The designer bra

Chapter 5

Arush had returned back halfway from the stairs. He had decided to find out who the owner of the beautiful bra was. Today aunt again asked him to collect the clothes, and she stressed on ‘don’t bring any more fancy undergarments’.
He was wondering if the owner had even realized their bra was missing when, to his great astonishment, there hung another fancy bra, right at the centre of their rope. Without giving it another thought, he went and picked up the soft satin brand and was feeling its soft contour when someone started hitting him from behind.
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Ramaa waited with bated breath as the footsteps approached and stopped. Holding her breath, she peeped carefully and to her utter astonishment, she saw the boy, the same boy that ignored her, leering at her bra. And he proceeded to take it off the rope. 
She pounced on him from behind and began hitting him.
“Thief”, she shouted, “Thief! How dare you touch my bra! Thief!”
From the shocked expression on his face, she realized she had taken him by surprise. He defended himself from her onslaught of blows once he had regained a bit of his composure.
“Stop! Are you insane?” he shrieked.
Ramaa finally stopped hitting him. She was panting and out of breath from the efforts.
“How dare you touch my bra? Where’s the other one?” she asked breathlessly.
“This is yours?” he asked, looking at her incredulously.
“Why? Why can’t it be mine?” she challenged him.
“Then what was it doing on our rope?” he asked.
“That gives you the right to steal it? And what were you planning to do with it?” Ramaa questioned angrily.
“Well, maybe wear it once in a while,” he replied with a straight face.
They looked at each other for just longer than a moment.
And inspite of everything, Ramaa could feel the anger suddenly dissipate and they both started laughing. They laughed hard, doubling over, over the weirdness and hilarity of the entire situation.
“Here, your designer wears back to you,” Arush said, handing both the bras to her as their laughter finally died down. “I just did the chore my aunt asked me to do. Never gave a thought as to who it must be belonging to”.
“It’s okay. I thought I lost it. I over reacted,” Ramaa said, now ashamed at the way she had hit him just moments before. “No hard feelings”.
“Well, if I hold both of them any longer, I might start getting hard feelings,” he said, and both began laughing again at his apt though adult joke.
“Arush,” he said, when they had laughed some more.
Ramaa smiled as she took both the bras from his hand.
“Ramaa,” she said coyly.
There was an awkward silence for a moment or two, both wondering what to say next.
“A really unique way of meeting for the first time,” he said, and both began laughing again.
They chatted for sometime then, and Arush told her how he had come to Mumbai from a  small village in Konkan because his father thought this was a good place for him to get proper education, and how he was finding it difficult to adjust to life in general and make friends in particular, in this new city. Ramaa told him about her family, her cousin and about the school which they now had in common.
Ramaa couldn’t stop smiling as she lay down to sleep that night. The entire sequence of events kept on playing in her mind like a video tape on repeat mode, making her laugh even more each time.
Next day when their eyes met in the school, for the first time ever, Arush smiled at her. But there was something more to that smile. It was a knowing smile, that said, I know what you are wearing underneath. Ramaa felt her cheeks going red as she smiled back and hurried over to her class.
From his overall behavior, Ramaa had realized that Arush was not shrewd, he was an introvert. But she had felt really nice talking to him today. It felt like meeting a long lost friend. She wanted to meet him again. But how could they? How could she get to meet him and know him without it becoming obvious to others? And then she had an idea!
The next morning, Ramaa took her pista coloured designer bra and hung it on the rope belonging to Rukmini aunty.
Then she went to school, with fingers crossed that her idea would work.
That evening, she went to the terrace, her heart thudding in her chest like a fluttering bird. What if he did not understand, and just leave the bra and go? Or what if Rukmini aunty had collected clothes today?
The tension vanished the moment she reached the terrace. Arush was waiting for her.
They chatted on the terrace till the orange sky turned jet black with stars shining brightly. This time, they decided on a code.
Ramaa would hang her bra on Arush’s rope whenever she wanted to meet in the eve.
If by any chance Arush was going to be late, he would change the position of the bra on the rope.
If he changed the sides of the bra, they would meet next day.
And if he returned the bra to her rope, he was not sure they could meet that day or the next.
The designer bras were proving more useful than ever. In spite of having no mobile to coordinate with each other, Ramaa and Arush now regularly started meeting on the terrace. Ramaa soon discovered that Arush had many stories to tell. She had spent all of her life in this cramped up chawl in Dombivali while Arush had spent his childhood living on a stretch of beach along Konkan. He told her fascinating stories about his expeditions into the sea in various kinds of boats, stories about their regular fishing trips, anecdotes from his visit to his grandma’s house which was a century old home in the midst of a farm. He had a vast knowledge about all types of sea creatures and all kinds of trees that grew in coastal areas. Listening to him was one of the most interesting thing for her.
The chawl members had a meeting once every three months to address issues faced by the residents. It was one such meeting when Ramaa’s mom told everyone that she and Rukmini were facing a major issue.
“We have noticed that someone is hanging their flashy designer underwear alternately on our ropes. We want the culprit caught and penalized,” she told the committee.
Ramaa looked across at where Arush was sitting and their eyes met. And both had to run in opposite directions away from the meeting to prevent themselves from collapsing with laughter at the meeting.
Ramaa rushed to the terrace to have a hearty laugh. Arush followed in sometime. They laughed hard again before cooling down.
“Imagine what your mom will think if she finds out that the culprit,” he said the word culprit making inverted commas with his hands, “is you.”
“I know. We can’t do it anymore,” she said, still partly laughing.
At night, after everyone was asleep, Ramaa carefully packed the bras in a small bag and sewed it up. Next day, she would keep the bag at the bottom of the trunk that contained her late grandmothers few personalized belongings, a trunk that no one ever opened. She could no longer use them but she could never throw them away either. And now they had an emotional value attached to them. So they would be safe and sound forever.
A week later, when Ameeta came to visit, she was surprised to find out that Ramaa was not using them.
“Why?” she asked.
“Well, I did use them but now I can’t risk mom finding out about them,” she said.
And plus they have done their job well, it was time for them to resign, she thought and smiled to herself.