Few months after that Ritika and Suprotim Da got married and they moved to Bangalore.
Every single night Paree used to come in my dreams like a mast of an old wooden ship, disappearing on the horizon, sailing into deep waters of Blue Ocean. I folded her silk handkerchief and carried in my wallet all the time. Every passing day, I tried hard to smell her jasmine fragrance from that small silk handkerchief. Alas! It was only a piece of cloth, from where could it retain the fragrance of my heartbeat?
Debi was always in touch with me. We talked over the phone. She also tried to call my home once and asked for Paree, but she also got the same answer. She never went to my house again as I told her what dad told Ritika. Probably they also wanted that none of my near ones ever come to their house again.
Debanjana and Arindam got married. I was unable to attend their marriage as I had promised not to return to Kolkata anytime.
It was about four o’clock in the early morning of a Saturday of July of 2009.
My cell phone rang. Arindam was on the other end.
He gave me the good news ---“Debi has given a birth to a daughter, few hours back. Do you want to talk to her?”
I ---“Oooooooo….. Sweet Debi is now a mother of a princess. Yes sure. Pass the phone to her.”
Debi in her usual tone of abusing me sweetly ---“You rascal, swine, how are you?”
---“I am fine, you black raven, cunning foxy bitch … So sweet heart have become a Mom now.”
She paused a little and then said ---“Yes Dear. We have named her Suchismita and pet name Paree.”
After their princess was born, they moved to Australia.
A whole decade passed. Few months back, April 2011. It was dead night at about eleven thirty. I was waiting at the T3 terminal of New Delhi airport in the international wing to board airplane. I was going to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, for an official trip. I was browsing mails on my tablet and was anxiously waiting for the boarding call. I was deeply engrossed in my work.
Just then I heard some lady calling my name, that too in my mother tongue.
That lady ---“Abhimanyu, don’t run like that, you will fall down.”
I was very much surprised to hear a sweet voice calling my name in T3 terminal. I looked up to find out the source of that voice.
Again the voice called ---“Abhi, don’t go there, baby.”
How could I forget that sweet chirping voice that stole my heart years ago? Could that be possible what my heart was thinking? How could that be possible?
Just then the lady attendant announced to form line to board the airplane.
I stood up and requested her ---“One minute please.”
At last I found that lady. She was at a little distance from me, probably ten meters. She was facing the other way calling a child, probably three years old. That kid was very sweet and was running away from her.
The lady wore a blue jeans and a white blazer. Her hair came down below her shoulder, swaying on her broad back. I was not getting a clear view of her face, but from the side I figured out that she was wearing a pair of golden rim spectacles. The colour of the hair was brownish.
______________________________
She was probably in her mid or late thirties. Suave and elegantly dressed, I could sense that from the texture of her white suit and the stole around her neck. She possessed a beautiful figure but she was bit slimmer than whom I was thinking of. I saw a black Omega wrist watch on her slim wrist and a diamond ring twinkled on her left ring finger. She outstretched her arms calling her cub.
That puerile kid smiled at the lady and came running towards her. I saw the face of that child, beaming with juvenile smile as he jumped on the lady’s lap. That lady was her progenitor. I could make that out from the way they hugged and kissed each other. I put my tablet in the case and smiled at the kid. He kept smiling at me from her mother’s lap, looking over her shoulder. I waved my hand and threw a flying kiss to that sweet puerile little angel. He waved me back.
I picked up my handbag and was about to walk past the gate. I was constantly looking at the child’s face. The lady asked something to that child in his ears. That kid pointed his little fingers towards me.
The lady turned to find as who was waving and smiling at her cub.
Our eyes met. I forgot to step ahead. I forgot to breath. I forgot that I was waiting to board the airplane. My heart started galloping like a race horse. Veins started to pump blood like a steam engine. The world around me, rattled in front of my eyes for a moment.
The lady froze there like a pure ivory effigy.
The child looked at her mother’s bewildered face. She cuddled her cub with all her strength. Her lips quivered, her eyelids fluttered on finding me in front of her. That very old expression of controlling her dew drops; she bit her lower lips under her upper row of pearls. Her creamy nose tip, turned red. Her chest gurgled in some deep unexplainable agony.
The tectonic plates under Pacific Ocean shook violently and removed those old crusts over her heart to bring out the mantle from the ocean floor.
How could I forget those pair of lotus buds which were then behind the gold rimmed specs? How could I forget the small dimple that used to beautify my beloved rosy cheeks? How could I forget that small lock that used to dance on my EVE’s right cheek? Those lotus shaped eyes, those rosy cheeks, those small dimples all those eternal beauty kept me writhe on my bed for most of the nights.
I jabbed my right hand in my left suit pocket and grabbed my wallet, which still then had her soft silk handkerchief folded in a corner. I tried to take that out but I could not do that as the twinkle of diamond ring resisted me to do so.
The voice of the lady attendant broke my trance.
---“Sir, please board the plane.”
I looked at her deluged lotus buds once again, before stepping in the aerobridge.
She was my EVE whom I kissed; she was my Aphrodite whom I knew a decade ago.
But she has metamorphosed by then. A beautiful Signora stood there instead of the person of whom I thought of.
That ivory effigy was her cub’s progenitor, whom she addressed as Abhimanyu.
On which airplane she would be boarding, I didn’t know. To which country she was going I didn’t know.
Every single night Paree used to come in my dreams like a mast of an old wooden ship, disappearing on the horizon, sailing into deep waters of Blue Ocean. I folded her silk handkerchief and carried in my wallet all the time. Every passing day, I tried hard to smell her jasmine fragrance from that small silk handkerchief. Alas! It was only a piece of cloth, from where could it retain the fragrance of my heartbeat?
Debi was always in touch with me. We talked over the phone. She also tried to call my home once and asked for Paree, but she also got the same answer. She never went to my house again as I told her what dad told Ritika. Probably they also wanted that none of my near ones ever come to their house again.
Debanjana and Arindam got married. I was unable to attend their marriage as I had promised not to return to Kolkata anytime.
It was about four o’clock in the early morning of a Saturday of July of 2009.
My cell phone rang. Arindam was on the other end.
He gave me the good news ---“Debi has given a birth to a daughter, few hours back. Do you want to talk to her?”
I ---“Oooooooo….. Sweet Debi is now a mother of a princess. Yes sure. Pass the phone to her.”
Debi in her usual tone of abusing me sweetly ---“You rascal, swine, how are you?”
---“I am fine, you black raven, cunning foxy bitch … So sweet heart have become a Mom now.”
She paused a little and then said ---“Yes Dear. We have named her Suchismita and pet name Paree.”
After their princess was born, they moved to Australia.
A whole decade passed. Few months back, April 2011. It was dead night at about eleven thirty. I was waiting at the T3 terminal of New Delhi airport in the international wing to board airplane. I was going to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, for an official trip. I was browsing mails on my tablet and was anxiously waiting for the boarding call. I was deeply engrossed in my work.
Just then I heard some lady calling my name, that too in my mother tongue.
That lady ---“Abhimanyu, don’t run like that, you will fall down.”
I was very much surprised to hear a sweet voice calling my name in T3 terminal. I looked up to find out the source of that voice.
Again the voice called ---“Abhi, don’t go there, baby.”
How could I forget that sweet chirping voice that stole my heart years ago? Could that be possible what my heart was thinking? How could that be possible?
Just then the lady attendant announced to form line to board the airplane.
I stood up and requested her ---“One minute please.”
At last I found that lady. She was at a little distance from me, probably ten meters. She was facing the other way calling a child, probably three years old. That kid was very sweet and was running away from her.
The lady wore a blue jeans and a white blazer. Her hair came down below her shoulder, swaying on her broad back. I was not getting a clear view of her face, but from the side I figured out that she was wearing a pair of golden rim spectacles. The colour of the hair was brownish.
______________________________
She was probably in her mid or late thirties. Suave and elegantly dressed, I could sense that from the texture of her white suit and the stole around her neck. She possessed a beautiful figure but she was bit slimmer than whom I was thinking of. I saw a black Omega wrist watch on her slim wrist and a diamond ring twinkled on her left ring finger. She outstretched her arms calling her cub.
That puerile kid smiled at the lady and came running towards her. I saw the face of that child, beaming with juvenile smile as he jumped on the lady’s lap. That lady was her progenitor. I could make that out from the way they hugged and kissed each other. I put my tablet in the case and smiled at the kid. He kept smiling at me from her mother’s lap, looking over her shoulder. I waved my hand and threw a flying kiss to that sweet puerile little angel. He waved me back.
I picked up my handbag and was about to walk past the gate. I was constantly looking at the child’s face. The lady asked something to that child in his ears. That kid pointed his little fingers towards me.
The lady turned to find as who was waving and smiling at her cub.
Our eyes met. I forgot to step ahead. I forgot to breath. I forgot that I was waiting to board the airplane. My heart started galloping like a race horse. Veins started to pump blood like a steam engine. The world around me, rattled in front of my eyes for a moment.
The lady froze there like a pure ivory effigy.
The child looked at her mother’s bewildered face. She cuddled her cub with all her strength. Her lips quivered, her eyelids fluttered on finding me in front of her. That very old expression of controlling her dew drops; she bit her lower lips under her upper row of pearls. Her creamy nose tip, turned red. Her chest gurgled in some deep unexplainable agony.
The tectonic plates under Pacific Ocean shook violently and removed those old crusts over her heart to bring out the mantle from the ocean floor.
How could I forget those pair of lotus buds which were then behind the gold rimmed specs? How could I forget the small dimple that used to beautify my beloved rosy cheeks? How could I forget that small lock that used to dance on my EVE’s right cheek? Those lotus shaped eyes, those rosy cheeks, those small dimples all those eternal beauty kept me writhe on my bed for most of the nights.
I jabbed my right hand in my left suit pocket and grabbed my wallet, which still then had her soft silk handkerchief folded in a corner. I tried to take that out but I could not do that as the twinkle of diamond ring resisted me to do so.
The voice of the lady attendant broke my trance.
---“Sir, please board the plane.”
I looked at her deluged lotus buds once again, before stepping in the aerobridge.
She was my EVE whom I kissed; she was my Aphrodite whom I knew a decade ago.
But she has metamorphosed by then. A beautiful Signora stood there instead of the person of whom I thought of.
That ivory effigy was her cub’s progenitor, whom she addressed as Abhimanyu.
On which airplane she would be boarding, I didn’t know. To which country she was going I didn’t know.
That beautiful Mater Dolorosa was Mrs. Suchismita…….. I didn’t know her surname.
-------- THE END -------
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