Part 12

Arnav was ready to leave.

 He had glanced at the things happening on stage now and then. Some he had found creative and watched them a little more till he lost interest and got back to his phone. Some he went through without even glancing up. But one of the performances till now, which held his attention a little was that of a girl dancing to a medley of old remixed Bollywood songs, it caught his attention when mamaji who was sitting beside him was relentlessly poked in his ribs by mami to watch the show with enthusiasm. He looked to the stage to see what all the fuss was about.

He saw a well structured girl with dusky complexion and twinkling eyes dancing with gusto to the songs being played. He watched it for a couple of more seconds and thought “ hmmm, she could have been a good model, if she wanted.” and went back to work.

He knew the last program was being announced and he couldn’t wait for it to get over. Just then he saw his phone’s screen blaze up with life, he saw the caller id, it said “AMAN”. Aman never called unless it was necessary, he got up to leave and the music started flowing in as the curtains were drawn open. He didn’t know why but he wanted to ignore Aman’s call and just stay. He turned to the stage completely forgetting that he was inconveniencing the people behind him and stared at the stage.

They were a lot of dancers on stage. Unlike the traditional way of placing the dancers evenly on stage, 6 girls with similar dresses colored in pink and blue were on one side of the stage where as just one girl was on one side of the stage in a completely blue dress. The girl in blue had her face covered till her nose like a ghunghat.

The dancers were all seated and doing different gestures with their hands indicating that they were engrossed in different activities. Then the music of a flute joined the already soothing music that was playing in the background and immediately all the girls of stage went on alert and looked around searching for some one.

Then Arnav realized it must be about Krishna and Gopikas. The 6 gopis on one side of the stage were already up on their feet and moving around in synch and enacting an intense search for the elusive God; whereas the girl on the other side was still seated and looking around.

The Gopi’s:

 

Just as suddenly as it had started the music of the flute stopped and this bought gloom on stage as all the girls showed their grief. But Arnav’s eyes were fixed on the girl in blue she held her heart with both hands and stilled.

Then the song started and the girls that were standing were only doing leg moments and facial expressions with their hands held behind them. The blue girl was the only one who was doing the hand moments.

Arnav understood the meaning of the song from her gestures, she was asking him to come back to her just one more time, to fill her world with joy just one more time, to let her hear his voice just one more time and to hold her in his arms just one more time… just one more time…

Then she slowly started lifting her ghunghat to reveal her face and begged the lord to smile at her looking into her eyes… her eyes… Arnav wanted to look into her eyes, RIGHT NOW, he was irritated that he couldn’t get closer to her to look into them. It was not like she was begging the lord to look into her eyes but more like she was commanding Arnav to look into her eyes.

He could make out that she had beautiful doe like eyes enhanced by the stage makeup. He could see she had a slender nose, like a waterfall. He could see her luscious lips that were pouting to show the lord her unhappiness at not being with her. He could see her cute little chin that was adding more beauty to her already wonderful features. He noticed her skin had a glow like no other he had seen before, he knew no amount or no variety of makeup could do that, it was natural.

He wanted to see more, he wanted to see the color of her eyes, he wanted to see a smile on her lips, he wanted to see her skin turn pink with a blush.

He snapped out of his thoughts as the music picked up pace and she stood up with a twirl, and the move was so smooth so graceful that it looked effortless. But he understood how difficult it would have been, probably another reason the other gopis didn’t do the same movement to stand up.

When she stood up her ghunghat completely fell off her head and shoulders and settled around her into its place on her back. The singing had come to a pause and now there was a little fast rhythmic music playing and the gopis were dancing to the rhythm. She would dance and the gopis would follow suit with simpler steps. Then singing had begun again but this time even the tempo of the song was fast unlike the beginning.

She moved with rhythm not missing a beat. She moved with grace making every move look beautiful. She expressed with her whole body making you feel the pain she was going through at being separated from her soul mate. She twirled and moved on stage like mercury on the floor, or like water on a lotus leaf, she was neither on the ground nor was she suspended in air. She pined for her lover with such reverence that her grief was radiating in the hall.

A twirling Khushi:

 

 

Then she started twirling as the Aalapana and the music reached its peak. Her lehenga flared gracefully around her and she looked like a beautiful blue spinning top. Then she collapsed on stage at the end of her twirling overcome with grief. The music came to a dead stop, just the singing was there in a slow painful voice and she looked around one more time for her lord and closed her eyes in pain.

Arnav had this insane urge to get to her and hold her close, tell her that he is there and he didn’t know what would have happened if the music of the flute hadn’t started at that moment and Krishna had come on stage. And now happy music played and the 6 other gopis danced around Khanayya, but the lord obliged them for a split second before he proceeded to the girl in blue.

Then it hit Arnav, the girl in blue, she was Radha, there might be a million Gopis but she was the one for whom the lord would turn the world upside down. Krishna sat beside her and gathered her close and she looked at him with a smile on her face, caressed his face with her palm and when he smiled at her she turned and hid her shy face in his shoulder and the curtain fell…

There was pin drop silence in the audience, before someone’s clap broke the trance and thunderous applause followed.

ASR was brought back to earth with the applause. Only then did he realize that he was sitting in his seat… but he didn’t remember sitting down, the last he remembered was turning towards the stage standing up. And he was about to go do something, what was it?... ooh ya answer Aman’s call. He looked at his phone, he had 2 more missed calls from Aman, “S***! How did he miss them? It must be really important Aman, never calls so many times.

He was about to get up and go when the curtain lifted again and all the people who had performed started coming on stage and the audience stood up and applauded for their efforts. Arnav was stuck again, he wouldn’t be able to make it out of his aisle without causing a nuisance to others. So he gave in again and turned to face the stage one more time.

He knew he was avoiding analyzing the surreal experience he had a few minutes back. When his brain said “ASR what was that?”… he replied “It must be the glucose level.”

Then she walked on to the stage with her group and his eyes were glued to her… Aman and his phone call forgotten again.