‘Ek chhoti si’ love story

by Jupinderjit Singh

There would hardly be anyone who has not felt love ever. Generations remember some stories. But some stories remain in the hearts only. A friend of mine is living his own ‘chhoti c love story’ these days.

He was young. She was younger. He was in Class tenth. She was in ninth. He liked her. She found him cute. He had no idea what the longing was all about. She was too innocent to understand anything.

He was the star player and the head boy. She was the first one to dare to wear trousers amidst the sea of suits and salwars. He looked in her dove eyes. She looked down.

He loved the dimple chin. She loved his humour. He followed her back home on his red bicycle. She was always ahead on her pink bicycle. He never sped up to catch up. She always peddled slowly thinking he would.

Then, one bigger boy on a bigger bicycle overtook him. He could not keep pace. The boy was aggressive and conveniently pedalled his cycle in between them. Then, there was another one on another bicycle and then a bike and a scooter and then even a car. The girl kept growing beautiful and her suitors bigger, stronger and richer.

He was silent. He was sad. He always thought tomorrow he would say it all. But when tomorrow became today, he let it become yesterday and yesterdays became the past days, the past life.

They met years — donkey’s years — later, on a social networking site. His intense eyes still peeped through the specs. Her dimple chin was more prominent in her double chin. Her husband and kids smiled from her profile picture. His wife looked on from the side of their family picture.

“Hi,” he began. She smiled. “You remember me?” he asked. “Yeah,” she wrote.

He punched in a smiley.

“And life?” he asked. “Good, he is rich and our two kids are in best school, and I see you have progressed a lot.”

“Thanks. And love?” he asked. She paused long.

“Yes, I experienced love. It was little short of what I felt on the road when someone used to follow me.”

“That someone was one of the many,” my friend couldn’t resist, “but they were all rich and handsome.”

“Others? Who? I didn’t notice any. I felt only him everyday and I live those moments again and again.”

“I wish you had given ‘him’ some sign, maybe... ,” my friend left it incomplete.

“It is destiny, as they say,” she wrote.

My friend smiled: “Yes, and remember John Keats said in the Ode on a Grecian Urn about the permanency of love. The lovers kissing each others in the painting on the urn would always remain locked in the immortal love, unlike the real world.”

“And so those two shall be always on that road,” she punched along with a smiley. He repeated and both said time to sign off, time for the loving family.

first published in The Tribune dated August 17, 2011. link - http://www.tribuneindia.com/2011/20110817/edit.htm#5