Once, A Rainy Afternoon - Rittu
The untimely rain cast a grey shade to the white-walled room. Her thoughts traveled much past this uncolored chapter of her life as if the rain washed down the petals from her plants. An arrangement made them convenient in the face of society. The vicious cycle of studies, work, marriage, and kids surpassed Maya's life, it seemed a bit too early now. The stench of dailiness began to stink for her. Every comfort she had in that lone flat, had become uncomfortable. She felt as though she was caught in the stagnancy of time. Everything past moved so fast in time and now, there was nothing left to do. She was merely existing in that perfectly molded building, not a home anymore. Her kids hardly noticed her, they had all grown so big. Her husband, down at work, and their marriage, like many other Indian marriages, cut off from its zest and molded into the wearisome regularity of life.
Too much silence hushed her zeal. Everything had become solid. It felt as if somebody hit you, and the eardrums rolled to generate a consistent noise as if drawing a plain linear line across a blackboard, with the uncut chalk, making a resistant high frequented sound.
The rain lowered; the windows were no longer pelted at. It seemed less destructive. Strolling her hair, that started to grey at the roots, she saw how time moved on with each rotation of the ceiling fan, rusted by the edges, which made a quirky treble every time the third leaf made a turn at the left corner. She got up, walked up to the glassed door, sliding it left stepped on the balcony. The slight elevation that distinguished the room and the balcony impede the water from hurrying to the room. Maya stepped on the water, careful not to slip, leaving ripples with each step, as she forced her fingers on the rail of the grilled rim. Moving her fingers beneath the handrail as to wipe off the dew left, the variated walk into the watered floor pondered into Maya’s face a sudden smile, creating those wrinkles at the edge of her lips, reckoning all her childhood memories of flocking over puddles and making paper boats. The slight pour that hit the roof slab sprinkled over her face.
The greens in the background, the vertical garden she planted with care, the tiny little orchids, hanging down the grills, reds and purples and yellows, all reminisced her, of her kids when they were young. “They used to be so little,” she thought to herself, “three of them, the twins and their sister, really naughty, their crooked, broken laughs filled the space. They would sit with their utmost enthusiasm, to listen to me read.”
Maya often read to her kids, a promised endeavor every afternoon. It had almost become a ritual until when they no longer wanted to be kids and moved on with their chores. The twins always resembled their father, and their sister was filled with her mother. For Maya, it was as if watching herself grow again, except that now she knew as a mother. It's funny how mothers always want their children to remain, kids, no matter how old they grow. A mother always worries if her kids ate well, slept well, and in the course, she often forgets to realize that they aren't her babies anymore. And maybe one never wants to realize, call it their right to do so(chuckles).
The rain ceased, and a narrow beam from the tangerine sky kissed her cheeks, the clouds parted, to brighten the heavens. The clock inside her room struck half-past five and the doorbell rang, in the same monotonous treble. Maya's husband, Ashok, trolled wearily in its ampleness of his age and panted from climbing the two-floor stairs. Maya presented herself with a glass of water, taking from him his black office bag. Just as she turned to walk, aiming to their room to keep his bag, Ashok called out to her, “Maya…”, Maya was startled at this, it’s been ages since he addressed her with her name, unlike when he normally said what he wanted facing her and seldom calling out. “Can I have a cup of coffee?”, he spoke, contemplating his words, as if speaking them for the first time. “Oh, yes, sure”, said Maya, with a note of suspicion. "Ashok has not had coffee since college, this wasn't his usual" Maya thought as she walked further. "Maya, make it two. Remember the newlywed across the street, the balcony that faces ours? The boy joined as my subordinate, and on the way back we had fritters. I took some home. I thought you liked them, just as you did in college." Maya bespoke a tint of joy, she no longer remembered the taste of fritters. They had long abandoned her taste buds, a long 32 years. The sky narrowed to red and purple, the caned furniture in the balcony dried themselves off wet, the little teapot placed right between the chairs, decorated themselves with a plate of fritters and two cups of coffee. Maya and Ashok sat right across each other, as the coffee proliferated the balcony. Maya no longer felt grey-haired and wrinkled, she had a face, less-aged, bright in youth, thick black hair flowed down her bosom, entombed with her colorful dupatta that embraced her shoulders. The vermilion in her forehead was ever so bright as the glass bangles she wore. As she sipped her coffee and looked ahead to the balcony across the street, to the newlyweds enjoying their eve, she saw a younger Maya and Ashok holding hands and eying the sun as it settled on the horizon.
