Time Of You And Me

Where The Time Flows For Us

"Magic, Nana.... how old are you again?" Milli didn't even turn to her grandmother as she tried her best to wipe off the coffee stain adorning the table in a futile attempt for the third time with their newest cleaning liquid. 

The one which her Nana bought the other day from a random saleswoman, the latter just came up with one tactic and her nana was sold on the liquid, she mentally noted in her head to keep her away from sales or just the mention of one. 

The stain just won't go away, just like the sneaky sun rays that illuminated this section of the cafe. The small, quiet part of their cafe which held the stories of many of their wandering customers, the one where the studious kid would sit burying his/ her nose deep into the book to stay out the eyes of the popular ones, the one where the hushed murmurs filled the space and the one where the eyes did all the talk for the ones fallen head over heels for each other. 

"Milli... it's real, you got to believe in it. That's what makes it real" she heard back from her Nana who was currently nursing the second cup of chai in her weak yet determined hands. Having built this cafe from scratch, managing the smallest of things, fussing over the piled up bills or just about having her cafe on her mind 24/7, her nana knew it all. 

She could pull it off, in her little ways. The old woman though couldn't sit back when she came across the ones needing help. She would go all out to help them get around the situation. 

"Yeah? Have your magic clean this stain up then Nana," she made her way to the old woman and caught her in a much needed embrace. "Miss Milli Srivastava, did you just wipe your hands on me?" the cafe rumbled with the chaos that followed as if it has suddenly come to life, just the little things, these little memories were their world. 

The world which carried their lives, the beautiful yet hard life. This was their safe haven, the one place which cradled them in its loving embrace and cajoled them into the peaceful sleep after the day's toil. 

Cafe Crush was the biggest dream of her Nana after her life seemingly fell apart with the sudden and untimely demise of her son and daughter-in-law in a car accident, leaving just herself and little Milli behind in her care. 

If Milli was her heart, the cafe cum bookstore was her soul. The place was her everything, the roof over her head and the provider of the basic necessities of life and they couldn't be any more grateful for that. 

Milli, on the other hand was your normal next door girl who would try to fit in everyday, with a new spirit, an unrelenting determination and the passion to keep moving forward. Juggling her studies and the cafe alongside her Nana did take its toll on her but she wasn't the one to back down. Not now, not ever. It was more of a subtle promise she made to herself to never let her nana overwork herself or become  worried about the functioning of Cafe Crush. To her, her nana was her everything. 

It wasn't like she was completely happy too though, she sometimes wanted nothing more than to just take her Nana away from this work load... maybe become popular or successful, anything that could help her to take all their struggles away. 

Maybe she actually was in dire need of some magic in her life. 

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The magic in his life seemed to be fading off into the abyss little by little. 

"Not again Mukund please, this is the fifth interview of the day already. Please do something," the guy almost begged in front of his manager and his only confidante who helplessly shook his head sideways and gave him an apologetic look.