My dear
Avantika,
I am dismally and unforgivably late, having been stuck in Yudh land for the past over 5 weeks, but I
am here at long last-- der
aaye durust aaye.I was relieved to
see that Chapter 11 was not up yet!
This
one is really about, no, not love blossoming between Arjun and Sakshi,
but something which I think is rarer - a real sense of belonging together, with
all the caring for each other that comes with that territory.
It is as yet mostly on Arjun's side, for
though Sakshi feels, to use the beautiful and apposite Urdu word, mehfoos with him,
she is too beset with 3 separate sets of worries - about her campaign to clear her father's name, about her current assignment with Jay, and
now about her uncle - to have any time
or emotional energy for anything else. This
is not sakshi_stargazer, at least not
for the present.
But Arjun does not know why he feels what he feels and does what he does. Neither
why he goes to the hospital nor why
he stays there for hours on end, holding
Sakshi's hand, metaphorically speaking, helping thru that long agonizing wait
outside the OT. It is as yet nascent in
him, this need to comfort her and ease
her worries, and he is puzzled by such unfamiliar emotions. But I was relieved
that he does not want to fight them, which would have been an additional
complication!
You have handled this delicate transition
with a very sure touch, Avantika, and
have managed to preserve its as yet will
o' the wisp quality. There is magic in this tentative reaching out to each
other, just as surely as in the snowflakes that pile into Sakshi's outstretched
palm. I loved that line of yours after
Arjun follows Sakshi into the ICU, and again, he knows not why.
Something had
changed in that moment..
As for the
Arjun-Sakshi, a walk to remember,that the precap offers, I hope it is to the Kempty Falls. That was the in place in Mussoorie for moonlight
rambles, even 40 years ago! As I am sure
your grandmum would know. I hope you get
on that train to Dehra Dun with her
soon.
I liked the new entrant, Mr. Abhinav Krishna,
a nice Tamil name, though of course these days, with the new fads in names, he could be from
anywhere in India! He sounds interesting and
also flexible, in that unlike with, say, Arjun, you can, if you so
choose, make this AK white, black or grey.
I hope it is grey!
Now some questions.
-Why is a
blessedly Roshni-less Arjun so
perennially agonized, so inhibited, and so afraid of any emotions at
all? You say "Over the years, loneliness and the anguish contained within him had
rendered him incapable of accepting a change, for fear of losing a grip over
his restrained emotions; or so he forced himself to believe." But why? Is it only the calumny that besmirched the honour of his dead mentor that causes him to
become so closed in? It seems a bit too
much to me. Or is there something else that you have not revealed as yet?
-I shall not ask you who is the client for whom
Sakshi, on a 6 month sabbatical from the India Post Enterprises, and Jay are
working right now, for you would hardly want to open up that
card at this point. But how would
investigating or even getting to the bottom the arms smuggling racket centred
on the Garhwal Police Academy help Sakshi
progress with her crusade to clear her father's name?
This is besides
my other doubt about the size of an arms
smuggling racket where the smuggled goods can be fitted into the storage
compartment of a scooty. And where would
the guns come from anyway? The Academy
stock of guns and ammo would be carefully entered into registers and checked every few days.
To revert, my
second question arises, of course, because we are still in the dark as to how
exactly Col. Anand was framed, arrested, probably sentenced on trumped up evidence, and then disposed of
for good in an explosion triggered in
the police van in which
he was being taken back from the hospital. I hope at least some of these
questions are answered in the next chapter.
Shyamala Aunty
[QUOTE=Fantasia_junkie]
Heylo everyone.. The next one is up! It's longer than usual but I couldn't stop in the middle.. 😛
Do read and review, please..
I've replied to your previous comments. Take a look, if you'd like to.. 😊
Chapter 10
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