A Transit Date

I am concerned that if they are overly bewildered, I might not have the resources and time to lull them back to their comforted homoeostasis.

I planned to do a moonlight sonata as well to round it off as a trilogy. Then, I reckoned that moonlight sonata may be too bold.

Arey, I am trying to keep my characters urban and urbane and ubuntu. You are suggesting that I denature them into another mediocre couple. Never! Poorni and Adi epitomise the next wave of moonlight sonata romance with no trite and empty affirmations and family-way episodes. They are goofy and charming and spirited. Let them harness their jeu d'esprit and toss it at each other.

 

Missy, the extra "o" is conditioned! You must know that jazz about American, British, Continental, and Indian spelling.

Its "manoeuvre" for me and its "maneuver" for you. I prefer that portly spelling.

My homobunti were not born that way. They were naked and ignorant and frightened to taste that apple in Eden. Later they were chastised and subsequently conditioned to "think" and not just "comply" by the wicked snake. And that reading of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre awakened them and cured them of platitudes. They are not voracious readers but they read what's relevant to them. They are not intellectuals or philosophes, they are social observers. Thus, Poorni and Adi were recruited in my Shaggy God's Story.

 

Moonlight Sonata​

"Do you love me?"

"No, not that train of thought again, Poorni. This is precisely the station where a man pretends to fill water in a bottle and miss the train and discontinue to travel in that silly train of thought. Next, you will ask, how much do you love me, why do you love me, when did you realize that you love me. Don't be that caricature of a woman!"

"If only you resist being that caricature of a man who never answers straight. You could have said, I love you with the expanse of the sky and the depth of the ocean, and we would have gotten on with our not-so-dramatic lives."

(Adi turns around and probes her with a stabbed look.)

"You! You would be satisfied with that cornball and rest the matter. You would mock me my whole life that I once told 'I love you with the expanse and depth and height and whatnot of the natural elements'. You would make a living hell of such gauche undertaking"

(Adi draws her closer and hisses into her ear.)

"Don't trick me you sassy sorceress."

"Huh! There, there, you know me too well."

(Poorni cups his face and winks.)

"Do you love me?"

"I think, I do."

"YOU THINK?"

"Well, Richard Rorty proclaimed that you can never attain the absolute truth. I only think that I love you."

"You are a Doubting Descartes."

"Hey, "think" is lot better than "may be". Think is still a forthcoming affirmative to a weak affirmative maybe."

"Your dad too sent you to some faux-Montessori run by Miss Thistlebottom, eh? I'm impressed."

(Poorni lifts his chin pointing to the skylight above them.)

"That moon, you see that round moon, what do you see in it?"

(Adi squints. He springs from the bed and walks to the balcony and gazes at the moon.)

"I see abandoned landers, a moon buggie and a gold-plated telescope. Wait, there is also a can, is that a Coca Cola can?"

"Stop your Ripley's amazement. Is that all you see? You don't see a passionate lover."

"Moon?! A passionate lover. Are you kidding? Last I heard, moon was a con artist who concealed his pock marks for centuries."

"Do you love me?"

"You really want to know?"

"Hmm"

"Get up, get out of the bed."

(Poorni playfully rises from the bed.)

"Toss that bedsheet. Go on."

(Poorni pulls the sheet.)

"Go near that pillow and lift the mattress."

"Adi, you know that mattresses can be lifted even with bedsheets on them"

"I know, babe. I wanted to make it dramatic."

"Go on."

"What is this scrap of paper?"

"Go on. Read it."

(Poorni picks the paper and thuds the mattress back.)

"It's a train ticket."

"Too bad, your dad squandered his money on a cheap Montessori."

It's not a train ticket, it's the train ticket."

"It's that train ticket. You still have that ticket, that journey where you met me for the first time"

"What can I say, the Bella Celine in you charmed me in that moonlit train and I too wished like Jesse to stall that sunset."

(Poorni walks towards Adi who is still eyeing her from the balcony.)

"You are in trouble. You know me. I would mock you forever that you saved a silly scrap of paper in that remembrance."

(Adi waggles his brows at her.)

"You also know now why husbands prefer a sturdy mattress, not for the obvious wild and passionate rantum-scantum, but to stash their unobvious fondness underneath it."

"Adi, go, make the bed, fetch the sheet and no crimps. I want my bed smooth. No more peas and pods and Hans Christian Andersen props underneath the bed."

"Dare you ask me these silly questions on another night."

(Poorni giggles. Adi winks back at her.)

 

They better be interesting, what with all that airport flirt and kale squabble and moonlight frolic. In spite of the stylised mise en scène, if they are dull then my homoubunti have failed their species. That's a nice sum up - "Interesting". Not too aroused but not too overlooking.

If you are wondering, what the blasting furnace is she blabbering about, then don't worry. You will get used to odd species and kettles and tooters who masquerade as writers here at IL, now that you are acquainted with the emerging homoubunti. @Nonya I cannot discount you for my inspiration. There you go a tag to honour you in this burble. A pansori is underway to commemorate this rare collaboration.

 

Eye for an eye

​

"Hey! I am Aditya”

“How exciting that you are Aditya.”

“Missy, where are you travelling to?”

“Wherever this Hogwarts takes me in the night.”

“A sassy Hermione there.”

“Where’s your lightning scar?”

“Well, I might have to pull down my pants to show you my scars from my football days. I am attracted to you, Carra”

(Poorni puts down her book)

“So am I, insanely attracted and smitten and bitten by your charm and Dorian Gray looks in less than two minutes.”

(Poorni laughs in a mocking tone)

“Marry me, someday Ms Stranger”

“Why some day, is today inauspicious?”

“Nah, someday will give you time to know me”

(Aditya rolls his sleeves)

“I am feverishly smitten with you, that droopy ear, that button nose, that sexy eye and that ..”

“Hold on, am I asymmetric, just one ear and one eye you find attractive.”

“The other ear and eye need further exploration. From this aching distance I cannot make out if they are equally attractive.”

“I see. Why don’t you come closer?”

(Adi shuffles his legs. Rises and sits beside her)

“Am I proportional and geometrically aligned as Alberti decreed?”

“Ears are ok. Eye might need a slight adjustment, but I can live with that”

“Marry me, someday, Ms Ninja Reader”

“Ninja?!”

“Such slim books in your handbag, do you ever read any book more than a hundred pages?”

“If a writer cannot articulate and fold up his thoughts in a hundred pages, he might as well not say it.”

“Marry me. Do I have to ask your hand in marriage to your parents?”

“Why? Don’t you have resources and privileges to elope? Tell me the date and time and I will pack my dowry and trousseau and leap out of the window. Weddings are boring.”

“Quite saucy there”

“Scared?”

“No, dreamt for ages to have someone like you for me.”

“So that the Galen in you can stitch up my crooked eye.”

“Marry me, Carra”

“Hold on, why marry, why not live-in, common-law partner, or other less fussy variant”

“Whoa! You are quite unorthodox there.”

“What part of me screams ortho, you are forgetting I have a crooked eye and my other ear is only passable”

“I will marry you someday.”

“I wish us both good luck then when you eventually marry me. You see that moon, what does it remind you Maxim De Winter?”

“A passionate lover, Carra”.

“Hooh! I will ask you the same question in few years time.”

“That means you want to know me, spend time with me, madly fall in love with me and then more madly lock me outside the home because I forgot the anniversary”

(Adi stretches his arms)

“I am going to make you Mrs Nilakantan.”

“Nilakantan? That’s a handsome surname. At least something in you does not scream rakish.”

“Well, I had women fall for me just with my surname. And you?”

“I am Poorni, Annapurna. And I had men falter with my name.”

“That’s my station. I will see you soon. I hope you are splashed online in LinkedIn and Facebook to find you.”

“I might be easier to locate if you search for 'Girl with a crooked eye and an unshapely ear'.”

“That too. I might refine it with 'Girl with a crooked eye and an unshapely ear and a missing nose'.”

(Adi disembarks and as the train is pulling away from the station he mouths)

I am going to marry you, some day, be ready.

(Poorni winks at him from the window and curves her lips in a wicked smile.)