CBC’S The Valentine’s Day: One Post One Scene Tag
***
Guru had been waiting for nearly an hour at the Express Avenue in Chennai. Geeta hadn’t turned up as she had promised. He hated Ahalya for not understanding him, he hated Geeta for making him wait so long for nothing, and he hated himself for forgetting his mobile phone at home.
It was the last straw. When he reached home, he checked his mobile phone.
47 missed calls from Geeta.
Guru cursed. People would never leave him alone to die in peace. Irritated and with no intention for smooth talk, he just pressed the call back option.
The call went on wait.
He was completely pissed off. He slammed the cellphone onto his bed hard.
In the next moment though, Geeta called him back.
He just picked up the phone and said a curt “hi” to show his displeasure.
“Guru?”
It was something in that voice. A feeling of dread, something that made his body shiver. He knew something was wrong. Very wrong. His entire body was numb.
“Yes Geeta…” he answered timidly.
“Its your Ahalya…she is dying….” Geeta was crying uncontrollably over the phone.
“Where??” his mind was blank, he couldn’t concentrate. His heart had stopped beating.
“Miot hospitals Guru…Please come soon” she sobbed.
He was in shock, words and thoughts escaped him.
He wanted to comfort Geeta. Give her hope.
Ahalya cannot die, surely not.
He had to go. He had to be with his Ahi. By her side.
But, he was so far away from her.
Ahalya seemed to be an entire galaxy away.
***
“You are the cutest kid in the entire world” Guru proclaimed, caressing Ahalya’s hair.
She laughed just like she always does, a laugh that still gives him bonkers even after all these months together.
“How do you know that darling? Have you met all the kids in this whole wide world?” she teased.
He kissed her forehead tenderly and said, “Yes, I have sweetheart…You are my entire world”
***
The journey on the bus was the most horrendous 2 hours of his life. He was weeping uncontrollably.
He was stuck in incessant traffic. It was raining heavily.
He felt lost completely. Totally alone. Without her. His heart was a blackhole sucking away all his happiness. He was being sucked into it.
He tried to relive every word, every memory, every moment of the times he shared with her. All those long talks over the phone . . . the amazing nights they spent together discussing the world’s woes. Every memory made him feel that she was melting away to a place far far away. His heart felt a searing pain like a thousand knives through it. He was burning alive. Raw, savage pain. He felt completely lost. Completely alone.
He made a run for the exit as soon as the bus stopped at Miot hospitals. He had to get be with his Ahi. He couldn’t leave her. She needed him. She will survive, he told himself. She is the world’s most beautiful woman.
He struggled to fight back his tears.
***
He was finding it difficult to breathe. His Ahi . . . his first love . . . was slipping away from him. An unknown fear engulfed him. Somewhere deep down, he knew she wouldn’t survive. He knew that she was leaving him abruptly alone. He saw her tired eyes look at him with love. She was in a mess. Tubes of all sizes were thrust into her body randomly. He’d never been to a hospital before. The mere mention of life support systems scared him like hell and made him feel nauseous. He had never visualized his Ahi as a weak person. To him, she was always the world’s strongest woman. But, today seeing her lying in the ICU, frail and totally lost made him break down completely.
She beckoned to him with a flutter of her eyelids. Her eyes . . . it spoke a million words. Enchanting, mysterious eyes that made him go weak in the knees every single time. She had a smile on her lips. A sad smile. A smile that betrayed lost hope. A smile that conveyed that it was the end. A smile that had always wiped away his troubles, made his eyes well up with tears now. Guru rushed toward his Ahi and knelt down beside her.
He held her morbid hands in his, the skin was parched. How long has it been since he touched her and lay down next to her, massaging her feet?
He was crying very hard. Tears flowed down his cheeks like a leaking tap. “Ahi please… You are my world . . . I cannot imagine a life without you, please come back to me dear… Please be there for me.”
She clasped her hand tightly around his. She was breathing more heavily. Gasping for breath, agonizingly.
“You are the biggest liar in the world Ahi! You said you would be there to see our great grandchildren and spoil them completely . . . You said that you would be there with me for a hundred years and beyond… You said you will be there to see me win the world… You lied to me dear… You lied”.
Tears rolled down his cheeks never ending.
She tried to stop his tears but couldn’t. Her hands were weak and numb. The strain was just too much for her to take. She gave him a feeble smile. He placed his fingers on her cheeks and wiped away her tears. He saw himself reflected in her glistening eyes. She closed her eyes and opened them again as if to capture his face in the album of her memories forever.
***
She was wordlessly admiring the way he was playing with the kids, beaming all the while.
He looked up at her with questioning eyes. “What?” he seemed to say.
She just shook her head with a smile spread across her timelessly beautiful face.
“Nothing” she said “Nothing”.
He smiled back at her.
“Your daughter is just so lucky darling”
He looked up at her sheepishly.
“I love the way you treat the kids as if they are your own!” Ahalya exclaimed.
He went completely red.
“C’mon Ahi, don’t make me blush! And stop pulling my leg. It will be OUR daughter not just mine.”
She smiled.
“Ahi….what is that smile supposed to mean? That we won’t have kids?” he flushed.
She smiled again.
“What will you do if we don’t marry each other Ahi?” Guru asked.
“I will die sweetheart . . . I will die” Ahi said, her eyes searching for love inside the eyes of the man she loved the most in the world.
“I won’t let you die Ahi, you will then leave me forever alone” Guru caressed her hair.
“No dear, even if I die . . . I will come back to you as your daughter.”
“Oh Ahi, you are like a baby to me even now . . .”
Ahalya smiled. A tear dropped from the corner of her mesmerizing eyes into the ground.
“I really want to be your daughter Guru, I love you so so much”
***
She was trying to remove the oxygen mask from her face. She didn’t have strength enough to pull it off her face. She was struggling, thrashing her arms around to indicate that she didn’t need it anymore. She wanted to speak. To Guru. To HER Guru.
He tore the mask away from her with one swish of his hand and cupped her face in his fingers. Her heart beat erratically, rising and falling like giant waves. He was weeping on her shoulder.
“Hey lover boy. . .” she said.
His eyes burnt with tears and he felt a dull pain in his chest.
“Don’t go away from me Ahi, please” he pleaded. “I love you so much”
She continued breathing on her own. She was hanging on. For him.
He just wanted to touch her, lie on her arm, kiss her beautiful lips . . . forever. He looked into her eyes . . .
Her eyes . . . two worlds within his world.
Pain had made it shrink but, it still held mesmerizing depths. It was filled with love. Pure and eternal. The most divine love in the entire universe.
She kissed his forehead.
He cried at all the love she had for him, undiminished through all the pain.
You are just like the wind that blows past me
I can sense you embracing me
But, I cannot hope to embrace you back
Like the wave that steals the sands under your feet in a hurry, he felt the world under him giving way. He drowned in the emotions, gasping for breath.
“I always love you Guru . . . You are my heartbeat, my first baby . . .” She gave him a weak smile. Her eyes were brimming with tears. She was peaceful in the knowledge that he loved her too.
He cried even harder.
Her hands reached out to touch him. It was shaking with the pressure. He grasped her hands in mine to support her.
She reached out to his face . . . and wiped his tears off.
He had been on top of the world, the king of his universe…but, he knew he would never get to that place again. He knew deep down that his life is dead.
In every pain, there is happiness
In every tear, there is joy,
In every shadow, there is light
In every night, there is dawn
In every failure, there is success
In every nadir, there is zenith
In every sorrow, there is pleasure
In every death, there is life
In every memory, there is you
In every you, there is just emptiness.
***
He suddenly wished that reincarnation was true. He wanted to hold her in his arms again, one day. He wished she would be born to him. He wandered into thoughts of the future.
His Ahi would come back to him as his daughter. He could sense the happiness on his face overflow when he would see her out of her mother’s womb for the first time. Those big, black eyes with its mesmerizing depths and those beautiful little fingers awaiting his touch.
He imagined taking her in his arms and resting her on his shoulder and whispering into her ear “Thank you for coming back Ahi”. He imagined her smiling back at him with the same smile that gives him bonkers even after all those years.
“I’ve been waiting for you for 10 years Ahi…” he would whisper.
She smiled yet again.
“I knew I will come back to my Guru again, my darling” she seemed to say through her serene angelic smile. “Am returning back to the person who loves me the most”.
He imagined holding her fingers while training her to walk. He wished that she would be addicted completely to him. She would be his guardian angel. He imagined rejoicing at her first big step, her first tooth, her first word. He wished that she says “papa” first. He would be the happiest man in the entire galaxy.
***
Will Ahalya survive? Will true love win the world? Or, will she die and come back as Guru’s daughter?
Catch the next episode of the greatest love story in the world . . . to be penned down by Poet, Bibliophile, Cineaste and die-hard romantic Mahesh Iyer, who blogs at http://www.vincimax.blogspot.in! 🙂
God's own child 
Love the direction you have taken the story in Vishnu.. and it is such an apt one for the day.. awesome going 🙂 Looking fwd to next chapter already!! :=)
Oh, I was so restless and unhappy. Vishnu, what have you done? No No. I wish that she lives.
Joy always,
Susan
oh my I just hope she does not die. btw nice narration 🙂
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I wish she lives! Lover / wife is not the same as daughter! why oh why!
Nice narration! Wish she lives 🙂