I don’t know how I should react. I am in someone else’s room. Also… I know this someone too. I have to share this room with this someone for the rest of my life… “Only destiny knows”. I… I have ended up experiencing the things which I don’t want to do or undergo in my life. The people around me says that I have started my life. Yes… I got married. And I am married to the person who has loved me since I was 14 years old.
This someone is my friend Leo. When I was 14 years old, he turned away from me claiming himself as my lover. He has loved me in all the fanciful ways the cinema, drama and fiction has told. And I have rejected him in a one single way… through my silence. After a year, he became a complete stranger to me. We hadn’t met at all. I knew nothing about his whereabouts. I was very busy in my own world… my love! My love life.
Leo would have taken aback when he heard about my love… my failure… He wouldn’t have imagined that I have this side of me. I don’t know how he reacted when he came to know about me. It is not my purpose to hurt him, rather I see it as my responsibility to hurt him to make his senses return to reality. But everything ended up in vain. I know one thing for sure, I lost a good friend through this marriage. Leo might not know, that I wanted to meet him… at least once… once in my life to feel…, the fancifulness of love, to cherish the LOVE in love and most importantly my memories for him. I never imagined that I would end up meeting him like this.
When my parents talked with me about Leo, I resisted to the core and panicked them saying that I would revert my idea of not getting married. But in turn, I was cornered emotionally, had left with no other option, except… marrying him. I am damn sure that I don’t deserve him. I know his sincerity. I have strongly felt his sincerity even when I was at the age of 14. And till now, when someone talks about sincerity in relationship, only his bright face pops up in my mind.
I too wanted to be acknowledged for my sincerity. Though, my parents had told about my past to him, I wanted to ensure him doubly that I am not fit for him. I asked my closest friend to reveal him everything about me, my love, the extremes that I have gone for to withhold my love.
But as always, he epitomized sincerity. Through my friend, I came to know that he knew the whole self of me even before my parents had told him. Though I made him a complete stranger to my life, he had never let me go from his life. Somehow through our common friends, he had inquired about my wellbeing. He had made sure that he should know each and every special moment in my life: The day I first met my love, the dress I wore, the compliments I received… He even knew, the days and nights I had spent with my love… He had silently watched the happiness and hardships I went through.
I had seen Leo loving me. He made me laugh! laugh! and laugh!. He chased me, cared me and even had made me nervous, embarrassed in front of others. May be because of that I had my own understanding and philosophies of love that “Love is filled with LIFE”. All those understandings and philosophies were proven wrong in my love. After all the heartaches, I let go my love. Now I shouldn’t say it as my love. The reasons are, I don’t want to cherish it anymore and moreover the society too might not allow me to cherish it for I have got a new license as WIFE.
I don’t know whether I have completely let go off my past. But Leo is very confident, that, I had. When I tried explaining him, he made up his mind not to listen to me. I know he is very much determined not to let go me. The moment we exchanged our wedding rings and the time he uttered our marriage vow, only one thing was running in my mind. “Does he really love me like before?”
I am going to meet him as his wife now. Theoretically speaking, I have enough time to ask him all my questions, practically I may not have time too. So, I don’t want to wait. I have waited a lot… to be loved, to be hated, to be convinced, at last… to… live my life. This time he cannot forgo my questions. He has to face me… but, the fact is, it is me who have to face him. All my senses asked me, “Will it be easy for you to look into his eyes and reciprocate his love?” To the people, who knows my past would find him only as scapegoat. Even to me… he seems like a lost bird who has found a wrong shelter to lead its rest of the life. As of now, more than his love, literally, I could feel only his sacrifice. “Is it love or sympathy or sacrifice?” No matter what, I have decided to ask him, yell him, and express all my anger, frustration and my inability to reject this marriage.
I heard someone approaching the room. Yes, that someone is Leo. “My Leo…?” My heart raced. “My Leo…?” My brain argued with my heart. I am mentally prepared to face him. As I organized my thoughts, he entered the room. He doesn’t look nervous or uncomfortable. I looked into his eyes. It has neither pain nor regrets rather it expelled a tons of happiness.
As if I caught up in a spell, I looked into his eyes. I couldn’t speak out anything. I was in the process of organizing my thoughts. He waved his hands acknowledging me and my thoughts. He called me, “Charu… Charu…” I could hear him calling my name but I couldn’t regain my senses. I heard “Charu…” for the third time and I nodded to his response. My heart and brain raced with each other. My heart tried to forgo all my rational thinking. On the other side, my brain pestered me to think rationally. But still I looked at his eyes.
My eyes tried to register his whole face as if it sees him for the first time. “Oh my God! I should move from this place. I thought of asking him so many questions. But, why I feel so weak? Why my heartaches? Why I feel like crying? No… Am strong… I know I am strong…”
He interrupted my thoughts. With a warm smile he said, “I know what is running in your mind." I blinked. Having assured, he continued, “Why did I proposed to marry you? Why did I approach your parents first and not you? Why didn’t I listen to you when you tried to make me listen? Am I right?” I nodded like I agree to what he said. I see his broad smile slowly fading away. I could feel pain in his eyes. A different feel… Even when I was in love, I haven’t felt such thing. I could feel his loneliness, dejections…
He looked into my eyes and continued, “Though you rejected me, I could feel my love in you. All these years I loved you when you didn’t love me. When you fell in love with him…, I felt dejected. It pained like hell when you chose him over me. My heart asked, why him? Why not me? I saw you being happy with your love. But, whenever you were sad, you cried, you shattered… I felt like, I want to be with you. I felt that… you longed for me. I felt… that you are searching me in him. Your brain may find it meaningless but your heart will tell you the truth. Yes, you searched for ME and MY LOVE in him.” He paused for a second and with an assuring tone he said, “Irrespective of those reasons, to say plainly, the selfish part of me says…, I want to be loved.”
I broke down into tears. For the past 9 years, though I had busted out crying many times, I made sure that none sees or hears me crying. After 9 long years, for the first time, I cried loudly in front of him. My tears concealed my vision. But I could see him taking few steps forward. I closed my eyes. I could see the same 14 years Leo with all his sincere and earnest love standing at half past eight in the bus stop for me. I wish to look into my watch and the calendar to confirm, “Is this happening for real? Am I in the time machine? Is this the same 14 years old Leo standing in front of me?” My heart skip its beat. Once for all, it wants to ask him just one question. Only the answer for that question has the chances to bring me together… together, the old self of Charu. I want to assure this before our parents step in. I know if I miss this chance, I may not get guts to ask him ever again. The last final chance left to me to take up my life… My LIFE… we heard our relations approaching our door. The last chance that I never want to miss…
I gathered all my strength and asked him…, “Why me?” I observed him carefully as he walked to the door. I knew that time was running out but suppressed the urge to check my watch. I took a deep breath and started counting in reverse under my breath. “Ten, nine, eight, seven, … three, two, …” He turned to me, faced me gently, with a mesmerizing broad smile, he said, “you are my love and I love you.” I sighed, “Huh!” I felt like standing in the bus stop with my school bags on. I looked at my watch, it is half past eight. As if he understood my reaction he added, “You didn’t give me a chance to propose you when I was 14. And I didn’t expect that I would propose you after our marriage.” With an innocent, sincere smile he said, “I want to be loved by you… only by you.” Like a reflex reaction, I flew to him, hugged him and cried to my heart’s content. And I understood that is why, me...