Kashmir Diary

' I DON'T KNOW HOW I REACTED TO THAT'

That night, I was waiting for my mother to return home. She worked for a full fledged woman welfare organization so sometimes she used to come late because of her hectic schedule. However I could talk to my father about the band thing, he was home. He had been off duty the whole week for some reason, but I thought of playing it safe and waiting for my mum's presence before talking about it. My dad was an army-man and he couldn't be home often and that made me more dear to him and also more likely for him to agree for whatever his dear daughter asked for. Still, I waited for mother India to arrive.  Within a few minutes, the doorbell rang, I ran to open it but for real, it was too far from the living room. It took me legit 2-3 minutes to get there.

 But to my surprise, it was not my mother but my lovely brother standing in front of me!He was in the army too and he had not been home since two whole years, I was beyond happy to see him... "SURPRISE!!!!" He remarked, I squeaked out like a tiny mouse and hugged him tightly like koala bear holding on to a bamboo tree. My eyes almost teared up but I managed to not show it because he was the branded emotional fool and not me. He was also responsible enough to follow all the duties of a true brother. He brought me chocolates, a pair of jeans, a watch and a leather jacket! I was worth it though. Listening to all the noise we made, my father came in but he just smiled and nodded normally because he knew he would come. 

Then arrived the lady, my mother. She too knew he would come, all were traitors. But she still had the same reaction that I had. Apart from that much, she kissed his face like for a thousand times. I didn't receive even half the number of those kisses in the whole two years from her. We had the dinner together, all the four of us after a long time. It was a really happy dinner.

In the middle of all this, I forgot to bring up the topic of the music band in the convo. 

It was late night, full moon was visible from my room's window. I was lying on my bed with eyes fixed on it. Cool breeze was cooling my face. Then I slowly fell asleep unknowingly. 

The next day I woke up with the idea of talking about my band. I walked to the living room on my toes as the floor was cold. This was because our house was almost entirely made of marble. Above that it was raining that day.

But there were some other plans waiting for me in the living room. Chiran and Aadil were sitting on the wooden couch! This was not a good sign at all, them asking my parents about me joining a band would be the worst way to talk about the band to my parents. I said a simple "Hi" to both of them. My brother- Arjun Pandith came in. "You know them?" he asked. "YOU know them?" I retaliated. He laughed and said "Obviously! They're my mates. I have been their brothers even before I became your brother." "So since when do you know my sister, boys?" he asked them. "Bhaijaan, just yesterday we met. We asked her if she would like to join us in making a music band."Chiran said. "Nice! You're bandmates now!" Arjun bhaiyya remarked. "No no, not yet, she said she needs to think about it."Aadil broke in. The old brother laughed again. "In my opinion she would die to be in that band!"he said. "Isn't it?" he questioned me. "Um, I would like to join the band, yes but I need to ask my parents first," I awkwardly replied. "Ha! Come on, you rule this house. Who says no to you? " My brother mocked. I sighed with a slight frown. "No boys, I'm serious. She will absolutely be in your band, she's just making a scene here for don't know what reason." he said. Then the three of them left. Those boys had come to meet my brother and to ask him to accompany them for playing cricket.

It was afternoon, my mother was home early. She gave me a weird look. "You won't go with them to play?" she asked me. "I'm not twelve." I said. "Then come help me with these files." she ordered. I banged my head on my fist and went to help my mom with those boring files without any other go. Those files always infuriated me. It was a list of long named women. I had to sit there and put a tick mark for whosoever names my mom called out. While doing that, my mother casually asked, "Why are you not showing any kind of interest in joining that band?" I was surprised. "You are okay with me joining it?" I asked. "What in the world made you think I wouldn't be okay with it?" she said very loudly. "Whatever...But will papa be okay?" I said again. "What is wrong with you? Have we ever denied anything that is good for you?" she said sounding curious. "No no. I just thought that..." I struggled with my words. After all, my parents were better than I actually thought.

Evening was near and I rode my cycle as fast as I could. I reached the bridge and I was impatiently waiting for them. At last I saw them coming. "Waiting for us!?" Chiran yelled from the other end of the bridge. "Nah! Just writing my song as usual. But we can talk!" I yelled back.

We sat on the bench and settled ourselves to talk like real adults. The conversation went like this.

Chiran: So you are in the band now. What are your musical skills, Bhairavi?

Me: Well, I can write songs and sing.  I also know basic Tanpura tuning.

Aadil: Good, I can sing and play Rabab. Chiran can sing and play the keyboard.

Chiran: But we still need people.

Aadil: We can have your younger brother in our team, Chi. He plays tabla right?

Chiran: Oh yes! We'll take Diljeet for Tabla.

Me: I can call my two friends Inaaya and Zeenat. Inaaya plays harmonica and Zeenat plays santoor.

Aadil: Wonderful! We have all the pure kashmiri instruments and also the keyboard to give a touch of modern music.

Me: I must say this, I'm really thrilled.

Chiran: Yeah! Me to...

Aadil: I really can't believe all this is happening right now!

[The conversation went on really long and at some point it ended.]

The sun was not in the sky anymore and all our faces were lit up by the lamplight. The two of them were ready to leave. "So, we'll meet tomorrow then. The entire band together." said Chi. Yes, the convo went so good that I started calling him Chi. Chiran stood up and turned away. 

Aadil stood up and before turning away, he turned to me, "I know, you were waiting for us on the bridge. You didn't bring your notebook with you to write music as usual, did you?" he said looking at my empty hands. He gave a little smirk and left.  

I don't know how I reacted to that.