In the doldrums..

Rinky was walking down the street, when a number of faces and voices kept coming back to her. Was she dreaming in broad daylight? No, she wasn’t. Instances kept flashing in the display unit of her mind. Her pace increased as her thoughts raced with the flashes of recollection. With every increase in her pace, the voices echoing at the back of her mind, became louder & louder.
Finally she had reached the gate of a huge building. In a moment, she was inside the building, & had placed herself where she usually did. Being unable to match what was going on inside her, with her surroundings, she yanked herself away. (This act of yanking was again a common characteristic of Rinky. Her friends called her insane for that. Naturally! How was anybody to know that she always took help of that, to do away with in-fights?)
It was when she reached the staircase that she was nearly choking & she ran up the flight of stairs. She kept running till she reached the place where she had come so many times in the past half-decade. Still she couldn’t get rid of the instants & the cacophony. Almost out of breath, she strained her vocal-chords as much as she could, “Shut up & Go away” being its main content. But, they were too adamant to obey her orders. When the stairs ended, she turned right and ran towards the end of the floor. Now, she was there for the umpteenth time & was looking at the empty corridor.
She pressed her hands over her ears, to shut out the sound. Gradually, the voices faded out. It was then that she fell to her knees & covered her face with her palms. She broke down. Yes, for the first time in her life did she break down in a public-place.
Minutes had fled past, after she had started crying copiously, when a hand rested on Rinky’s head. She knew this touch so well, that she didn’t look up to see who it was. Soon she was in those familiar arms & as usual she heard the words, “I’m still there with you. Even if everybody deserts you, I’ll never leave you.”
For the day, she was released from her keyed-up state of mind. She sidled towards the staircase. When she looked back the corridor was just like it was, when she had entered it – empty. The often-heard, melodious, Sanskrit devotional song came down the stairs from the terrace, as it always did at 6:30pm. This made Rinky feel the presence of her consoler. She was at the topmost floor of RMIC, with…..

Undefined feelings

What are you to feel when :
- You know that the two people, nearest to you, are hiding things from you, when you yourself are much more aware of it & when it is regarding you?
- You try to disclose your newly acquired knowledge to them & stop short in the middle of it when you see fear in their eyes?
- You call up the nearest blood relation to unbosom yourself but keep shut when you think that you shouldn’t sound depressed because the other person is happy?
- A friend calls up & you can’t tell that person anything?
- You feel like crying & you land up stifling your cries just to hide your tears?
- You cry & feel the absence of a shoulder?
- You look around for someone & find none?
- You need somebody & you have no clue about who that ‘somebody’ is?
- You want to do a lot but you know that you’re running short of time?
- You look for some company & nobody has time for you?
- You want something & you can’t have it?
- You dream of something & you know that it will never come true?

Pure bliss..

It was late that night, when Rinky desperately wanted to speak to somebody, rather she wanted to listen to somebody (& perhaps she wanted neither!). She needed something or should I say that she wanted something. Was it mental peace or was it only a whim? (She had always been dubious about what her various ‘something’-s meant.)
Rinky found herself gazing at the telephone, hardly thinking that it would ring; but ring it did, with an unexpected person on the other end of the line. The very moment of recognition of the familiar voice gave her an unbounded joy. That calm yet strong, quiet yet supportive, vague yet apt, practical yet understanding voice gradually seemed to fulfill that void of ‘something’. The moment there was silence, she filled it with a couple of sentences, maybe because she wanted the conversation to go on.
Even though it took place because it should have, she felt that she was speaking to the right person. She had got exactly what she had longed for, & that left her completely pacified. Somewhere, something had ‘clicked’.Sooner or later the blissful effect had to die down. It was time to say ‘bye’, when Rinky wanted to say just anything other than that three-lettered word. For the first time, did she want to come out with the words, “Please don’t hang up.” That was exactly when she did away with her desire & filled in the conversation with the least wanted trio.

Haunting Hiker

Ding went the clock to announce that it was 10 p.m. and at such a time, I was nowhere to be found! Unusually, the main road was not streamed with lights, due to the fact that all the streetlights had gone out together, as if by consent. This was the outcome of a power failure.
The only shimmer was due to a quarter of the moon. The long-tailed constellation gazed down at the murky area, with a wrathful glance. The swish coming from the nearby trees made the night even more creepy.

A score-and-a-half plus six stairs would have given anybody an opportunity to behold a solitary silhouette on my terrace. Needless to mention, that that sight would have surely made the spectator jump in his skin for terror. However, if I were to take notice of such a sight, then I would have mustered all the courage to… well, to turn around & rush down the stairs in the smallest fraction of a moment! But I did no such thing. Can you guess why?… Simply because I was the sole character of the sight. To put it in other words, the rambler on the terrace was – the one & only me!

Pulling herself together

Rinky always made sure that she was happy on special occasions. The day after the next was one such occasion. She liked referring to this one as the Grand Slam. (If you're expecting the 4th Grand Slam tournament of the year after the Wimbledon tennis tournament 2007, then allay your excitement, because Rinky's Grand Slam was certainly not related to that.)
It was time to say good night, when Rinky was found admiring her waist-length hair, as she knit all kinds of possibilities that could happen on the concerned day. At that instant, something terrible happened.
Why the hell does this have to happen each time?(Thank God she didn't say that aloud, otherwise people around her,though there were none & she always craved for atleast one,would have learnt Rinky's usual way of wishing herself 'good night' in such situations.)

Just 2 days to go for the Grand Slam & she had landed in the midst of all this mess!
Beep beep. (Now that's a double-decker slang). How on earth did things always fall through?(Well, this was 2 days ahead of time. On a few other occasions it had been just two minutes before time!)

That night she was engaged in fisticuffs with her pillow.(No doubt that she imagined it to be her best enemy) . When she was exhausted after acting maniacal, luke warm salty water rolled down her cheeks. This made her embrace her pillow in a familiar grip, to press her face into it , in order to make sure that nobody saw her priceless beads of transparent liquid. (How could anybody make out that this was the same pillow which she had been lambasting not more than a minute-and-a-half back?) She ran her hand from one side of her head to the other & halucinated that somebody was telling her, "Don't worry. Everything will be fine. I'm always there by your side." But in reality nothing as such happened. The more it sank in, the more did her emotions pour out... She had no idea when she had fallen asleep.

Introducing Rinky

That evening, when there was a torrential downpour, the sole figure of Rinky was found in her room. She had a reflective countenance & nobody could make out what she had on mind. Only she knew that she was hooked on to a chain of happy recollections. All that could be heard, included the constant battering of the raindrops on a nearby tin-shed & the hissing sound of automobiles on the wet street. Out of what could be smelt, was the sweet smell of wet mud. But none of these registered to Rinky.
After a long time, she was in perfect peace, wrapped up with exactly those silent thoughts which made her ecstatic. All on a sudden, breaking the impeccable silence, came the ringing sound of her phone. She experienced a shudder as a reaction to the unexpected discord. Her face lit up as she summed up in the next few nano-seconds, what she had been thinking in the previous hour.
Gleefully she answered the call. Gradually, her delight started fading away. Her voice became softer & softer till she heard the line go dead. That was the moment when she slammed down the receiver with an uncontrollable rage (which could have probably made her kick the phone out of the window, if it bothered her again).
This is very common with Rinky. I know exactly how badly she wants to reciprocate each time & fails to do so every time. Oh how desperately did she want to utter curses & castigate Mr. X (the person who was there just a couple of minutes back, on the other end of the line); but she knew better than anybody else, that she simply couldn't. There she was on her bed burning with ire.
For the past four years she had been perceiving this repeat telecast. Why couldn't he just go to hell? (Oops, sorry! She dare not send him to hell; because if she did, then she would have to meet him there sooner or later. Okay, I guess any place other than hell would do... Wait a minute. Does that mean heaven? That's certainly not the place where Rinky would want him to land up! In that case, I think hell will serve the purpose!)