11 years...

9:15pm - COLLEGE-GATE:

I stepped out of the bus, and started walking on the boulevard from the main-gate towards pearl-66. (Pearl is one of the hostels in my college and I stayed in room# 66). I looked into my watch, and it was around 9:12pm. It was dark, windy and cold, but not rainy; it was mid-autumn of 2001; it was 19^th September of that year.  

My feet felt too heavy to walk; shoulders drooped, I was confused in thoughts, trying to figure out what went wrong, and how and where. I was clueless; heaving a heavy sigh, I just raised my head a little to look in front. My goodness, there she was walking to her hostel, right in front of me, just 30 or 40 yards away. She did not notice me; I further slowed down to increase the gap, to avoid attracting her attention, to avoid facing her again.

It felt…, like…a walk after death.

She walked and walked; and disappeared on her way. Lonely, I was walking on the dreary, deserted road leading to hostel, thinking about what transpired between us an hour ago. I could not avoid being forced into retrospection.

7:30pm – AIYAPPA TEMPLE - OPEN SPACE:

We were sitting on the temple premises, side by side but a foot apart.

When she said, “I’ve never come out of our college compound with any male-friend”; felt a sting - perceiving myself being compared with other guys, I impatiently retorted, “I also would not have asked you out, had I considered you just as a friend”.  It was not a meditated response but an instant reaction.

(To me, she was NOT a beloved, lover-girl; she was an angel….that’s the reason I did not take her to a park or anywhere like that… I took her to a temple; …whenever I went to meet her, I always felt like a pilgrim rather than a friend/lover. In her presence, I felt purified; in conversing with her, I had my heart and mind, cleansed. She was more of AN ANGEL than a FRIEND.)

 Her reply was, one of the typical answers of many lost love stories, “but, I….regarded you as a good friend”.

There was an uncomfortable, embarrassing silence for a while.

None spoke; both seemed to struggle to find words and collect thoughts. As for me, there was no coherence in my thoughts. It was clear that it was indeed a rejection, though indirect.

“Let’s move out, it’s almost closing time”, I said, staring listlessly at the temple workers’ preparations. Standing at the temple gates, before parting, she asked, “what are you gonna do, now?!”

“I…ah…do not know.” I had no answer. I was blank. “I don’t know what to do”.

Silence fell again for a few seconds.

 “tell me what are you gonna do now?!”, she enquired considerately.

“I really do not know, I just heard you. You had told me whatever you had in your mind”, I replied.

“I….. think we should go to our hostels, getting late!!”.

She nodded mildly. “mhmh…”.

I said, “can you go alone?!”;

“I can manage”

“mmhmh… . See you tomorrow!?”

“Yeah… ”, she said uncomfortably.

She stood there hesitantly. She did not move.

I said, “Go on”

She said, “No, that’s ok; you first please”

“mhmhm….ok”, I unwillingly turned and started walking away silently.

After an hour I dropped out of the bus at the campus.

9pm - 19^th September 2012:

Exactly 11 years had passed since then; that proposal was not direct; nor was the rejection. It happened impatiently. Probably I expressed it in an awkward way. Now…I think it’s not about how it’s expressed but how sincere we are.

As soon as we entered the temple, I made a prayer to the gods, ran into a pact with those gods. But some prayers go unheard; some, go unanswered; some, get rejected. She never heard THAT prayer. Had she heard, I think, she would have accepted mine.

And that prayer is….

“…… …. …. ….”

I wish I could tell her that at some point of life. I wish I could tell her I, out of love, had accepted her rejection too.