Swara had wanted to hate Sonal Singh, or be angry with her or just upset with her. Unfortunately, she found Sonal to be a sweet girl and Swara realised that she actually liked her and could also sympathise with her. Swara knew how it was to be shy and then be teased for it; if it had not been for Kiara, she would not be where she now was.

Sonal had come around three weeks before her wedding to invite all of them to her wedding celebrations and Swara had been excited till she learnt that the groom was not SM. Unable to hide her curiosity, she commented, "But then you were in love with SM, right? So how is it that you are marrying someone else? Would that not be cheating?"

Any further questions Swara could have were silenced when Kiara shushed her and she felt her grandmother glare at her. She sighed, that happened only when she stepped outside the confines of acceptable social behaviour, and even if she believed that people should be open and honest with their feelings, there were times when she realised that it was better to keep one's opinions to oneself. She was about to apologise when Sonal surprised them by answering, "I think it was only an infatuation on my part, I had only seen him a couple of times and have never spoken to him. Further, even though you have been sending notes all these days, I have not received a single word of acknowledgement or reply. And when my parents asked me to meet my fiancé, I could not refuse, there was no reason to do so; we liked each other and now are getting married. So all is well, I guess."

"Are you not too young, you are sixteen?"

Sonal chortled, "I do get that a lot, I am twenty but I look much younger, guess it is in the genes, my Dadi and my mother can pass off as sisters and it angers my mom. There are times I hate it but there is nothing much I can do unless I apply makeup to look older."

There was an awkward pause before Sonal continued, "Anyway, apart from inviting you for my wedding, I wanted to tell you guys that you can stop sending the bouquet and notes. I should have told this to you much earlier, but I think I was too embarrassed to call and let you know. I am sorry for all the trouble you had to go through for my stupidity."

Kiara, ever the professional, was quick to assure Sonal that it had been no trouble for them and that they had welcome the chance to assist her. However, when Kiara worked out the amount they would have to refund, Sonal refused to take it, "please do not embarrass me further, I am not taking a paisa back, in fact, I think, I have paid you less in the first place and if you start insisting, I can and will recalculate the entire cost and that would have me paying you."

Swara took advantage of the on-going argument to slip away, she had been stunned when Sonal had mentioned cancelling the contract and she was surprised that she was not happy that she would not have to write any notes. She ran into her garden and sat on the stone bench wondering what was wrong with her that she was going to miss writing those notes, she had found reading and writing difficult even as an adult.

Swara had always been a slow learner, having difficulty in reading and writing. Till she was five years old, the trauma of the accident and losing her parents were offered as a basis and then put forward as an excuse, but her learning curve did not improve; it dipped as she grew older. Swara was intelligent and creative; there was no dispute about it, and she had no hearing or optical disorders, yet somehow her school grades were never commensurate with her intelligence.

Swara would not have minded being labelled stupid, it gave her the perfect reason not to study or do her homework, though it set in a vicious cycle. What tormented her was the teasing she had to put up with, both for her inability to keep up with the class and for being the smallest of the lot. She had tried to give it back but that only made them tease her more so she simply ignored everything, tolerating the hours she had to be in school and spending all her spare time in the garden at home, where every plant under her care flourished. She also took care to ensure that news of her being teased did not reach Kiara, it would end up in a fist fight.

Swara would have continued to achieve inglorious academic failure if her school had not been the one of the random schools picked by the Government to collect data for the newly developed NIMHANS battery. All the students had attended the tests, nineteen of them which covered a wide range of activities, and their performance was evaluated to obtain an assessment of the child's neurophysiological profile.

An apprehensive Mrs Bose had sat in the small discussion room along with the principal, the test administrators, the child counsellor, Swara's class teacher and Swara, as the result was explained to her. Since it was mostly in technical terms she was not sure if she comprehended correctly, when one the administrators, seeing her bemused expression, explained, "Mrs Bose, it is nothing to worry about, the tests shows that Swara has some difficulty in reading, writing and spelling. It is called as Learning Disorder or Word Blindness, the medical term being 'Dyslexia'. However, it is not frightening as it sounds, it can easily be overcome, all she needs..."

Whatever the test administrator wanted to say was lost when her class teacher, an over enthusiastic woman, who would have made an excellent career in drama and theatrics, had exclaimed, "Dyslexia? But that would mean she is retarded."

The damage could still have been contained if the teacher had not been loud enough to be heard across the next two corridors.

Both Mrs Bose and Swara bore the resultant taunts in silence, though after six months and a dozen complaints later, when Kiara came home, once again, with a broken lip, a ripped skirt and ugly bruises on her arms, her grandmother had lost her temper. Swara stood to a side, watching her sister and grandmother fight it out; she was too tired to care and just hoped that this would end in her being pulled out from school.

Swara did get her wish. Their grandmother made the decision to stop sending Swara to school, that was the only way they could stop Kiara from beating up anyone who dared call Swara retarded. However, they had reckoned without Kiara's stubbornness, who soon realised that Swara not attending a school would not wipe out that label, the only way to do so would be to ensure that Swara learnt to read and write, at levels commensurate with the applicable school grades for children of her age.

Swara could not fight her sister, not when Kiara apparently developed infinite patience when it came to helping her learn, they started off with the Class one level and Kiara would persevere till Swara mastered each lesson before starting the next. It was a slow and laborious exercise, during which Kiara would beg, plead, cajole or blackmail Swara into doing her assignments, which also took a toll on Kiara's performance and could have come to another premature end if her grandmother had not decided to join forces with Kiara.

Their efforts paid off, in the confines of her home, without any external pressure to perform and surrounded by those who loved her, Swara slowly picked up enough to enrol into the distance learning courses. When she passed her tenth class examination at eighteen years of age, Kiara had gifted her with an envelope of papers.

Apart from the expected application forms for the plus two courses, there was a set of legal papers, which had taken Swara a week to read and gather a gist of the matter. Kiara had been over the moon when Swara had given her assent, not even minding the corrections made; each place which had mentioned 'Swara's Flowers' had been struck out and 'Kiara's Kreations' was written and Swara had carefully signed against each correction.

Swara had also managed to complete a Diploma course in Horticulture a year ago and could call herself a successful and qualified business woman. And Kiara Kreations, now in its sixth year, was a lucrative business; they were not rolling in money, but with their simple lifestyle and careful investments, they had a sizeable nest egg built up.

However, Swara was still a little awkward and uncomfortable in social gatherings as her early childhood experiences had left their mark; for though she had gained confidence to manage her business and life, conversing with people was still a difficult task for her.

The letters, which she had so disliked in the initial days, had given her a chance to communicate without saying a word and she was upset that she would have to stop so abruptly. But she did not have much time alone for Kiara soon joined her, "Okay, it is settled, we do not have to refund any amount, which is a relief, the numbers would look better. But I think we should send across a lovely bouquet for her wedding, do not worry about the cost, just make it as lovely as it gets."

Swara just nodded her head, without looking at her sister, which did get Kiara's attention, "Shona, you are upset."

She nodded and mumbled, "I am, a little. I should be happy that I do not have to write those notes, I used to dislike it in the beginning but then I took it as a challenge and wanted to write out all the three hundred sixty five notes."

She looked up at Kiara with misty eyes and continued, "And Sonal had to ruin it for me. I am happy she is getting married but could she not wait for a couple of months, there are only seventy days left from the wedding day."

"Are you falling in love with this SM?"

Swara's eyes widened at Kiara's question and she blinked; once, then twice, before shaking her head. She took a few minutes before she answered, "No, Di, I am not falling in love with this SM, I do not even know who he is and what sort of a person he is, we even do not know his name. Maybe we should have asked Sonal?"

She grimaced at the lost opportunity and then glared at Kiara, "And you know that I am not the type of girl who harbours stupid romantic dreams. It is just that I wanted you to be proud that I managed to finish off one task, fully, on my own, without having you to cajole or blackmail me into doing it till the end."

"I am proud of you, Swara, I have always been proud of everything you do. I forced you to study because I knew you could do it. But I can understand you; you have a few notes already written out, right?"

When Swara gave an abashed smile, Kiara hugged her and chuckled, "let us do something else, continue sending the bouquets till Sonal's wedding day, we can stop it after that day."

Swara was in two minds about that solution, her heart was insisting that she write out all the remaining notes, it was only a matter of seventy more. But then her mind was prudent enough to caution her; since Kiara was the one who oversaw the deliveries, there was no way Swara could continue the notes without Kiara's knowledge. She finally agreed with Kiara, it was a good compromise and it would give her the time to prepare the good bye note and the final bouquet.

However, the Universe was not willing to go with this decision of Swara's; it was having quite a bit of fun and was going to ensure that the writing continued, at least till the end of the year, as per the original plan. So it decided to run interference, a tiny nudge or rather a soft gentle breeze, for a nudge could translate into chaos, the ones we humans term as 'the butterfly effect'. So a teeny weeny brush it was and a distinct possibility ended up turning into a sure shot probability, another coincidence in mortal terms.

On the day of Sonal's wedding, the day when Swara decided not to listen to her heart and instead chose to follow her Kiara di's instruction, she had sent out what should have been a farewell note. She had chosen it with care, the first quatrain from a poem by Lord Alfred Tennyson, which reflected her ambiguous feelings.

That evening, the three of them were having a quiet dinner when Kiara let them know about her new assignment, which would last for three months. She was quite excited about the opportunity it afforded her for it could lead to a promotion, though all that Swara heard was that Kiara would leave early in the day and return late at night as the office to where she had to travel was located in the suburbs on the other side of city. Unsure as to whether she had heard correctly, Swara squeaked, "Diii.. that means you would not be there when the deliveries have to be assigned and the list has to be checked off."

Kiara mistook Swara's question to be born out of fear and smiled, "Swara, you really do not need my help at all, I am only there because I want to do something to help, you are fully capable of handling the work on your own. I have full faith in you, you will manage it well."

Swara nodded, excitement bubbling inside her for she realised that it was the perfect chance to complete her annual assignment of writing notes without Kiara finding out about it. The fact that she would have to handle everything else without Kiara beside her to turn to for help, troubled her too but those fears appeared faint in the thrill of being able to complete something within the original time frame. And if she lived up to her sister's faith in her, it would go a long way in mollifying Kiara once Swara confessed that she had continued to write to SM.

Her elation shone through in the note she wrote the next day, it was from Og Mandino's 'The Greatest Salesman in the World' and one which was a personal inspiration to both the sisters, 'I will love the light for it shows me the way; yet I will love the darkness for it shows me the stars.'

The rest of the days passed in a happy blur, for it was with joy that she picked out the lines to write, as varied in tone and nature as possible. She wrote tiny quotes, stanzas from poems or lines from the songs she heard, and they all reflected the happiness she felt.

They were also the days which left Swara exhausted; she had never realised how much she depended on Kiara but then she was excited too; for she had finally learnt the joy of being fully independent.

When the three hundred and sixty fifth day rolled around, Swara woke up with a happy smile, she had spent the last few days thinking what she would write to celebrate the ending of the letter series and had finally found it while listening to the radio. It was only fitting she felt; she had used a song to mark the start and so it was a song to signify the end. The song had been difficult to learn but she had heard it so many times that she could now sing along.

Since she was not too sure that SM could read Hindi, and since it did not hurt being prepared, she took out another paper and scrawled a rough translation, it took her quite some time and an hour of internet browsing to get the words she wanted, but she was proud of her results and was surprised that the lines sort of rhymed too. She carefully rolled each note, tied them securely and attached it to the bouquet. The bouquet was special too, for it would be the last one she would send, though it was a stretch of imagination to call it a bouquet in the first place. For rather then send a bunch of flowers, which would fade and die in a couple of days, Swara had chosen a poinsettia plant. Though the plant was almost at the end of the flowering season, but still had a few ends of scarlet leaves. As poinsettia plants were quite hardy and could be kept indoors for some part of the year, she was sure that he would have no problem in maintaining it, and a small part of her hoped that he would remember her by the plant.

Once she sent it off for delivery, she let out a sigh of relief; a full year of note writing had been successfully completed. Throughout the day, instead of feeling sad that she would no longer have to write, she kept humming the song she had chosen to write:

लिखे जो ख़त तुझे, वो तेरी याद में,

हज़ारों रंग के, नज़ारे बन गए,

सवेरा जब हुआ, तो फूल बन गए,

जो रात आई तो, सितारे बन गए,

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Note: the transliteration of the song is as follows:

likhe jo khat tujhe, woh teri yaad mein,
hazaaron rang ke, nazaare ban gaye,
savera jab hua, toh phool ban gaye,
jo raat aayi toh, sitaare ban gaye.

___________________________________________________________

And this is all about Swara, how was it? Does it give you answers and insight into her or has it raised more questions? I would love to know what you thought about her, do leave a comment, be it good or bad, and if you like it, also do let me know.

The next would be mostly Sanskaar and a little of Swara, and yes, they would finally meet, as the Chapter title says it all - 'When the Earth met the Sky'

love,

Nyna