Sometimes, it just so happens that things are not in your
hands. All you can do is, wait, watch, think and realize. May be in the larger
scheme of things, as people love to call it when they can’t change their lives,
it is for the greater good. But
sometimes, feelings are so true, those which couldn’t be suppressed, those,
occurring only and exclusively when one’s ability to acquire is not challenged.
Occasionally, it happens, that someone falls in love, and then falls out of it,
and then again, with someone else. It goes on, and on, as it depends upon the
fact that one can approach someone or not. Therefore it is possible that people
may find someone, living opposite to their houses or in office or anywhere
else, adorable when compared to make up laden, fancy dress ridden film stars.
And most of the times until some sort of cosmic interference
steps in, and that is, usually, a decision colliding with another decision. A boy
may stand up on his feet, collect courage, and talk to a girl. And that’s just
the beginning, a lot of things follow, until the boy proposes and strangles the
love story, there and then. Because always, all love stories end, where the guy
says “I love you”, despite wondering how corny that sounds. And no, those love
stories beginning with the boy and the girl attracted to each other, those
which don’t end with the corny statement,
but much later in fact, are not love stories, they are tragedies. If by chance,
such a story ends happily then it isn’t a story, it is a properly planned
marketing strategy executed successfully for financial benefits, to sell a book
or a film.
So the matter of fact lies in the truth, that whatever is
believed to be a love story is either a hoax, or a tragedy. But it isn’t a love
story. And, exceptions are always there, everywhere. Had movies been a
reflection of life, or dreams, that they are capable of, they’d have shown a
story where boys and girls live in dreams more than reality. They work, they
dream, they sleep dream, they talk they dream. Greatest moments of life dwell
within fast foods corners, over pizzas, breads, fried chickens, mochas,
burgers. At times, over those pizzas, when single girls make fun of single boys
who in turn flirt with other single girls, if they come to know about it and
considering Indian situation if there
are at all, within a group, where the
flirt in question is there on the table, but the girl in question isn’t and at
all times, there is another boy on the table dreaming of someone else, that
others don’t know of, and don’t care of. When the discussion is too spicy to
end, the dreamer’s dream girl pops out of the dream and enters the fast food
corner, with her own herd, the red-blue tackily colored, bizarrely designed
eatery that is capable of generating not-to-be-taken-seriously mood, with glass
walls, out of which dusky evenings, above the highways are slowly swallowed by
nights, star filled, lamp lit.
The red-blue walls, with insanely circular, red-blue in
color, office like but conveniently large, table, for eating is occupied by 7-8
hoodlums, comprising of both boys and girls, who have no other thing to
discuss, or think, or dream. From a distance one would think there are 10
people, but actually on that table, there were 7. Throwing gags at each other.
Boys with girls, slightly less familiar, become formal, alarmingly. They try to
be funny, serious, diligent, enigmatic, magnificent etc. all at the same time.
But there are few, who most of the times, think too much to bother, or dream
too much to bother. And that is another skill of theirs to attract, attention,
obviously. Most of the human lives are spent fighting for it, so no point in
blaming that hard coded beauty of the human nature. That is the poetry of it, the art of it, of the nature.
Successively, that discussion is wished, that it doesn’t
end. And one amongst them gets bored and starts dreaming. In Paulo Coelho’s Alchemist,
ripped off, hilariously in an extraneously asinine Hindi film, it was said that
“When you want something, the entire universe conspires in helping you to
achieve it”. As that discussion continues to get mundane, and that evening
deepens, into the glossy mysterious night, reality, steps aside, for the
dreamy, partially accurate, partially abstract haze. That, from that door,
transparent and outlined by red fabric thick pillars, where a grey colored car
whose metal shines reflecting the lamp above it is parked, from behind it, a
man leaning to the car could see inside, but he seemed lost in his own
confounded diligence. His carefree smoke evidenced. The highway behind the
highway was traffic free. Occasionally a motorcycle or a car or a lorry would cross
one’s line of sight.
Orange was the color of the lamp post, not the one above the
car, but the one established on the divider slicing the highway into two,
across its length. Illuminating the portion of the highway, because its
location wasn’t exactly opposite to the eatery, so from inside, it looked like
a painting, beginning with a red colored pillar on the left, a transparent
door, another pillar, a glass wall, outside the glass wall stood the car, and
the man leaning to it, and smoking, very slowly, towards the right end of the
wall, outside the part of the highway which was partially illuminated and
partially dark, and the lamppost. That was maximum an eye could see, without
turning the neck. The eye of the dreamer, which intended to see a girl, unknown,
who stayed nearby, and the dreamer would see her, in that place, many times,
and started dreaming that she would enter, and today, he would stand on his
feet and say hi.
There is a sequence, the way he dreamt. She would come with
2-3 other girls, she would stop outside have a chat, analyze if there is a
place inside, to sit. And she would resume discussion and she would move on, go
straight. She wouldn’t come in. The whole pack would go straight.
She would come alone, analyze if there is a place to sit,
she would think for some time, she would come in, and order what she would like
to have, wait, get it packed, and take it away.
She would come, chatting with her friends, and without even
thinking about coming inside, she would go straight.
She would come, with a big group of people, she would see
that there is no place inside for such a large group of people and she would go
back.
She would come inside; it doesn’t matter if she comes with a
large number of people, and she would order something, have a blast and go
back.
She would come inside, she would sit, and dreamer would wait
for the right opportunity, gather courage to say Hi, and he would go to her,
and say hi.
She would come inside, and he would see her come, eat and go
and without doing anything.
She would come, with 2 other girls, without even thinking
about coming inside, she opens the door, chatting with her friends, places her
order and occupies a table right opposite to him. She notices, the boy is
seeing, nervously, she looks away, she observes again, she sees the boy is
still there, not one inch turned, she gets nervous, even further, and looks
around, only to check back again, and the boy is looking away and his friends
are taking pot shots at each other.
Usually, it so happens, that there is another truth, hidden
somewhere. But when there exists a group of people there is someone who senses,
what’s wrong. So inside a fast food corner, the boy, slowly, carefully,
trying to find an opportunity, to catch a glimpse. The problem, lies in
capability to acquire, the matter of fact that someone is close enough, and
also, the fact, that the other person is good looking, at-least in the eyes of
the beholder, also points out to an internal urge of having a good looking girl
friend who can be a status symbol. Perhaps that is also the reason, people
usually tend to move on when situations change, finding a better looking girl,
for example.
But that, was not the point, right now. Right now, the loneliness
of a youngster was playing a role. Especially, while dwelling in dreams, analyzing reality, most of the time he’d suppressed feelings. For that one
moment of time, when dream took a shape, and undying will to observe in silence,
that urge to talk to someone, and see without any hitch, for the rest of the
life, in that moment lived feelings, that usurped, thoughtfulness, logic.
In that pack, of people that evening, one of his friends,
observed shift in behavior, turned around to see, to be stunned to know, what
stopped the boy from behaving normally. The boy was interrupted as looked up to
see his friend with his eyebrow raised, rather gleefully. Then started the
problem. Reading expressions, of the two people in the pack, another one got
curios, and she was a girl, she turned around to check what’s wrong, and that
was it.
The dreamer guy was too shy to speak, and here he is, amidst
people, who had no other topic to discuss other than each other’s counterparts,
and the dreamer was immediately, the center of attention. Not that he’d mind,
but then it was a nervous situation. Of all the confusion, one of them asked
a question, apparently, not knowing anything.
“What’s up, why is everyone so silent?”
“That girl”, dreamer pointed, using drastically magnificent
gestures, that people could cherish and laugh for another 5 minutes, without a
hiccup.
“So what’s wrong? Go on and say hi!” few friends in a pack
are dudes, they are too carefree, just to enjoy the scene. There is a category
of these people. Those who say ‘go on and fight I’m there’. And many get fooled
by that statement, primarily because he’s there would not make a lot of
difference. Because he is not the one going to curb his fear and make a move,
which usually is a disaster of epic proportions.
“I won’t”, dreamer had another dream going on with him, as
he observed the girl was alone on her table rest of her friends were standing
in front of the counter, trying to decide what they’d decide.
“This is the moment, either you go, and say Hi, or you sit
here and glance till she leaves and you continue with your dreams forever.” Another
one said.
“You know her name?” a girl from the pack asked,
“No”, another one replied, “he’s been doing this for quite some
time now but he is too cold to make a move”.
The problem is, he had a similar experience already. He
tried, to talk to a girl, rather unknown. Still he knew her name and phone number.
He dialed, she picked up, he said “Hi, Actually, I’m, Actually, I’m, actually I’m
Rohan, Actually, no I’m not Rohan, actually that’s not my real name, actually I
wanted to talk to you, actually can we be friends? No actually, I mean”, “Do
you have another word than the word ‘actually’
in your vocabulary?” With one single statement, she told him he is very bad
with the talking part. That day, he swore, this would be his first and last
time, when he’d flirt. Regardless, whatever he might feel, he’d keep his head
down, and never be ashamed. Better coward than ashamed, he thought.
“What are you thinking? Go” One of them pulled him back to
the reality.
“Go, she’s alone, go” “Go.” “Yes, be a man!” “Look at your
face, don’t throw up already” “He’s red!”
“He’s blushing Idiot” as everyone
quietly yelled, blushing was the word that hit him. It infuriated him,
disgusted him, he stood up, without a plan, walked into reality, that today he’d
do the thing. He’d win the war and say hi, despite the fact he might have never
talked to a girl unknown, well, other than one exception, though the last time,
the girl wasn’t completely unknown, still.
So, he stood up, walked as a military general with assault
rifles and guns on his shoulders, ready to destroy the enemy, the hitch of
being someone who couldn’t talk. Like a cowboy from westerns on horses, he
lifted his shoulders, put aside his chair, and walked as the girl observed the
weirdly elegant masculinity approach.
With each step he took, the boy would change his appearances
in his dreams. From a military general, to a cowboy, to a shirtless hero from
Hindi Films, to a charming superstar who’d make women awestruck simply by
stretching his arms, to an elegant magician who’d please the audiences by
removing his hat and taking a bow, to accept success.
As he came close to the table he turned his gaze towards the
girl’s eyes, he fixed his gaze as he walked and then he gradually looked down,
pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, turned left from the girl’s table,
walked straight, took a right turn, walked a few steps forward, and went out of
the eatery.
And that was it. When he bowed in his dream, he looked down in
reality, he was wearing brown colored nubucks, with blue jeans and a black T,
he was no magician, but an ordinary boy full of nervousness, and sheer
shamefulness. He walked away, pretending he is sending a message. He perhaps
would never know the name of the girl, last time, he did because she was in
college and there were mutual friends. Now, there was no chance, that girl
would remain, that girl would continue to be that girl for the rest of his life.
But it wouldn’t make a lot of difference, will it? At times
he felt, that in case he’d really talk to that girl, he dreamt may be he’d
succeed in seeing through it, to the end of it, he dreamt that end was plane
boring. Talking on phone for hours, going out eating, watching movies, if things
get serious enough getting married and back to usual life all over again, the
true poetry lied before the endings, and in that nervousness, he realized was
true romance. One day may be he’d find someone, that he could gather courage and
confidence to talk to, or maybe he’d just spend the rest of his life dreaming,
thinking whether whatever he felt, was it true, or just another vague attempt
at attention seeking?
