The World Through Your Eyes

And Lightning Struck

Swapnil's see-sawing moods were only one of the problems that afflicted Samar right now, contributing to the humongous headache steadily taking root at the back of his head. That fated night in his office, even as Aarti had been rambling away on the phone with her irate teenager, Samar had watched the government ban all international commercial airlines for a month, both arrivals and departures, with growing perplexity. He'd been anticipating this for a while, but honestly, he was expecting more of a warning.

"Why does this godforsaken country always oscillate between delusional, sunny optimism and ignorance and then such drastic decisions," he muttered on the drive back, even as he kept trying a certain number, gritting his teeth every time he reached the answering machine. "How am I going to bring her back here from the other side of the globe at this point?! Why won't-"

His phone buzzed loudly. Belting out yet another choice profanity, he read the message on top of the notif bar,

"Here's some trivia you don't need: there are approximately 18600 Indian students pursuing various degrees in the States.
Here's the logical reasoning you do need to listen to: that's far too many people for our government to abandon. I was in an emergency-brainstorming session with all my immigrant batchmates here, just got off the call. If you've stopped hyperventilating in two minutes,call me back. All my love, D."

Samar, smiling inspite of himself, had called back immediately. Honestly, he'd meant to grumble a little bit, even turn on the silent-treatment tap, but when the peals of his favourite voice rang on the other side of the line, he could barely keep calm. It'd been some three years, and yet the butterflies seemed to have permanently leased their spot in his stomach since the day he'd met her.

"Well, this is disastrous, I'm clearly not seeing you anytime soon, long distance sucks. What else is new?"

"This isn't just about me throwing a tantrum about long-distancing, Dams. India's locking down as a precautionary measure, the States have a 2000+ daily caseload and it's growing as we speak. You haven't got family on the East Coast. USA has the world's lousiest public health care and insurance system, and you're an immigrant student. You do realise that you have it bad on so many fronts?"

"This isn't helping, Samar! I'm 24, that's not exactly within the COVID-vulnerable age bracket. Also, if you're going to talk numbers, right now, the mortality rate-"

Samar almost choked with panic, cutting her off.
"Good grief, Dams, how have you landed up in the one country that has a higher caseload than China?!"

"Um, I study here?"

"Unfunny. Listen, have you spoken to your parents?"

"Yeah, I did, right before I called you. They have it worse, you know. We met when you were here last October. They haven't seen me for more than a year. They're distraught."

"They've every right to be. You should've never waited a week, babe. You could've returned on the 13th, there was a chartered service from Pune, we'd flown back here together."

"You know I can't afford-"

"You wouldn't be the one paying."

"I'd never let you blow half a million bucks on a plane ticket that I can buy myself at one tenth the price. Samar, this is going nowhere. Listen, the admissions desk and our administrators here are constantly in touch with the embassy here. They'll probably patch us Indian students through tomorrow on a Zoom call and brief us. Please, please stop worrying. I'll come home the minute it's possible."

"Take care, Dams. Let me know how that Zoom call goes."

"Listen, don't get your hopes up. At this point, it might be little more than empty reassurances, things look a little iffy. Keep your hair on, breathe. I'll still kick your sorry ass at online Scrabble tonight. And who knows, I might find a nice, clean-shaven IFS officer to flirt with at tomorrow's meeting. Ma would approve, she LOVES bureaucrats. And it'd keep you on your toes."