Chapter 3

And they started leaving serially.

Ani looked at the calendar pages from August 2020.

A sudden call from Kolkata. It was Raksha Bandhan, August 4. Her heart beat rhythmically with the caller tune. It was the early hours of the morning.

" Hullo,who's this ?"

"She's passed away this morning," a female unrecognizable voice conveyed in a solemn tone.

A silence followed on both sides for a few forgotten seconds.

"Ok." Ani found no other words to respond. No remorse. No condolence. 

Ani went down memory lane. When she entered their house, Pronoti was in full form. She stole hearts of stags in the Hall of Fame. Her performances on stage ,in the radio, in television and in parties arranged anywhere ,occasionally fetched laurels for her. Her only child ,as talented, handsome and ambitious ,carved out a niche for himself.

Ani fell for Amit. He longed for emotional dependence . He was a dreamer too. He found that he could share ,though in a negligible way, some of his experience with Ani ,who listened attentively and nver proved to be judgemental. 

Amit was too close one day to confiding something that he had never told anybody earlier .

" Will you keep it to yourself only?" Amit said as the boat sailed from the bank towards the middle of the Hooghly River. A simple treat on his birthday he gave Ani. They both would take the river route to Belur. The river was deep. The launches passing by caused the boat to rise  up and descend with the waves. The boatsmen rowed while Amit recited Jibananda Das,   Nazrul, Shankha Ghosh and sang some romantic numbers from Rabindranath's immortal collections.

Ani watched him ponderously. Does he have a mountain of unspoken words that he is giving a tangential vent through these mediums of expression ? He is not the person that she has known for almost two years now. However ,an unseen thread seems to draw them nearer to each other than ever before.

Ani was lost in her own thoughts when she realized that he was now sitting close enough to brush his shoulders against her. The oarsmen ,perhaps ,were used to such couple - behaviour .They were indifferent even when he took Ani's  hands in his and became silent suddenly.

Both were perhaps engrossed in the melodious sound that silently coverged in their feelings and the sound of silence made them oblivious of the moving boat that had already reached Belur and one of the oarsmen called out ---"Didi time to let us go".

O no so fast a space of forty minutes fleeted to feelings? Amit still gripped her right palm firmly.

They looked ahead .The Belur Math ,where monks, couples old and young, male and female loners, lovers of all age groups, fanatics and liberals, vendors and the frustrated unemployed buying peanuts or a cup of tea in paper cups, children with parents and grandparents --yes a colourful humanity walked around the vast green meadow every single day from early morning till sunset.