Love Rains....

Disclaimer: This is totally a figment of my imagination. Resemblance to any, living or dead, is strictly coincidental. :)


Lisa looks at the wipers that go swoosh swoosh on the windshield as the rain lashes on it with full power and she starts to feel that this is extremely romantic. She also has her FM radio station on full blast to assist her in creating the mood as it plays the extra mushy, extra sugary Bollywood love songs. She hums along as she drives through the bylanes in Juhu that have been lended extra clean by the little streams of rainwater gushing through and wiping off the otherwise dirt and mud. She breaks into a big blush as she sees his face in her mind. She keeps smiling to herself the whole time as she reminisces on how ‘love’ entered her life and changed it forever. Maybe not her life yet, but certainly her thoughts and her dreams. She has this parallel life that is now conjured up in her mind and hopes that one day, it will all come true.

Amit, quintessential, baby-faced and a reticent guy, who was perfectly happy to keep to himself. She first met him at The Blue Penguins Inc. where she has been working for almost a year now. Whenever a joke was flung in the air, everyone would be laughing their guts out, while you could just never get anything more than a smile from him. Though he had a decent sense of humor himself, he never participated in their ‘full-on masti’ parties where they danced, drank and blabbered mindlessly. She thought he was too ‘serious’ in life and lot of times ‘boring’.

When Mumbai was blessed with heavy downpours in the monsoons, which happened many a times, people like Amit worried about how to get home. But Lisa would be very excited because she thought of such times as an opportunity for an adventure. She dreamt of getting soaked in the rain, stomping in the puddles and maybe bumping into the man of her dreams. He was too real and she was too filmy. On one such day, she had to share a cab home with him. She kept asking the cab driver to keep stopping for the hot and spicy vada pavs and bhuttas while Amit kept fussing about the traffic and unwanted delays and just itching to get home. She remembers Shweta asking her the next day, “so how did it go with him”? She had always been teasing her with Amit. And she replied, “oh c’mon, he is just too boring for me okay. He’s a nice guy, but not my types yaar”.

Then what had changed. Why this so boring and serious guy had suddenly become the hero of her dreams? Why couldn’t she just stop thinking about him? Why and how had she fallen in love with someone not her types?

It was the new year eve’s party at La Fiesta. They had got special passes for this party that had been the talk of the town this season. Amit, as usual had preferred to not go, but this time, Lisa had insisted. She thought that if he would tag along and see how much fun it really is, it’ll lighten him up a bit. The music was excellent and perfectly ripe with the latest hits and she was gyrating high and fast to it totally loving it. And Amit stood in a corner with a glass of wine in his hand and kept watching them dance. She called him out many a times to come join her, but he didn’t budge. Then came the slow numbers. Everyone picked a partner. She went up to him, took his hand, led him to the dance floor and put them around her waist. He smiled a big smile at her, flashing his teeth, and this was the first time she noticed how cute he really was. This was the first time she noticed him from up so close. As the song progressed, she kept her head on him and just swayed with the lilting music. But the music gave way to this sense of comfort she suddenly felt with him. His arms, she had never realized he had such strong arms, had blanketed her in the warmest manner and she found herself feeling completely safe and secure with him. She forgot about everything and everyone as she stayed cocooned with his head resting on hers. When the song stopped playing, she found it very difficult to let him go. She wanted time to stand still.

The new year presented her with the most special gift of love. Lisa found herself paying extra attention to what she wore and how she looked before she left for work. She found herself wanting to talk with Amit more and more and hoping he was looking at her too. She found herself defending him if anyone else called him a ‘nerd’ or didn’t want to include him in any of their gatherings. She knew she had slipped, in love. In love with someone not her types. And so strongly attracted she was to him that it consumed her every minute and every second of her waking hours. Not to forget the vivid dreams in her sleep.

It had been 6 month now. The monsoons had come back. Lisa was on her way to Shweta’s birthday party in Juhu. The FM station played the very same song on which they had danced at the party. And she found herself blushing again as she thought of Amit. She was dreaming of melting in his arms as he held her head up against her with his big hands and they kissed. She was dreaming of dancing on his feet. She was dreaming of the warmest embrace she didn’t want to get out of. She felt that she couldn’t wait anymore. She couldn’t keep it bottled up. And she couldn’t wait for him. He was too shy to let her know if he did feel anything for her. It was up to her to get things moving. Tomorrow. Tomorrow will be the day she decided.

Lisa dressed up extra nice the next day. She wore her favorite red kurti and sprayed some extra ‘Chanel No. 5’. She was fidgety the whole time. She kept looking at him from her desk lest he would disappear suddenly. But she didn’t have to wait too long. He came to her with something in his hand. Her heart skipped a beat. “What’s this?”, she asked excitedly. “A surprise”, he said with a big smile on his face, “and make sure you come”, he continued. He handed her the card and left. She didn’t look at it because she was busy watching him go. Two full minutes later, she looked up at the card. There was a bright red heart at the corner and her name written on it. She just ripped the card from the envelope as her heart was beating so fast that she couldn’t contain it any more. It had a baby pink tissue-like transparent paper which she flipped …..to read…. Amit weds Sunita …. and the card just fell from her hands. She felt numb and unable to think or feel anything. She heard the thunder but didn’t pick her umbrella as she started to walk outside. And as the tears fell from the heaven up above, it soaked her body, heart and soul.