MaNan FF - Angel In Disguise

#13- Deal Cancelled

#13- Deal Cancelled

"So sir," he passed a 'you-can-go-to-hell-for-all-I-care' look to Nandini. "May I?"

Nandini tried to intervene so that Manik doesn't read the wrong one, the one she didn't choose. She was hell scared, for the words she spilled on those pages were nothing less than the shards of glass that pierced her skin once, and left scars forever on her heart. She herself dreaded from some of the memories she once bled on those pages of her book.

Nandini M.

And nothing's sadder than listening to a heartbreak in the voice of a musician.

And he, he just flipped to a random page. As if this diary was just another one at the local book shop. As if it wasn't weighed by feelings more than words.

And he started. Not what she wanted him to start.

"Aankhein dikhaye mujhe jab zindagi
Yaad mujhe aati hai tere gusse ki.."

Nandini's head shot up to look at him, whose smirk is slowing turning grim.

"Daata bhi toh tune mujhe, phoolon ki tarah
Kyun nahi m...maa," he hesitated,
"...saari duniya teriii tarah."

Manik too looked up at Nandini, only to notice a wave of nostalgia pass through her eyes. And he continued.

"Maatha garam hai, subah se mera
Rakh de hatheli na Maa...
Tune kuch khaaya?
Der se kyun aayi?
Koi na poochhe yahaan."
Manik was trying his best not to reveal the kind of emotions that were erupting in small bouts, within him.

And Nandini, only her Aiyappa knew how she was still standing without a single drop of tear rolling down her cheek.

"Heera kaha, kabhi nagina kaha,
Mujhe kyun aise paala tha Maa.."
He looked at her fist crumpling the hem of her kurti and her eyes downcast. He was about to continue but then Nandini spoke, and when she spoke, Manik finally felt what he should have.

"Teri nazar se mujhe, dekhe na jahaan... duniya ko toh daantegi na, daantegi na Maa?"
Neither did she try to tune it, nor did she give a musical stretch- it was a plain simple sentence, a request, an urge. As if asking for some assurance to have her mother by her side. Manik looked at her, and in an instant, he felt remorse for every wrong thing he did to her ever since.

"Teri nazar se mujhe dek...dekhe na jahaan,
Duniya ko....ko toh daantegi na...daantegi na Maa.." Manik read out from the book, the very same sentence, realizing how this wasn't just Nandini's talent penned down here, they were grave emotions, which were etched so deep somewhere within her, that she remembers each word of it.
Or else, how would he justify her brilliant memory of an excerpt of a writing scribbled down years before? Yes, he could observe from the handwriting, it ought to be the handwriting of a teen or a kid, while the tenderness of the worn-out pages gave away its age.

He had no courage to look into her devastated eyes. He was choking on his words.

"Mujhko shiq...aayat karni hai sabki
Mujhko sataate... hain Maa...
Ab- "

"That's it" Raghav stopped Manik from going further, "I'm... well, that was too overwhelming for me too, I must say."

Manik and Nandini, as well as the silent class looked at Raghav sir as he commented further.

"I, uh, well.... I wonder how you both came up with such a thing. It was, I don't know what to say, just take that as a compliment already." He smiled at both of them. Manik smiled back, though the smile didn't reach his eyes and Nandini, well, she was staring blankly into oblivion. Manik's self-consciousness started hitting him.

"Sir, actually I-" but he was brutally cut off by the shower of praises which Raghav now bestowed.