Sandcastles | A Virat Kohli Fanfiction

09 • the journey

Virat's POV

I quickly informed Bunty about the trip - right from the wheres to the hows and the with whoms.
His opinion of Kavya was quite unsettled. He actually did not bother who I hang out with.

So he postponed and cancelled some stuff from the professional schedule.
But he insisted on not letting me go all by myself and made sure Sudeep drove the car for Kavya and me.

Her flight was to land at 9:50 in the morning which naturally delayed by about 25 minutes.

I wore a full sleeves hoodie over my white T-shirt so that my tattoos won't grab attention and also donned the huge pair of sunglasses that perfectly blocked half of my face.
I went to the terminal gate only after the arrival was announced because I wanted to avoid getting discovered as much as possible.
For the record, helmet trick doesn't work here anymore.

A few minutes later, a familiar figure made its way out. Her sunglasses shifted from her eyes to the top of her head angularly.

Kavya!

She wore a royal blue palazzo paired with a white crop top knotted just above her belly. As divine as a goddess.

She waved and walked towards me while I found it difficult even to move.

Everything, except her smiling face and waving hand, blurred from my vision. And there she was - snapping fingers in front of my eyes bringing me back to reality from the third space I had made up in my mind.
A space where only we both dwelled.

"Hey!" she said aloud, bending forward to look underneath my sunglasses.

I later realised that I was stuttering and saying some absolute nonsense in every sentence that escaped my tongue that moment on.

It can't be my fault when someone looks so incandescently beautiful.

***

We seated ourselves in the backseat next to each other while Sudeep turned the music on.
An SUV for three people might sound too much but I liked it better. Pretty raised up, spacious and cosier.

As songs kept playing one after the other, I noticed Kavya.
She was smiling by herself gazing out of the car window. Her wavy brown hair blowing away from her sunlit face.

I curiously asked her if the song that was then playing on the stereo was her favourite. She just shook her head no but didn't stop smiling either.
So I decided to continue looking at her, pretending to be in a music video together.

After a long while when she had devoured all the pleasure of every song and had had enough of the view outside, she looked at me and said, "You know it always leaves me with mixed feelings. Tum Mile's reprise version. It feels untrue and yet so captivating that for a moment I start wanting to believe in love."

I was stunned.

"You-you don't believe in love?"

"Maybe not. But deep down I might be. I just never know. It is out of my understanding.
I'm not faithless; just too afraid.

Of the love I have for my dog and the love he has for me, it's beyond conditions. Just like the love you have for cricket. It grows inside you. You nourish every piece of it. You live with it. Just like that.

But the kind of love they write in books or show in films, it always seemed so selfish and limited. So ephemeral."

I didn't want to agree on that. But she made it so compelling and hard-hitting that I was left dumbstruck.

The girl who was nothing but 'love personified' did not believe in love? How does the universe manage this irony of life?

"I love that song too. Used to be my favourite in younger times."

"That's what!" she exclaimed as if she was waiting for me to say the exact thing.

"Virat, that's what has become of love now. We listen to a song for the first time. We feel there's nothing more symphonic and soulful than that very song. We keep on listening to it hundreds of times. It drenches us with a stirring feeling that it will always remain our favourite.
But what happens then? With time, we listen to it lesser than before. We get so used to it that we know all of its high and low notes and lyrics by heart! There are always better songs being composed. We eventually stumble upon one of the new ones and make it our favourite. We forget that song gradually, taking it for granted."

After a while of airless silence, I replied,
"I understand. But someday we suddenly recall its melody and keep asking ourselves what song it is. And then, when we listen to it again, our hearts flutter at the sound of its name all over again.
Kavya, there's always that one song you sleep to, you come home to. The song which you don't feel like lip-syncing. The one you just let play and pass. You don't hum to it, you don't have to look up its lyrics - because you let it reach every part of your being. That's the song you truly love."

And then she reached out to my hand and squeezed it tight. I could see tears filling most of her eyes but they didn't roll down.
She then quickly let go off my hand and stared out of the window.

We were far ahead of the city and the milestone showed "0 km - Madikeri".

It was about half-past 6 when the sun mingled with its rich and varied dyes irradiating every hill on the way with a lustre of gold and crimson.

Kavya tilted her head over the cushion edge of the headrest and glanced at the setting sun with no precise expression on her visage.

She was lost. So was the sun underneath the blanket of dusk; and so was I in the forest of her losing emerald eyes which eventually closed shut. Her head softly hit my shoulder and the beauty was sleeping.