Neel, She called him.
Noori, He named her.
They decided to stick to names that didn't matter much to them or anyone else.
She was running from a horrible vision.
He was running from his existence.
She wished to fly.
He wished to be grounded.
Sh...
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It was raining.
Heavy rains and Mumbai could never be separated. She had come to accept the fact for the last 10 years she had spent here. In the city the rains were as frequent as trains when they once started.
The first day she had stepped into this place, she had found the place humid, hot, and too crowded but once the dry period ended and it started raining, everything washed along with her thoughts. The rain took away everything she had disliked: humidity and crowd.
The roads were empty with nothing but the scraps of things left behind, a symbol of life that seemed to fade with dropping water. She had played that day, drenching her 17-year-old self with joy, fun, and exhilarating after-effects of rainfall.
She liked it then, which later grew to become her favorite thing.
Dancing on the Bandstand with the clouds showering with everything in them. She liked the sound of crashing waves and splattering water as she jumped up and down. The petrichor was a drug for her system, numbing her worries.
It was true when Mumbaikars said it could rain disastrously beautifully.
She waited for the cars to move along as the light turned green. Her car wipers doing the job of clearing her vision but her eyes failed their efforts, her soft brown eyes blurred with the relaying memories.
He had ruined her favorite thing, and it seemed it was forever. Never she will be able to enjoy the rain like before, being carefree and happy.
"You make me happy."
Silly of her to say things like these to someone who valued nothing. Not her.
"Please stop." She begged herself to stop thinking, "Just stop thinking about that man, Vandita. It hurts. You are hurting."
Quickly wiping the corners of her eyes, she pressed into the accelerator and maneuvered her way through the traffic.
An incoming new message lit her car dashboard as she parked in her regular parking spot.
