A Story From Heaven

We smiled and laughed all day while travelling down to the next stop which would be our loving wedding destination which both of us thought to make it happen for a very long time.

“Oh! Wait! I didn’t introduce myself. My name is Shankar and this is my story written by a guy who keeps dreaming of stories. Well, I emerged in his mind one fine day, and conquered his trust to listen to my story”

“How can I sit there amongst the angels and have a wit within my heart and not share the story to the world”, I thought.

That’s when I saw this guy sitting idle by the window on a rainy season. I went through his mind and asked him if he was interested to listen to my story.

Well, my timing was pretty right. He didn’t twitch his eye, but said to himself as “Agreed”.

And so here it goes.

Its about a girl. To be honest, she wasn’t pretty fair as most of the stories that I keep reading kept saying “Oh! That girl fair and beautiful like Cinderella walked down of the horse cart and won the heart of the king!”

“No! You know what made me say how beautiful she was!”

When I saw her for the first time, I always thought, that day could have been much better. That day was known as Hartal. Hartal is a terminology created by local politicians where if any terms were not abided by the localities like us then all the shops would be closed and none are allowed to leave their residence until the next day. What a pity to have such people living amongst us. It was on that very same day, I decided to leave the house and get some fresh air in the streets after having a clash with my baba who was forcing me do petty farming. I was a very important chef in a chapatti factory. The factory was not far away from our small village in Manjampetti.

My baba was earning more in the agricultural farm than me. But for me, money wasn’t the greatest happiness or resources in life. For that, I had friends around the circle and watching rattling couple fights for an ultimate entertainment.

“Anyway coming back, where was I?”

While I was walking straight through the small stricken street to reach the road, I saw a girl being harassed by a group of people ordering her to go home. The food which she was carrying covered in the banana leaf fell down and littered everywhere. Those people didn’t care to look. All they wanted was her to go home. And there I fell in love with the girl and of course not the situation.

My immediate course of reaction was ultimate, I think. It was bright day light and I could have thought of something else than this. I climbed the wall made of harsh branches and broke a stick from it and then wound it with my t-shirt. I sneaked to a crazy old man sitting idle and asked for the matchbox or lighter. I wasn’t expecting him to have it. Well, he had it and happily gave to me. I lit the stick torch and it was set. Even though had few minutes before the light turned ashes, I turned and ran towards them.

“Weird isn’t it? That’s what I thought as well”

It worked. Both the girl and the group were astonished and ran for their life to different directions. All of them ran and even the girl. Screaming just as a hooligan and gone completely crazy, I dashed towards them. It was so hilarious. I haven’t laughed so much. Later understanding the environment was calm and safe; I threw the stick and walked to the direction where she ran into.

And there she was; hiding beside the cow barn calm and quietly. Brushing my hair, I turned around and then suddenly heard a voice from behind. It was that very first time in my life; I froze and closed my eyes. All my focus, strength and whatever ability I could captivate were given to the ears of both sides of my head. She shushed again. My heart beat was beating so fast that my brains were commanding to hear the rate of the beat than her voice. She came closer and held my hand.

“Waaah! She gave me the chill of a new life, a new beginning”, I said to myself.

She came upfront and stared at me, I think. I could feel her breath next to me. I didn’t know what was she doing?

Though she asked me to open my eyes, I couldn’t. I hate to say this. But instead of opening my eyes to her, I just opened facing the ground and ran past her back home.

“What in the world was I thinking?” I thought to myself.

It was late evening and mother asked both dad and me to sit down to have dinner. We are in a village and for those who are reading can’t expect us to have dining tables and chairs. We really were villagers, and our dining was on the floor. The plates that we had food were on the banana leaf and the spoon was made from Jack fruit tree leaf which was thick and sweet as well. We had our food in clay pot in its rudest form.

I wasn’t hungry at all as my stomach was filled with bubbles of love and admiration to see the girl again. Feeling lazy to eat, baba; my father, shook me up and asked me to eat the rice pudding. And still I was hesitant even to take a spoon of it. And then suddenly, my brains came to normal after my mother wacked straight on my right chin and asked me eat before it’s cold.

“For the readers I bet you would think “What the heck? How can she do that?” well, as I said earlier, we are villagers. This is the least. But please don’t take it to the heart. This is what we call parental love”

It was next day, Hartal was over and all the shops resumed back to work. And I had to resume work at the factory as well. I was at the bus stop waiting for the bus to arrive and there she was walking to the stop as well.

I froze again. “Not again!” I closed my eyes hard enough for the normal daylight had lost hope to enter through my eyes.

I don’t know what she had felt about me. I slowly opened to see that she was standing next to me without fear. The old gags reading newspaper stopped what they were doing and kept staring at us. I was nervous already. Even though time flew and I felt the same throughout the entire time, I was even happier to have her stand beside me.

“By now, I should know her name right? Well I didn’t”

More than knowing her name, I understood the kind of girl to whom I was in love with.

One fine morning on a Sunday the usual habit for both baba and mine was to have a cup of tea and read the newspaper sitting on the bench closer to the tea shop while gossiping on the political situations arising around the state. She came to the same tea shop with someone who is smaller to her. Perhaps it could be her brother or someone else whom she was taking care off. Instead of hiding behind the newspaper I shut my eyes, so much so that her conscience took over for her realize that it was me.

Our conversation was interrupted. I couldn’t complete the sentence of what I was speaking off.

“What is wrong with you?” asked baba.

I couldn’t say anything as I was so nervous even to respond back to him.

“You won’t believe what could happen next”

She kneeled and received blessings from my baba and asked him directly if she could sit next to his son. Baba was totally perplexed and said

“No!! You cannot. You are a girl and how can you ask me such a question?”

Her response was even amazing;

“Okay! Sorry baba! But do one thing, have your child sleep in the crib rather implying some courage to talk to me”

Her courageous response made baba gave her tight slap.

“In movies, you would see girls crying and running back to their houses. It didn’t happen like that”

She didn’t nudge even for a moment and came and stood next to me on the other side.

Baba stared at me; stood up, threw the tea and left while the others who were seated next to us kept staring at her. She wacked my head, caught my collar and pulled close to her and said,

“My name is Swetha and your name is Shankar. I already know it. See, we have been together for few months and we haven’t talked ever since. I want to know if you want to be with me or are you making fun of me?”

All the sweat from my fore head began dripping down, sliding through my chin and shoulder.

Even before I could completely open my eyes, she brought her lips to mine and made it publicly believe that our relationship was 100% confirmed.

She left finishing the remaining the tea from my cup and walked boldly in front of the people. I neither smiled nor froze but instead rocked.

A guy from the tea stall walked to me and said “you are doomed”.

“Yes, folks, I am so doomed. The word that spread in the village was worse than BBC, I say”

For the first time, I understood completely about Swetha.

Swetha – Though she is mystically slim her body stroke like the lamprotornis emerging from the woods. While her hair is so straight and glossy that you don’t require a mirror to see your shadows. She loved it so much that she left swaying all the time. Moreover, the magic that struck me was her nose. It was carved as though drawn from canvas. It started off like a long journey from the roads of heaven smeared down to the valley of a bumpy line of finishing structure. And finally the purity of having a strong relationship was her eyes. Looking at her, I could visualize how manly, responsible and romantic I could be. The shine in her sets off my sun to the brightest vision to the future.

“Hope you can see her by now. If you do, that’s her”

I wasn’t shy or nervous anymore. Instead had the powerful courage to stand by her side and shout to the globe that she was my world and nothing else matters.

Words flew from papers to rocket science. I thought and believed our relationship among the tribe was catastrophic. That was the power of love but stood strong because I knew she was stronger than me.

“Yes, Readers, Believe it or not! that’s the power of women”

A year later of continuous flirting and responsible talks, both of our families agreed to have a wonderful ceremony to tie the knots between Swetha and me. It was mesmerizing. Finally it happened. With showers of blessings we tied the knot. The families joined together becoming larger than sky.

It was the day of our honeymoon.

Baba and my ma packed the bags with rice pudding and few desserts which she prepared and a flask with hot water. Waving them off, we set for the most romantic trip. The destination we planned was to Meghamalai; a mystic tea plantation. We took the local bus from the next stop of Mangampetti. It was for the first time we had taken such a trip. Romantically it was wonderful.

“The writer was tired with agony and left me for a sound sleep. But the best part is yet to happen”

The promising factor is that we made it to Meghamalai and were enjoying every bit of that time we had in.

One evening as we were returning after a brisk walk from the tea plantation, I nudged Swetha that I wanted to pee. She giggled and said okay. It was a foggy weather and so made sure that I would stand to such a distance where both of us were visible.

While she stood beside the road, I walked few meters down the valley. While keeping an eye on her and doing my part, both of us could hear some kind of exploding sound. Quickly finishing my job, I returned back to her. I looked at her and said, “It is okay, there is nothing to worry. We are there for…..”

Before I could finish ending my words and her smile; a truck that got overturned in an upper curve few meters above us came rolling down and took us with it.

That’s it. See how happy we were!

Both of us didn’t go through pain or know what was coming for us. We left the world together without any sad emotions. Our hearts were filled with joy and love. We held each other so closely and left with the angels.