Love? yes, love.
Brave are those that do greater battles than we can imagine.
He smiled his thoughts away. What could happen to him in this new place? How could a new school make so much of a difference to his life. He was sure and secure in his shell. In his impenetrable defense that has withstood many storms. Many battles and wars through which he had survived, going from strength to strength. Where could his mind and heart lead him now?
She entered the school, shyly defensive and apprehensive. This would be a new experience. How could this be? Though outwardly strong and safe, deep inside she was a trembling wreck of emotions and fears. She was far too terrified to let anyone see her true self. This first day would be important.
He sat in the class, the freshness of the feeling reflected in the silence and mutual sizing up taking place. There was polite conversation. A low murmur snaking around the class that reflected the official questions everyone asked everyone else. He mutely sat through his share, offering nothing, asking nothing. Not out of pride or want of solitude but simply absorbing the atmosphere before he added his share.
The girls were voluble and talkative. She instantly felt at home. Asking her share of questions, replying softly but clearly in that gorgeous soft silky voice of hers. The voice that seemed like it belonged to someone else. A voice as though it was a beautiful movie star who was whispering sweet nothings in a star-lit night. A voice that whispered of good times, a voice then generally captured attention.
He heard a voice that told him more than most people could understand. A voice that tugged somewhere deep inside him. One of the girls. His mind flipped. What was happening? Who was she? And, what was she doing to him? He as listened more intently. He could approximately place where it was coming for. He had to get to know her. He had to do that discreetly. What was she saying...
As she spoke, her feelings of inadequacy vanished. She was comfortable now. She wondered about the rest of her class. How would they be? What kind of friends would she make? How would this year pass? She was comfortable in the awareness that she did not want to see so much into the future. She was happy and comfortable where she was. Now, what was the teacher saying she thought,she had to focus on her academic work.
He needed to get appropriately introduced to her. He examined each possibility and discarded it. Most of them involved other people that he did not feel comfortable with. To add, how could he identify her - by her voice? 'Not such a good idea' his logical side replied. He waited and prayed for luck. Few boys have prayed so much or so hard. He took God into his confidence and explained all.
She sighed a sigh of relief. The first day was over. She could reach the safety of her home. And then, examine each event of today and analyze it appropriately. Sort out events, people and places. Tidy her mind and rest. She had to travel back via the school bus. Her father wasn't free now to drop her home. She shrugged. The day hadn't been bad. The trip needn't be worse.
He was in the bus early. He needed to think. Each method was considered and then discarded. There had to be a way. He just needed to think. There was a commotion at the door. A new student someone was late entering the bus. The routes would take sometime to get used to he thought. The bus began to move instantly. The next thing he felt was someone landing onto his lap. Someone that smelt of a heavenly perfume and felt like an angel. More and most importantly repeating "sorry" in that gorgeous voice.
She could have died of embarrassment. How could they make the bus move so suddenly. She could have got hurt. More than the indignation was the mortification that she had landed on someone that she didn't know. Entirely terrified that everyone knew what exactly happened, she slid off whoever and sat in the next seat. Looking away, entirely disinterested and completely casual, she tried a daring move. She introduced herself and started a conversation.
He couldn't believe his luck. Yea gods, you do respond pretty quick. How often does the object of your dreams fall into your lap - that too this time it was taking it literally. She was talking to him. Amazing. How much better could this get. She was playing it casual and normal. Ok. He could do that too. He could do it better. He could act as though someone fell into his lap everyday. He turned his body away from her ever so slightly and began to respond.
This being was not so bad. Apart from the initial freeze, this guy was nice. Cute even. Nice voice. She liked the way he spoke. In soft measured sentences. Like as though he weighed what he wanted to say twice before he said it. Like as though each word he spoke he meant and meant deep inside. She felt a spark of emotion. Well, well what do we have here, she wondered, a good friend?
Many days and many conversations later, he was still enchanted. The most exciting part of school now seemed to be the part when he returned home - with her. He now knew about her all that he wanted to know. Good friends - that's all we are, he thought. Desperately wanting not to destroy what he had, he was satisfied in the fact that she spoke regularly only to him. She was only a good friend, nothing else, he fervently counselled himself.
She had battles going on within her as well. For the very first time it seemed, she was alive. She was asking herself questions that she had never asked herself before. She too desperately was seeking answers to the same questions that he was doing battle with. Except of course that she did not know. Thinking herself to be all alone and stupid in feeling this way, she jealously savored the time that she had with him.
The cosmos gives you only so many chances. Today was the day. he decided to gamble. To tell her all. Tell her the way he felt from the very first day that he had heard her speaking. That fateful first day of class. That day that would for ever stay in his mind. Today he would tell her all.
When would she get the courage to speak she wondered. Perhaps it would never happen. She had for long discounted the possibility of him speaking about her. After all for him, she was just a good friend. He was intelligent, mature and unlikely to react in ways that she could. It came down to her wanting to either acknowledge it or forget about it. She weighed the pros and cons. For the time being, let's forget it being the ultimate result that her mind took.
He spoke. Stumbling over his sentences. Speaking irrationally without coherence or clarity. Acting as though he was drunk. His words meandered on a path of their own. His thoughts seemed to flow out of him as though they had a life of their own. She seemed to react slowly. She want saying much. His heart skipped beats, wondering if he had the wrong thing. Was this the end of everything?
Her mind was filled with a million thoughts all at the same time. Yes, yes, she was not the only one. She was safe and secure again. He was as impressed by her as she was by him. He was all but what she could have asked for in a dream. She tell him now, could tell him the way she felt. She could tell him all about the battles that she had within her. She had a silly smile on her face. She was in love.
As she spoke, his mind soared. So, she felt the same way too. His life seemed as if it was bursting with joy and happiness. He was reveling in this feeling. The feeling that he owned the whole world. The feeling that he was the only person to have experienced this feeling. This sensation of pure emotion, of love that seemed to cross almost anything. His luck was in today, he thought. Apart from the accident on the first day, he had not touched her. Surprisingly for himself, he dared to reach across and touch her face with his fingertips.
Gingerly as though he was touching a masterpiece his fingers moved over her face. Lightly touching and nervously shivering, his fingers traced out the curves and lines of her face. She responded by placing her equally nervous fingertips onto his face. She was equally nervous about the planes and ridges that she was feeling. And it was in this manner that they first saw each other, for their fingertips long accustomed to Braille were the eyes for this couple. Although both of them were blind, they sightlessly looked into each eyes with more love that can be rarely seen, more felt. Such are the ways of love.