MISSED THE HEART BY 2 INCHES

             Its 12th of November…a pleasant evening.. Birds chirping in their nests.. An unusual hot loo sets in... Everything looks perfect.. Except of course the dead body.. Too much blood for any passersby comfort you know.. The body lies on the pavement beside river Mahanadi. It’s a sorry sorry sight... The white salwar was scarlet with blood..

I have been observing them right from the 1st year of our engineering college. You see.. I had a little crush on the girl. But then again, what was my college life if not a series of crushes right from my OB maam to “whats her name” from Electrical Department. This is the story that started when they accidentally touched hands while exchanging lab records to the fateful day of 12th November. It started like any other college love story. The meet each other in the 1st year basic electrical lab.. They exchanged lab records. They smiled.. their eyes met… with the blurring sound of the 220V AC motors in the background.. Yeah you may say it was like a movie scene.. Its true though.. Well like all hindi romantic movies, It disgusts me. It was an instant spark she used to tell me.. Load of crap i say... But its their story.. They talked in the canteen over coffee.. She wrote his name and he wrote her name in the “boy/girl I like the most” in our college Welcome Ceremony. And the lord said… ”let there be love”. She gave her a rose at the welcome and voilà…Love, stupid stupid love.

They were the perfect couple. Budding lovers use to look up to them and ask for tips.. Bloody losers. They cared for each other. They put each other’s attendance proxies; they introduced each other to their respective parents. It was as if they had planned their whole life already.

 And then things started going wrong.. horribly wrong.

She was the most beautiful smart dumb girl I had ever seen. She was fun-loving hip hop girl. She was very strong minded. She was a bundle of joy… she was very broad minded.. talked with every one happily.. even to the shy boys that come to engineering colleges. I knew that as I was one of them.. Needless to say I hated Varun with all my guts. Varun on the other hand wasn’t ..what can I say.. a social guy. He didn’t talk to his batchmates much… only on a need basis. Didn’t attend college functions Didn’t go to picnics… Well we boys didn’t take much heed of him.. “Screw him” we said.

By the end of 2nd year the “honey-moon” phase of their relationship was over.

If I was him i would have loved her more, cared for her more. Would have literally carved out my heart for her. But not that bastard. Long ago he had started abusing her. Wear this, don’t wear that.. "how could you talk with that guy".. After some days all he said were abuses. He had converted into a jealous insecure pathetic piece of a human being. I loathed and hated his very existence. When she used to talk with me she never brought up his topic. I couldn’t look her in the eye. There was way too much sadness in them for me to bear. She had become inattentive. Her grades degraded. It was a really messed up situation.

He suspected her of everything. Once he saw her riding with another boy.. He called her and in front of the whole class and abused her in all possible languages known. He even physically assaulted her sometimes. He once pinned her to the wall during one of our visas. But she was in love. Screw her love.

It was 11th. I remember every moment of that day. Her father had a brain stroke. She got the news during our RTC class. She was in a messed up situation. She started shivering from head to toe. Varun was nowhere to be seen. Her father was admitted in a govt hospital in Cuttack. She was looking at everyone helplessly. Cuttack was 50km from our college. She didn't have any idea how to get there for reason had failed her. I went to hostel and arranged a bike. I offered her to take her to the hospital. But she was afraid. "What if Varun sees me with you?". I could see the extent to which she was damaged. I caught her hand and forcibly made her sit on my bike. As i was turning my bike i saw S looking at me as he just arrived. I don't know why that day i didn't just stop the bike and let her go with him. But i didn't. I also don't know why i smiled at Varun as my eyes met his eyes; those which were burning with hatred. She hadn't seen him. I rode off. Big mistake.

As we drove she put her head on my back and cried all the way. I don't know why but i was not feeling sad anymore. As my tshirt grew more and more wet from her precious tears I had a feeling of great contentment. I had finally saved her from that bastard. I was wrong.. So very wrong. We reached the hospital. Her mother was already there. She was a mess. Shakshi put a brave face in front of her. She said nothing was going to happen to dad. We were sitting at the reception hall. I got up to leave. She caught my hand. I our eyes met. I sat down. Why did i sit? I have been asking this question to myself for the past 1 year. Varun came through the door. She was still holding my hand. By the time her teary eyes recognized him he was storming out of the hospital. She left my hand and ran after him. But he had already left. The lift arrived. Her father was to undergo a MRI scan. It was a sorry sight when her father was rolled out. He was unconscious. The ward boys stopped the bed in front of her.. “Dad.. Dad can u hear me?”.. Suddenly he sat up with the vigor of a normal person. “Who are u.?” “Who are they?” he said pointing at us. And then he sunk back to his bed, as if drained of all life. His right hand was tied up. The doctors said that it was twitching. There were tubes coming out of every pore of his body. They rolled him out for the MRI. I looked at her. She was unresponsive. It was obvious she had never seen his father in such a state. She was in shock. I made her sit. I sat beside her. She was murmuring. "He didn't recognize me", "He didn't recognize me"... She kept on saying.

I left that night. Her father died that night.

I reached the next morning. Her mother was crying. Relatives had arrived. Mourning everywhere. But she was sitting in the next bench. Still as a mourning crane. Not a shred of tear in her beautiful sad eyes. It was as if she had no recognition of her surroundings. I sat beside her. She looked at me and smiled. I didn’t know what to say. Her phone began to ring. It was Varun. Her eyes swelled up. She broke down. She couldn't stop her tears anymore. She picked up the phone. I didn't hear anything. She was crying.. Pleading... "Please listen to me. " that was all she said.. All she could say. After a long time on the phone, suddenly her face became emotionless. Stoic. The tears had stop flowing. Her face had become hard like a stone. It was as if she had made a decision. A final decision. She cut the phone. She went into the hospital. She came back after a few moments. She was hiding something in her churni. "G, will you take me to naval enclosure on the river bank of Mahanadi. Varun is waiting for me there?" I looked into her eyes. I couldn’t.. Somehow something was wrong. I looked at her... I kept looking. She looked back. I stood up. We left. She wasn’t crying. She looked as a girl determined to do some deed. I didn't ask. Why didn’t I?

 Near the river banks pavement she asked me to stop. She got off the bike. She hug me. Gave me a little kiss and said “thanks for everything G”. There was not a shred of emotion in her voice. The overflowing Mahanadi roared as she turned away. I stood there and watched her as she walked away. Mahanadi was deafening.

Varun was already there. She walked up to him. “We are through”, he said. “I know you love G. I can't believe you bitch. After all i did for you.. All the sacrifices i made for you”. She murmured "sacrifices?". He wasn't listening. Then again when did he ever listen to her? “How could you . I am going to kill that son of a bitch. He took you away from me”. She had broken down. She was crying helplessly. Passerby were looking at her... “Don't you act now. I know what you and G have been doing behind my back”. "But.. But" was all she could say. “He is such a big looser that none of the other girls talk with him..

Only you do”. She had stopped fighting. But then again she had stoped fighting a long time ago.

“Our relationship is over.. I don’t even know now whether we ever had a relationship. Upon hearing this she became impassive. She became very still. No more tears…the tears were drying. It was like something inside her died. “No doubt your father is in the hospital… what father would want a daughter like you? Yes maybe he should die than have a daughter like you…” She looked at him as if she had never seen him before. A range of emotions, from disbelief to anger to betrayal passed her face. Then there was the final emotion. Love. She was shaking like a leaf in a storm as if trying to hold on to the last thread of sanity left in her. And it was with that final emotion, love, that she stabbed him. She stabbed him with the knife she had brought from the hospital. “Yes Varun, he is dead”.. A look of sheer disbelief and pain masked Varun’s face. He looked down at the spot the cold knife had pierced his body. Spidery veins of blood crisscrossed his white shirt. Varun fell down and died in his own pool of blood, while she sat beside her. And all that the passersby’s could see was love in the eyes, eyes of the girl who had just stabbed his boyfriend. She just sat beside Varun as if she would never leave him…even in death. She ran her hand through his hair. She wasn’t crying but finally a solitary tear betrayed her. The tear slid down her beautiful face and on to the blood strained white churni.

 I would never know whether it was pre meditated or not. Nor will I never know if she had decided to kill him before she reached that river bank. All I know is that she loved him. She couldn’t stab him in the heart.. His heart was hers you see… Yeah.. The knife had missed the heart by 2 inches...