(Picture : Internet)
‘Chal kya raha hai yeh?’ I startled as Taasha’s words burst on me like a cloud.
I never realised when she sat down quietly next to me, stepping almost on my toes. I dragged my knees towards right making space for her.
‘What on earth happened that you had to leave that hunk ’s snuggles and dash on to me like this?’ I could see the hunk staring at us gayly from across the bonfire. It wasn’t his fault. None could ever dare to resist her. The flick on her forehead was going haywire. Must be the snuggle. I straightened it up.
‘Madam, let’s play a game or something to pep up the party - antakshari, karaoke, some music at least?’ Kaaya, my assistant interrupted us. After a long day the team had decided to light up a bonfire. The lazy and disheveled guest house deep in cold slumber suddenly turned in to an enticingly warm and a dreamy lounge. Bright fuchsia pink-orange bolsters and cushions were splashed across the warm toned woven rugs and durries across the garden. Each rug had two cushions settled on it with a foldable wooden table in front, embracing little knick-knacks and a bottle of wine.
To lighten up the air further someone began playing the theme song of my film. Yell rose from all corners – ‘Nooo! Not the same again!’ True to tonight’s spirit swaying in the glasses around.
‘Absolutely right, not the same. Even I deserve a break!’ I quickly shushed the uproar down. ‘But I do have an idea, though.’ I looked at Taasha and implored her to sing the ghazal she had recorded for her Insta reel last month. All began cheering. She stared back wide eyed and dumbfounded. She was not a professional singer but had a honey sweet voice. With an auto tuner at work she sounded a swan. Nilesh, our sound engineer quickly got up to act her auto tune.
‘Ishq sab ke bas ki baat nahin,
aur yeh bhi sach hai ki ishq sab ki zaat nahin.
Nahin chahiye yeh junoon har rooh ko,
rehne hi dijiye, bas ab,
Jo hua so hua!’
Years back, I had scribbled these on her coffee table. Years later, she took them to the world.
‘God knows who wrote these gems? Must be you, Taasha madam!’ Tanmay, the costume guy beamed.
‘Nahi. Mera koi azeez.’ A trickle escaped her still shut eyes. That is how she sang. Not for others but her. Within herself. Singing does something to her. Amaal who was still sitting on my other side squeezed my hand.
‘What is going on, Angie?’ Taasha whispered again leaning towards me as Tanmay began his rendition. I could almost hear her mind’s rumble.
‘Matlab? I hunched up faking ignorance. I did not want Taasha to rake up something which even I had not deciphered yet. Some battles should stay put in the hearts and never rise up. ‘All is going well. We are almost through. The movie has shaped so well, don’t you see it for yourself? What is driving you crazy?’
‘You?’
‘What me?’
‘You are talking to yourself. All the time. People are noticing.’
‘Since when did you start bothering about them?’
‘There are rumors, Angie.’
‘That I am losing my mind?’
Taasha phewed. After a moment she looked around and gulped in a swig from the bottle.
‘I can sense Amaal'. The wine spoke this time.
‘What?’
‘Angie, don’t think about whatever happened that day. It had to. It needed to. Actually, it just happened and it’s good that it did’. She shied her eyes away. ‘I swear Taasha it is not so…’
‘Then why the hell are you looking that side?’ She snapped grabbing my chin hard. Amaal immediately released my other hand. He straightened up. A heated round of antakshari was going on. Tanmay was on the floor holding Kaaya’s hands. Taasha looked back at me and then towards the place where my eyes were fixed.
‘Stop that. He is playing with your mind. You will go crazy. That is what he always wanted. Either him or no one else’.
‘I am not going crazy’.
‘Then?’ She pulled my chin again. ‘Angie. Even right now your eyes may be at me but they are looking for him, may be even towards him.’ She turned her head back to where he was, right behind her.
‘Do you get it?’ My embarrassed blink irked her further. ‘Amaal, is that you? Can you hear me? I know you are back. Not fair Amaal'. ‘Leave her… now!!!’ She howled. She moved her eyes around knowing nowhere to settle. Her voice was trembling now, faltering in between, as if every word was giving a deep thought before stepping out. They were not ready, were putting up a fight, they were not ready to betray the real ones, the intended ones, left behind, pushed back and down.
‘Amaal,’ she took in a gulp of air, ‘if I was in your position, I would’. ‘Jo hua so hua, Amaal.’ She pleaded him. For me.
I was shaking. I looked at him. He looked away.
‘Kucchh nahi hua Taasha. He is here only to help me.’ I attempted to comfort the words still snarling at him, still in the air. ‘He just wants me to finish the movie. It is his dream too. That’s it.’
‘He just came back to hear that I still love him.’ I wanted to say. My palms were sweating profusely. They tried to find Amaal around, not sure if he was there. With eyes down I shouted in a whisper – ‘Amaal, where are you?.’
The same guest house, the same garden. Exactly 17 years back. I was sitting next to my father on a tattered chaddar. A game of antakshari was going on. There were no cushions, bolsters, wine, rugs or music - just a small bonfire and around it a group of families who came up here every summer to spend their vacation and more essentially to escape the scorching loo in the plains. We always rode up here in five taxis. The fifth one would carry a mini version of our houses - spices, groceries, fresh bedsheets, soaps, towels, pillows, utensils, almost the whole of the household. Even our drivers looked forward to this trip. They loved helping us around here in this rustic guest house which was way rustier then with its Indian toilets, creaking doors and only a single caretaker cum watchman cum cook cum everything whose service to every room would be directly proportional to the gifts brought for him which were mainly old clothes, books for his kids but most importantly a bottle of liquor which Papa proudly carried in his lap throughout the journey while sitting on the front seat.
We rode through the clouds on the journey here. I prayed for months before that it should not rain. I floated amongst them with my eyes shut as Amaal and Papa sang along. Amaal and me would always sit next to each other on the middle seat with Ma keeping an eye on us. But luckily her head would fall off on the head rest exactly 10 minutes in to the journey. Me and Baba would count backwards in whispers- 10,9,8…..
And after that even a roar could not wake her up and our dhamaal chaukadi would begin. We would sing, play games, chit chat, write a few more lines of our script , our dream – how we will go to Mumbai to shoot and who will be the heroine for my story and amidst all this Amaal would always be ready with a rolled up polythene – a receptacle for my vomit, yes – my vomit, every time a steep turn caught us unaware around the hills.
‘Iski zindagi ka maksad sirf teri ulti hai!’ Papa would laugh. Amaal would shy away.
But that year i.e., the 15th summer of my life, Amaal did not come. Two days before, we had a big fight. Our new neighbor Ayan had joined us for our night walk. I had just matter of factly offered Ayan to come with us in the same car uphill for this trip since he offered to teach me his card tricks. All was set the next day. The cars stood ready to leave. We all stood in front of them, in wait. In wait of him, Uncle and Aunty. We were already late by an hour when we saw Uncle and Aunty running towards us. ‘Arre, kamaal hai yeh ladka! Till yesterday evening everything was fine, all bags packed. Suddenly in the morning he announced that he wants to join his classmates on a trek instead. Do whatever you want, but if not permission, inform us well in time at least. These kids nowadays, Ray saab!’ He tchhed.
‘Grow up, Amaal. Can’t we have any other friends or do some things, not together, once in a while?’ My words and Amaal’s resultant expressions danced in front of my eyes. I did not rush back to call. Ayan was eagerly standing next to me with his pack of cards. The journey began. I had planned to show my new story to Amaal when we would walk in the clouds at night at the hill above the guest house. It was in my backpack. I threw it over to the back seat where our suitcases were stuffed and said a prayer for rain.
Papa shot off with his favourite song in the front seat as Ayan began our tutorial. He could not sing. But he made me laugh with a genuinely humorous introduction of every card and its exact role in the trick. New seemed fun.
Suddenly, a steep turn landed in front of us. I bellowed. The polythene receptacle appeared. My eyes gladly tried to catch a sight of the hands from a corner during my uphill ritual. Sadly, they were not Amaal’s, neither Ayaan’s. It was Papa.
‘Is se better toh woh hi tha!’ Papa whispered cheekily as we climbed back in to the car and both of them swapped seats.
‘This boy Amaal will ruin her’. My mother had sniffed sitting across the bonfire.
‘At least she will be happy.’ Papa had quipped in response. Years later, my father died the same. Unhappy. My parents had a love marriage. Very pleasant kinds with no major drama except for a few frowns and blackmailing. Arranged marriage couples would look up to the them when they met them for the first time trying to find the traces of the fervor and the adventure of those days.
But failed.
Both of them never talked about it or fought in front of me but often Papa while brooding over a wrinkled newspaper in his morning baniyan and lungi would hold my hand and utter absentmindedly – ‘beta, the most important thing in your life should only be your happiness. Money, fame, society, marriage, nothing matters at the end of the day.’
‘And nothing stays the same always. You have to find happiness in the little things. It won’t land in your lap on its own.’ Ma as always repeated the same, plastering it with a smile.
‘At least she should try.’ He took off his monkey cap and slapped it on his thigh twice to shirk off the dry leaves fallen from the tree above.
‘You are forcing your failures on her’. She grabbed the cap from him to dust it properly against her silk saree.
‘Our failures!’ He grabbed it back and slid it over his head and face.
‘And what is wrong in letting her know beforehand, in making her live my dream, maybe she would.’
‘Shaadi nahi karegi woh, if you scare her so much’.
‘Yeh toh maine kabhi nahi kaha!’
‘Dahi bhi pada pada khatta ho jaata hai. You have to whisk it. And if you are too lazy to do so, then make a curry out of it at least. All is possible. Bas use pade mat rehne do. Naa hi rishton ko, aur na zindagi ko’.
‘Amaal!’ I called out again.
‘Hey, why are you shouting? Don’t spoil those youngster’s party. People here already think that you have gone crazy’.
‘Thank God. I got so scared’. I hugged on to him.
‘About what?’
‘Of losing you.’
‘That’s not possible. The sole mission in my life is and always was to hover around you.’ He leaned sideways and gazed towards Taasha who was rolling on the floor laughing to the hunk’s jokes.
Amaal let out a puff of mist from his mouth. It had a macabre sheen to it.
Beautifully written once again