On A Hot Summer Afternoon

Neelu.

Your name was no mystery. Whoever saw you, first saw those turquoise eyes with their specks of gold. They also saw your smooth butter-biscuit skin. And your hair that changed colour with the different watches of the day. What made it unbearable for me was the fact that we--both you and I--were young, not yet eight, but somehow ready for love.

And then the movie happened to us. Actually, a scene from it that showed a just-married hero and heroine coupling like hungry animals. You looked at me and smiled. I smiled too. It was a sort of code. One that promised something new. Hot and tantalising.

The scene over, the movie held little interest for us, so we came out of the movie room, where the whole larger family was watching a Sunday film on TV, just days ahead of an uncle's wedding.

"You saw?" You were definitely the bolder of the two of us.
"Er… yes," I was a bit tongue-tied.
"We should try it sometime," you said, your thin red lips curling into a smile like a snake slithering on a still waters.
"Yes… we must," I said, my heart beating like grasshopper wings.

The grasshopper feeling was realised the next day. On a hot summer afternoon, when everybody was asleep. You had no fear of being caught. You probably had all your alibis in place. We were in an unoccupied room where only a curtain separated us from shame and exposure.

"We are just married, okay. And it's our honeymoon," you explained and started to strip. "Now you pretend you're taking my pictures," and you began striking poses I had only seen on poster models.
"Okay, darling, I am tired now… let's sleep now," you smiled your red curly smile again. "But why are you still wearing your clothes… take them off… it's our honeymoon, no?"
Soon I was naked too, trembling to the touch of your skin against mine. Naked we kissed and caressed each other. Till we ran out of ideas. So we napped naked before waking up and going back to the rest of the clan.

I was guilt-ridden, after all you were my sister, no matter how distant. But you were back to being your blithe self. You stirred something in all of us. In your heart you probably knew that you were the hidden reason behind a lot of fights between us brothers, cousins. And you'd play us all together and individually: catching, like a child genius, on our peculiar weaknesses.

Later as a teenager, I remember once convincing you to come home with us during the summer break. I promised you movies, music and some trips to the new water park in my city. But there was a hidden agenda. Of being able to finish the love scene that we started years ago.

But this time you were playing someone else. Another cousin from my mother's side. I sulked but I can't even say you were totally callous. You played me too, but whenever you found the time. And I regretted getting you with us.

When you left, you left with a promise of keeping in touch. And you did, but it was mostly to tell me about your current boyfriend.

Soon after our class XII results, we got news that you had eloped. The family was livid. Search parties were sent out in different cities to look for you. I was part of one too, more curious than vengeful. But it was all a wild goose chase. Your plans were like a film script.

It happened a few months before your 18th birthday. And as soon as you turned 18, you were married in a secret ceremony where no-one from our side of the family was present.

In the years that followed the beautiful rebel in you turned into a devoted housewife and mother and all our childhood fantasies were erased like chalk stories from a blackboard.

This Monday I got another piece of news about you. That you had left your husband and two kids... forever.

In these last six months of your life you had been like an upside down drip bottle, slowly emptying out of its contents to those around you. I never visited you in hospital because I didn't want to change my last image of you… But Pa did. And he admired your strength when you told him that you'd be back on your feet soon.

Strangely, last night you and I were kids again.

Pushing the envelope… playing wife and husband once again… again without a damn care in the world....

Goodbye and take care Neelu!