Family At First Sight

Chapter Two

Eleven months back

I was working for a private sector, as a software personnel and my job paid me enough to meet my ends. To be quite frank, neither was I a career driven woman nor my parents depended on my salary for survival. I just didn't want to depend on my dad for all of my expenses and the ultimate reason was to not get married anytime soon. Either I had to study more or do a job and I took the easy way out of marriage for as long as I could. But my dad was not someone to be fooled, for he started searching a "suitable" guy for me to tie the knot. I couldn't possibly postpone the inevitable, forever. I was only 24 and it definitely didn't feel like an age to take such a huge responsibility. After a lot of ultimatums and emotional blackmail, my parents finally got me to agree for the marriage.

I thought it would take at least a year for them to select some potential candidates for this ordeal, but guess what? My parents thought this through, way ahead than I gave them credit for. Which is the one place that puts so many people to connect and choose a life partner from? A matrimony site. Well, I was registered in one of the famous matrimony sites and my parents updated all the details about me. I was made to see several guys from the site, just like I was shown to many of them. My dad spoke to some of the parents of guys in the site whom they thought would be a good match for me. I usually was not a part of this conversation and so far, we were not making much progress.

On a Saturday morning, a few days after the start of "man- hunt", my dad came up with a guy's profile and he asked me to check if he fits my expectations. His name was Aditya. The first thing I wanted to check was his picture. Don't get me wrong, but I do believe that when someone's our true soul mate, we would feel all those butterflies and fire works. He had normal complexion, jet- black hair, almond- shaped eyes, long eye lashes, well- trimmed mustache and beard, his body was well- built but in a lean sort of way and above all, he was around six feet in height. He seemed like a guy who was well above my reach, both figuratively and literally. Here I was, with 5'2" in height and leaning towards "above average" in body size. Big round eyes and long hair that grazed my hips. I was no match for this man in any aspect. He was easy on the eyes and I had a sudden urge to dwell a bit deeper into his profile to know more.

He was an engineering graduate like me but he had gone ahead and had done his Masters as well. He worked for a private company that dealt with hardware and he was well- established in the financial sort. And I just browsed through his profile further more and came to know that he was not much of a pet- lover, he listens to classic, jazz and country music and symphonies, he loves Italian, Continental, and Mexican cuisine and he loved reading books. He was also a social drinker but he never smoke. The profile didn't say much about his family, about which I would get to know if I was to meet him and take it forward. I informed my dad that he seemed like a good one and asked him to talk to his parents. I wondered what he would say when he saw me and read about me. That thought kept me thinking through the whole night. The next day, my dad said that he spoke to his parents and they were interested to meet up and take this ahead.

We all decided to meet at my home and that we would meet coming Saturday evening, which was two days from now. Great! I just had two days to get prepared, both physically and mentally. Somewhere inside my heart, I hoped that this was it, that he would be the one for me, since I started growing a fondness for him and it might be due to the fact that we had so much in common. I fought with my inner feelings and tried promising myself that I wouldn't grow any feelings for this stranger. But at the end of the day,  when I thought of him, I just wished that he would turn out to be an important person in my life. Ugh! So much for being a strong- willed girl.

I swear I just blinked and the two days passed in a haze. It was Saturday morning and I paid a visit to the Salon to pamper myself a bit. I'm not a fan of make- up and I strongly believed that it's what inside that matters. But I wanted to feel special, for myself. Plucking here, scrubbing there and a lot of curse words after, I finally looked at myself in the mirror. Not bad. The amount of money that I just gave up was not in a vain after all. The whole morning went that way and by the time I reached home, it was past noon. Aditya and his family were to reach in another two hours and so my mom hurried me to change into a Saree. We had few of our relatives around to help me get ready and there was a good aroma coming from the kitchen, for my mom and the other ladies had prepared a great deal of savories and sweets to serve them.

I requested two specific people to be by my side today and they didn't disappoint me. They were my best friends, Shivani and Sameera. They held a special place in my heart and I literally share all my life events with them. We had no secrets among us and we shared almost every moment of our day with each other. Shivani was like the angel on my right shoulder while Sameera was like the devil on my left. Shivani was careful of every little thing we did and she always made sure that we didn't get into any trouble. Sameera on the other hand, was a free- spirit and the things she did in the past had always put us into trouble. They were so contrasting in characters, yet they kept me sane, even through the toughest of times. It was only fair that the biggest decision of my life to be made with their approval as well. So I showed his profile to them, right after deciding to meet with Aditya and his family. They reviewed, dissected and did a complete analysis of his profile, both in matrimony site and in social media as well. Their investigation led to a deep understanding of his personal life. He was not as bad as I expected, since I expected the worse, just in case. After getting the official approval from my best friends that he was good to be proceeded with, I was confident enough to go through with this. They were also pampering me and making me up so I would look the best on this day. They were also teasing me about him and that definitely did put a blush on my face. It was different to have this kind of a feeling and it was the first time I'd ever experienced this.

It felt like being in a typical South Indian movie scene and I laughed within myself at that notion. Now, it was 5.p.m and they would be here any minute. I gave myself the pep talk and that how brave I was, all the while shivering in nervousness, like a piglet on a winter evening. Just when I was reaching the final part of my self- motivational speech, I heard someone say that they have arrived. Oh, no. Now was the moment I anticipated for the past two and half days. I heard some new voices and guessed his family has been seated and everyone were talking. All those who were surrounding me went outside to see them and I was left with my friends inside the room. My friends went to the door and tried listening to the commotion happening outside.

After some time, my mom came back to my room and took me outside. I was so scared that, if someone stood nearby me, they would literally hear my heart beating so fast. With my friends accompanying me, I walked slowly, with my head bent and my eyes on the floor. Once I came outside, I lifted my eyes and then I was shell- shocked on seeing what was in front of me.


***Stay tuned for the next chapter to know what shocked her and if things went the way she expected***