The Last Date

3^rd Feb ‘11

I was on my way to meet him. I was happy, excited, sad and guilty all at the same time. We were together, in love, for more then three years but something changed and we drifted apart. The feelings were not the same anymore. I could no longer see the love in his eyes neither could he in mine. So we accepted the fact that we’re out of love and therefore would meet for one last time and then part ways.

We were supposed to meet at our favorite café in CP. I was running a little late. He used to hate my getting late. He would always call me at least five times before meeting just to make sure that I reached on time. For three years he did that every time we met but today was different. He messaged in the morning and asked if the plan was still on. When I replied, “Yes,” he replied, “K.” How I hate the ‘K’ in the SMS language. You can never make out the mood of the person by that letter!

I got out of my house and sat in my car. I loved to drive. When we went on drives I was the one who would actually drive the car and he just sat beside me. He loved the fact that I was taking him for drives and I loved him for sitting beside me and letting me drive. Most guys want to be ‘the man’ in the relation but he was just so easy and sometimes let me be in control.

As I pulled out on the road and saw the traffic on the main signal I knew I was going to be really late. I wanted to call him as I waited in the traffic like I used to. We would talk whenever we were stuck in traffic and when one of our favorites played on the radio, we would turn it up so that the other could also hear the song. I couldn’t do that anymore.

As I reached near the airport and saw a plane taking off I remembered when I had asked him to come to that place just so we could sit in our car and watch planes go by. We sat for almost an hour, mostly quiet, and stared at every plane till it vanished in the never ending sky. I wish love could also be like that, never ending.

Dhaula Kuan has changed so much since I moved in Delhi. It used to be a normal chawraha, the only difference was it had five main roads going in five different directions instead of four. Now it’s just a web of confusing flyovers and underpasses. The first time we went through it we had to take two u-turns to reach the correct road and he had said, “Girls can never make out directions.” Even though he was sitting beside me and was supposed to show me the way. I feel he should have. He was the guy!

Reaching CP nowadays is also a task if you’re driving. There are so many diversions that you can easily lose your way. But I had been there so often with him that now I knew how to reach and even how to be lost if I was with him. As I reached the outer circle my heart began to beat really fast like it would just come out of my body and tell me to stop and use my head first. But I didn’t listen to it. I took a left turn in the inner circle.

That’s when it hit. I think it was a big vehicle, probably a bus that hit my poor, tiny car. It just came from the right and hit hard on my side of the car. It did hurt to think that I would not meet him today for our last date. Then I just lost the sense of where I was.

I woke up after two hours, as my family said, in the hospital. I know something is wrong. Maybe I won’t live to see him again. Maybe our last date was my last date. I may not live through the day but I know I lived, specially when I was with him. He made me come alive. Every day, every drive and every journey where he was with me is what I call really living. So when I sleep tonight, and I know I may not wake up, I will be content and happy that I lived and loved.

A Little Less Than Perfect

26^th Aug ‘10

Anu is a photographer with a travel magazine and does landscape photography for it. She has joined the magazine just three months back and therefore she is yet to do some profound work. She thought she will have a chance on her trip to Manali which her magazine was covering next.

She has been planning for the trip well in advance. She saw many pictures of Manali as she had not been there earlier and visualised what she would click. She kept thinking about the hills of Manali and wanted to capture a sunrise over them. That photograph, she thought, would show her bosses that they had made the correct choice by hiring her.

The day to leave for the trip arrives. Anu, with her personal camera, is sitting excitedly in the office bus. A team of six people are going out of which she is one of the two photographers. The other is Raj, senior to her. She wanted to click a perfect photograph so that Raj would take her on all the following assignments with him.

The team reached Manali on a Saturday morning. Most of the journey went by in the night. Anu got down from the bus and took in a huge breadth of fresh air and smiled. The weather in Manali was perfect, not hot, not too cold, just perfect.

The team reaches their hotel to freshen up and soon everyone leaves to wander in the city. The boss is giving instructions about where to start, the writers are getting to know about the popular spots and Raj and Anu are planning their shoot. The trip is going to be of two days. The planning was complete and they went back to their hotel for lunch.

In the evening, Raj and Anu move to complete their task together. Raj clicked photographs of people, houses and the bazaar but Anu is not interested in these subjects. Still she observes Raj and notices how he approaches people and convinces them for a quick click. Raj encourages Anu to click some photographs. Every photograph he clicks he claimes to be perfect and every photograph Anu clicks he claims to be good but less than perfect.

In the night Anu enters her room upset and disheartened.  She is standing in the balcony of her room and is gazing at the horizon. The sun has just set and the sky has turned into different shades of orange and red. Anu remembers her desire to click a picture of a sunrise. She sets the alarm for early in the morning and goes to sleep. The alarm woke her up. It is still dark outside. Anu quickly got up, washes her face, picks her camera and leaves.

Anu had noticed a way towards the hills last evening when she was returning to her hotel. She starts her trek. After about an hour she reaches a location that would be perfect for her perfect photograph. She places her camera on a tripod and waits. The sky now is turning into different shades of yellow and Anu realises the moment is near. She clicks several pictures of the sunrise.

Anu is quite satisfied with her work while coming back to her hotel room. She freshens up and joins the others for breakfast. The boss asks Anu and Raj to meet him after breakfast with the photographs they clicked yesterday. He does not know anything about Anu’s little trip in the morning.

After breakfast Anu and Raj enter into their boss’s room carrying their laptops. Anu smiles and greets the boss and sits opposite him. The boss looks at their photographs and appreciates Anu’s work. Now the boss has to choose a photograph for the magazine. He chooses Raj’s photograph of the bazaar. Anu is disappointed.

Satisfied Raj stands to leave the room. As Anu is following him their boss stops her and asks her to stay. She sits back down and feels like he is about to scold her. But the boss appreciates Anu’s work again and opens a photograph of hers that she clicked in the morning. He asks Anu more about the photograph and says that it is perfect. He also says that for the magazine they needed a photograph that showed the people of Manali and not only the landscape. Her boss offers to send her photograph in a photography competition back in Delhi. Anu is excited at the thought of the competition.

The competition’s theme is ‘Open Spaces’ and Anu is proudly admiring her photograph on the wall with the rest of the entries. Her photograph has the blue hills, the dark green pine trees in the foreground, the yellowish sky and a new yellow-orange sun coming out from behind the hills. After the judges took a look at all the photographs it is time to announce the winners. Anu can’t hear anything because of her nervousness. All she hears is her name, “Anu Sharma, first prize, for her photograph titled ‘A Little Less Than Perfect,’” and then the claps.