterey cheythu dushkrutham
Rama kalan varumbol
nam enthothendutharam*
( I spend my days doing everything bad and Lord Rama, when the God of death comes to get my soul, what am I going to tell him, so he would spare my soul)
“What about you and Arjun?”
“What?” I was startled
“What about you and Arjun?” He asked again
“What about me and Arjun?”
“Are you in love with him?”
I didn’t know the answer for that question. I looked at his eyes again. He was staring at me.
“Are you?”
I tried to think. The man who was sitting by my side was the only one I ever loved. But do I love Arjun?
“Arjun was there when I needed someone. We have nothing in common, but he was there every time I needed someone”
“Do you love him Nina?” His voice sounded pretty annoyed
“No. Don’t you get it? You are the only person I ever loved” I was equally annoyed.
“ok”
“ok What?”
“it solves all our problems. I will break up with Caroline and you break up with Arjun and we can be together”
“No” I screamed
“Why not? You are in love with Arjun, aren’t you? You don’t want to break up with him!” He sounded mad
“No, it is not like that. I don’t want to be the reason you beak up with Caroline. My life is already so wretched. I am already carrying so much burden,I don’t want another woman’s tears on my conscience. I will not let another woman cry because of me and I can’t break Arjun’s heart. I can’t hurt him. He didn’t do anything wrong” I started to cry again
“God” He screamed. I watched in horror as he got up, clenched his fist and started to punch the rocks at the back of us.
“No! don’t, Please don’t” I got up and grabbed his hand. I checked his knuckles, most of the skin covering the bony prominences had gone and it was bleeding.
I wished I had worn the duppatta with my salwar. At least I could have used it to clean the wound. I gently wiped his knuckles with my hand. I knew it must have hurt him a lot. I hoped he wouldn’t have broken any of his bones.
“Is it hurting?” I asked him
“No”
I knew that was a lie.
“May be we should go to the hospital and get an X-ray done”
“No. I am fine. Come let us go. You will be late”
“Ok. Can you drop me at the bus station?”
“Why?”
“I don’t want Caroline to know that you were with me. You will get in to trouble unnecessarily”
“ok” He mumbled
Silently we walked up to where he parked his bike. I watched him starting the bike and he looked at me
“Do you love me Nina?”
“Yes, I do. I will always love you”
“And you won’t break up with Arjun, even when you don’t love him?”
I shook my head. I knew I was the dumbest person on earth, but I wouldn’t let Caroline cry because of me and I couldn’t break Arjun’s heart.
I climbed on his bike. The road was full of potholes and I tried not to hold him. All of a sudden I was afraid to hold him, I was afraid to feel anything for him. I was afraid to cheat on Arjun.
He dropped me at the bus station and I took an auto from there. As soon as I got out of the auto, I saw Arjun standing near the guard house
“Where were you until now? I was getting worried”
“I am sorry Arjun, I got held up” I felt so guilty for lying
“Here” He passed me few pages of photostats
“What is it?”
“Pharmacology notes, I xeroxed my lecture notes for you”
“What lecture notes?” I checked the paper to read. It was dated today’s date.
“These are today’s notes” I looked at him tying to see what is going on.
“Yeah, I took the lecture notes and xeroxed a copy for you”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t want you to miss out the notes. Otherwise you will have to ask someone for the notes and write it again! This would save you all the trouble”
I felt so incredibly guilty. I knew how much Arjun hates writing lecture notes. All the while he borrowed my lecture notes, because he never took any notes during lectures and he would have written the notes only for me
“Thank you Arjun. You are so sweet” I couldn’t stand there and take the guilty feelings any more “Arjun, I have to go now. I am already late. Thanks again for the notes”
“Ok. You are welcome. See you tomorrow. Good night Nina”
“Good night Arjun” I started to walk
“Nina”He called me
“Yes Arjun?” I turned to look at him
“Sweet dreams” He was grinning
“You too, sweet dreams” I started to walk fast.
snehicha hippiye kittiyillenkil, kittiye kashandiye snehikkuka(if you haven’t got the hippy you loved, love the baldy you got) I remembered the words of wisdom in my 10th standard autograph book. But the writer didn’t say how hard it would be to love a man who has nothing in common with you.

* Can’t remember for sure who wrote the poem, But if memory is right, this was written by Nalappattu Narayana Menon( Madhavikkutti’s uncle)

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