London, street lights and.. an angel.. Episode 2

And then, there came an unexpected reply.

Part III:

‘I am the girl living in the house opposite’, said the voice from the outside. It was a great timing, the door opened and the first song started playing.

‘What the hell..!!’, I cursed myself.

I swiftly opened the door with all my fury to face the neighbour I was furiously shouting about.

“She is a fantasy.. shina.. na.. na.. na.. oh..! oh..!” The first lines of the song.

There she stood like a beauty from my fantasy books..!

“She has a harmony.. shina.. na.. na.. na.. oh..! oh..!” The song continued.

Such a harmonious beauty..!

“No one knows she’s a mystery.. shina.. na.. na.. na.. oh..! oh..! oh..!” The song went on.

Those mysteriously calm eyes..!

“Fills the heart with ecstasy.. oh.. hoo.. oh.. ye.. ah.. yeah ea..!” The song again.

Every beat of my heart, was filled with ecstasy…!

I had never understood the real meaning of the song. And now, there she stood the meaning of those lines. The fantasy..! The harmony..! The mystery..!

‘Hello’, she said hesitantly.

I was, well silent - kind of awe struck for the moment of time. The radiance of her beauty kept me mesmerised. I didn’t even hear the ‘hello’ she said.

‘Eh.. Hello’, she said again.

I am sure, I would have looked stupid. I was standing there, looking at her, without even taking time to blink. I didn’t hear what she said, even for the second time.

‘Hi..!’, said some one behind me. Well, it was loud Hi and it shook me to reality. It was my cousin to break my concentration, to be precise, to get me out of the mesmerism. J

‘Hi, I am Evangeline, I stay in 21 C the house opposite’, she said to my cousin.

‘Hey, come on in..!’, invited my cousin.

‘That’s ok, I am already late to college. I.. eh...’, she hesitated and looked at me standing there with a blank face.

‘I just came over to apologise for what happened last night. I didn’t mean to call the police. It’s that I was so scared and didn’t know what to do’, she completed without taking in a breath.

‘No problem, it’s alright..!’, said my cousin.

‘What..?!! No problem??!!’, I asked my cousin as she gave me a strong nudge to stay calm.

Evangeline gave both of us a bewildered look trying to understand our situation.

‘I would have done the same’, said my cousin, ‘not to worry at all’.

‘Oh.. Thanks a lot’, she said and looked at me trying to gauge my reaction. I was still standing there with a blank face. I was not sure why but I guess it was the time when I was deciding to be furious with her or to be awe struck by the beauty and innocence.

‘I have to run’, she said, ‘I will catch you sometime later.’

‘Take care then’, waved my cousin and she walked away.

‘She looks cute, doesn’t she?’, asked my cousin.

‘What..! How come it was alright..??!!! I was the one who was ‘almost’ arrested..! not you..!’, I shouted at my cousin.

‘Ha huh..!’, my cousin sighed, ‘ don’t start all over again.’

‘Whatever..!’

‘Its getting late brother..! you better run to office..!’, she said.

‘I know.. I know..’, I said in a frustrated tone.

And just before I walked out of the door, I came to a halt, took a second to smile to my cousin and said, ‘Yeah, she looked really cute.’ I gave her a mischievous wink.

‘Ah ha..! There comes the imp out of you..!’, she smiled.J

Yes, it certainly did. J In a few minutes, all the furiousness had vanished without a trace. All of the furious rage was completely replaced by a soft smile.

A few days passed and everyday I looked at her house when I started to office. There was always small thought that I would see her soon. But unfortunately it did not happen.

That day, I was hurrying to catch my bus at half past seven. I met her just around the corner to the bus stop when she was hurrying towards the house. And in one split second everything around me came to such a slow motion. Even the seconds in my watch was taking ages to move. Seemed the world had come to a stop as she came close by. And a bright smile appeared on my face.

I guess she was not expecting me to smile after all the blank reactions I had given her when she came over to my house to apologise. And in a quick second she gave a slight smile with a lot of hesitation as she walked across me,

‘I thought you were angry with me. I didn’t even expect you to smile’, she said.

‘Oh that, eh.. forget about it. It’s alright Evangeline’, I said. I hoped my cousin was not around. If she had heard me saying ‘its alright’ after all the fuss I had made, my tongue was definitely to be chopped as a punishment.

‘Oh that’s a relief finally Mr.. eh..’, she smiled.

‘I’m Peter by the way and no formalities please’, I said.

‘That’s a real relief Peter. I really feel bad about what happened’, she said.

I didn’t know what to say but kept on smiling searching for words to speak out.

‘I guess I need to hurry. I need to be at the university an hour early’, she said.

‘Oh.. Ok. I thought the bus stop was in the opposite direction’, I said pointing to the direction opposite to which she was hurrying up.

‘Yeah’, she smiled again, ‘I need to check out back entrance of my house. I am not sure if I locked it.’

‘That’s interesting. You forgot to lock you door in a hurry? Ha Ha..! Be careful young lady, burglars like me could be in the opposite house’, I winked reminding her of her emergency call.

‘I kind of keep doing this always. Iron boxes, warmers, gas etc etc, I sometimes am quite confused if I have shut them all off.’

‘Oops..! Someone like me’, I said.

She smiled again for a few seconds and then realised, ‘I need to hurry its getting late’

‘You certainly need to hurry’, I said smiled bidding her adieu.

She hurriedly took a few steps and said, ‘Try not standing under the street lights at night. You look scary like in the ‘Candy man’ movie’’, she winked.

‘Taken as a compliment..! And point noted..!’, I winked back. ;-)

It was nice having talked to this girl. Right from the second we landed outside her house, it had all been excitement. And right from the second she stood at my door, it had been.. well, excitement of course, but of a different kind.

I would have hardly taken ten steps and something within me kept saying, ‘Turn around..! Turn around..! Turn around..!’. I came to halt. I turned around.

What I did was unexpected. And what I saw was totally unexpected. (Maybe it’s the expected for the readers. J )

Part IV:

Trust me..! I didn’t even expect what I was about to see..! J

She was standing a few feet away from me having turned around to look at me.

A fairy tale situation when Romeo turns around to see his Juliet. And Juliet blushes and cheekily skips a couple of steps. In a spark of a second hundreds of flowers bloom at midnight, thousands of stars shine bright right during the day.

I don’t know what to call it but certainly did I feel all of these happen in those few seconds.

There were a lot of cheeky surprises as we bumped into each other almost every day. More smiles, more blushes (obviously both of us) and a story was slowly beginning to build up.

Evangeline Fiona - that was her full name. Two of my favourite character names put together. Evangeline – the little girl from ‘Uncle Tom’s cabin’ and Fiona – the beautiful princess from ‘Shrek’. Kind of romantic name, na? J

One fine day I was getting ready at least twenty minutes ahead of my lazy schedule. That was my cousin’s biggest surprise. J

‘Well well well, look whose early to start’, she said.

‘I need to meet Evangeline’, I said just taking a step out of the door.

‘What..! Meet who..?’, she looked confused.

‘Evangeline..? The girl in 21 C..?’

‘Meet Evangeline..? Am I dreaming..? When did…’, I didn’t even wait for her to complete her sentence and I was on my way.

I hopped over to Evangeline’s house and rang the door bell. I waited there for a few seconds but there was no answer. I rang the bell again but to no avail. I thought she would have left a bit early.

‘That’s ok’, I said to my self and turned around to leave when the door opened.

‘HELLO..! What a surprise..!’, she said with such an enthusiasm.

‘Hey Evangeline, how are you?’, I began.

‘I am doing good, just starting to college’, she said.

She was dressed the most pleasing colour of all, White – the holy colour of Peace. And true to her name, she looked like an angel.

‘An angel would look brighter than the brightest of lights’; I had read in someone’s recent blogs. I was not sure if the world around her had suddenly gone dark or if she was really brighter than the brightest light. I really didn’t know. If those words were the true, she sure was an angel.

‘I brought you this’, I handed the wrapped pack over to her.

‘What’s this? Can I open it?’, she asked enthusiastically and I nodded yes.

She opened the package to find a thick book with the name ‘PETE’ embossed on the cover.

‘What is this?’ ,she asked.

‘That’s me..!’, I smiled.

‘Pardon me?’

‘It’s a daily check-your-door-book for you to make a note of things.’ I smiled.

She was waiting for me to tell something more.

‘That’s me..! Helping you remember that you have done your things right’, I said.

I could see a smile appearing any second now.

‘It might seem cheeky but at least you won’t have to run back and forth to check your door and warmer’, I said.

She smiled. ‘Eh, Peter.. I don’t know what to say’, she said with such a heartiness and understanding, ‘I.. Eh.. Thank you..!’

‘I think I only know very little about you and could think nothing better as a first gift.’

‘Yeah, I guess you are right Peter’

‘Yeah, I wish I could be there helping you with things’, I said trying not to conceal too many things.

Before she could answer I said ‘And.. Call me Pete. People close to me call me that way’

Before she even agreed to the question, my next words came blurting out, ‘Can I call you Eva, or Eve, or angeline or angel..?’

‘Eh.. call me.. eh.. what ever way you want’, she said.

I didn’t understand what she meant and gave the same old blank look.

‘I haven’t had anyone close to me for a long time now to be called with pet names’, he smiled. Her wry smile spoke a thousand words of loneliness and the heartiness to have met someone she liked.

That’s when I got to know a shocking and sad truth about her past. She was an Indian by birth. Her parents had moved to London a year after she was born. She had always grown up to be a happy kid well taken care of. She had all that she needed in life. Above all, she had the love of her parents.

A terrible and tragic road accident had made her an orphan four years ago. Her happy life was shattered and she had been living sad and alone since then. She had learnt to live life this way. She had learnt to make sure she was safe and not to be scared. That was when she became extra precautious with everything.

Being the first person in her life in a long time got me more attached to her than anyone else. It was certainly the case with her. Slowly and steadily over the next few months, the relationship took its own course. And then came a time when both of us could not do without each other.

And then, as in all the ‘boy meets girl.. falls in love.. ’ stories like ‘And then it drizzled’, ‘The most beautiful girl I had seen’, etc, it all began. I didn’t know whether I changed her life or she changed mine. But for sure, there were lots of changes in those few days, our lives had changed.

She liked me for the way I cared for her, the way I took interest in each and everything she did. I became more than a friend to her, more than her guardian. I didn’t know if she had ‘technically’ fallen in love with me. Not yet. J

Me, well I had fallen in love with her a long time back. I just loved everything she did. The way she talked, the way she sang, the way she.. well, I will go on and on and on. Except for her over-precautious self and the way she repeatedly checked everything. Ha ha.. J I never took that seriously though.

Then came the day, I can never forget in my life.

Part V:

It was a Friday evening and I had come back earlier than usual to take her out to ‘Costa’ for a cup of coffee.

She had been uncomfortably quiet for some time. I could see that she was trying to hide her nervousness. I wanted to ask her why but bit my tongue. I knew if it was something that I should know, she would definitely tell me.

When we started walking back home, she said, ‘I’m a bit nervous’

‘Like I didn’t notice J’, I said.

A few uneasy seconds passed in silence.

‘Will you hold my hand?’, she asked me out of nowhere.

I took a couple of seconds trying to adjust myself to her question.

‘Will you, Pete?’, she asked again. I could feel the shallowness in her voice.

I still didn’t react. I didn’t know how to react, if I put it in the right way.

And I slowly asked, ‘Now.. or.. for ever?’, looking into her eyes with all the love I had kept in store just for her.

And she said, ‘Now.. and.. for ever..!’, with the same love and with tears of happiness in her eyes.

Those few minutes, those few wonderful minutes. Unforgettable.

Slowly I took my hands to her’s and held her hands for all the time in the world. And we walked hand in hand, in the beautiful evening forgetting the whole world around us.

Just before I left her at home, I said, ‘You have got beautiful pair of hands Eva’

‘Really?’, she blinked.

‘Oh yeah, really’

‘May be, because I keep cleaning them often. I have a feeling that my hands get dirty always’, she smiled. Another addition to her precautions, I thought.

‘So finally, you have fallen in love?!!!’, exclaimed my cousin.

‘I.. Well.. yes..!’, I said, jubilantly.

‘Wow..!!! I knew it..! Right from the minute she knocked at the door..! J My God, the way you looked at her mesmerised. I knew it right that minute. J’, she said without taking a minute.

‘You did?? You didn’t tell me..?’, I was just kidding.

‘Leave that you idiot..! Have you proposed to her?’, she asked.

‘Yes, Actually, she did’, I said with a blank face.

‘Eh.. And..?’, doubtfully asked my cousin.

‘And.. J And what..?’, I smiled.

‘You got to be kidding me man..!’

‘What? I am serious!’, I said.

‘Oh ho ho..! She is a pretty unlucky girl to have got some one like you’, she said with a sarcastic smile. She was kidding really. J She knew that Evangeline was the most luckiest girl.

Evangeline and I made sure that we spent at least a couple of hours a day together. However busy I was at office and how much ever held she was at her studies, we made sure that neither of us was left alone.

She could not even imagine a day without seeing me. And me..? I loved Einstein right from childhood. Oh yeah, the theory of relativity. To me, seconds were years and minutes were millenniums, slightly more that what Einstein had proposed in the theory.J

And with a progress of time, I noticed something that had changed a bit. I didn’t know what it was until one day. (To be continued)

London, street lights and.. an angel


Part I

‘Pete, where is the coffee cup?’, that was my mom from the kitchen.

‘I think I left it on the computer table mom’, that was me from the hall without even a wince. Most probably, it would have been a Spielberg movie on the television that I was concentrating on.

‘Peter, it’s been ages since you arranged the rack..! Is today a good day?’, that was my dad calling me from my room.

‘I will do it next weekend dad..!’, that was me again. It should have been a Dan Brown novel I was into.

‘Bugger..! Wake up..! Will you give me a hand? The flower vase is heavy..!!!’, definitely my sister. Never mind, I would not even have bothered to answer.

That was me, the guy in the early twenties, with no worries in the world or household responsibilities to shoulder, perfectly enjoying the best days of life.

Eight months had passed since then, like a dream. And, here I am: In the capital of the United Kingdom. That, I should agree, is one hell of a twist in life.

Typically for a bachelor who moves for an onsite assignment would turn out to be difficult with not many options for cooking, stay etc. But, it turned out that luck was still shining on me as at home. I had my cousin out here to help me out. So, technically, home-made-food and a comfortable place to stay was not a problem at all. And even better was that she was a nurse and there was no question about the immediate medical attention as well.

London is a great place to be. Very orderly, polite people, excellent transport, romantic locales and everything with one vital catch. You need to take care of yourself.

Shopping for vegetables, groceries, household cleaning, boiler malfunction, broadband connection, oooopppss! Not my cup of tea. For a guy who never even had moved a coffee cup at home, it definitely was one hell of a twist in my easy going life.

One cannot keep complaining about stuff like these, can they? Absolutely not. I definitely learnt to shoulder, though not completely, at least some of the responsibilities at home with my cousin. And then came the biggest twist of all – shifting to a new house.

With the rental agreement of the apartment coming to a break, my cousin and I were pushed to locate a new house. With my period of stay in London uncertain and the cost factors coming into play, it was a difficult task indeed. It took us a little over five weeks to finalise a house to move in. That was the less difficult task of all the difficult tasks coming soon.

Back in India and just before moving to London, I had moved my parents from my native to a rented house in Chennai. Surely there was a lot of shifting done while I was busy with my weekend errands with my friends. Seems it was someone’s curse, finally I had to shoulder this, that too thousands of miles away from my home.

With very little time to spare from work, other than the time to sleep, both my cousin and I had never been able to sort out our plans to confirm our contracts, arrange for help and to shift our whole lots of things to the new house. We had to run over our schedules again and again to understand we were never going to make a final plan.

At an unexpected time on a Monday afternoon, my cousin called me up to say, ‘We are shifting tonight, whatever time it is going to be.’

‘You got to be kidding me..!’

‘No..! As serious as ever’, she said

‘I can’t come home before seven and you can never reach home before nine’, I reminded her.

‘I guess there is no other option. I have friends to help us out today and this is the only way we are going to move the things. They are free only tonight.’

With only my cousin and me working on this ‘House shifting’ project, it was going to be a nightmare. The only way out was to get the help out of my cousin’s friends.

According to the new plan, we started getting our things together onto the arranged mini truck. That was one hell of a workout. My word, it took us three whole hours to just fit all the things into the truck cabin. And the time, well, the clock had just ticked eleven pm. We all were dog tired. But we didn’t know it was going to be a longer night than what it seemed.

My cousin was the first person to get down from the truck. She hurried to open the door of our new house, while her friends and I began to unload the things. We would not even have brought the third carton box out of the van when we heard a loud, ‘OH MY GOD..!’. It was my cousin.

That gave us a serious fright. And we reached the door in a split second to see what it was.

‘I didn’t do it..!’, she began, with an awful and bewildered look.

‘What? What did you do, eh, didn’t do?’, we asked with none of us understanding what was happening.

‘I don’t know, but this is what happened’, she showed something.

That was the funniest and the most interesting thing that I had ever seen in my life. Seriously, for a few minutes we didn’t know how to react to this. But as usual, we burst into laughter. The thing that my cousin held in her hand was ‘half’ of what should have been the key to our new house. The second she turned it in the key hole, it had broken into two halves.

At midnight, in a place we hardly knew and during the worst of English winters, we all stood under the street lights with half-a-key in hand trying to figure out what to do next. Out of the splendid discussions, we had three options.

First being, breaking the door. That would mean, we might end up in jail. No kidding. We can’t afford that.

The second was waiting in the street till the morning to make a new key. Well, that would mean we were going to freeze in the cruel winter. Nope. Not a good option either.

The third was waking up the landlord who lived a couple of hours away, even if it was midnight. Yup, a sensible option finally.

Thanks to God, there was late night cab service right at the end of the street. My cousin and one of her friends decided to take the drive and her other friend and I agreed to guard the things placed outside the house.

‘Its gonna be a long night’, we thought.

As a normal habit of mine, I kept gazing around at the houses trying to while away time and make sure those ghosts and vampires, from my movie collection, don’t spring out of the darkness. This seemed to be a quiet neighbourhood. I was beginning to like this new place.

I was taking a stroll on the street to keep my self warm. I was walking back and forth trying to count the stars, look at the leaves, and check out the windows of our new house, all in vain, trying to burn time. I was counting every minute and couldn’t wait to get into the house; the cold was really terrible that night.

With every minute counting and the temperature dropping, I started a messy search into the carton boxes for a couple of my coats and my much beloved mufflers. I stuffed my self in more than two sweaters and three mufflers. Hopefully, my cousin was going to reach back before I froze.

It had been about thirty to forty minutes since we ended up on the streets. Just then, I noticed some movement at the farther end of the street with a couple of guys crossing with a concerned look towards us. And then a tall guy crossed the street at the near end with a serious look at me. He walked fast across and said something into his phone. I guess I heard it right.

‘Double Positive’, that was what he said.

I didn’t understand what that meant, at least not for the next ten seconds. And the meaning struck and that too with a bang. What happened next was going to linger in my mind for a long time.




Part II:

Out of nowhere came in a string of four cars and every one of them came to stop just near the house with a deafening ‘Ssssssccccccccrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeettttttttcccccchhhh’ with a bunch of cops jumping out with guns pointing right at us.

‘FfffrrrreEeEeEezzzeee..!’, shouted the cop before we could even blink.

‘HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD..!’, shouted the other cop.

‘What in the world is going on?’, I could not understand a thing.

‘Aaaaahhh, Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhh’, that was my cousin’s friend, scared to death.

‘HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD..!’, warned the cops again.

‘Aaaaahhh, Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhh’, she was still screaming.

‘What in the world is going on?’, I managed to shout back.

‘Son, you are under arrest for burglary..!’, shouted the cop.

I could not believe what I was hearing. Under arrest? For burglary? I certainly could not believe this was happening. I didn’t know what to do other than to close my eyes and hope that this was just a dream. Everything around me was as if I was watching the ‘Phone Booth’ in slow motion.

‘Its going to be ok, its just a dream. Cool it, you are just dreaming.’, I told myself with my eyes closed.

‘Aaaaahhh, Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhh’, the screaming brought me back to my senses and made me realise that this was not a dream I was going to wake up from. This nightmare was for real and I was standing in the middle of it.

‘For God’s sake, stop shouting, WILL YOU?’, finally the cop made her stop screaming.

‘No..! No..! we are not stealing anything. We are just moving into this house..!’, I pleaded immediately.

‘What..? What the hell are you talking about?’, it was the cop.

‘Yeah..! we are new tenants of the house, for God’s sake. We are just now shifting in..!’, I shouted with the hope that they would understand.

‘This is ridiculous.’

‘Certainly not..! Believe me..! Please..! Believe me..!’

Another car came to a smooth stop, just near the cops’ vehicles. It was my cousin and her friend who had reached in record time with the new key. There they were the lifesavers of the night. J That was one of the so many times I thanked God that night.

‘That was a close call..!’, said on of the cops after a few minutes of ‘edge of the seat’ thrilling moments. Only then did they lower their guns and only then did I take in a long breath.

That was a really a pretty close call. Had my cousin’s cab reached a few minutes late, who knows, I would have been in jail: and that too without having tried out the first option of breaking the door.

It took us some time to sink in and get the things into the house. And all the time, the cops were hanging around just to make sure that we were alright and surely not what they thought we were. Anyways, after having moved most of the things in, I walked over to the cops.

‘Care for a cup of coffee officers?’, I asked.

Though the initial reply was a ‘strong stare’, the senior cop slowly smiled.

‘No thanks son. Just keep the noise down when you move the things in. We don’t want another emergency call coming in.’ J

I had never felt this much of an adrenalin rush in my entire life. The heart beat took a long time to settle down and so did the shivering. This was an adventurous night indeed. Being that close to getting arrested is an adventure, isn’t it? Well, almost. J

Just when the cops were about to leave, I over heard something about the whole fiasco.

‘The emergency call came in from the house 21 C. That’s the opposite house, isn’t it?’, the cops were asking each other before getting into the vehicle.

I turned around to see the house. So, they were the culprits. How in the world could they say I was burglar? Whoever it was, I was in a rage to pay it back when I had a chance.

By the time we woke up the next morning it was almost ten am. The adrenaline rush had settled down but there was some other feeling that had taken over. I was by then FURIOUS about what had happened. I was furious about this new neighbour who had called the police.

‘Me..? A burglar..! How could someone call the cops without knowing what was going on?!!!’, I shouted with all the fury.

‘Cool down will you..? talk about something else..!’, said my cousin.

‘What do you mean..? How would you cool down if someone called the police to get you arrested?’

‘Well, I don’t know. May be it was the time, the dull street light, someone six feet tall, bulky as you and the sort of hairstyle, beard. Even I would have called the cops’, she giggled.

‘Ha ha ha..! Very funny..! That was very funny..!’, I said very seriously. At the same time, there was soft knock on the door.

‘Get the door; I will switch on the music. It should relax you a bit.’

There was another knock while I started walking to the door, ‘Coming.. Coming.. Who is it?’, I asked while fumbling with the keys. I was finding it difficult to open the door as I was not used to this new lock.

And then, there came an unexpected reply. ... (To Be Continued)