Chapter 4- Duet.

When he heard her voice for the first time, he saw stars. Actually, it was more like constellations. He had expected her to be a typical Dilli bomb-shell. Which is why, even though she had wanted time to decide, he had talked her into meeting him that Friday itself.
Ken was anything but a romantic. At least, it had been ages since he felt anything flutter in his stomach, at the idea of meeting a girl.
He braced himself- she will possibly be an Aunty-ji with a hot voice, trying to gift a guitar for her teenage son. 
But as Friday drew near, he caught himself thinking about the meeting more than once.
"Aisa nahi chalega." He shook his head clear, as he realized it was time for the afternoon team meeting. 
Tapping his pen impatiently on the arm of his plush chair, he drifted into a reverie of a girl clad in a blue saree who he chased across hills, as the mist finally engulfed her.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpfL40g8szs

He looked up. Everyone was staring at him.
"Hmm?"
"What do you think boss?"
Ken was in a mess. Work was always ALWAYS top priority. But looks like he had somehow slipped. He mentally slapped himself.
Someone came to his rescue, "The first draft of the proposal we put forward was similar. But the features this time are personalized, so it may have more chances of being approved."
Ken got the drift, " Yes, we look for customer satisfaction. But, we need to discuss the difference in budgets once more. Johri, look into it."
And since then he had cursed himself and banished the thought of this strange witch-woman._____________________________________________________________________
Alice finally caught up to Ken and saw his bike with the guitar bag on it.
"Mind if I check?" Alice went forward. 
Ken allowed her space to pass by. She smelled of Vanilla. 
Alice unzipped the bag and took out the wooden acoustic. It felt smooth under her touch. 
"Can you play?" Ken scratched his stubble thoughtfully.
"No I'm just buying this as a show piece." Alice replied sarcastically and immediately felt guilty. The guy was good looking but his face and fallen slightly and his jaw had tightened at the last remark.
"Why do I always have to be mean to a perfect stranger, just because I haven't got a reply from that jerk, Kenhelm. Maybe he's gay. I should probably forget about him and concentrate on the here and now."
She tried to look at his face closely but her dark glasses limited her vision. Such a dismal time to get Conjunctivitis! She had had to put on the scarf obligatorily along with the dark glasses. Very 1960's Heroine-types. Plus,It was better to look mysterious than blind!
"I have definitely seen him but no way in hell am I gonna use the 'maine aapko pehle kahi dekha hai' line."
"This is beautiful. Can I make you the payment in cash?"
"I was thinking- can you fiirst play something?"
"Whaaaaaat, on the road?"

"Haan, there is nobody here. I just want to see if you can play."
"I havn't played in a looong  time."
Ken looked almost disappointed. He had wanted to hear her sing.
"That's alright. It was just a suggestion ..." but Alice was already positioning herself near the bike, strumming absent-mindedly. 
"Okay, so I'll play, lekin tumhe gaana padega."
Ken's eyes widened, "No, it's fine. Forget it... sab dekh rahe hai." 
Alice chuckled as she watched some beggar kids gather around curiously.
"You okay with Bollywood?"
Ken nodded slowly. He couldn't believe he was going to sing in front of a total stranger.
With graceful fingers she started picking the strings of the guitar, "Hmmm hmmm hmmm, la la la la la..."
Ken at once recognized it- it was from the movie 'Rehna Hai Tere Dil Mein'.
He took a deep breath and started.
"Dil ko, tumse pyaar hua, pehli baar huaaaaa, tumse pyaar hua..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbC91dUEg_c

Chapter 3- Strangers In the Night.

"What am I doing?" Alice thought to herself, as she reached the foot-over bridge. She had parked her car under the Golf Course Metro station and was walking towards the place where she had planned to meet the seller of the guitar.

"He's 7 minutes late. It's already 8:07 p.m."

"No sign of guitar guy", Alice fiddled with her phone, checking Whatsthat, the free messaging site-  just messages from exes and forwards from the crazy group of school teachers.

Alice had recently started working in a High School as an English teacher.

She loved her work but it was the Summer Vacations, so she had time to herself.

She had decided to spend the summer trying to pick up a few songs on a guitar. Her acoustic had been sold when she left her hometown, Kolkata, and shifted to Delhi- three years ago.

After Nor's tragic demise she hadn't been able to look at a guitar, let alone play it. She was haunted by memories of them jamming together at his place. But she finally was trying to get back to being norm Normal, and the first step was getting a guitar.

________________________________________________________________________________
 

"8:20 p.m.! Where the fuck is this guy?"

The foo tover bridge had three neon lights on it, but it did nothing to cast the shadows away from where Alice was standing.

"I told him, let's meet at the bridge but he was so adamant to meet under it. Useless.... oh, no!"

Suddenly, the lights went out on the bridge.

"Ohh... scary...I have half a mind to get out of the place. I need to call this guy, hope he picks up though, last time I had called from the land line." She said to herself, as she started to dial his number.

"I'm getting mad at this guy. Doesn't he know Noida is unsafe after dark?"

Before the call could connect a dark figure walked briskly towards her. Alice instinctively grabbed her purse towards herself.

"Were you the one who had called for the guitar?"

Alice just nodded silently.

She couldn't make out how he looked like in the dark, he just looked very big, broad shouldered, possibly tall but his stocky frame didn't make him look very tall. 
She glanced at her phone- 8:37 p.m.
"Jee haan, maine hi call kiya tha aapko."

Ken looked at the girl closely. He could tell she was tall and had a slim bone structure. Her face was covered with a scarf that hid her hair and half of her face.
Even though it was quarter to nine she was wearing dark glasses. 
"So weird. Am I selling my guitar to a terrorist? Or worse..." images of female vampires flashed through his head.
"Err, so I'll get the guitar then. Wait here."
"Umm, main aapke saath aa sakti hoon?"
Ken turned to look at her, a little dazed.
"Sure. This way."

Chapter 2- Ken

'Ken, do you plan to get back to her? She asked me again today. It gets really embarrassing for me, bro. Achhi ladki hai. Kya problem hai teko bhai!?'
Ken remained silent. Eyes glued to his phone.
'Did you level up on Candy Crush?'

Ken looked up. 'Don't make me abuse you on a Sunday, man. I'm checking LOLX.'
'That site on which you wanna sell our guitar? Crazy,dude,we had such good memories with that six-string.'
"Yeah, but after Chitraa... "
The door suddenly opened and Ken's brother, Eshan walked in.
"We need to get the choir together for the First Friday Mass."
Ken finally put away his phone.
"When the Lord calls, you better answer. Let's go."
______________________________________________________________________

"That was a good trip. I've always wanted to see snow. But.. now back
to the life-sapping Delhi heat." Ken looked back at the road that
would lead him home.
"Somehow I don't know if I'm looking forward to that."

That evening Ken sat on his bed, running a finger along the neck of his guitar.
He thought about the reason why he had bought it in the first place.
"Chitraa... "
But no, this wasn't the time to think of the past. He had a good job now and he was working to stabilise himself.
"I don't have time for anything else." He thought aloud.

He stretched lazily, clasping his hands behind his head. The sleeves of the white cotton shirt he wore strained under his forearms.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hEdP8x8yGE
"I really need to catch up with the group. It's been ages. I just hope they don't try to set me up with someone. Poor Luc, I know he means well, but I'm so not motivated to get myself back into the dating game."
Most of Ken's friends were either married or dating and some were even expecting fathers. But after the fiasco Of his first proper relationship, he had decided to stop thinking about all this. Pushing 27, he even had the vague idea of agreeing to his parents requests of seeing a nice girl of their choice and getting
settled.
"But, before that- I still have 283 places to visit, things to do, a freakin' life to live, anything else will just have to wait."

At that very moment, his phone rang. Ken looked at the cracked screen on his phone but the number but  wasn't listed.
"Next thing I sell on LOLX is this useless piece of ..." he thought to himself as he absentmindedly swiped the screen.
"Hello?"

Chapter 1- Alice.

"This has GOT to stop."

Alice said to herself as she idly scrolled down random Farcebook posts.

"I mean- just look at this woman. She just shows one half of her face-

because the other half is the birthing ground of 3 perfectly hairy

moles."

"And... she has more likes than me! Whatta farce!"

I wouldn't blame Alice for being in a bitchy mood.

She was currently on Vacation and had absolutely nothing to do.

I never thought I'd miss holiday homework she dolefully told Puddles,

her 7 year old spaniel.

He just looked up at her bored. And yawned. Alice finally broke out in

a thin-lipped smile.

"Yeah, you and me, both, boy."

 ______________________________________________________________

“All I need now is like a little break from all these damned idiots.” Alice exclaimed, disgusted.
She had woken up when the power had gone and had waited till the little AC room where her entire family slept in summer, (to save on the electricity bill) resounded with deep snores and little puffy snores, to start browsing Youthube- an interactive music platform that launched new artists.
There was this new single by a sweet little band called Blind Pilot and the song was ‘3 Rounds and a Sound.’ 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ll6vUo0Su80

Alice let the harmony wash over her quietly; as her mind went back to the times she had spent with Norbert. ” He would have been 23 today, if he hadn’t…” Norbert, or Nor, as she used to playfully call him, had been snatched away from her almost two years ago.
Unusually, she hadn’t let that stop her from moving on. She had had her string of hopeful maybes- expecting every other relationship she engineered to prove her wrong – to show her that all had not been lost. She was an optimist- sometimes.
“This damned song is making me nostalgic. I TOTALLY need a new Playlist- pronto!”
Alice was always weird like this. She thought Music was super important in changing the way you think- you could change from a super happy mood to a super down-in-the-dumps mood- all in the precious time window of 3 minutes and 11 seconds , or however long the latest Coldplay track lasted.
And speaking of dumping, there was a little time to reflect on that as well- her most recent ex had dumped her- hard.
“Screw this, I’d rather see what’s happening on Farcebook.”
Luckily the power had returned and with it- the Wifi- (god bless that!)
“Hmmm, Humans of Lajpat Nagar, (yes, because this story is set in New Delhi, no matter how Anglicized it seems.) Terribly Tiny Trolls, Lion Shroff- nothing new here… oh, hey!”
Her eyes narrowed slowly at a common friend’s new profile picture. It was a guy who used to be her classmate back at the University. He had just returned from Jilin, China, after an official trip.
“Everyone is traveling EVERYWHERE!”, Alice used her irritated voice. Puddles opened one sleepy eye and growled. “Oh go back to bed, idiot.”
This guy, Luc, had some amazing profile pictures it seemed. So, at 3:35 in the morning, Alice started looking at the pictures.

“Here is Luc on a bike (typical). Luc and girl-friend. Luc and beer can. Only beer can. Luc and ex University buddies- wow, Laisha was SO thin here. Luc and….”

She stopped speaking.

Her eyes rested on the guy taking a selfie with Luc, wearing a Converse t shirt, and… a ring? On the ring finger too. The sign behind them said ‘Emergency Exit. Keep Clear.’

Kenelm Stevens.

Youthtube took this precise opportunity to start a fast track by Smash Mouth, ‘I’m a Believer.’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaKDOYTZbJg


“I thought love was only true in Fairyyytales… Meant for someone else but not for me… Oh love was out to get me, that’s the way it seemed; disappointment haunted all my dreams… Then I saw your face… now I’m a BELIEVERRRR….”

“Can’t you ever go to bed on time?” Alice’s dad suddenly slurred, sending her packing – laptop and all to the hot sitting room.

“Kenelm-  What a strange name. It sounds … ancient. I wonder what it means.”

There was something about Kenelm that Alice kept returning to.

She clicked a button that led her to his Farcebook profile.  The privacy setting was pretty high. All she knew was that Kenelm was working. in Delhi and Some pictures of a recent trip to some place in Uttarakhand.

She checked the time-

4:55 a.m.

“What the… ! I need to go to bed now or morph into Girl with Zombie Eyes tomorrow.”

She slept a strangely restless sleep as dawn broke on a bright blue morning that day.

___________________________________________________________________________________