Revisit

"Abhi?" Rashi kept on calling my name while we were packing my stuff for a three-day office trip. "Abhi?" She called again. "Abheeee!" This time she shook me by my arm. I got up startled. "For heaven's sake, where are you actually?" I sighed and uttered, "Nothing! You were saying something?"

"Something?" She frowned. "I repeated my one question and your name like a million times!" "Sorry!" I replied.

Rashi continued, "Where are you going, and when will you return?"

"Kolkata. Will be back in 3 days," I replied as shortly as I could.

"You are tensed because you are asked to visit Kolkata?" My wife taunted. No, I was not tense or panicked because I was asked to visit Kolkata on short notice. But I couldn't explain to her either why I was not behaving normally.

"Okay, whatever." Rashi changed the subject after sensing no answer from me. "Don't forget to take the keys. Just in case I am not at home when you arrive." She continued saying a lot of things, but my mind was still somewhere else, with someone else.

The next day, I was on my way to Kolkata. There was still time for boarding, and I just sat there drowning in nothingness.

It was not just a place I was going to visit. It was my past I was going to revisit. Collecting the ending of the story that was unfinished. Or finished with an open end.

And on the flight, I decided something. To return to where it all began. To at least find answers. From the airport, I took the cab straightaway to a lane that wasn't my original destination. In the old streets of suburban Kolkata.

Are the streets still filled with those retro vibes? Or has it become all modern, with high-rise buildings and cafes. I don't know. Are people still in love with the kulhad chai and Mughlai and fish fries at the corner of the lanes? Or have those people started loving pizzas and brownies and all? I wondered all the way when the cab took to Bally bridge. I rolled down the windows and tried to feel the cool breeze of Ganga.

The spell was broken when my phone rang, "Abhishek?" Came from the other side. I scanned the screen for the caller's name. It was my boss. "I guess you must have reached. Did you catch up with the clients?" He was firing questions from a point-blank range, and I was in no mood for spoiling my plan before I achieved my current goal.

"Sir, I am not in Kolkata town right now. I will do it by EOD." I replied.

"What? Where are you now?" Before he could have said anything, my phone died. And the car jerked abruptly. "Your location!" The driver said without looking at me. I paid him and got down.

I was standing in front of the same iron gates. The iron staircase connecting the terrace and terrace room was still there. The red letterbox existed too. I was just 5 feet away from those gates, and it took me forever to cover it.

1995. We didn't have cell phones. We hardly had landline phones. Handwritten letters and sending cryptic messages through telephone booths were still a thing. My twin daughters have a hard time believing these stories, but to me, it was still as if it was just yesterday. It was my first job, and I was posted in Kolkata, near Tea Board. It was easier to travel through a local train than to have a 2-hour bus journey. So, my colleague found me this rented place- 20/3, Ghoshpara, Bally.

"So, you are our new guest!" A bubbly, tall girl with two long and neat pleats hopped into my newly rented terrace room while I was arranging the bare minimum stuff I had with me. I studied her carefully. She was chatty, and I was an introverted piece of crap back then.

I simply nodded in a yes. "Nandini," She said. I looked up at her. "My name." She continued. "And you are Abhishek. Dad told me that we have a new paying guest." Without asking, she picked up my books and started turning the pages. "Oh no!" She sighed, looking at them.

"Hmm?" I stared at her questioningly. "You only read Hindi books. I can only speak Hindi but haven't read anything except for Sanskrit till 9th grade." I smiled this time. "Don't worry." I said, "You can start with these. It's Premchand, that you are holding."

"Are you sure?" She asked expectantly, her eyes twinkling. "Yes, I am."

"Okay, thanks." She hopped out of my room in the same way. But she returned within a few seconds of her departure, "The main point..." She said. "What?" I asked. "You can have your lunch and dinner with us. For today. Okay, bye!" And she left.

"Are you looking for someone?" A voice broke through my flashback. One of the neighbors was peeking through their balconies and noticed me standing there, still. He must have assumed that I am a lunatic. But then he gazed at the luggage I was tagging along with me.

"Well... I was looking for..." I tried recalling the name of Nandini's father, my long-lost landlord. I pointed out towards the iron gate. "Ranjan Mukherji?" The old man asked. "Yes," I replied.

"Well, he passed away 2 years ago. It's only the Mrs. Mukherji staying here." And before I could guess what he was doing, he screamed, "Lata boudi, you have a guest!" And in a few seconds, the whole colony knew that Mukherji house had a guest to receive. Also, I realized that nothing had changed. That is the Bengal way of greeting people, and it will always be there.

Mrs. Mukherji opened the gates and looked at me with a question in her eyes. "I am Abhishek, Abhishek Saini. I was a paying guest here once. I thought of visiting this place..." I trailed off.

"Yes, I think I remember you. Come inside." She took me inside. I tried collecting all the pieces of memory that I had left 22 years ago. I settled myself on the couch. My eyes fell on the framed picture of Nandini on the wall.

I suddenly remembered those Sunday afternoons when she sneaked into my rooms to exchange books. I had gradually started to learn Bengali. Thanks to her. "Don't you have Saturdays off? Like we have in colleges?" She asked innocently.

"I wish I was lucky," I said. "But that's what you call a job, you know." I leaned back on my chair, turning the pages of the newspaper. "By the way, you were here to collect the clothes and get them back downstairs right?" I was always cautious about the boundaries, being an outsider. But she never cared. "Yes, I can be late for a few minutes. Bird watching is not a crime." I never realized when I got addicted to her extroverted self. I used to be in the listening mode only. She used to do all the talking.

One day, while I was rushing towards my room, Mrs. Mukherji called me, "Abhishek, you got a letter." I took it from her and thought it was from my parents. It asked me to meet at the river banks near Ramkrishna Mission in Belur. Signed by Nandini. I thought someone had caught me off guard.

And even today, I felt as if I was caught off guard when that person entered the room. Age didn't ruin her beauty. She was beautiful in her own way. Like some fine wine.

She didn't notice me. "Maa, here's your grocery. I am in a hurry today, will you..." She paused when finally our eyes met. She was speechless. Like I was, on that day in 1995 December, on the banks of Ganga, when she came in a blue saree with her hair untied. The only difference was she was tired, and her hair was tied into a bun.

"Umm... Hi Nandini... Well!" I tried gathering words. "Abhishek, you remember?" Mrs. Mukherji came out of the kitchen with a cup of tea and some biscuits. "Yes, I do." She said.

They both sat down. "So you never visited Kolkata all this time?" The mother asked. "No, never got a chance after I got transferred." She nodded. "Which year it was when you had left?"

"1998, June," Nandini replied. Without looking at anyone. I tried reading her face. It was expressionless. And transparent. "You remembered?" I asked. She nodded in a yes.

Like that time, when I handed her my transfer letter. After three years of going around together, after gathering memories and reveries, after I had promised her that we would be with each other despite the differences in caste and community, after pouring all that love we had for each other. I left her. Because I had to. I remembered us, sitting silently, on the stairs of the bank.

"Take me with you." She had turned towards me suddenly and clutched my hand tightly. "No, Nandini, this is not the way!" I had frowned. "Think about your parents. What will society say? That a tenant tricked his landlord's daughter and all that stuff?" I had tried consoling her, but she was sobbing hard.

"Three years, Abhishek! And you expect me to live without you, make it a habit, just like that?" She gasped for air between her words. "I am not saying anything like that." I had cupped her face in my hand, "Listen, I will find out a way. We will be together but in the right way. Finish your masters. It's something you have always wanted. I will save more for us, and then I will be doing everything to be together. Fine!" She said something which had sounded like a yes. We sat like that for a long time, watching the sun going down. Her head leaning on my shoulders and my eyes secretly growing misty.

The clanking of the spoon brought me back yet another time. "So you have a family? Where do you live now?" Mrs. Mukherji asked. "In Delhi. Yes, I am married, and I have two daughters." I looked at Nandini. She kept staring at her biscuit.

"Wow, nice." Mrs. Mukherji replied. "It's so nice that after all these years, you have still remembered us. We rarely have anyone coming to our house these days. Thank god, Nandini lives near me. At least I have her by my side. She takes care of me." She smiled proudly, looking at her daughter.

Nandini looked up to revert her mother's smile, and I finally saw something floating in her eyes. Or at least I imagined. And the same sadness returning to those blank pages. The sadness she had on her wedding day.

I had failed to keep up my promise. Or rather, I was too late. Or I was a coward for not being brave enough and waiting for things to do the right way. 'Maybe I should have eloped and taken her with me!' The thought and the guilt trip ran million times in my mind whenever my eyes fell on that invitation card, which read, 'Nandini weds Sunil.'

"Maa, I have to go. Soham must be back from college." She stood up suddenly to leave. It was also my cue to leave. "I shall also take your leave now. Thank you for everything." I touched Mrs. Mukherji's feet, picked up my bag, and came outside.

I was walking with my eyes locating Uber on my phone when a voice rang in my ears. "So, you really remember me? Still?" Nandini came following me, or it was the way to her destination, I don't know.

"I never forgot you in the first place," I said, scrolling through the phone. "You were present at my wedding. Why didn't you come to meet me?"

I took a deep breath and looked at my footsteps for a while. "I didn't have any courage left to meet your gaze. I couldn't keep my promise. I betrayed us both." We kept walking.

"No, you didn't." Nandini's answer made me stop. I looked at her. "You are not mad at me? I couldn't look at you directly. Your sad face pierced straight through me. I feel terrible to this day." I said in a single breathe.

Nandini smiled. "Yes, I was sad. I felt broken. But I was never mad at you!"

"You were always right, Abhi. We needed to do things the right way. I saw you that day, I thought you would come to say something, but you just left." This time, she kept on saying.

"You have been blaming yourself all this time! And I kept on thinking, only if I had waited a little longer if I could have convinced my family. It was as much my fault as yours."

We stood there silently. Something heavy, buried all these years, was lifted off with just simple words, and I felt like I got a new life.

"By the way, after all these years, why are you here, in Kolkata?" And her question reminded me of all those pending tasks awaiting me in the real world.

I told her about the official purpose while my cab came honking.

"It's okay if things don't end in the way we want them to. But at least we meet people we truly fall in love with and who love us purely from all their hearts. Thanks for being that person."

She smiled and waved goodbye. This revisit to my past gave me a new purpose, a new beginning, and finally, a new closure to my old story...