‘You?’ she asks.
‘Fiancée too,’ I answer, savouring the word.
The first time I used it was a couple of days ago at the landlord’s. The landlord had been sceptical, the word being abused by bachelors to get into apartment buildings that don’t allow bachelors, but the landlord seemingly liked me so he let it slide. Sumrit is also the only one who knows I’m here at the airport. The other three guys had all responded with, ‘Dekh le, if you really want to do it. Don’t regret it later,’ when I’d first mentioned it. That was disappointing. You want your friends to back every decision of yours, even if it is a bad one. What are friends for, if not for shouldering a part of the blame andresponsibility for your actions? But what blame? Nothing will go wrong.
‘What?’ she exclaims. ‘Crazy! Where’s she coming from?’
‘Lucknow.’
‘No way! Seriously? Which flight?’
I check the ticket. ‘10.20 a.m. landing. Indigo.’
I watch her eyes grow wide and lips curve in a small circle. ‘Noooooo.’
‘10.20 a.m. landing too?’
‘Wow!’ she says and grabs my hand excitedly. ‘This is going to be so crazy when we tell them!’
Will it be crazy for Megha? Will I tell her about this? Or will she be anxious about the new life that awaits us? Will she be thinking—and blaming me—about how I uprooted us? But this girl has been nice to me so I don’t say any of that. I don’t tell her that I feel a deep sense of relief or that I’m deeply terrified of what lies in the future. I don’t tell her how scared I am. I don’t tell her that it’s hard for me to hold myself together till 10.20 a.m., and all I am waiting for is for Megha to land and hold me and tell me that we are doing the right thing. That I need her to walk towards me and say the words, ‘We’re okay.’
Just that.
‘Hey?’ she says.
‘Huh?’
‘You okay?’
‘I’m fine.’ And then add, ‘As you said, it will totally be crazy.’
2
Aditi
I can’t stay in this washroom stall for too long.
I could lie to Raghav—the nervous guy outside—and say I had an upset stomach. But then he’d picture me on the toilet, sweating, eyes twitching. Because that’s better than saying that I have trouble controlling my tears. And then he would have to ask why out of politeness and it would get weird.Just stop crying, Aditi! This is what you want!I wipe my tears even as more threaten to flow. I can’t cry for too long. In ninety minutes, Aman lands, and he’ll expect me to jump into his arms. I wonder if he’ll find me any heavier, considering my heart feels like lead at the moment.
I wipe my tears and leave the bathroom stall.
Outside, Raghav is waiting for me, two steaming plates of idlis in front of him. I want to remind him that it was two hundred rupees, not a thousand, and that the chai he ordered earlier would have been enough. Under normal circumstances, I would have cut off the conversation a long time ago. But nothing about today is normal. I needed to talk to someone to stop thinking and he was there: polite, second-guessing if he should keep talking to me or go away respectfully—which are three golden rules of any man talking to a girl that he doesn’t know.
Also, I can’t ignore the fact that his fiancée and mine are on the same flight(!), and that he seems to be carrying the same nervousness that I am.
‘My stomach’s a bit upset,’ I tell him as I sit down.
‘Stress can do that to you.’
‘What? I’m not stressed!’
He looks at me as though he knows I’m lying.
‘Their flight’s delayed. Forty-five minutes,’ he tells me.
I turn to look at the arrivals board. Just behind it, I see rain pattering on the large glass walls of the airport.
He continues, ‘A few flights have already tried landing but ended up turning around.’
