nostalgic and oblivious

CHAPTER 6

                  "what the hell....you freak me out every morning", I say to Tanya as I open my eyes in the morning. "I hate to sleep alone....good morning to you too", she says sarcastically. "come with me today please... I miss spending time with you", I say as I hug her sleepily. "Aww...okay I will", she says politely. "Now get out of that cozy thing right away", she says. Jeez she is as cold as Rayan! No....actually he is not cold all the time. Anyway, I get out of the bed and freshen up. We have a very formal and systematic breakfast in the restaurant.

                   We walk in the parking when jaguar c x 17, fiercely comes toward us and halts right before us. Its the same car which was at concert."Rayan!" says Tanya. He gets out of the car and greets Tanya. "What brings you here?", she says warmly. "I am here for Ahana", he says as he acknowledges me. "Ahana..I was going to drop her". "Now you are not going to", he says. "I thought maybe I would spend some time with her", I say reluctantly. "Avinash is waiting for you up in your room, he begged me to give you another day off, but the choice is yours", he smirks. She looks at me and I say, "GO", I say. She hugs me hard, "thanks", she says and runs back to the hotel.

             I wait for him to open the door for me and then I step inside. As he walks to the driver's seat I admire the XUV. It's spacious, and royal. "You don't have to restrict yourself this time", he says shyly.

"seems this isn't your pet car?", I ask.  "It is...you are not that a stranger now", he says shyly again. I blush.

                     "By the way we are not going to the studio today", he says dryly. where the hell are we going then! I just give him a confused expression. He doesn't even notice. It's so him! "why?", I say finally to kill the suspense. "Akaash has to work on the track of your new song so we really don't have solid work." he says. "Doesn't it mean I get a day off" I say. "No..I want to take you to someone you will like him", he says. The bunch of butterflies are back in my stomach. I already am making images of HIM in my mind.

              It was a long drive a really long one  where he talks to me! That's so not normal coming from him. After a while he pulls in.

                  It's huge. A huge royal villa. It has a typical Islamic arches. Doesn't look so young but fascinating. "Saahab is home isn't he?", he asks the young boy at the gate who gestured a salaam. It killed all the butterflies as saahab was obviously not a young handsome man! The villa was a place where Rayan would be a miss-match, but then I realized he was wearing a plain white tee and a normal jeans still has messy hair. He wasn't a rock star Rayan anymore. He was as excited as a kid, I could see it in his eyes. They lit up as we moved toward the villa. Seeing him in such a way was way too far from normal and it made my inquisitiveness grow even more. Who was saahab?

                  As we walk past the gate, I saw women gardening the well maintained garden which was home to many eye catching colored flowers and huge trees. It was not at all like a busy city of Delhi. Maybe we were in the outskirts of it, but the place wasn't a village yet the premises of the villa had a historic feel and authentic features.

                   Before we reached the door Rayan halted at a tap line. He took his shoes and socks off and opened one of the taps and placed his feet below the running water. I followed him. I was filled with questions as to where are we going, why is Rayan so different, what place is this and most importantly who is Saahab?