Saturday, January 12

It Happens For A Reason

                      
                   ' You go home and check your emails. You read the second mail and freeze ! .'

                       Shikha wished upon Gods if what she was dealing now could be replaced by the above scenario . For she was freezed to the core , so much is true , but on reading the second unopened mail on her mother's inbox instead of her's !
  
                       She didn’t have to cringe her eyes or strain harder to recognize the girl and boy cuddling cozily on that peach coloured couch , so engrossed in each other that they seemed oblivious of the fact that it was already 1a.m on the frog faced time piece which adorned the book shelf beside .  The picture was taken on a summer night one year back , when she with her boyfriend Sameer and another couple had crashed on his house after their twelfth standard school farewell party . Wait . What had she lied to her parents the next day about not returning home after the party ? ‘ The function stretched for a few hours more Ma , instead of winding up at 10 P.M . Shruti’s home is just a couple of blocks away from school , you know right . Her parents were out of town ; but her grandma was there . Shruti urged me to stay at her place for the night , said it was not safe to wander back alone.

                     She hadn’t expected her parents to buy such a cleverly construed story , where there was almost nil scope for an eye witness , given that Shruti’s grandma was half blind ! Yet they never bothered to scrutinize the story further .

                    Now , after one long and eventful year , she was jolted up , rather heavily , on being stumbling upon this picture , fortunately unopened , on her mother’s Gmail inbox page . 

                  She turned 19 a month back , but her mother had already registered her profile on the most sought after matrimonial site available. If it wasn’t for the occasional tryst of her mother with her laptop , surfing the matrimonial site for new proposals , she wouldn’t have had a clue as to what Sameer , her ex – boyfriend now , was upto . Her mother never cared to log out of her gmail account even . Srolling the page further down she noticed a message emboldened in large red print which read ,

You must have got a hint as to why I sent you this brazen picture of your daughter and me . No , as you fear in shock , I wouldn’t stoop that low to indulge in a frantic mania of spreading an online scoop linking me and your daughter . This serves as the perfect revenge for me to tear away the mask of reclusiveness she fakes in front of you guys . Like what you must be expecting , she is not just a diligent student , but a reckless woman as well . “

                   She  stared in disbelief at those words , her heart wrenching in spite at how he could muster the courage to come lashing back at her , through her mother , after all those mind boggling  days of fight they dragged  through 6 months back . His egregious words soaked in the stench of booze and smoke echoed shrill in her ears , like they had deafened her on that God forbidden day,

There is more to being in a relationship than sharing the soul Shikha , You better beat it into your rotten brain .  Strange enough , the surge of emotional vent that I used to feel in your presence has drained empty . Pardon me for being candid , but you owe me big time for all those fruitless hours of comfort and consolation I showered on you while you were wrecking your head pondering your life problems ! “

                    She felt a shiver run down her spine harking back those minutes when she had scampered past his living room and garden , crying ,  to reach the safety of the four walls of her house .  She had let herself take the brunt for being nice to him for the whole two years they had gone out . But not anymore .

                    Shikha swiftly moving to the door , glanced out to check on her mother . Not seeing her , letting out a sigh , she closed her door behind her slowly . Returning to her laptop she began typing frantically , swiping away the beads of sweat clouding on her forehead . Leaning back to scan the message one last time , with no tad of doubt , she pressed the SENT option . Going back to the SENT messages folder of her mother’s account , she reread the message she had sent Sameer, a minute back .

 “ Sameer , if you expected me to thrash my little girl and ground her forever on seeing this picture , you are wrong Son . I am well aware of the nasty break up you two had . Shikha , though late , fed me with the details ; the poor girl suffered a lot trying to hide it from me for months . As her mother , and as a Government Employee I warn you against further misbehaviour of this sort to my daughter . I hope you are aware of the unpleasant consequences of the crime you just did by sending me this obscene picture of her's. My conscience urges me to grant you a second chance . Don’t ever message to my email or my daughter’s . Let us consider the chapter closed . “  Shikha deftly cleared both Sameer’s message and the message she just sent , from the history so that her mother wouldn’t come to know about her prying into her  Gmail page .

                      Shikha reclined back on her pillow , her eyes grazing a picture frilled by a pretty pink photo frame - A picture of the 2 year old she nestling against her mother’s neck . Gazing into her mother’s face , she recognized the warm , affectionate person her mother used to be in her thoughts . Has her mother changed ? Or is it she who had  let her mother’s love slip out of her life when she got so busy sewing up the broken pieces of her life . How could she let the half boiled words of Sameer drown her mother’s pleas to be careful while selecting friends ? How come she never think about nestling against her mother  to share her little secrets now a days , even when she could undoubtedly feel her mother’s heart breaking to bits knowing her daughter’s reticence ?

 “ Shikha , open this door baby . Hot crispy chips just out of the frying pan reckon you ! Come taste it . “ .

                   Her mother’s exhuberent , albeit worried voice snapped her back to the present . She felt a pang of remorse stabbing at the back of her heart . She knew she needed help . Can any other person in the whole world understand her in as much depth and perfection as the warm voice which just called out to her ?

                 Opening the door , Shikha softly let out those heavy words which possessed infinite power to seal the silence they shared for months .

   ‘ Ma , I need to tell you something .‘ 


                                       *******************

This post is a part of  write-over-the-weekend  , an initiative for indian bloggers by  www.blogadda.com

42 comments:

  1. WOW... that was some story!

    Truly intriguing...

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  2. Whoa! Thiѕ blοg loоks exactly like mу οld one!

    It's on a completely different subject but it has pretty much the same layout and design. Superb choice of colors!

    My page: build a healthy brain
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  3. Nice story. Should admire the way Shikha found her way back to mother. We do need to encourage such stories more often. It helps us to check realities and prevent unfortunate incidents.

    Here's my entry for WOW- http://aniruuud.blogspot.in/2013/01/the-unknown-place-called-mritika.html

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  4. thanks anirudh ! very well said :)off to check the other posts on he prompt . .

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  5. Lovely story Maliny on mothers' love! Beautiful narration!

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  6. Nice story and very well written.

    Glad to come across your blog. Thanks to indiblogger :)

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  7. The pleasure is mine ! Drop by more :)

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  8. I hope mum listens to the daughter ..
    good story ..


    Bikram's

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  9. yeah she does :) thats how the story ends in my imagination :)

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  10. The relationship between a mom and a daughter is indeed special. In my teen years I had some secrets with my mom but eventually I confessed to her :) Good luck :)

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  11. A Mom after a certain age, is truly a daughters' best friend.. The earlier we realize that as daughters, the better.. nice piece :)

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  12. Good for you :) thanks for the wish :)

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  13. A Mom is truly a daughters' best friend after a certain age.. The earlier we realize that as daughters , the better! Nice piece :)

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  14. Thanks crazyambivert :) true that . .

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  15. humm nice
    from
    http://panktee.blogspot.com/
    Jigar

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  16. I could relate to this post as a daughter and as a mother to a daughter.

    Lovely write!

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  17. @meenakshi : glad that you could relate to it :)

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  18. Maliny...Marvellous! The way you put the story is superb as it brings so many emotions easily...

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  19. Awesome!! Nice mother-daughter relationship shown...the guy was Dog!! :P

    Very well Done!!

    http://meintheblogosphere.blogspot.in/

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  20. Such a nice story..... Keep blogging....

    http://debnature.blogspot.in

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  21. A beautiful story ! A mother can be a daughter's best friend. I feel no one can understand a daughter better than her own mother :) It's a beautiful relationship.

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  22. Glad to see that the Mom had stood by her daughter. :)

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  23. In the end, parents do agree. Well written Maliny.

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  24. I guess she could have blocked that guy too, and i sincerely hope she tells her mother not to keep her inbox open. The relation between mother and daughter is well brought out.."resham dhaage" is what we call it in Marathi.

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  25. i really liked how she handled it smartly. you write exceptionally well, i guess, i said it already before(searched for the post where i commented earlier, in vain)

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  26. thanks a lot Deb . . yes you had commented on a post earlier . . i remember . . :)

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  27. thanks kappu . . will definitely come read your blog :)

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  28. vivek , never thought of the blocking idea ! i was racking my brain to come up with something stronger to push away the guy forever . . sigh . . thanks for pointing it out :)

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  29. thanks diana and shail . . very true !

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  30. Wow! You write exceptionally well. Flow of your story was great, it grabbed all my attention. Keep writing more of such great fiction (I am assuming)!

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