something I want to be worried of. We are all excited about many other things here.”

  Purvi pushed Poorna to ask sorry. Poorna slowly lifted her head and said, “amm….. meee…. I ammmm….. really…… am…..”

  Purvi shouted, “Say it! You are doing it like a struggling fly in the food”

  Poorna said “I am sorry Sumit” and smiled at him.

  Sumit replied, “Accepted and agreed”

  Purvi was in hurry. She said, “You two talk a while” and left the room.

  Just as Purvi left, Poorna started non-stop. “What do you think Sumit? I told everything to my sister because I knew she would bring me here. Oh dude! You are such a show off!”

  Sumit was a lot puzzled! He said “Whattt?? Nonsense!”

  Poorna went “You do all things to seek attention. You are really such a show off. Am not at all sorry for what I did to you. In fact I feel sorry for your friends that I don’t know how they tolerate you. You are a total jerk. ”

  Sumit responded calmly, “God! These girls! Poorna, when will you get your brains? Will you ever stop bugging up my life? Just don’t look at me or talk to me!”

  Poorna answered “Never! I will treat you the same till the day we depart from here. I won’t leave you that easily. I will haunt you!”

  Sumit went crazy. He started throwing the pillows at her. Poorna rushed towards the door, grabbed the pillow Sumit was throwing at her and threw back at him. She had a perfect aim. It hit him right at head. After a small fight Poorna before leaving the room screamed, “I will haunt you Mister!”

  Forty: The Letter

  As Poorna left the room, Sumit saw a letter lying on the bed. He was questioned to see that. It was sealed in an envelope. He picked it up, opened the envelope and read it in hurry. It just said an incomplete sentence. It read, “Please Help!”

  Why would someone keep a letter on his bed? That’s too which reads “Please Help!”. He started the guessing game on who would it be. Would it be Aakash or Anwesha? It cannot be. If so they could have told him directly. They were thick friends.

  Purvi was in his room. Was it she who left the letter? Is it something she wants to share? He started feeling all the concerns about Purvi.  He had mixed thoughts of all the positive and negative feelings. Why would Purvi say so? What would it be? Do I need to go and talk to her? He decided to go and talk. He rushed out of his room and started searching for Purvi. He could not find her anywhere.

  He searched for her in the kitchen, hall, in culture hall, almost everywhere and could not find her. With every place he moved in search of her, his worry increased. He looked tensed and he started running all over. He suddenly saw her sitting in garden along with Mohit where he was putting colors on her hand.

  Sumit had a sigh of relief and headed back to his room. He just cursed himself for being so weirdo. As he reached his room he saw one more letter on his bed. He rushed and opened it. It read almost the same but a complete sentence. It said, “Please Help Yourself from Being Mental – Poorna”. Sumit shut the door and shouted out loud! “Why did I even not think of this? This girl is getting me go mad. I will have to do something. God, save me from the trauma!”

  Forty One: Sumit and Amit

  Sumit was literally irritated. One reason being Poorna was very much of a torture to him. Secondly, he had high and different expectations when he had seen her first time. He had never experienced so much of irritations before from anyone else, anywhere else. He decided to clear the mess that day evening.

  With one more day left to marriage, there were still a hundred rituals. Purvi had her hand colorful and her friends were dancing around her. Purvi called Aakash, Anwesha, and Sumit and told them to prepare for a dance number by next two hours. She also suggested including Poorna to the group and they all happily agreed. Yeah Aakash and Anwesha did. Sumit had crooked smile. Purvi added, “There will be many dances tonight. Small teams are formed and they are all surprises. Don’t practice too much. Synchronize a little and leave the rest to fun. It’s all about dancing the heart out. I and Mohit are performing as well.”

  Aakash and Anwesha asked Sumit to call Poorna. Sumit thought this would be a best opportunity to talk to her and luckily she was in her room. He rushed to her room. Poorna was crying. As she saw Sumit, she started crying very loudly.

  Sumit had already prepared in his mind on how he is going to shout at her. As he saw her crying, he started thinking is she really crying and is this just one more of her funny acts? He was confused and said to his mind, “God, Why always ME??”. He still made up his mind and went to her and asked “What really happened now? Was it not enough of teasing? If you want to do more, here I am. Slap two or three more and stop stalking me!”

  Poorna started crying more loudly and she covered herself in blanket. Sumit said loudly, “Why do I always meet cry babies!?? Firstly, you tortured me. Now you cry? Instead of asking me sorry? You are so mean! Come on slap me? You may even throw me out!”

 

  Poorna, uncovered herself from blanket and said, “Go Away Amit!”. Sumit stood still and shouted back, “Whattt??”.

  Sumit had chills running down from his head to toe. His heart had started beating faster. He was feeling nervous. Poorna was still crying!

  Forty Two: The Dark Past

  Sumit could not believe his ears. He said “I am sorry Poorna” and ran out of the room.  He rushed to Aakash and said “I am having a little headache, you carry with dance practice. I will rest a while” and started walking towards his room. In a moment, Sumit was on his bed with hands on his head. Poorna in her room was still crying. The emotions had caught her up like a dangling web.

  You know sometimes the world around you looks meaningless and senseless and empty and insignificant and immaterial and of no consequence! That’s how exactly Sumit was feeling about himself. He was feeling down and ashamed of himself. Never in his life had he imagined that such a day would come and stand before him and he had no answers to back himself up.  The only things he had to do were ask sorry and be ready to take any kind of castigation. It was the matter of trust and promises.  When the trust is broken, even after earning back, it will never be the same.

  He had realized why the face looked familiar to him when had seen Poorna for the first time. Not because that she was Purvi’s sister. But also he had met her before. It was like around five years ago during his irresistible teen-age. Had he even not thought in his wildest dreams he would meet this girl again.

  Poorna, made her mind up and came to Aakash and Anwesha. They both were trying to put some dance steps along with other friends of Purvi. They all had mixed up as one team.  Poorna joined them. Flowing from her genes she was good at dancing as well. Poorna took the lead and choreographed the dance number. She picked up all the rock numbers and made it spicy enough to dance. This dance practice got Poorna closer to Anwesha.

  It was evening and the performances began. Team by team, groups came up one by one and danced the heart out. Every family member was dancing along and it was fun all around. Everyone enjoyed the evening and there was one huge family dance in the evening. Followed by were delicious dinner and the day out. Poorna was joyous and was smiles to her best. She enjoyed every moment to make the day for her sister.

  Sumit was not seen around for the whole evening. Anwesha and Poorna were sitting on the bench outside. Aakash called Sumit to query about and Sumit just answered he needed rest and will see them all the next day morning. Aakash wished Anwesha “good night” and headed back to the room.

  Anwesha and Poorna were sitting quite for a while. Anwesha asked, “So, tell me. What is the story?”. Poorna asked, “What story?”. Anwesha replied, “Do you think I can’t see what’s happening around? That too with my best friend? Tell me Poorna. You will feel better. ” Poorna said, “Okay. Here it is!”

  Forty Three: Sumit was Amit

  Before she could start, Poorna asked Anwesha “Why do you want to know the story from me? Wh
y don’t you ask your best friend Sumit?” Anwesha retorted “Guys give a different perspective to the story. They self center themselves when they say it. I will hear from him definitely, but first I want to know the one from you.”

  Poorna knew that Anwesha totally understands her. She started, “It was around five years ago. I had just started getting to know the internet and opened my account on a social networking site. It was orkut, which is now not there anymore. But for me, my account lasted exactly for three months. I deleted it after three months.

  As soon as I created my account, I uploaded my photo. It was midnight around 1.00. I was too excited about my new profile. Before I could start sending request to my friends, I immediately got a friend request. It was from a guy named ‘Amit’. Without further thoughts I just accepted the request and started finding my friends. Amit immediately liked my picture and did write a scrap on my profile saying ‘Welcome to Orkut’. I was happy to meet a new guy and I juts replied ‘Thank you’. He vanished. I started finding out my other friends and joined few communities. I also checked out Amit’s profile. He had many girl friends and could not find a single guy in his account.