Satataharitam - Short Stories On Narayana

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"I love this." Lakshmana whispered, looking at a city full of lights that evening.

Rama looked at him. All the light around them reflected in his dark eyes that almost seemed a little teary from the extraordinarily festive environment around them, after fourteen years of tremendous adversity.

"Nobody deserves to be celebrated this way more than Bhabhi and you."

"And you." Rama added in. He threw his arm around his brother. "For someone who has been the brightest source of joy for for fourteen years. All these lights are for you too."

Lakshmana turned away to hide his tears from his brother. To finally be home, safe and sound, with Bhaiya, seeing these celebrations with him, was such a relief to him. Four months ago, he couldn't have told himself with conviction that they would see Ayodhya another time.

"Funny how you still try to look away when you're in tears despite knowing that I know."

"It's not the best idea to be crying when we've finally got this happiness."

"Crying isn't all about sorrow. Even if it is, it's alright. But is it not also about relief? About feeling comfort once again? About the awe of seeing an entire city glowing with a million diyas, streets completely decorated with coloured rangolis, massive amounts of sweet cooked with immense love, all just to celebrate our return? To welcome us? I think it's fair to be a little overwhelmed."

"There were so many times I thought we wouldn't make it back, honestly."

Rama shrugged. "You seem to have concealed the feeling quite well over the last year at least. But here we are, back in the same balcony where we fought over whether the sword or the bow is better!"

"I still stick to my point on that." Lakshmana said promtly, rolling his eyes.

"Yes, because you are stubborn. You won this massive war, killed so many demons with the bow and arrow and you still think the sword is better. You're just being irrational now."

"Oh, look who's calling who stubborn! You can't call anyone stubborn. You refuse to use anything that's not your bow and-"

"I can fight using every weapon-"

"Because you were forced to learn by our Guru. And thank god for that. Or if have had to teach you swordfighting from scratch."

"To be fair though, that would've been some fun stuff to pass our time with in the fourteen years."

"I did teach you a bunch of techniques, Bhaiya. Do you remember them?"

"You can call me stubborn but I'm a great student, okay! I won't forget sonething I've been taught!"

Lakshmana smiled rather fondly. "Wonderful. We've fought over which weapon is better. But which weapon is the worst?"

Rama punched him on the arm. "I know what you want and you know what I'll say."

Lakshmana laughed. "Go ahead and tell me, then!"

Rama rolled his eyes and looked away as his brother continued to laugh. "The spear is my biggest enemy now, okay?"

"Oh you're the cutest."

"That I know." Rama winked.

Lakshmana shook his head, laughing. "Did you expect something so grand though, Bhaiya? Sure, I expected a lot of people to throng around us and, I don't know, maybe a lot of flower petals and all of that, you know. But so much light? An entire city glowing golden with all of this light? I could stand here all night, just looking at this sight."