There was a couple madly in love.

There was a couple madly in love. In Urdu you call such people diwaaney. They were madly in love. A love not defined by status, caste, physicality or raw sensuality. It was an ever present entity, a love which is just there; it had its own aura. Two people who realized that they have met their soulmates. Ayana used to ask Raajvir every now and then. “ so what makes you love me so much?” and he always started passionately, saying “I love you so deeply because………..” then a dull pause in which he jogged his brain to analyze what made him love her.. and then he said “ I just love you, I have no reasons to support my belief. Its just the way you make me feel and I know for sure this is how you will make me feel till the time I breathe my last” One special day when he quoted these words, he didn’t stop… he continued on.. hugged her and said “happy anniversary my love, got something for you”… it was a plain gold ring with ‘ il embrace death before I leave you. Love you always’.. She was speechless, she touched his face and her eyes were wet with tears. Cupid could see a tear blessed with sun’s golden rays… they were as big a drop as a giant pearl. A beautiful sight. They cried and kissed.

She was from a well to do family but Raajvir’s parents were snatched from him at a very young age. Despite all odds he wanted to give Ayana a life of pleasure and happiness. For him his love for her was not enough, he wanted to bring the whole world down on its knees just to bring a smile on the face of his lady love. She understood his passions and never derided them, she was a true supporter. It did not bother her that his need to satisfy her in every way was becoming a self consuming passion for him.

They had faced good times and harsh times together, they knew each other. They loved each other. She did not have to look the other way or make an extra effort to forgive him. When you truly love someone you can never ever hate those people. As no matter what you made them feel, they made you feel special. Her support was leading him to better things, a constructive love affair. A relation made to mend rather than break.

The amount of work Raajvir was putting in was clearly visible, he looked pale but always had a brilliant smile over his bony but strong façade. He wasn’t weak instead he was inspiring, but Ayana worried for his health. He just did not know how to take care of himself and that did not please her. She did not pamper him, it was an outright one sided shouting match. Then he had no option but to take care of himself. He was too stubborn to accept it but he liked being a baby in front of her, he liked all the mommy style scolding and all the care she showered on him. He worked while she stuffed his face with food.

Ayana was talking to her mom. She was talking about fixing a marriage date. We will call her mummy for reference. So Mummy tells Ayana “ you know beta if you are happy then we are happy but we don’t trust that boyfriend of yours, think about it. You are 24, you still can wait.” The conversation turned south there onwards and Ayana decided not to listen to her mother rip her man’s self respect to pieces any further.

She decided to take a walk on the gravelly road on the back alley of their make shift home. It was windy, the sky was blue, pink and orange in places. The wind had an eerie feel to it, she pulled her coat closer to her body and kept walking. Something kept nagging her and then she saw Raajvir in a roadside café hugging his best friend Asma. It was a different hug, a lingering hug. She held his hand after that. She smiled at him peacefully and then they parted ways. Ayana hid herself, her heart was thumping; a feeling so unbearable that she wanted to rip her heart out. Her mind was screaming for the pain to stop. She felt as if someone was sledge hammering her heart at unequal intervals. She was unable to breathe. She fell on the pavement and started grasping for breath. She kept telling herself that it was not what she thought and Raajvir will never hurt her.

Wearily Ayana walked into what they called as home. The door of their home had a hand painted sign.. It had their names written in varied colours and it was circled by a quote from Rumi, which stated “Love has no cause, it is the astrolabe of God’s secrets” . It was her habit to recite these lines while she entered and as she did the same she saw Raajvir sitting by the window looking outside the purple sky…which felt like impending doom of the unavoidable night and the promise of a brighter day.

He saw her and focused, he walked towards her and kissed her. Raajvir said “I am not the person you thought me to be. You treated me like a God but in the end I realized I am only a human being. I am sorry Ayana. Forgive me.” He kissed her again, took the ring off her finger and walked out of her life forever. Ayana froze, she could not even say anything. Her whole being waited to implode. An implosion of pain, a feeling so real and unbearable that anyone who has ever truly loved could understand her suffering. She begged and cried and looked at the sky. Nothing changed. She looked at the lightened skin of her index finger and cried. The ring was gone and so was Raajvir.

It was very tough for Ayana to piece her life back together. Her daily routine was picking the shards of the life Raajvir left into bits. She used to drip tears without even realizing. Her pain had such immense beauty that it made the people near her cry. Mummy intervened, she could not see her daughter suffer like that and asked her to zap out of it. An epitome of mother’s selfless love, never she rebuked her. She accepted what happened and helped her back on her feet.

After a year Ayana was engaged and married. A businessman, a goldsmith. Arun was from a different part of the country but he made his business flourish in Ayana and Raajvir’s city. He was a simple man, big hearted. He did not know about Ayana’s past and he did not care. He was confident of what he and Ayana shared.

Arun proved to be a great husband and father. They had a baby boy whom they named Karan. Ayana had finally forgiven Raajvir and wished he was happy with Asma.

Ayana was a doting mother and could not see Karan cry. He had the tendency to fake stomach aches to get chuttis from school. He just knew how to mess with her mother’s mental peace. One fine day he did just that and then after sleeping his heart’s fill he started throwing tantrums about visiting dad at work. Ayana knew she was being taken in for a ride but why not!!! Karan would love to see his daddy, so will Arun…. How often do you get to see your raja beta and Karan ki maa at work.

The weather was chilly. Both mum and son hurried inside the jewellery store and huddled besides the counter. Karan was playing with his Doraemon while Ayana was adoring her beautiful child. Suddenly her eyes fell on a diary. An old diary which Arun generally used to note special requests. As they sold run of the mill stuff it was not a stuffed diary instead it had entries spacing between months and even years.

she kept flipping back until she reached 2007. The year when Raajvir left her. She read an order for a gold ring with the words  ‘ il embrace death before I leave you. Love you always’. Her world shook. Memories started flashing, she broke into a cold sweat and requested water. Arun was concerned he asked her “ What happned wifey?” she replied “this message to be engraved is so haunting, reading it gave me a terrible feeling about things”.

Arun remembered the order with a smile and said “the fellow who ordered the ring was a sickly guy, but so passionate about this ring. He called me every half an hour to know the update on his ring. He kept babbling about how her jaan should love this ring and so on.  The strangest thing happened, after a few months a pretty girl came in with the same ring and asked me to encase it in an ornamental box. A memento.” Arun tried to recollect her name, he was closing by but still time has its toll on everyone’s memory. Then Ayana nudged in “ Was it Asma?” Arun nodded in agreement and knew there was something wrong. He trusted his wife and when she left in a hurry; he picked up karan and told him that mumma would be back home late so he should better teach his dad how to play with a doraemon.

Ayana ran to a telephone booth and picked up a directory, she ran her fingers through name starting with A. There were 7 Asma’s. The first three were duds but the fourth one was the person Ayana was looking for.

Ayana: “Asma, this is Ayana. You remember me?”

Asma: “Yes Ayana, I do. We never ceased to be friends”

Ayana: “ Yeah, yes. Of… ofcourse”. So hows Raajvir? Are you guys together? Are you happy?

Asma: “Raajvir is content. Happy am sure. Why don’t you visit me Ayana? Come right now”

Ayana disconnected the phone and hailed a taxi. At the foot of the steps, she felt dizzy. She did not have the guts to face what was to come. She cursed her foolishness. How could she ever think that after all of this they could be friends? She decided to carry it through and forget about him after that.

Asma opened the door, she looked beautiful. A haunting quality was about her which made her beauty painful. Ayana walked in….. and said “can I see raajvir?” Asma pointed her towards the study. She walked in. A framed picture of Raajvir hung by the dark side of the wall. The base of the picture was supported by a rack which had a gleaming glass and bead box with a ring stuck in between. Besides his picture were tiny frames containing eye lashes. Ayana remembered how Raajvir used to pick up her lashes when she wished something out of them. Her eyes were brimming, she had an unfathomable expression of hurt and grief however she managed to smile at the same time.

She walked towards the picture and touched his face.. her eyes dripping. She turned towards Asma looking for answers. Asma said “ Raajvir could never ever have stopped loving you. He knew how much you loved him. He was detected with cancer right after he proposed you. There were no symptoms in him making him feel sick but by the time he got the medical attention required, it was too late. The doctors had given him 4 months. He knew that you will kill yourself if you got to know so the only thing that we could think of was to make you hate him. It was tough for me to lose a friend like you and to lose my best friend forever. But he just wanted you to be happy”. His last words were “Asma tell Ayana that it hurt me to snatch the ring out of her finger but I had to, I had promised her il embrace death before I leave her…. Oh I left her before um dead. Guess the joke is on me. Tell her I loved her. Tell her I will look out for her from the other side. “

Ayana hugged his picture and stared at the floor. She picked herself up, she still kept hugging the picture and walked out of there.

Curtains close.