Broken

It was an event less day in the busy streets of Bombay. The high-pitched women bargaining for 3 rupees and eardrum shattering cries of unattended children surrounded me in the worst ways. I was beginning to question why exactly did I choose to sit outdoors in that cafe. I mean the view of the lake was beautiful but the constant typing the teenager had done on her phone was starting to kill my mojo considering she was like 2 feet away from me. But my annoyance survived for only sometime till I saw a young girl, maybe 2-3 years younger than me, approach the cafe.

From far away she looked like she was limping, her clothes dusty and her hair all over the place. As she came closer it seemed she was approaching me, and surprisingly I offered her a seat at my table. I think she was as taken aback as I was with my gesture because not all Mumbaikars offer a hand to strangers, since we doubt almost everyone. Well. With shaking hands she took the seat and up close I could see her features well. A herd of pimples lay on her cheeks and her hair was dark with a brown that showed in the rays of sun. Although it was frizzy and haywire it somehow suited her. She had a mole on the underside of her chin, but it was her eyes that caught my attention. They shone with a dark shade of brown bordered with a caramel coloured rim, but they had an empty void in them, hollow and sad eyes that stole all the energy from her face. She looked so broken. Her clothes told me that she was from a good house, but her posture told me how lost she was. I pushed a spare glass of water towards her, a feeble attempt to break the heaviness in the air. She looked at me, a weak smile that she tried to portray, sighing as she accepted the glass. I didn't know how to break into the awkwardness, but she beat me to it.

"I was a happy child you know. Never like this, flunking tests and locking myself in. I transitioned into this..this..this..ghost of a person after...after.." she stammered and tears pooled in her tiny eyes. I never realised until then how our eyelashes are accentuated when we cry. I let her cry. Over the years of dealing with similar things I know sometimes you just want to..let it out. You don't want people to tell you that things are going to be okay when its equally possible they won't. You don't want to hear "Stop crying it's okay" when you want to scream and throw something around. You want to be left alone to face the harshness so you can come to terms with it. You want to speak out loud how you feel and be angry and sad at the same time. I sat there, willing to tell her with unspoken words that I'm here to listen to her.

She was having a conflict with herself, thinking if she should go on or if she should just walk away. I mean I get where she is coming from. It would be completely bollocks for me to just tell my story to a random stranger, but she thought otherwise and spoke again trying to regain her stance and sound braver than she felt.

"Sometimes I sit and go through the photos of us. He was a good man. I was his princess and he always pampered me with gifts and tickles and hugs. We had this ritual where I kissed him before he headed to work, and then I would make this weird face since I would taste the aftershave he put, and let me tell you, that was bitter!" She giggled at that thought. There was this lightness in her voice like she was talking about a place where she was so joyous and happy. "And then when mom would shout at me for small things I would call him and he would pretend-shout at her and then tell me to call again if she troubles me." The corners of my mouth tugged into a smile. I could relate to her. I was living my own memories again, the amazing ones.

"But I don't know what happened." Her smile fell. She was coming to the difficult part of the story. "One day he was this awesome dad and the next..he..became someone else. He threw things and he went mad on mama. I used to cringe from him and hide away. He kept telling me that I failed as a daughter..but I don't know what I did." She remained stoic, staring into the soft lull of the stagnant water and brushing her hair away from her face. I wanted to say I knew how she felt, I knew that pain and that loneliness. I knew how it was. But I didn't want to interrupt so I let her go on. "I would keep quiet and see the torturous exchange between him and my mother. The bitter words and the harsh meanings behind them. I would try to protect my brother from it but there was only so much I could do." She spoke with words shaking at the end. She was scared and she was tired. She slid down further in her seat. "Then I met this amazing guy and he helped me, supported me and made me happy, till I became the nagging problem among us. My sob stories and my pain taking away the attention from what we were, or what we were supposed to be. And then it went downhill; the one thing that mattered to me, I royally messed it up.. " She smoothed her wild hair and her crumpled shirt, willing to bring some decency into her clothes and trying to harness the rawness in her voice. "... And then he just left...I understand why, I was too much luggage...I was not the girl every guy wants to have. Even though he was so much better than the rest, I was the one, the problematic one. And so I ran away today, away from the horrors of my house and away from the heartbreak of losing him. Away from the fact that my dad was gone, that I am shattered from the day he changed. Away from being strong for my mother and brother just so I could deal with how I felt for once. But I will have to go back."

Realisation dawned upon her. I saw the unfurling of her eyebrows and how her posture went rigid. Her eyes wheezed with sadness but she somehow looked determined. "I get it now, I know he can't accept me, no one can, I'm too damaged for anyone to handle. I'm too broken for anyone to fix." With a fixed stature she rose, nodding at me for appreciating the time I took to listen to her woes. She left then, with an expression that showed that she found an answer, one that broke her furthermore. No words would budge her from her decision, she was too sure of what she was worth, and in that moment I wanted to tell her 'All of us are damaged, in ways different from others. But our brokenness doesn't define us, nor does it judge our worth. Even the most lost souls find solace somewhere, even the most damaged ones find love somewhere.'

This is dedicated to all the people I know, the damaged and the undamaged ones, the beautiful ones with their scars and their marks. You are all always worth it. You are amazing.

A Birthday Night

The wind was flowing in her hair, making her look like she was rapidly swimming in a sea of pure bliss. Well it really was one of those perfect candid shots. Lucky for her because I look like Medusa's sister in the exact same scenario. Her hair was randomly tied in what looked like the sad remains of a bun, similar to the rest of the 8 girls in the car. It's amazing how 10 people can occupy a 7 seater car. Two girls very uncomfortably shared a seat of one, except for the mom who was driving and the three of us sitting on the back seats, the seniors that we are,being merely a year elder to the other fellow girls in the car, but taking immense pride in the age gap. The atmosphere was pumped with excitement, electricity crackling amongst us at nearly midnight, and 9 girls bouncing to the beats of 7/11 by Beyonce. It's true ladies and gentleman, she brings the "craziness" to the party.

We three seniors made a show of singing horribly and differently to the Beyonce songs. Well we all have been there haven't we? Singing the wrong lyrics and acting like total apes with actions that no one can understand. The buns on our heads were bouncing one second later to the non-rhythmic bobbing of our heads, but we couldn't care less. We were too lost in the hot beats of a song purely meant to serve the prides and ego of women who just wanted to have some fun.

I was too happy, like a kid high after too much sugar consumption. Messaging my friends in CAPS and repetitively typing " WOHOOOOO". I felt like I was sneaking mischievously out of the house at midnight and the fact that I was breaking the rules made it all the more thrilling. I wasn't of course, considering we had the to-be-birthday girl's mom with us, but hey a girl can dream eh?

Yes. We were going to town, to the Bandra-Worli Sea Link more precisely to cut a cake and celebrate the birthday of my very close friend at 12:00 in the night; and yes the idea was a in-the-moment thing. Its unbelievable how willingly a bunch of girls would want to just roam out at any time of the day; well everyone has a bad girl in them after all. To snap out of the norm of cutting the cake quite boringly at midnight at the house and doing the birthday lalala, we ventured out to the city. And twenty minutes later, we were with our windows rolled down hooting and howling like shameless hooligans, gossipping about the latest news on relationship fiascos and little Miss stupidity-on-two-legs who was double dating!(bitch alert!)

The sky was beautiful, the few stars that you do see due to the city lights shimmered and twinkled like fragments of crystals. The moon was a beautiful curvy crescent, a shadow of the rest of it seen if you look very carefully. The road kept slipping underneath us, as if we were travelling on water, and then my night reverie was interrupted by my best friend's long wavy locks flying in my eye. Things I deal with, jeez. Music roared from our car; some songs that you would not probably listen to with your parents around came on. But aunty's so chill that she was singing along! Besides none of us girls had a filter over our mouth, so as usual, we talked without thinking too much and  that included singing along the profanities in the really recent songs.. and then everyone bit their tongue, worried that aunty is probably going to throw us out, and so the birthday girls responds saying, "it's cool, she's cool"! Um...okay..

Then there was another round of head swinging and hair whipping by the time we were on The Sea Link. And then silence. Everyone suddenly wanted to take in the serenity and the "pure sea-link air". The windows were down and no matter how many times you see the magnanimous structure, it always amazes you. The pretty lights that adorn the triangles of the sea link accentuated how it looked against the pitch black sky in the background. We were all poking our heads out staring at the spiralled poles and listening to the wild waves. It's like someone had clicked the pause button on our chatter and ugly singing. And by the end of the long stretch of the bridge we were back to being hippies and supposedly awesome people.
P.S. Most of us were in pyjamas and ridiculously stupid quote tees.

And then we parked at the Worli Sea Face, girls pouring out from a such a small capacity car, rolling over to the pavement and starting our selfie marathon. Let me tell you something, when there are a group of girls huddled at a side, the best and only thing they do is click a ton of pictures. And I am not one bit ashamed of this.

Snap,Snap,Snap till the clock struck twelve, and we sprung into a loud Happy Birthday Song in the middle of the pathway. That song could put Zayn-less One Direction to shame I assure you. Our beloved birthday girl was happy beyond expectations. It's something else you know, doing something different for your 17th birthday and doing it in public. It's fun.

And after a couple of rounds of hugs,kisses,photos,screaming and cake splattering, we were back on the road singing like an unsynchronised choir group, laughing in the most unlady-like manner, but we couldn't bring ourselves to care because that was one of the best night of our lives. You rock girls!