Dud Sea Scrawls The Writing, clearly, is not on the wall!

The afternoon wore on in an excruciatingly slow fashion. As the steady whirr of the fan droned on and as Sunil tried to teach me about fractions, I had to pinch myself to stay awake. Sunil was from my Dad’s village, he had come to our town to do his Masters and he occasionally taught me Math, I was never interested, my attention span would have matched that of a fly and he wasn’t even a good teacher…he was always vague and very serious about the task at hand which wasn’t one of my best attributes. For how long we would have tortured each other that afternoon, I don’t know but there was a knock and Mum called us out for tea.

Beady eyed Mrs. V sat opposite me at the dining table. She was my Mum’s friend from down the road and occasionally dropped in. For some reason she always humored me and found my outbursts sweet. Today with her well oiled hair and a large kumkum she looked particularly friendly. “My Sandhya is such a sweet girl”, she said to Mum as she noisily sipped her tea, “Now if only we could find a nice guy for her”….Mum nodded and said something reassuring.

“Are you looking for a groom for Sandhya?”, this had to be me. Mrs. V patted my head and nodded, “Do you know anyone?” she asked as she winked at Mum. “I do”, I said gravely and as Mum looked at me with growing fear in her eyes, I wondered if they had considered Sunil. I expected to be admonished but Mum and Mrs. V smiled and wondered why they hadn’t thought of it before. My plan was simple really, if Sunil got married to Sandhya or to anyone for that matter, perhaps he would not get enough time to come over often and then the tiresome fraction lessons could automatically stop.

Things happened rapidly after that and a date and a time was set. Sunil was excited, I could see it, he looked dreamy and he didn’t sigh as he usually did when I did the same sum three times and got three different answers.Come Sunday, he rocked up in his best clothes around breakfast time. Can I come too; I asked Dad and my Uncle S who were to go with him. No one ventured to take me along but I begged Mum, after all this was this my idea in the first place, and besides Mrs. V adored me and Sandhya was a friend. Mum nodded and I joined the party even as Dad asked me not to talk too much and Uncle S reiterated this. Sunil just glared at me.

Sandhya lived three doors away so it wasn’t much of a walk anyway. I scampered along, holding onto Uncle S’s hand who by now seemed to like the fact that I was coming along, so he pulled my pigtails and I let out a few mock screams. Sunil nervously wiped his forehead at this pantomime.

I waved to our next door neighbour when I saw her at the window. “Bhabhie”, I yelled, “Sunil is going to “see” Sandhya, isn’t that exciting”. Bhabhie came rushing down the stairs, two steps at a time, and shook Sunil’s hand vigorously and wished him luck and patted him on the shoulder. Sunil’s face looked like thunder and Dad nearly asked me to run back home but Sandhya’s parents were on the doorstep and we were ushered in.

I had been here many times but today was special. “Are these cushion covers new” I asked, I hadn’t seen them before and I was keen to let Sunil know that I enjoyed a familiarity with the V family that was rather special.Mrs. V patted me on the head again and Mr. V patted my cheek. No one answered the query of the cushion covers. Sunil looked nervous and my presence seemed to have dampened his spirits. Uncle S pulled me down next to him in an attempt to obviously shush me up and gave me a magazine to read. It was then that I discovered that in all this excitement I had come all the way barefoot and now I had to share this discovery with everyone. It was rather an unfortunate moment because Sandhya walked in at the precise point in time when I announced in a loud voice that I had left my shoes home. For a split second, everyone looked at me, then at my feet, there was much chatter all at the same time and finally Mr. V announced that it didn’t matter. Dad and Sunil decided to pretend they didn’t know me! Uncle S asked me if I wanted to go back home and grab my shoes. As I declined emphatically, I noticed that Sandhya in her fine saree and a head full of jasmine flowers looked quite different. She had obviously worked on this stunning entry, which thanks to me was ruined. If Sunil’s heart skipped a beat, he didn’t show it.

I sidled up to her and sat down next to her(next to those cushions with the new cushion covers). Sunil cleared his throat but he wasn’t about to get his chance to speak, not yet anyways. I had to ask Sandhya if the jasmine she was wearing was from old Mr. Kulkarni’s garden. No one answered this question either and Sunil gave Dad a pleading look, and Dad raised his eyebrows at me. Mrs. V stuffed some samosas (From “Purohits” down the street, I wisely informed the audience) into my hand and for the next 10 minutes Sunil asked Sandhya if she could cook for a large family, if she liked chess and things which provoked hoots of laughter from me. After each question I giggled and Sandhya mumbled and Uncle S shushed me.

“Run home and ask Mum if lunch is ready”, Dad said in the tone that brooked no arguments. But I was on a reckless high and I pretended not to have heard him even as I happily attached myself to Sandhya who by now was serving tea with a reverence that could have matched a Japanese tea ceremony. The cups were new but Mrs. V pointed this out before I enlightened the audience. We were almost at the end of this whole session and amidst emphatic outbursts from me that I wanted to stay back and have lunch with the Vs; I was bundled out and led home where an irate Sunil replayed the whole morning for my mother’s benefit. I could see that Dad and Uncle were exchanging secret smiles. Sunil never did marry Sandhya, things didn’t click that day, he later said and the matter was soon forgotten. Sunil moved away a few months later and Sandhya married the guy down the street.

“Everyone has a soul mate, you just have to be lucky enough to meet them”, my grandmother with wrinkles as old as the ages would say as she sat in her rocking chair and watched newly married couples out on their evening walks. I would hold her hand at times like these and nod wisely as the evening shadows lengthened around us.