It was the IG Airport domestic arrival lounge. The month of January, a hint of fog, a tinge of shallow sunshine, and the cacophony of people discussing their plans for the day. Mornings are usually cold this time of the year, and people talk, sometimes substantially and at other times to keep their teeth from clattering.
He stood near the convoluted black conveyor belt carrying the luggage. Suitcases being suitcases, it is not infrequent that some one picks up someone else's suitcase, mistaken. At times children make this mistake, and more often adults indulge in it. Maybe because children take in all the little details, while we grown ups are lost in our own worlds, too busy to notice.
He meticulously read the tags, before picking the bags. One of his had come, the other was still somewhere in the scrolling queue. Just before he was about to experience his pangs of impatience, he read her name on a dark brown bag. And he also read the ‘Mrs.’ prefix.
‘Suppose we don’t get married, suppose anything comes between us, and we end up separated. And then suppose we come across each other somewhere, in a railway station, what shall you say to me?’ she asked innocently.
He replied with a sneer, ‘I don’t intend to travel by trains the rest of my life.’
Laughing she had added, ‘OK, let's assume we come across in an airport, then?’
‘Well, first this won’t ever happen because there is nothing that can come between us; and then even if for a second I assume it does, I’ll run away, for I am not going to accept the fact that you are not mine.’
He stood there, rubbed the vapor off his glasses, and put them back on. The bag had somehow found its way to his hands. Maybe he wanted himself to believe that it was someone else; though he had always told her, with a name like hers, she won’t have a namesake. From the corner of his eyes he saw her, and then he saw her husband hand her a dark tan overcoat.
‘Tan always looks great on you, it offsets your hazel eyes. And the way your dark hair falls in waves, I am spellbound!’
She wrapped herself in the warm folds. And straightening the creases, she looked up to look at him looking. Their eyes met, and locked. For a fraction of a second he could hear roaring silences rumble inside his head. The crystal broke, when he heard her husband say, ‘we only have one more bag to go, I don’t know how long will it take, these airports na?’
‘Listen, you don’t try to avoid this, Ok! Just answer, will you talk to me?’
‘What shall I say? I won't know what to say?’
‘Say anything, you can start by saying Hi!’
‘Just a Hi…?’
‘Yes, just a Hi, rest I shall handle’
‘OK, shut up now, you know it gives me headaches to talk about things like these’
‘Without me, what shall become of you?’ she said hugging him.
‘Nothing’, he whispered in her ears, breathing in the fragrance of her hair, ‘nothing.’
She walked towards him. For a split second, his tongue forgot motion.
‘… just a Hi, rest I shall handle’
When people come across situations they are totally unprepared for, their nervous system panics, shutting down under the shock. Then words get lost in between the mind and the tongue. The heart begins to beat loud and clear. Breath forgets its rhythm. And feet just jam.
She was now almost there.
And he said, Hi.
She nodded her head. With eyes pointing toward her bag, she said, ‘that bag...’ He exhaled his lost breath, and handed it to her. His fingers brushed against her hand. And he felt that coldness.
‘You know, I love the way it feels when I touch you. You are all so warm-warm, and soft-soft’, he told her, holding her in his arms.
‘That’s only because you think that in your head, actually I am generally very cold, and it’s your hand which is warm.’
‘That's strange! I never feel that way’
‘Someday you will’, she said and giggled.
Her husband came along and tapped her shoulder. ‘Do you two know each other?’. Before she could reply, he said, ‘for four years we were together in college.' Her husband looked at her, she looked at him. Someone called out his name, ‘Sir, is this last bag yours?’
He turned to look at his bag, the only one sliding along the dark belt. Estranged. Afterall it was his bag.
Life finds some way to smuggle in a bit of irony in the most unsuspecting of moments. They are life’s metaphors and similes, its ornaments of speech. And then it has its poems and plays. While some are divine comedies, there are some tragedies as well. The cosmos seems to possess a sense of humor.
He picked up the bag. Her husband put an arm around her. Together they walked to the exit door, towards the taxi stand. Three mute witnesses to the tornadoes in their minds. To break the uncomfortable silence she asked him, ‘what are you doing these days?’
He had reached a cab. Opening the door, he turned to her and said, 'Nothing... '
