By Parika Singh
“Roli di! Roli di!” Roli fell off her armchair as an urgent cry startled her out of her reverie. Once again Roli had drifted off while imagining her scenarios in distant lands. She was sitting on the verandah of her house, reading a book and sipping warm milk from her favorite mug. But reading about her ferocious, independent female protagonists invariably lead her to thoughts of her own future and the kind of life she wants to lead. These days such thoughts had been plaguing her all day, refusing to let her sleep. She often found herself dozing off during the day while flitting from one possible situation to another.
“Roli di! Where are you? I have good news!” Her younger sister Shagun’s persistent screams would only increase in volume and tenacity if she did not go and enquire about her arguably questionable definition of ‘good news’. She had come to realize that lately good news only meant one thing in her household. Another prospective offer for marriage had arrived and all the inmates of her house will exclaim with joy and enthusiastically debate the merits and demerits of the poor unsuspecting groom the entire day until she put a stop to it.
Sadly she was not mistaken this time either. The moment she went inside and approached her visibly thrilled sister, she was presented with an official looking document containing all the details of a slightly older looking man called Sameer, right from the time of his birth to whether he enjoys toast for breakfast. “Roli di, look! This just arrived in mail. Ma says he has such pleasing features. And Papa is convinced that your star charts will certainly match this time”, chirped Shagun. Looking at her face alight with happiness, Roli did not have the heart to tell a 15 year old girl that marriage required a lot more than pleasing features and perfectly aligned stars.
She sighed and went to look for her parents and found them in the middle of a heated discussion in the kitchen. As soon as they saw her, they immediately stopped and smiled at her. She was enveloped in a hug which reassured her for just a tiny second that everything will turn out to be all right in the end. She broke apart and threw an enquiring look towards her mother. Her parents returned identical sheepish expressions and confirmed the news. “Rolu beta, we just spoke to Mr. Verma over the phone. They have assured us that he comes from a very nice family and owns his own publishing business”, Ma began speaking but was interrupted by Papa who said, “and he is only two years older than you. I checked. You look very young for a 24 year old anyway. Sometimes these photographers make people look quite aged in pictures.”
She quietly let them finish and took a deep breath to start her oft repeated speech every time she had to listen to them praise a random guy without knowing anything about him. “Ma, Papa”, she began, “how many times do I need to tell you that it does not matter to me what kind of family he has or what his career prospects are?” She wanted to scream in frustration but continued calmly. “He might become my life partner and a life is made up of more than a job or family members”. She looked up at them exchanging glances and studying his profile again and said, “It is just a piece of paper. It may be great for job recruitment but it cannot determine whether we can tolerate each other our entire lives”.
Her mother started twitching a strand of hair between her fingers as she does whenever she gets anxious and her father noticing this, immediately put a hand on her shoulder to comfort her. Looking at their seamless interaction, she realised that a partnership is made up of these small gestures. Slight caresses, thoughtful words, constant support, this is what makes a long standing relationship successful. It is borne out of years of getting to know each other and developing patience and mutual understanding in small bouts every day. No amount of horoscope matching and essay writing in a marriage curriculum vitae will ever substitute the presence of a person in front of you and taking time out to spend real moments with them, each day building newer memories to be cherished forever.
She wondered if she could use this in the new story that she was writing and was impatient to finish this conversation and dive back into her world of books and imagination. Her mother’s voice broke into her thoughts once aging completely missing her point. “Rolu beta, you are such a wonderful girl and I am sure he is a very nice boy. Why will you tolerate each other?” Ma asked in utter confusion. “Ma”, I laughed, “I didn’t mean that literally. I just meant whether we will be able to appreciate each other’s joys and passions, annoying habits and personality quirks.” “You know me very well. I spend hours day dreaming and thinking about make believe worlds. I miss entire conversations around me when I imagine the next words of my characters. I am so immersed in my stories that I sometimes forget whether I have eaten and end up eating twice!” I finish emphatically.
“Yes, she does Ma”, Shagun suddenly appeared out of nowhere and chimed in, “I have seen her finish entire biscuit packets without realizing what she is doing. Which is why you call her Rolu don’t you?” “What if she finishes all of this boy’s food when she can’t think of an ending to her story?” Shagun burst out laughing at her own cleverness. Ma and Papa tried to smother their own smiles while Roli merely rolled her eyes. She usually pretended to be upset with her sister whenever Shagun teased her about her nickname. But in truth, she would always prefer being called Rolu, as a reference to her chubbiness and love for food rather than her actual name. As beautiful as it sounded, Roli stood for the vermilion on the forehead that sealed the fates of millions of women in this country, forever confining them to limitations of their marital status. Even her younger sister Shagun was bestowed with a name that signified the beginning of auspicious occasions, more of than not, marriage. Perhaps young girls should be named after the spirit of being carefree and following their own path, maybe then they will be allowed to make decision in their own lives. But that was probably wishful thinking on her part. You do not determine your own name, any more than your name determines how you choose to lead your lives.
Pushing her morbid thoughts to the back of her mind, she stuck her tongue out at Shagun and replied, “I may be the one stuffing sweets but look who’s tummy is about to burst Golu”. She had deliberately picked her made up name to annoy her. Before Shagun could retort however, Ma as always intervened and said, “all right all right, that’s enough girls”. “Golu, I mean Shagun”, she quickly altered looking at her crestfallen face, “go do your homework.” “And Rolu”, she finally turned towards me, “we have had this conversation before. A piece of paper does not mention whether your interests will match and whether you will like each other’s habits. But neither does it mention that you will automatically dislike everything about each other. Those details come into the picture later when you start living with someone. It takes many years. You can’t know that about anyone anyway in a short time. It’s a risk we take each time and sometimes it pays off beautifully “, she finished with an adoring glance towards my father. “But that’s just it! What if it doesn’t pay off? What if I’m stuck with someone who is unkind or who has smelly feet? What if he doesn’t wish to live with someone who spends more time with make believe than she does with reality?” She tried to argue her stand again but her mother as usual ended that discussion by claiming, “You have strange priorities”.
She huffed and puffed all the way to her room and shut the door with a bang. She was furiously pacing in her room when her door opened and tiny feet entered her room hesitantly. “Roli di”, Shagun called out meekly. “Are you mad because I told Ma about your chocolate treats? She told me that she already knew about them”. Roli smiled at her, her anger melted, and replied, “No sweetie. I am just upset because Ma and Papa want me to go start living with someone I don’t even know”. “But didi”, Shagun interjected, “you are the one who is always reading to me these stories of people falling in love and going to live on the beach or among the mountains all alone. I thought you wanted that for you as well”. “I did. I still do”, Roli replied, “but not like this. I don’t want to be judged on the basis of a horrible snapshot and a few words failing to detail my life adequately”. “I want to sit in a restaurant and meet someone’s eyes across the room. I want to go into a store and reach for the same box of cereal. I want to go for a walk and talk endlessly until I feel like the evening should never end”, she finished dreamily. Shagun suddenly started jumping up and down and clapping her hands. “That’s so easy!” She exclaimed. “When that guy comes to meet you, I will ask him to sit on the opposite end of the room and look at you. Then you can reach for the same piece of sweet at the same time and then you can go for a long walk and talk to him”. At Shagun’s words filled with childish wonder and simplicity, Roli realised that sometimes complicated problems need difficult solutions. But at other times, they have solutions as simple as clapping your hands and jumping in the room. Which is why she joined her sister and they danced around for the rest of the evening.
The next day Roli woke up bright and early and dread settled in her heart. She had been temporarily distracted last evening while playing with Shagun but now that she actually had to meet this guy today, worry engulfed her and she could not think straight. She looked at the words she had written last night but could not make any sense of it. What was she writing about? Who was telling the story? And whose story was it anyway? The words fluttered and flew in the wind. The pages fell down in a heap on the floor as the room swum around her and she felt her entire life slipping away from her along with those words. She blindly reached for one of the falling pages and clung onto it until her eyes began to focus again. She had just begun to read one of the paragraphs she had written last week when her eyes fell on one particular sentence when her principal character Esmerelda was gazing out of the tiny window in the room that she was locked in. ‘She saw the morning dew trickle down the shafts and each glistening drop filled this desolate room with warmth and hope’. Roli read her sentence over and over again until she could start breathing again. She gathered all her courage and went downstairs to meet a strange man and his family, all the while praying that by some miracle they had decided to not show up today.
But like all her prayers, this one too fell on deaf ears as she heard the sound of laughter and conversation in her living room. She entered the room and attempted to curve her mouth at three unfamiliar faces but froze mid way when one pair of curious warm eyes met hers. The entire room fell away. She was transfixed. She could no longer hear anything around her until her mother stood right in front of her and started introducing everyone. “Roli beta”, she emphasized her given name, “this is Sameer and these are his parents. We have a surprise for you”. Roli agreed in her head before her mother could even continue. She was definitely surprised. She had never entertained the possibility that she could feel this connected to someone she had never met. What was it about him that made her want to study his face and write ballads on his keen expressions? This was so unlike her. She momentarily forgot that her mother was still talking. “So what do you think Rolu?” She smirked mischievously. “Did you like our surprise?” Roli looked at her blankly, unable to fathom Ma’s behavior. Did she expect her to declare her feelings in front of an audience?
“The books silly”, Ma could not contain her glee anymore as she pointed at the stack of books next to the food. Papa realizing that Roli was still looking quite lost; picked up the top one and handed it to her with a flourish. Roli slowly read its title, unable to believe her eyes. ‘The vermilion tales’ was the heading. Shagun could not hold herself still any longer and came running towards her. “Read underneath it!” She yelled breathlessly. “By Roli Mehta”. “Your parents got it published”, Sameer spoke for the first time with a twinkle in his eye. His parents soon joined in, “your father came to us with a collection of your short stories and usually we don’t entertain new writers. But Sameer read them and loved each one of them before insisting that I read them too. And what can I say? The result is in your hands. You should be proud of yourself”. Everyone kept explaining their month long secret plan around her but Roli was in a daze. As she unfolded page after page, she was haunted by visions of her words falling down earlier in her room. Without her needing to confide in her parents, they had lovingly sewn those pages together and presented them to her in the form of a beautiful book.
But as she reached the end, the last page of the book caught her attention. It was a handwritten note. She read it once. She read it again. And then she smiled. She knew she won’t be able to stop smiling for a very long time for this is what the note had said:
‘Dear Roli,
Your writing is skillful and captivating. But it is your words which touched my very soul. Their raw sincerity ignited my imagination and stirred my senses. I had been trying and failing to put a face to these powerful thoughts. And now that I have, it will always be associated with your words of beauty and grandeur and your stories of courage and kindness.
I have been told that you despise your name because it stands for a constricting tradition. But you have the power to free those chains and liberate it. You can make it into a weapon of choice and individuality, symbolizing women like you who opt to change the narrative around them. I would always wish to stand next to Rolu and spend a lifetime getting to know her quirks. But I know I will willingly follow Roli for the rest of my life, spectacles on her nose, books in her hand and a streak of vermilion blazing on her forehead.
I have also been told that I had to stare across the room when you enter. But your vivacious sister never mentioned that I will not be able to look away. Now all you have to do is reach for a plate at the same time, hold my hand and take a walk with me. And I know that I will never want the day to end.
Sincerely,
Sameer’
