Penultimate Rain...

I cut the phone and stood there with those words still ringing in my ears. It took a moment for the gravity of the situation to sink into me. Slowly it dawned on me…

Today was the last day…My last chance...My only hope. Tomorrow she will be gone and I shall be left all alone with an eternal emptiness in my heart. All I shall have with me is scant but vivid memories of her…

The sky was busy, gathering clouds and getting darker by the minute. By your instincts you could tell…it was going to rain. I looked up at it hoping for a sign, a clue as to what to do. But, as always it was silent or spoke in a language alien to me.

Innumerable thoughts clattered in my mind. But this was not the time to sit and think, it was time to act. I set about searching for her, running around madly here and there looking for her.  I searched and searched everywhere but as fate would have it… she was nowhere to be found.

Tears swelled up in my eyes and that strange feeling got into me. The feeling of losing her…the feeling of being away from her…that feeling of not seeing her…that feeling of not being able to hear her voice. 

As if the sky had read my mind and wanted to sympathize with me, it started to drizzle. The wind started brewing up and was now blowing fiercely. It was as if the storm in my heart was playing itself in front of my eyes.  Soon the drizzle turned into heavy rainfall. I stood there getting drenched.

The rain might have quenched the thirst and given respite from the heat to scores of people but it sure wrecked my chances of meeting her. Now, even my remotest hopes had faded away.

Why does it always happen to me? Why does fortune never favor me?

I looked up to the sky again and said…give me one last chance. Dejected I walked back.

Soaked to the skin, I entered my room. As I changed to dry clothes, my mind was restless as a bee trying to conjure up some possibility of meeting her. I sat looking out of the window and the smell of the wet earth made me nostalgic. Even though I wanted to do it personally, I couldn’t hold myself back any longer. I picked up the phone and dialed her number.

She picked up and said ‘Hello’. 

I said ‘Hi’.

But words failed me after that. Hearing her pristine voice felt so soothing that nothing came out of my mouth. I cut the call and damned myself for being an idiot…a jerk…a nincompoop.

I calmed myself and dialed again. She picked up the phone and answered angrily ‘who is this?’ I introduced myself and blabbered something on the phone nonstop without giving her a chance to speak. I don’t know what I said or how I said but, I said all that I wanted to.

I wondered if she understood anything.  But her final words said it all.

I had conveyed my message and she had understood it flawlessly. I was relieved and elated.

Now, the exile shall turn fruitful. 

P.S.

The innocence of your words on the phone allayed all my fears.