Night chronicle…

My romantic encounter with a lonely night is in progress when my phone beeps with a ‘Hey!’ on telegram. Apparently, it’s a stranger, so clearly I may have to visit the profile to find out the mystery person. I choose to carry on with my work which is on the verge of finishing. I, then sink back in the chair and stretch out my hands into that humid abyss of Delhi and clumsily tap the home button which still reminds me of a ‘hey’ which by now was 50 minutes ago. I swipe right and try to wonder who that might be. The DP does strike a chord but faintly. I reply to that hey. Minutes later she asks me some help related to UPSC optional subject and a few texts are exchanged. “Would you mind me calling you here on telegram?” she asks. Advancing technology offers prospects of being able to call over an app which merely displays your ID and a DP perhaps. It’s hard to believe it’s the same country where one would stand by an STD booth braving the sun and rains by paying a hefty sum to check on a distant relative. So, I oblige and grant permission after I see my clock saying 2 AM. “Bold of her”, I say to myself. A not-so-extrovert me answers the phone call hesitantly and is greeted with the melodious sweetest hello ever. Night’s darkness just shuts and opens on me before I am pulled into the oblivion of a conversation that I didn’t see coming. Minutes become seconds and words become moments as we talk about something and nothing.  It’s just a deep connection that you haven’t felt for years. Or perhaps a deep disconnect which failed to connect and now it suddenly does. It’s like an orphan suddenly being greeted by his biological parent. There’s a knowing in the unknowing. That is how I feel when I am talking to her. Scrolling up the texts reminds me of a brief conversation that I had with her months ago, but then that was that. She is THAT unknown to me. But she seems like a song you’ve long forgotten only to hear it in distance someday. And now there’s this moment. There’s something beautiful the way she’s able to continue the conversation by giving meaning to the pettiest thought and you just find silently nodding with a gentle smile. You just sigh in darkness as the night breeze flows into your face while the night is being garnished by the voice that is nothing but the pure, undiluted, innocent melody. By now, she tells you about her childhood and the cities she has graced and she as a person takes birth in my heart of hearts that swings in front me getting washed in the moonlight. I don’t say anything about me. I just listen to her like an audiobook before I end my day with lights shut. Then the sun greets the day in the city she’s talking from and I bid her goodbye as smoothly as I’d said hello after a few hours. It’s a rare goodbye which is not bittersweet. It’s just sweet. Sweet it was when it began and sweet it is now that it is ending. Serenity ebbs in my heart and washes ashore a gentle silence that sprinkles over my eyes. A silence I have longed to experienced all these years. I just lay on my bed with a faceless dream. Smiles drench the end of my lips. I try to bottle the feeling while it floats in the air before convulsing in the past. Strange as it may seem, I don’t call her ever again and neither does she. Our realms

 just converged in a dream, not reality. Because she was a dream and I, a dreamer.

R

10/05/2020