The Love Letter

Can' t you see how much I love you? Can 't you? Hear the quickening of my breath, see the
tightening of my muscles, paralyzing my movements and my voice as I watch you turn the corner,
from my window. I watch the back of you, swish-swashing away, hips swinging in time with your
one braid; watching you disappear away from me. And then, when it is too late, I half raise one
hand and practice today s line, robot-like, to an empty street, Hi. Do you know me? Each day I
practice one line, discarding it the next.

Because you should. You should really know me. As I know you, have known you, for years. I
watched you graduate from two braids to one, exchanging your blue skirted uniform for colorful
freedom, just two years ago. I know that you look your best in red, and have to fight the urge to
shout out that yellow does nothing for you.

And I know when your exams are, because of the light that burns late into the night, at your second
floor window. Did you know that sometimes I sit underneath that window, on the filthy ground of
the alley it looks into? Yes, I sit there, and watch for your dark silhouette to pass in front of the
translucently lighted, nylon curtains. If I look closely, during the day some time, I can even see the
spray of red flowers, dance repeatedly across the flimsy fabric.

About four years ago, you took up music lessons. I watched jealously through casually opened
doors, the master sahib, as he straightened your posture. He touched your waist that only I ought
to. But I lacked the courage to say anything. Instead, I paced outside your front door, pretending to
smoke, hearing your laughter wafting through the air. And then your songs. Climbing and
plunging, trilling and deepening, seeping into my very being. I don t hear that anymore. Sometimes
you are too flighty that way. I hope you grow out of it. Don t get me wrong, I am glad that the
master does not visit any more. I just miss hearing your voice.

Oh how I coveted the cups of tea you handed him so solicitously. And I wanted the smiles you
flung at him so generously. Perhaps when we get married, I shall make you sing again. Just for me.
And drink the tea, sweetened by your hand, the same liquidly light brown as your skin. And I
would gaze into the obsidian depths of your eyes. And you would tenderly brush away my
obstinate cowlick, and attempt to smooth it away with your spittle.

You have no idea how often I sit here, in the darkness of my room, hearing the footsteps of other
boarders returning wearily from work, and dream my dreams for us. I plan the details of what you
will wear and what you will do all day. And then I imagine the future, where I would come home
and hand over my brief case to you, and enjoy your fluttering around me. Sometimes I can taste
and smell the pooris you fry fresh, just for me.

I see you everywhere. What spell have you cast on me? Sometimes when I go home, to see my
family 500 miles away, I hear your stifled laughter behind me. And I turn around, and all there is
to see are the stupid, giggling village girls. I scowl and glower at them. I sit at the banks of the
little stream that joins the Ganga, and eventually heads for the sea. Closing my eyes, the sun beats
down on me, the water ripples just as you walk, and I build our dream house. I cut my infrequent
visits home, short, with creative excuses, so I can time my life, according to your routine. My
mother strokes my head and whispers loudly. You live there alone. No-one to take care of you.
May Lord Yama take your boss, making you return so early from home. I did not even get a
chance to fatten you up. How thin he is, look. Here, take some laddoos with you. You need to get
married soon. But who listens to me? She would dissolve into tears and I would leave her wiping
her eyes on her sari, with my silent father beside her, surrounded by a clucking gaggle of sisters
and sisters-in-law.

And, even, in this jostling, madding city where you and I live, I see you when you are not around.
A tightly woven, fat braid swinging on supple hips, the flash of an eye, a familiar print. I see you
on trains and on foot, in cars and with other people. Sometimes I see you with men. And I burn
with rage and jealousy. Until I pass the stranger and look at her, full in the face. Only then does the
fractured beat of my heart smoothen.

I rush home, to sit by my barred window, and watch you turn the corner. And again, I practice
what I will say to you. Sometimes I wonder if you do know. I watch you hesitate and look around
you, as if you can feel my eyes devouring you. As if the waves of my love wash over you,
submerging you, pushing you off balance. And I wonder why you look apprehensive, a winsome
wrinkling of your brow, a quick-shot glance backwards. As if someone lurks in the shadows. And
hope rushes to fill the lonely, empty spaces in my life.

Last night I left a rose on your doorstep, knowing that you are the first person to leave, certain you
would pick it up. Instead you trilled out a backward goodbye to your mother, and callously stepped
upon it, not even glancing down to see its velvet petals, crushed. How could you? How could you
not see it? I wonder if a dewy petal stuck to the soles of your sandals and if you dragged it through
the black mud of the first monsoons. And somewhere in that viscous black morass of the city, you
left it, dying. How could you?

But I love you and I will forgive you. At least for now.

I spend waking nights writing you a letter. A letter I started writing the first day I saw you, five
years ago. As I watched you, serious schoolgirl, nearly bent double with your bag our eyes met.
And I decided to take this room on rent, though it was almost twice as expensive as many others in
the city. For this was the lane where my beloved lives. Where else could I go?
I write in frenzy. Like ghosts, my violet-penned words haunt the pristinely white paper. I have to
let you know exactly how I feel. So I choose my words carefully and discard them, along with the
paper I write them on. A mound of white on violet grows in my room, and trapped within are my
stifled emotions. I cannot do this, cannot complete this letter. I am angry with you, for your
perfectness that refuses to be captured.

So, with a flourish, I just write, I love you, on a stark white page. On the way from work I buy a
fragrant string of mogra and lightly tied it to the tightly rolled up note.
And now, I wait here, in the relatively deserted field-like entrance to our basti. And I pace back
and forth. People disembark from the buses that periodically pull up, spilling their over-stuffed
contents. No sign of you.

You re late. Where are you? Fevered images of lecherous boy friends swim in my head. Until,
there you are. I wait for you to emerge from the dispersing crowd and say good-bye to a few of
your college friends. You come straight toward me, and I thrust out my hand in your path. I realize
it s the empty hand. Quickly I bring out the other one, the flowers already wilting, turning a rusty
brown.

Please, my eyes beg her to look downwards, and she sees the letter. What? she asks almost rudely,
what is this? I wrote this letter. I..I really like you. I could not bring myself to invoke the power of
my love in such a prosaic word.

What, she screams, repetitiously. Have you seen yourself? You villager lout. I will tell my dad, he
knows people. You won t be able to walk straight for a while. Grabbing the letter from my hand,
she throws it down and grinds it with the heel of her shoes. Then, without a backward look, she
stalks away.

I could have made you a queen, worshipped you like a goddess. Did you know I just got a
promotion? Do you know how much money I make? Treating me like a common roadside goonda.

How dare you? Don 't think I do not notice the little smiles you exchange with that jean-clad boy
who travels on the bus with you. I watch how your shoulder touches his, unmoving. I know about
your shopping trips with your bitch mother, putting together a nice dowry. You looked beautiful
in that pink sari. Why didn t you buy it? See I still love you and I notice everything about you. I
know everything about you. I know you.

I know you don 't love me yet. But some time in the future, soon, you will beg for my love, on your
knees. And I might even take you back. Because I still love you, after all. But one day, you will
know just how much. You will know what my stuttering voice and discarded letter could not
convey. The mangled letter tied with a bald string, stained with the juice of crushed mogra, that I
caress often. You will know of the painful vise in which you trap me, without the possibility of
escape. You will feel my love for you, sharply and cleanly. You will know all this, one day. Even
if it is the last thing you ever learn. Even if it is on the day I kill you. I will kill you, you know.

Because I love you too much.