She

Dated: 18th June, 1999

I was in my final year of education when I first saw her. She wasn’t beautiful in any context of speaking, but, she was hardly a person who would pass off without a second glance by any of those who saw her. She stayed at my neighbour’s place, but I never knew her name, if she had one, nor did I ever bother to know. She’d always be there, in her room, just outside my room’s window.

I do not know if she saw me as much as I have seen her. She was always busy in her room. Going round and round, doing nothing in particular, eating non-vegetarian stuff and the rot – not that I complained. She never studied and I – being poor in studies – envied her, for I had to constantly put my nose into books to get good grades lest the knuckles of despondency hit me.

I wasn’t in love with her, but I must say, she was a very important girl in my life leave alone neither did I know her personally nor did I know her name. In a way, she was what people generally say as, the woman behind the successful man. Because I used to see her only when I came to my room to study. But generally whenever I study, the mind wanders away, as it usually happens, and so does the eyes. Whenever my eyes set on her, I would say to myself, “No girls for me. Not yet, anyway,” and I used to laugh. And it was back to studies. The process continued and the result: my eyes fell more to the books, I studied and I got respectable grades. The woman behind the man indeed!

I did not know her exact age, but knew enough that she was ready to move with the boy whom she liked. Predictably, a few months later, she had had a boy friend. I didn’t feel jealous – how could I? – but I missed her, for, she hardly was in the room; always roaming around with that boyfriend of hers. A few days later, she was back in her room, but I could detect a sense of depression in her, because she wasn’t bustling around as she used to on other days. I concluded that perhaps she had broken off with him. I couldn’t summon the guts to talk to her through the window any time, for fear that my parents would hear me and think all ridiculous things about me. You know them! A boy talking to a girl always sends sparks flying! So there was no way for me to go to her and say, “C’mon, it’s not the end of the world. There’s always going to be someone else.”

Anyway, later, she disappeared for a few months and returned back with an extended stomach meaning pregnant. I guess the marriage was a silent affair. Our neighbour was anyway a silent community, and a person from that community is expected to be silent about her activities anyway.

Now she is back again in her room. Not bustling, for her stomach’s sake, but she is back. She looks quite contended. Naturally, she is going to go off once her baby is delivered.

I wish I could talk to her just once before she goes off. I wish I could somehow congratulate her when she gets her baby.

If only lizards understood what men talked…