1000 messages

"Beep Beep Beep" Ritvesh's mobile received a sms from Raksha. The night after Ritvesh took Raksha's mobile number he started text messaging her. The messaging started with "It was a great day. I could rate it as one of my best days." to which she replied in a similar tone. And some more messages were exchanged in the same format and it started to get boring. Ritvesh thought to himself that if was starting to get bored then Raksha would have sunk deep into the sea of boredom. He had to find a way of keeping the conversation going but in an interesting way. He wanted to his mind to put in some effort. It had gone numb because of the inactivity for some time. But then it did respond and he got an idea.

He messaged Raksha saying "I have a game. Would you like to play?" to which she replied "I am not much of an athlete but I shall try." He messaged back saying "I guess I did not put it in a good way. It does not involve physical activity. For that matter it does not even involve you being present with me. The game is called 'how much do you know me'". Raksha was a little excited this time "The name sounds lame but I like the concept. What is it about?". "The rules are pretty simple. I would ask a question about myself. If you know the answer you can say or you can take a guess. Whoever answers the higher number of questions wins. And the loser gives the winner a treat." "Sounds great. I am in. But its pretty late in the night now. We shall start tomorrow. And lets keep the count till the weekend so that we can get a decent idea." "Awesome. So tomorrow it is."

It was about 9 in the morning and Raksha heard her mobile beep. It was Ritvesh who had messaged her. She picked up the phone curiously and read the message "I shall start the game now. What is may favorite color?". The game had begun and it went on for five days. The phone bills were soaring but they were not bothered about that. Raksha was asking the questions to which Ritvesh could not even take a guess. On the other hand Ritvesh was asking pretty simple ones. Raksha did not understand the reason behind that but was happy that she was leading. 

The game got over and Raksha had won by a huge margin. She was elated because she had not only won but also was going to get a treat for that. Her mobile starting to ring and it was Ritvesh who was calling her. She answered the call "Hey I won!!!" "Congrats. So as we had decided earlier I have to give a treat. Can I know when you would be free?" "I guess dinner would be fine." "Okay. What time?" "How about 8 pm?" "I am fine with 8 but could you come there directly. I wont be able to pick you up. I have some work so I shall come directly at 8. Could you please come by yourself. I am sorry" "Dont be. I shall be there. Not a problem at all." "Cool. So 8 it is. See you at 8 tomorrow. Bye" "Bye". Raksha put down the phone and was angry that Ritvesh would not pick her up. She said that she did not have any problem but did not mean it (like all girls). Anyways she was excited about the treat.

Raksha reached the hotel at 8 pm sharp. She went to the reception and mentioned Ritvesh's name. He had already reserved a table. So she was directed to the table. She was expecting him to be present there. But to her suprise he was not present. She started getting wild about the whole thing now. She said to herself "First he does not come to pick me up. Now he is not even present here." And as she was sulking she saw a waiter coming towards her table. She was preparing to shoo him away but he gave her a gift. She was shocked "I am not expecting any gift" "Ma'am, this is a gift from Mr. Ritvesh." Now she was relieved but annoyed at the same time "But where is he?" "He would be here in a short time. Please open the gift in the meanwhile." She put her frustration aside because she was excited about the gift. The waiter left and she started un-wrapping the gift. It was her favorite watch. Before she could think of anything she saw a whole line of waiters walking towards her table holding gifts in there hands. She got a little scared now. After the whole line of waiters gave the gifts she received a message which read "1000th message." Confusion started driving her crazy "First I am flooded with gifts. Now I get a message saying 1000th message. What does that mean and where the hell is Ritvesh?"

Ritvesh's idea had more to it than just conversation and not getting bored. He wanted to know everything about Raksha. But he did not want Raksha to think otherwise. So he came up with this idea that she should ask questions about her likes and dislikes answer them herself. That way she would never have any clue as to what was going on. She would be under the impression that its just a game. After the whole game got over he knew all about her likes and dislikes. He told Raksha that he could not pick her up because he had a lot of other stuff to do. He had gone to the hotel at 5pm and talked to all the waiters to help him. They all agreed. In the morning he was busy buying stuff that Raksha liked. From her favorite book to her favorite watch, from her favorite perfume to her favorite doll. He even bought a diamond pendant because diamond was her favorite. He had spent a fortune in one day but he knew it was worth it.

She received one more message saying "Please open all the gifts. I know its a tough ask but I cant help." "I guess you used to swim in the lake of sarcasm but right now I am taking a plunge into the sea of anger. If I dont see you after I open the gifts you will never see me again." "Sorry to keep you waiting. But I promise that it wont last long." She started opening the gifts and with even wrapper removed her happiness increased. After the last gift was opened she had a wide smile on her face and her face was pink with embarrassment.  She got one more message saying "I messaged the 1000th message because I wanted to know that I know you for more than 1000 messages. I gave you all the gifts because I wanted to tell you that I embrace all your likes and dislikes." She was looking for more in the message when a voice came and she looked up to find Ritvesh. "I LOVE YOU. I did not have any other way of saying it. If you think it is too early I can wait for a year and say the same. But the words wont change and so would I. I LOVE YOU."

Dream or Reality?

Last few weeks turned out to be the most wonderful weeks of Ritvesh's life. He had proposed to Raksha who inturn accepted. Things could not get any better for Ritvesh. Whats more? Ritvesh had never been abroad. Suddenly he finds himself on a flight to Bangkok along with Raksha. They both had taken a week off to go to a beautiful island near bangkok to spend some quality time together. 

Things were going perfectly as planned and in no time Ritvesh discovered how beautiful the island was. The scenic beauty of the island was good but what made it even better was the fact that he was alone there with Raksha. He told Raksha that he wanted to kiss her. He thought she would bluntly deny. But to his surprise she did not. She replied "Hand or Cheek?". Now Ritvesh got a little doubtful. "Am I dreaming? Let me pinch myself and find out. I'd rather not. Last time when I did the pain lasted for a week. I wont take a chance this time." Suddenly he found that something was disturbing him. Raksha disappeared all of a sudden. It was his alarm. "Shucks!!! that was a dream. Stupid alarm. It could have gone off atleast after the kiss." Then he realised that this dream was a result of watching 'kaho na pyaar hai' last night. He had found himself on the same island that Hrithik and Amisha dance.

He then looked at the time. It was 3.45 pm. He tried to recollect his thoughts. "Its a sunday and I had been sleeping cozily but the alarm woke me up at 3.45. Why would I set the alarm for 3.45 in the afternoon?" That is when he realised that he had to meet Raksha today at 5 pm. This was their second meeting. After the first brief meeting they had at CCD, they continued their tradition of HI's and smiles in the temple before Ritvesh decided it is time to meet again. This time Ritvesh requested, because he could not order, Raksha to be ready by 5 pm. He would go and pick her up for a movie. Raksha told him that she had been waiting to watch this movie for about a week so she wont be able to talk to him much during the movie. He was sad with this aspect but happy overall that he is taking a gaint stride by taking her to a movie. He told himself "There will be many more movies and I would have a perfect reason every time a new movie releases, to meet Raksha."

It was a decent movie but Raksha proved to be a movie buff. She was fully engrossed in the movie that Ritvesh never found even a single second to talk to her. For him it was about her but for her it was about the movie. She enjoyed the movie and he enjoyed her company. 

On their way back Raksha started "Ritvesh, I am sorry. Its just that I love movies a lot that I seem to forget people around me. You would have felt lonely but this is the way I am. If you do not feel like to coming to a movie with me I can understand. I am perfectly Ok with it." To that Ritvesh said "Are you kidding me? I am fine with the fact that you like movies so much. Atleast we got to talk during the interval. Its much better than just a glimpse in the temple. So I am game anyday anytime." Though most of whatever Ritvesh said was true he was not fine with the fact that Raksha loved movies so much. He brushed those thoughts aside and said "So what next? Dinner?" Raskha replied 

"I guess some other time."

"So you wont agree to anything the first time I guess."

 "Well, I agreed for the movie." 

"Oh ya. I almost forgot."

 "Is that sarcasm that you are engulfed in right now?"

 "Naah, I was kidding. Alright we shall fix up a dinner appointment some other time."

Ritvesh dropped Raksha at her house and when she was about to leave he said "My phone stays idle now a days. It would be great if it could get a mobile number to chat with"

"So is this your mobile phone speaking or you speaking?"

"Whom would you give your number?"

"I guess your phone"

"Then its my mobile phone asking you"

She laughed and gave him her number and left still smiling.

CCD

Ritvesh was fully excited about his meeting. He had bought a new dress for the festival. The festival was the very next day. But he was neither bothered about wearing the new dress on the festival day nor about the festival. His festival had already begun. 

He was so profusely excited that he reached CCD at 4 pm and kept waiting till 5. He would have looked at his watch for about 1000 times in one hour. People at CCD were scared whether he was some kind of anti social element waiting to blow up the CCD. His anxiety kept growing with every passing minute. Half an hour more passed and still no sight of the girl. He kept consoling himself by saying that "Girls always like making the guys wait." After what seemed like years he looked at his watch which showed 7 pm. He was depressed and frustrated, was about to leave when he saw the same elegant walk. He did not know how to react. He was obviously angry but at the same time happy that she turned up. She came and grabbed a chair and sat down next to him and started off

"Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry. I am really sorry that I made you wait for so long. Actually what happened was......"

"Please. Please do not say anything. Anything that you say will not make me happy. And whatever you say will indeed eat into the time we are left with. Lets just not talk about things that happened in the past and things that went wrong. Lets be happy that we atleast made it and we are here now. I am sorry if I am being a little rude."

"You are not rude but I would say that you are frank."

The conversation continued with the usual 'knowing each other' questions and answers. Raksha finally looked at her watch and it said 9 pm. It was getting late for her so she said that she had to leave. Ritvesh wanted to stop her and wanted to talk more, wanted to know her even more but something inside just stopped him from doing so. They called it a day and left.

On his way back home Ritvesh had his mind completely occupied with the thoughts of Raksha. He mind was completely cluttered with her images, images of her smile, images of her lips pursed when she was thinking about something, all the images that his mind has from the past two hours. He did not even feel that he was riding, he knew he was not. He was infact floating. He thought to himself "Is this what they call Love or Is this the general attraction that any guy usually feels when he meets a girl? I have met other girls before but never got such a strange feeling. I am confused but right now even confusion feels awesome. Let me wait till time answers my questions and clear my confusion. Till then I shall be confused."

Meeting

Where there is temptation, there is guilt. Guilt keeps pricking us but temptations forces us to make a move. The epitome of temptation is love. Love of all can happen in ways you have never imagined. Its a story of Ritvesh who is trapped in a tangle of guilt and temptation. Life was a simple equation to him. He thought he had solved it all, that he had known it all, that he had mastered it all. But he never knew what life had in store from him. 

"Where there is fear, there is a sense of responsibility. I fear that I might die not because I am afraid of death but because I might not fulfill my responsibilities. I fear, I am afraid, I am scared because I love her and I love her knowing that its the next most impossible thing on earth that should have happened. I was constrained in each and every way and I had known all of them. Heart is a complicated thing. It can love many people. Parents, friends, relatives and the special one. Now someone whom the heart loves doesnt want the same heart to love some other person. It is always a tangle, it will always be. Heart is a complicated thing. I know it better than most others. " were Ritvesh's thoughts when he was driving back home after a hectic day at the office. 

He had seen Raksha in a temple the very first time. Then it was nothing much but a stare. After a few stares a smile suddenly turned up from nowhere. He was exhilarated the first time she smiled at him. Of course he was not expecting that. After a few more smiles he mustered some courage to say a 'HI'. Few more 'HI's passed and he had gained the confidence to go and talk to her. He still remembers the conversation.

"Hi I am Ritvesh"

"So?"

Ritvesh was puzzled but he soon realized that even he had taken her by surprise. He tried again

"Hi I am Rivtesh and You are?"

"A girl."

He thought to himself "I know that and precisely thats the reason I ve approached you. Do I look gay?". But he did not say that. Instead he took a more soft appraoch.

"I was asking your name"

"Ya. I know. I am sorry. Its just that I got a little surprised. I am Raksha."

Now he was relieved. 

"I have seen you in this temple many times. So I thought... may be... we can go have a cup of coffee sometime..."

"Not now. I shall let you know" and she walked away.

He was feeling bad that she did not agree for the coffee idea. 

More days had passed by with smiles and 'HI's. It was like any other day when Ritvesh would go to the temple. He saw her and knew that he could expect a HI. He just got a smile back. He wondered whether his stand with her was deteriorating. To his surprise he saw her coming towards him. He was not sure though. She came and stood opposite to him and said

"I think I might feel sleepy tomorrow. A coffee would help." 

He did not know whether this was a dream so he pinched himself as hard as he could. Well it wasnt. He could feel the pain and his skin turn ferrari red. He could not worry about that though. He said

"What time and where?"

"5 pm, CCD would be fine."

"Great. So CCD it is"

She smiled and turned and left. She moved so elegantly and with such charm. He could not help but gaze.