Some Dreams are Drafts

• Unsent Drafts, 2016 •

Theme Song - Angela by Flower Face

Sometime in Late May when summer was holding the door open for rain, allowing gusts of breeze to make lives bearable, or dare we say, beautiful.

From : beingbhavika21@gmail.com
To : jackofalltrades03@gmail.com
Subject : Bookstore

Dear Jack,

I was at a bookstore today. Once in a while I love going to a bookstore, take a trip down the memory lane by smelling nostalgia, finding the books that defined my childhood. And of course, finding new companions along the way. I never buy a book. I'm not the sort of person who buys a book until I have already read it. You see, I am a library person. And middle class as well. And hence I am used to loving a book and then letting it go. If only it were this easier with people.

Anyways, I was at a bookstore and I heard someone giggle in the neighbouring section. It was a teenager who was reading the blurb of a young adult book and in that instant I thought of you. Wondered rather. About the kind of books you read. If you read, that is. I wonder how you'd be in a bookstore. If you would linger in sections that you find interesting. Would you be the one to purchase a book? If yes, what kinds of books? And would you read them as soon as you got home or wait and then pick them after a while when the time seemed right. Would you forget about them?

Would you smile at a stranger who you see squealing at a book you have already read and liked, nodding in approval? Would you ask for recommendations or like to be left alone, meandering the sections at your pace. Would you caress the books you're fond of? Would you roll your eyes at books that you had a difficult time figuring out and then later concluded that perhaps you had picked them at a challenging period in your life. Would you revisit them as we revisit friends we know we can reconnect with even though we've drifted apart?

I wondered so much, Jack that I was surprised. The teenager had stopped giggling and was looking at me, irritated by what I learnt was me staring at her unknowingly. I apologised to her, spent some time taking shelter in the historical fiction section before heading out.

You're intriguing me. That's never a good sign, isn't it?

I wonder if you wonder about me.

Probably not.

Warmly,
Bhavika.

******

Somewhere early in June the monsoon had tiptoed in the lives of people with the grace of an old acquaintance, so much so that it felt as if it had never left.

From : jackofalltrades03@gmail.com
To : beingbhavika21@gmail.com
Subject : similar names!

Bhavika!! I am in the metro and the person sitting beside me is talking to someone called Sanika on the phone. I don't want to assume that they're Indian but there are chances that a part of their lineage is linked to India.

Guess what, the moment I heard the name Sanika, I thought of you because your name is phonetically similar to it and I have been grinning since then. For no reason whatsoever.

And I am a little scared. I don't even know you and if this is how excited I get while hearing a name that is similar to yours then, I think I am getting a bit attached.

We'll be fine. These are only emails. Sooner or later, we'll run out of things to write about, won't we?

PS - I hope not.

Jack.