FICTION
Distant yet Close
Promita Dey
It was 8 p.m., and Kunal’s flight had already landed an hour back. I had been waiting since morning to get a glimpse of him. Since the lockdown had started, I had not seen him any way other than staring at him through a rectangular screen. While I had been juggling round the clock, I heard a voice calling me from the outside. Ah! It is finally him. All dressed all in kurta pajamas and fully masked up, he stood waving to me from downstairs, and all I could do was wave back from my balcony. He was staying in a flat opposite mine, as I had tested Covid positive two weeks back. Though I had recovered, we decided to maintain distance from each other till I fully recovered from the symptoms.
The next day was Diwali, so everyone at my house was busy cleaning down every corner of the house. It was our first Diwali after marriage, and unfortunately, the pandemic had separated us physically. Nevertheless, Kunal had different plans for me, which were still unknown to me. I could see from the balcony that he had passed on a massive sanitized bag to my father.
The bag was soon brought to our room by our maid; I excitedly unpacked it to find a beautiful dress, a paper balloon, two boxes of my favorite sweet kalakand, and a few packets of phooljhadi. I did not know how we would celebrate our first Diwali together as we were not supposed to meet.
As I was busy thinking it, a text popped up on my phone which read, “We will celebrate Diwali together, my love. I will ask you to do certain things and promise me, that you will do it without asking me for explanations.” His message brought a big smile to my confused face, and with a “yes” as a reply, after dinner I ended up on my bed, various thoughts mingling and trying to guess what plans Kunal had for me.
The following day, my eyes opened with the notification of a text from Kunal, “Tonight, wear a suit and bring diyas to the balcony along with the phooljhadi. For lunch, I am preparing your favourite, Kadai Chicken which I will send to your room through Radha bai.” Kunal had never been to the kitchen and cooked anything since we got married. Though he is a fantastic cook, his busy job schedule never allowed me to witness this side of his. His small effort made my morning, and I felt overwhelmed over how he wanted to make our ‘first’ Diwali so special.
Lunch went well, with his deliciously cooked Kadai Chicken and Ma’s butter naan, which got passed to his flat. We did not feel separated for a moment, even as we remained connected through FaceTime for the entire duration of the meal.
In the evening, I arranged everything as he had asked me to and stood waiting in my balcony. A few minutes later, I was surprised to find him on his balcony, right opposite mine. He was wearing a white kurta, twinning with my suit. He gave me a sign to start lighting the diyas, and he did the same. While lighting the diyas, I caught him taking pictures of me and I literally blushed. We exchanged smiles and glances. He lit a phooljhadi, made a love sign with its trailing sparkles and texted me “I love you,” to which I lit another phooljadi and made a wink emoji with it. We laughed hard and jumped to the paper balloon. Both of our balloons had each other’s names inked, and we let it fly at the same time and watched them until they vanished from sight. Choti Diwali went off well.
The next morning, I woke up a bit late. I quickly checked my phone for Kunal’s message. He wrote, “My gorgeous, wear the beautiful gown I had sent you, set your table and laptop on the balcony along with the candles. And yes, do not forget to bring the surprise food to the table. Kunal and I were not lovers before marriage, as our parents had fixed our marriage. But honestly, he was the best man I had met in my life. My day went by appreciating his efforts and thinking about our special night. At 7 p.m., the table got set, and I had connected on FaceTime and was waiting waited for him to join. I wore the new gown, and the food was still packed as he had instructed the maid to inform me not to open it. Soon he joined the call. He looked perfect in the blue sherwani, and I could not stop myself from staring at him.
He told me, “Ab khana unpack kia jaye, madam.”
I giggled and removed the lids of the plates and bowls. I was pretty astonished! I did not tell anyone that I have been craving Chinese food for so long but could not have it for two reasons: no one at home could cook Chinese cuisine, and the other because all the food delivery was closed due to the pandemic. To my surprise, he had cooked Hakka Noodles, Corn Soup and Chilli Chicken for me. We had our food, talked for hours, and not even for a minute, did he make me feel that he was away from me. In the midst of the pandemic, we had our candle light dinner.
Before going to sleep, I texted him, “Love has no boundaries and you proved it. Not even for a second, did I feel I was away from you. Our first Diwali was indeed unique, and I thank you for the same. A pandemic can make us physically distant, but it cannot separate us and our bond. Love you, Kunal.”
No comments:
Post a Comment