Lucy, the Sky and the bloody Diamonds

The Sky

The cuckoo clock sang 10 times. It was the biting Delhi winter. Velvet wall paper. The masquerade party. People clinking their champagne glasses. Mohammed Rafi in the background. A fountain in the middle of the ball room. 

I looked around at the people in fancy clothes laughing over irrelevant and humourless jokes.

I had been here before. Very long ago. In another time. In another life.

"Why are we here?" I asked the liquor novice.

"To have some fun." He winked.

"At the Shetty mansion? The mafia kingpin's mansion?"

"So, you know this place?"

"Shetty is filling his guts with that disgusting whisky right in front of me so it's not that hard to guess."

He chuckled twirling me around and pulling me closer. His body swayed to the faint sound of Khoya Khoya Chand.

"You look nice." He whispered in my ear.

I looked down realising I was wearing a satin peach number. This dress...I knew this dress. Why was I...He must have improvised on my wardrobe. But how did he...

"Why am I wearing this?" I demanded.

He cocked an eyebrow. "Would you rather be wearing your waitress uniform or better yet nothing at all? I am sorry but my memory on the dresses serves low. You are lucky I even remember one, so..."

"How do you remember this? And why?" I asked, confusion rising within me. Did he know?

"What?" 

"How and why do you remember this particular dress?" I asked.

"Uh..." he sighed. "Look there" He pointed to the ridiculous fountain in the middle of the ball room. "That girl by the fountain...the one in that peach dress with the white feathered eye mask. She is the only person I remember. That's-that's her dress, as you can see. I always thought of going up to her and saying something but---"

"That's me" I said. My heart thumping in my chest. 

"What?" he turned to me, almost quizzical.

"That's me" I said "The girl by the fountain in that peach dress that you ogle at. That's me"

"I don't ogle at her-you. Is that really you?"

"Yes" I said as slowly as I could for him to comprehend.

It wasn't that hard to believe. I agreed I looked much cleaner and healthier back then than I did now obviously. One couldn't count the number of bones in my body like they could do now. I didn't have the shrapnel scar on my forehead then. But it was still me. Right?

So many years had passed, I wasn't sure anymore. Nothing from my past seemed real now. 

"Wow" the liquor novice chuckled "You were rich."

"You bet"

I was more than just rich. I was the only child of one of the richest women alive. My net worth was bigger than most countries' GDPs. A long, long time back. Right now, I would be lucky if I gather enough cash to pay my rent.

"So, you were saying... you ogled at me?" I asked changing the subject.

"I didn't ogle at you..." he said "I was fascinated...for some reason. I always walked to the fountain to talk to you and just as I stood almost 20 feet away from you..."

"What?"

He turned around pointing at the balcony. There was a man in a ridiculously shimmery golden suit. He looked like a walking Happy Diwali billboard. That was precisely what I had said even that night.