'Sweet-and-Sour'
Khushi was marching towards 'Bankilalji Halwai' shop in Lakshmi Nagar market for those much needed piping, hot jalebis.
"Bankilal ji , Bankilal ji?" She called out unable to find her favorite jalebi stall friend.
A young ,lean figure facing his back to the road was frying jalebis with much devotion. He wore a loose dirty vest and seemingly white dhoti. A red cloth was adoring his soft charcoal black gelled hair wound into a half turban. He turned around hearing Khushi.
Looking at the man in front of her, Khushi could not control her mouth from dropping into her signature look of astonishment which was but of course ' a big O'.
"Arn..ava..ji, aa..p? " She stammered by the shock.
"And why are you frying jalebis here?" the idea of him doing this was too much to take .
"Hi,Khushi. What a coincidence, we met here." He tried to smile.
"Coincidence? Yeah right Arnavaji ! It's just a coincidence that you met me at Bankilalji's shop today. Otherwise you always go to those five star hotels to fry jalebis, don't you Arnavji ?" she rolled her tongue in her cheek.
"What the?" Arnav could only come up with this.
"By the way , what made you change your taste & choose such 'far-from -even-close- to- your 'standards' shop instead of those high class sweet marts for frying jalebis?" ..ohh ya..that was right on target..
Here he goes...3-2-1..
"It's none of your business, Khushi." ASR bit out through his clenched jaw. "Just tell me why did you come here?"
The site in front of her was worth bagging the 8th place into 'Wonders Of The World' thought Khushi. ASR stood there..fuming...wearing some dirty vest and dhoti ,his feet enclosed in his usual formal leather shoes (shine intact) and holding colander in one hand and half fried ,hardly any geometrical shaped jalebi in other. Ohh..and not to forget his Bluetooth device tucked to his ear peeping out of that turban!
The scene tempted Khushi to laugh her heart out which shot another level of anger into ASR's mind already a bubbling molten lava by now. It took all of him to fan that for now n speak,
"See, I don't have all the time in the world to stand here and look at your laughing face. Just make it clear why have you come here?"
Composing for a second or two she spoke, "Actually I had come to discuss about Barak Obama's decision to call back American army from Afghanistan with Bankilalji"..making animated gestures with her hands.
"What the.." that was it..he stepped ahead making her jerk back.
Putting up a hand to stop him she said sincerely,"Of course , I have come here to buy some jalebis , Arnavaji! if only you have made some edible jalebis." She wont give up anytime,will she?
"How much you want?" he bit out.
"Umm.. Actually ..woh Arnavji...I wanted to buy 1kg for all my friends but you know I don't have that much money" She smiled sheepishly.
That was his undoing.. the temperature dropped down instantly to zero from the highest mercury level of a thermometer,
"It's fine Khushi. Have as many jalebis as you want. Don't worry about paying for them. I will take care of it." He offered her quite a big box of jalebis.
Khushi couldn't help her 1000 volts smile from flashing. Due to her chloroment effect even Arnav grinned.
"How sweet of you Arnavji!" showing the gratitude she turned and took a few steps towards home, when she suddenly remembered Payal's words,
'You know khushi, when a boy truly loves a girl , he does such things for her which otherwise he never would do.'
She turned hastily towards Arnav who hadn't moved an inch gazing at her retreating back. She asked uncertainly,
"Arnavaji , umm..Have you ever made jalebis for any other girl before?"
She searched into those chocolaty caramel eyes expectantly. His thin line of lips felt disturbed while hesitating to answer those expectant hazel orbs...
When suddenly two strong arms grabbed box of jalebis from her and started shaking her vigorously.
"Are o titaliya, Ab uth bhi jaiyyo (Now wake up, Titaliya)" , Buaji had generously spared her of any morning exercise with all the shaking.
"Nahi...My jalebis..."...she sat up with a screeching scream. Making her buaji pick the action of that trademark 'NAHI !!!'
Smacking her on her head..buaji spoke,
"Yeeeh Lo, Chahe sari duniya dub jaye par ee ladaki apne muh me thhuse jalebiyan ke sath hi dubegi.."
(See, even if the world sinks, this girl will only sink with her mouth full of jalebies)
"Are o Parmaeshwari, wake. I don't want you to miss Payal's wedding because of your crazy dreams."
Disappointedly realizing that it was just a mere dream and shrugging that thought away Khushi woke up and clapped her hands in excitement ,
"Are wa, it's jiji's wedding today!" Jumping out of bed and dancing to the tunes of 'aaj mausam hai suhana ,jiji ki shadi ka hai bahana' she ran to get ready.
Buaji muttered smilingly "Pagli" and resumed her chores.
No comments:
Post a Comment