Savdhaan! Dulhe ki talaash hai...

Here's my first attempt at a short fictional story. Would love to hear your feedback in comments.

Scene 1

Prithvi Theatre, Mumbai

A girl, in her early thirties, is waiting for the queue to form for the 9pm play she booked. It's 8:30pm, and the place is beautifully decked up in yellow and red lights. There are posters all around on upcoming theatre shows but the one poster that brings a smirk to her face is titled as "savdhan! dulhe ki talash hai". As she is sipping the cold coffee, she observes the people who are here for the show, and starts thinking about how Delhi and Mumbai have different vibes.

"Excuse me. Are you a writer?" 

Suddenly these words bring her back to reality. A guy, probably in his mid/late thirties, with black frames is standing next to her. 

"Umm, no." She smiles. "though I aspire to be" she murmurs to herself.

"Oh, you look like a writer. " 

"Really?"

"Yes! So, you come here often?"

"I'm actually visiting. I'm from Delhi"

"Oh! Me too" he smiles. 

"Ah..Where in Delhi?" she responds to the unexpected answer. 

"Faridabad"

"I see"

"And you?" he immediately asks.

"Vikram Vihar"

"Nice". "What do you do?"

"I teach statistics in an undergrad college"

"I'm a freelancer. Art director" he says proudly with a smile.

"Interesting!" 

A silence takes over as she sips more coffee from her cup, moves a few steps to dispose the glass, and then quickly checks phone for time. When she turns back, she finds this guy greeting another man. Perhaps he was waiting for a friend, who joined him now. 

The queue begins to start, and she moves quickly towards it so she can grab a good seat for the play. She continues reading the posters on the notice board as she moves forwards with the queue, but she also notices that the same guy is almost behind her with another girl in between. His friend is nowhere around, so may be he is all by himself too. She continues moving forward, gets her tickets checked and enters the theatre. 

In the first scan, she is excited to see the front row is still empty. "Movies are best watched from last row, and plays are best watched from the first". These words of mumma echo in her head, as she moves towards the first row. Immediately she realizes the first row will be way too close as there is no distance between stage and seats, and she may have to continue lifting her head through out the play. She quickly moves her steps towards the stairs to third row where there is some empty space and which also happens to be mid section. As she maneuvers her steps to the newly found perfect seat, she notices this movement being mirrored by the person behind her, who turns out to be the same guy. 

She quickly grabs the seat and finds him coming behind her and sitting next to her. 

"I'm following you" , he says with a smile while taking the seat next to her.

"I think I noticed that" she laughs.

"By the way, I'm Arnav." and he extends his hand for greeting. 

"I'm Nishita." she responds as well.

"Nice to meet you." he smiles. "So, you like theatre?"

"Well I have fond memories of participating in theatre briefly during my college time, and I know what all goes into it. So, it fascinates me a lot" she says in a nostalgic tone.

"Ah nice. Do you go for plays in Delhi too?"

"Not as much as I would like to"

"I love watching plays. I often go to Habitat center, Sri ram center and so on to watch plays. In fact, I am a big foodie too, so I keep exploring places. Are you a foodie?"

"Me? No!" 

"Okay! Are you a vegetarian?"

"Yes"

"You should try this place in Lajpat nagar called Nagpal ke chole bhature. There's nothing like those bhature."

"Okay, thanks. I'll try." she says with a smile.

"Do you like watching movies? And what kind of movies?"

"Yes, but not limiting to a specific genre. But yes, I love the Lunchbox kinds. They are low budget, sweet and so touching"

"Oh yes, that was an amazing movie. Have you seen Gone girl?"

"No"

"What? You should. It's an amazing movie. What about TV shows?  What do you follow?"

"I recently watched House of Cards and loved it." she says with a pleasant smile. 

"So true. I loved it as well" he says enthusiastically. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, before we begin, we request you to switch off your phones, as they can distract the artists and other audience members" the announcement suddenly turns the room into a silence. 

*Lights go off* 

*Play begins*

90 minutes later, the lights are back. Everyone stands up and greets the artists with a big round of applause. And with this, people slowly start moving towards the exit gate. 

They both get up as well. Even though he was sitting on the corner, he intentionally stops and lets her walk first, and then quickly follows her steps. 

"Did you eat?"

"I did have a lite bite in the evening" she smiles with an acknowledgement for his concern.

"Let's go to this place nearby. It has really good burgers" 

"Haha.. Okay! I can eat a little bit more" she says a bit reluctantly but mostly amused at the confidence of this guy. 

---------

Scene 2 - 

Pottery cafe, Juhu Beach

As they enter the place, she is pleasantly surprised by the ambience of this cute little cafe. They quickly take a seat and order. As they talk more about movies, music, tv shows and plays, he offers to send her a list of all the movies she should watch. 

"Give me a missed call and I'll be sure to send you all the list of movies you should watch" he says enthusiastically while biting his delicious mushroom bruschetta 

"Haha.. so that's a smart way to ask for number. How about email me the list?" she laughs. 

"Don't be so cruel" he says dramatically.

"You really think I'll give you my number" and continues laughing with eyes mostly focused on carefully eating her avocado bruschetta. 

"Okay. No problem. Just email me your number then." 

"Haha.. sure" 

As they finish the meal, he insists to pay and asks her to pay the next time they meet in Delhi. She couldn't stop laughing on this guy's confidence, but doesn't defend too much on splitting the bill either. As they move out, he insists on having a paan, and she readily agrees. 

"Let me see which movie show is running nearby and we can watch that"

"What!? No. I'm not planning to watch any movie right now. I'm planning to head back" 

While she continued laughing on the flattery and enjoying the attention she was getting, she was also a bit taken aback by this. 

"Okay. No problem. How about going to Colaba for drinks? I know really cool places there."
"No, I'll pass" she says politely.
"Okay. Juhu beach? It's just here" he again asks with a hope. 

"Umm. Okay. I don't mind going to Juhu beach." 

While walking towards the beach, she was pleased by the opportunity to not miss the beach on this trip to Mumbai, which she thought she will because of the short trip. 

--------------

Scene 3 -

Juhu Beach

As they walk on the beach, she noticed how the waves didn't hesitate in making multiple attempts to touch her feet. The waves was refusing to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times they were sent away. The guy too, refused to give up on getting her engaged, no matter how many times she disengaged. While walking, he opened a plethora of subjects in front of her to gauge her interest. 

"So, you follow Elon Musk and his adventures?"

"Not really"

"Okay. Sci fi movies?"

"Only seen a few"

"What about old movies?"

"Oh yes, I like quite a lot of them. I love most movies of Amol Palekar, Rajesh Khanna and Amitabh Bachan. Have you seen the one where Amol Palekar takes personality coaching to win over a girl? Umm... Rajnigandha?" she said excitingly

"Oh yes. Amazing movie! I love how he transforms" he replies happily with a proud smile to spot her enthusiastic nerve.

"Yes! And it was way ahead of it's time." she says with a nod. 

"So, what else do you like?" 

"I love exploring topics on self-awareness. And this is something very few people dive into" she says and looks at him to see his response to her interest area.
"Very nice. I've done a couple of meditation courses of Osho, and they were quite an experience." 

She was surprised to find him interested in this domain. As they walk on the beach, they talk about their experiences on exploring self, meditations, Osho, spirituality and so on. 

"Since you like all these topics, you must have heard of that theory: Just you do your best, don't bother about results and let the universe do the rest" he asks

"Oh yes, law of attraction and even Bhagwat Gita: Karam Karo, and phal ki china mat karo" she says with a complete agreement. 

"Yes" he says enthusiastically and continues talking about his perspective on this theory.

A couple of minutes later.. 

"Do you have a boyfriend?" he asks

"haha.. why do you ask?" she laughs because this time it was the expected question to follow.

"Just for my knowledge" he answers sincerely.

"No" she firmly says after a brief pause. 

"It's interesting that a beautiful girl like you is single so far"

"Are you trying to find a problem on what made me stay single?"

"haha.. no. But how come you haven't found someone?"

"I'm very content and happy with myself. I'll only go for a relationship when my happiness increases with someone's presence" she laughs as she proudly declares the criteria.

"Whoa! That's an awesome approach" he applauds. 

"Should we head back?" she says as she realizes it's almost 12am. 

"Okay" he agrees.

While walking back, she wondered how old he would be.

"So, how long have you been working?" she asks in a sincere and careful tone.  

"18 years" he says proudly.

"Wow."

"Yes, I started working in 2001"

"Nice" and she wonders she probably was in class 8th in 2001 and then immediately asks: "what about you? Are you married?"

"I'm divorced"

"Okay" she says respectfully. 

-------------

Scene 4 -

Traffic junction outside Juhu Beach

"Where are you heading to?" he asks

"Bandra" she says firmly.  

"Okay. I'm in Lokhandwala. Hey, what about the number?"

"Haha.. Not happening Arnav" she says firmly but in a light hearted tone. 

"Okay. Email? How will I send you the list otherwise?" he asks disappointingly. 

"Yes, I can do that. Give me your phone." 

She grabs his phone, and types her email id on his phone. 

"I just sent you a 'hi'. Can you check?" he says eagerly to not miss the opportunity to exchange contacts.

"Okay, I will check later" she says while looking for an uber. 

"But you need to tell me what time you generally get free, so we can plan our Delhi meeting" 

"haha.. We'll see." she continues smiling and fiddling with her phone. 

"So we may or may not meet?" and the disappointment increases on his face

"Well, you just told me something profound. You did your job, so now let the universe conspire" and this time she couldn't hold her laugh. 

"Damn! I knew this would backfire" he laughs but couldn't hide his disappointment and amazement of her swift reply.

"Hahaha...My uber is here!"
"So, at least reply to my email, so I know you got it."

"Don't worry. I gave you the correct email id." she says in an assuring tone. "But.." she adds.

"But?" he asks eagerly.

"One of the things that I told you about myself, was a lie" she bursts into laughing as she notices the disappointment in his eyes. 

"Lie? Which one?" he couldn't hold himself back from asking this.

"Now that is something you figure out" 

She continued laughing as she sits in the cab, and waves. He waves too with a puzzled face as he watches the white Swift Desire merging with other cars on the road.

------------