A box of Chocolates

Love Aaj Kal - Part 1

16 years ago, Rai was deeply in love with a classmate from school. Rai was beautiful – even with her chubby cheeks, a little nerdy and overtly thoughtful, a bit too quiet , a bit too kind, and dangerously innocent like only 16 year olds can be. But she didn't think she was pretty. Her aunts from both sides of the family would often advise her – if she could dedicate even a tenth of the time she spent with books, in knocking off those extra kilos and grooming herself like a girl ought to, she could look pretty too.

And so, Rai fell in love with the very first boy who called her beautiful, even though he was an absolute misfit for her. In lieu of his acceptance of her, she felt she owed him her love, loyalty and beyond; and so the precious few months she should have spent preparing for her exams, Rai slogged hard to see the boy through to at least passing grades.

People might have had varying opinions about her prettiness, but everyone agreed that she was smart. They all had high hopes on her, especially her loving parents, but all Rai could dream of was a blissful life with that boy.

When school got over, and Rai couldn't secure a rank in any of the top colleges, she joined a mediocre one as a day scholar. The boy, who had barely passed, thanks to Rai, had rich parents, who sent him to another city and paid lakhs in bribe to get him admitted in a top institute.

Days rolled into weeks and weeks into months. Rai began to grow lonely. 16 years ago, there was no WhatsApp, Facebook or Zoom. The smart phones as we know them today were yet to hit the market. The only way to stay in touch with someone in a different city were expensive STD calls. Oh, but before the boy left, he took Rai to an Internet café and created an email id for her. He made her promise that she would mail him every once in a while.

But the boy didn't tell her how promises worked. He didn't tell her that the onus of honouring the promise lay entirely with her, like a one sided affair. Right from the second month, her emails began to go unanswered and slowly his calls too dried up. Rai started saving her pocket money (the money her father gave her for her daily expenses like commute and lunch) to call the boy once a week at his hostel. Sometimes he'd answer, at others she would be informed that he wasn't around. On the rare few occasions that he called or dropped a 'hi' in reply to her essay like emails, Rai would go berserk and much to the delight of her unassuming parents, would stay in that cheerful state of euphoria for at least a fortnight.

Almost a year passed by when the boy called her one day. He was coming home on Diwali, and told her how he was dying to meet her. Rai couldn't sleep the whole night. When the excitement became too much for her to contain in her tiny heart, she let them roll down her cheeks and soak her pillow throughout the night.

Through the next couple of weeks Rai tried out many things she had never tried before. She got a manicure, a pedicure, a facial, straightened her hair - things she was told, a girl ought to do to look pretty. She had never liked dolling up before, but this time she wanted to be just perfect for her boy. This time she told her parents too, and secretly nudged her mom to cook something special for him.

To be continued....