Mitali Jain 

At times the scenes are so different, mom walked up to me and held me in her arms, and she combed my perfectly set hair once again just to irritate me and gave me one of her best smiles. I hated this the most, she knew I didn’t liked being this dressed yet she would do that again and again. 

“Mom not now…” 

“Daksh, it’s okay beta, you are going to be all right, and even Jai is going to be there, why do you have to worry about anything? And if ever you feel weird, you know where to find me and dad.” 

I knew she was right, but through the night when the parties would go on, I would still be by Dad’s side, Jai would as well be there, but I liked to stay beside dad, I had always felt grown up… my 10 year old self dressed in perfect suits and ties walking amongst these big people and listening to business, I didn’t liked it, But I liked to hear the praises that people sang of my people. 

The scenes though would change eventually, I remember sitting with my mom and dad in the back of the car. The two of them so happy, they were telling me how soon we might go back to the beach house… I loved to be there, I missed it. 

And then all of a sudden there would be a loud squealing of tiers, mom screams echoed the most, the belt that was wrapped around me held me to be safe, mom, and dad wrapped their arms around me as the car toppled around in circles, once twice, thrice… the number of times eventually getting lost as I would sleep back into the slumber, with mom and dad’s voice still lingering around me for the last time. 

…. 

The days have changed, I still get those dreams, at times I am at the beach house in Panjim, I am way younger than the other dreams, and this time I am not alone… there is someone else, I can feel her, her face is quite blurred almost unrecognizable but I would run after her, chasing her, her laughter seemed so soulful that it somehow used to give me a good feeling. 

At times I would hear her talk to mom, she would ask when her mom would come, and when I would look at mom, she had that forlorn look which I didn’t like to see, this would somehow upset me… but then I would see the little one on the verge of tears and hence I would tickle her… her giggles would echo all around us. 

Though she was smart enough, as she would steal my balloons and run off towards the waves, her frill filled frock blowing around the winds, as mom would go behind the canvas once again, smiling at us… while I would call behind her…

Mini!  

……

The nightmares have seemed to deteriorate, Tejal is quite a nice doctor, and she can surely do well ahead. But it scares me now; there are certain things which seem even more amiss to me now days. 

Like there was this one fine day I knew there was someone who was following me. I knew that. And then there was that one time when someone tried to push me from the stairs, but kaka and my secretary has to say that there was none… that I might be deluding such things. But no I was right… there was someone. 

Jai has been calling me again and again, he says that Naveen and he are starting with the work on the textile company and that he needs me there. May be this would help … a change in place might actually help me. 

…. 

Mom, I met someone really amazing today. She had the same spark in her eyes as you had whenever you would talk about art. She was so pretty, her name is Mitali, she is Naveen’s sister. I know that may be she didn’t recognized me.. But I did. She is so pretty; it makes me nervous when I am near her. 

She has different perspective to every art that she sees, to the world, it makes me smile… it’s a wonder that a person as such like her as well are there. 

…….. 

Mitali has a complete different aura around her, she is like that of the spring, filled with flowers,  her steps have the chirp in them that of like the free birds, you the same way those little chirping ones who would fly high, tease each other, bright blue in color, beautiful and cute at the same time… she makes me want to keep on looking at her. At times I find myself looking at her more than any of the paintings or pictures… she is more beautiful than them. The air around her is always so pleasant. Is it possible that one could be able to just breathe normally while being with someone and as soon as the person goes away, it feels as if we are struggling to breathe in? Her smile seems so enchanting, she has this habit of nibbling her lips, playing with her hair when she is nervous…, she herself doesn’t know about this. She is an angle. Mom, when I am with her, I always tend to forget that I am Daksh, a person who is so desperately trying to keep his mind sane… mom I guess I love her, but then, will she be able to love me back? 

….. 

What could be more rational mom? That I would stay by Mitali’s side, pursue her… I know each and everything about her, how she likes to stir her coffee till a few minute particles of sugar are left so that she would dissolve them at the end, making the last sip of her coffee the sweetest, Or the times when she needs food a lot when she has to think or has to talk to someone new. Mom I know her, I understand her the way she does, we calm each other… but mom, Jai loves her. He has since long back, how come I never saw that coming, why was it supposed to happen with us. Jai deserves her, they are so compatible, she is like that fire which has the ability to melt the ice stone. Jai smiles now mom, he thinks through about people other than us all… he is himself. He goes out to be himself. I have seen them talk for hours… mom Jai talks to people for hours. How wonderful it looks when he discusses life and stuff with her. 

But mom I found something else today mom, I had an attack, I am not well mom, I know that… but I don’t want to die, I want to be with Mitali. Mom do you think we did wrong with letting go of mini… should we had ran off from there back then? May be then I would have never seen these people attacking me again and again. 

Mom what if I were to find mini again? 

……. 

They were back dad, they were back, this time they had guns, huge ones, I tried to hide mom as you had told me… I even kept the food aside, I had the packets of masala with me… just the way you had told me they would help to protect me. But that it wasn’t spicy so I added more, a few went into my eyes as well, Kaka was so worried. 

He would cry again and again, why he doesn’t understand that I am good. Thanks a lot for this Diary dad, I don’t know why a lot of entries are for mom when she is here with me… see even right now she is there drawing something, she looks so pretty, I know one day her paintings would be on wall, everyone would love them, so much so that they would know you as her husband. I love you both. 

But no… ohh no dad they are here again, Mini, dad please come back, they would take away mini and mom. How would I fight them? 

***** 

Mitali Jain 

I wiped away the tears and turned around the page, the first word made my heart stop beating. 

*** 

Dear Mitali, 

Wipe away those tears, I know you did a minute ago as well, still please once again, they are rolling down your cheeks. Don’t bite your lips, Jai doesn’t like it. 

You are worried for me right? Don’t be, I am good, I am scared a bit but I am fine. Mitali life is never the way we want, I knew a day would come when you would see this diary… I even want Jai to have a look at it. 

You might have got to know by now that I love you, I could never tell you about it right in your face, I tried many times, the day of your first art exhibition, the day when you had called us to meet… but I soon realized, your talks, your thoughts your eyes and ears your everything had Jia’s attention. I could never get you out of that euphoria you looked so pretty talking about him. I know you love him so much, I as well know you think you love me. 

Haa haa, Mitali there is such a fine line between friendship and love isn’t it? Let’s keep it there, I would be so happy to be your friend, you know the one who would be there when none would, to talk to you at late nights, to help you decide if its right to go on a date with the person you love or not… to just help you be you.

Once I had seen mom, she had told me that, “If you think she is slipping off your hands, its time you held on to her tightly and confess your heart. Nothing is more powerful than the heartfelt words.” 

I think you are slipping off my fingers as a friend, I want to just hold onto you little more, to tell you what it is that you mean to me, and then maybe we could just smile like old times and discuss how Vincent van Goh and Lavis wain were poor sadistic souls with beautiful brush strokes. 

But I wonder the day would ever come, I am slipping off day by day, and though I don’t want to, I don’t know what to do… I need your help I guess, but even before that I want you to go be with Jai… it’s you two Mitali, it’s always you two, I was never supposed to be there. 

Although at the end of certain days I wonder, just may be when all things would come to an end, and we would be given a second chance, I might have a chance to be the first to meet you, to see you, to be by your side… this time not just as a friend but the special person to whom I lost you the other time. 

I will be waiting for that, I know I will… but till then, marry Jai, have lots of kids, spend as many days with him… get old with him, smile in your end of the days, cook food and sit by the balconies and just talk, do all the things you might have wished for… but if I were to die now, I want you to think of me at the end of your phase so that when the next time you would open your eyes, it would be me… just me. 

Love you Mitali. 

You know right I miss you, help me if possible? 

Daksh.  

 *******

Throughout my life I was told, taught and made understood through so many different things that love was supposed to be pure it doesn’t has any conditions when it comes… but it always has to be one person. I was never known that there would as well be a possibility that you would fall in love with two different people at the same time. 

I knew I loved Jai for who he was, the bond that I shared with him was different, and it was beautiful and unexplainable at the same time. But then there was as well Daksh whom I met unknowingly, we talked, we talked for hours day in and day out… he was not like what Jai was, his arrival and settlement in my life was nothing like that of Jai, and never did I realized when did I fell for him. What was it that attracted me to him? 

At times it made me wonder was it the fact that I liked the way he understood my craze for Art or was it the fact that he always had a different thing to say a particular situation. 

Jai was someone with whom I could be on the same page easily, whereas Daksh…he would always make me think of all the things around that topic. With him everything meant meaning and relation and I liked it. 

As I sat on the stool beside Daksh, the diary still in my hand his last words ringing again and again in my brain… I couldn’t understand what was I to do now? It felt as if I was walking through a dark set of ally’s whose end was nowhere to be seen; I didn’t know what was I to say to him?... To Jai? 

I took hold of Dakh’s hand that was rested on his stomach and felt their roughness, the feel of his rough hands against my soft ones made me take a deep breath as if it was making come in contact with reality. I kept on staring at his closed eyes; the thought that he could hear me; understand what it was that I was trying to say made me nervous what I was supposed to say after all the things that I read there. 

But after a long while, I felt a tear dropping on my cheeks as I found my voice back, “Kaka gave me your diary today, and when I read it for the first time I felt conflicted. I thought I knew you well but then I knew there were things that made us all feel lost when it came up to you. Daksh, I am scared, I want to help you but I don’t know what could I possibly do? All I know is to discuss art with you, fight with Jai on how we should talk more, select the best art that is there around the world according to a theme and narrate them.” 

“How will I help you Daksh… “ I let out a huge sob as I continued, “I love you, you know how illegal that feels right now, because I as well love Jai and I know its him at the end of the day then what about you…why do I feel like this about you Daksh, why if I had jai with me?” 

I kept on crying there as my hands still held onto Daksh’s for a very long time. I didn’t knew what was it that I was crying for, they kept on flowing, and with them the various thoughts of how weird I was, I wanted someone to be there for me. I didn’t know if this was actually a love triangle and surely this story of ours was to be a stupid cliché story… but it scared me what was it that our future going to be like. 

I was to be married off to Jai, I knew I love him, I wanted to make it through that wedding to have a life with him, to fight with him on petty things, to talk about silly things, to cook together, to sit in the balcony gazing at the sky, and then show him around the art pieces as he would then take me into his world of stories… but then what was to happen to Daksh? To his condition? To my feelings for him? Were they to be settled off without any closure? 

As I looked back at him, I wiped away my tears and leaned down near him and kissed his cheeks surprising myself to the core. I pushed back the small locks of hair that falling on his forehead as I said, “ Daksh, I don’t know what I and we all could do, but right now for us to take a step towards you… you will have to take hundred more, you will have to wake up, you have to open your eyes so that we could get the old you back, you are not going to live like this… you are going to be okay and you are going to be there fine and lead your company just the way you had once did.”