![\"Agnisaakshi\"](\"http:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Agnisaakshi-300x173.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
He had kept his appointment to meet me at the beach\u2026. My friend Srinivasarangan was a punctual man\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n It was two years since I had seen him. He was thinner and visibly paler, certainly not the ebullient man in his bell bottoms he was when we were together at the Presidency, and surely a far cry from the rosy cheeked young chubby lad he was during his school days. It was neither day nor night. The sun had gone down and stars had come out and darkness was swathing in a stride much like the grief of his heart. I wasn\u2019t sure how to start.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cRanga, I want to talk to you about something\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSure, go ahead\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWill you mind if it\u2019s personal, Ranga?\u201d \u2013 I was unusually held-back with my best friend in being out-spoken.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYou can say anything, you\u2019re my best friend.\u201d\u2026. \u201cAnd now, what more do I have to hide as personal?\u201d \u2013 he added with a look towards the blue lined horizon beyond the sea.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll talk sitting on this beach\u2026..\u201d he said. We walked a few yards to a spot at the foot of a tree. We sank down on the soft sand of the beach. The same beach that saw us run in fun and frolic, hand in hand as children \u2013 little boys who knew nothing about life\u2019s travails; The same beach that saw us play beach cricket with tennis balls as college kids;<\/span><\/p>\n His now dried sea of sorrow reflecting in his voice cut through my heart.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cRanga, you must marry again.\u201d- I said, in my own blunt way, and paused.<\/span><\/p>\n There was his usual silence, and after a calm survey, he smiled. \u201cAnd why must I?\u201d asked he.<\/span><\/p>\n I had my answers ready \u2013 \u201cYou are still young, and you are not a father yet \u2013 why would you want to waste your life in Padma’s memory? I respect your love for her, but you had only been married for 2 years\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n He smiled. \u201cDid Amma ask you to talk to me?\u201d – \u00a0He knew. The old lady had tried to get her son out of Padma\u2019s memory for two years but received no response from him who slowly became a sober introvert, who\u2019d not entertain any topic of him marrying again. Out of desperation she had called me and asked if I could talk to her son, in my capacity as his best friend.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWell\u2026.\u201d I started to speak, but his hand on my hand stopped me in my tracks. \u201cI know you and I know her\u2026..I am sure she would have\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201c\u2026..\u2026\u2026.\u201d – There was silence in the air.<\/span><\/p>\n By now, the moon had come out\u2026.. It was a Poornima\u2026.. I thought for a second that the moon was more like a white swan that came swimming out of the black ocean, above our heads\u2026.. I wondered what was going on in Rangan\u2019s mind\u2026\u2026 His gaze was fixed on the moon\u2026\u2026.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cDo you see that moon?” \u2013 he asked\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYa\u2026 beautiful, isn\u2019t it?\u201d \u2013 I replied.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt is\u2026\u2026 It\u2019s good you brought the topic up. I had to open my heart to someone, my friend. And none better than you\u2026\u2026.\u201d \u2013 he paused;<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cHmmm\u2026..\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cDo you know, this moon has borne witness to my times with Padma here, on this very spot below this tree? This spot to me, is sacrosanct…… Every Poornima\u2026. I and Padma would come here\u2026 to this very beach\u2026 this very spot\u2026. We used to pack our dinner and come here\u201d\u2026\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cHmmm\u2026.\u201d – I did not want to interrupt him\u2026\u2026 After a pause he continued\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cOn our first day here, I wrote a shlokham for her, comparing her lovely turmeric tinged face with the rising yellowy poorna-chandhran. I don\u2019t mind repeating to you”…. He recited the verse.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYou are quite a poet,\u00a0aren’t\u00a0you?\u201d \u2013 I tried to infuse some cheer. He gave a wry smile and nodded it off… “What\u2019s the point?\u201d\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cShe was the best person in my life, you know? She took care of every single detail for me. She knew I liked my potatoes fried to crispness, with some extra chilly in it, and that\u2019s the way it was done. She knew I was allergic to pea-nuts, and it was banished from the limits of the household. My wake up alarm in the morning, for those 2 years were her keerthanams and varnams, one raaga for each day, and my lullabies were her neelaambary and yadhukulakambodhi \u2026. Despite my protests, she washed my clothes by hand. Do you know? I have bought a fresh set of clothes to be used after she left this world. I have preserved every cloth she washed with her hand. I did not want to dirty them\u2026. They bear her finger prints and I don’t want her finger prints to be washed off\u2026. her unwashed saree wraps my pillow now….. and her scent wraps my heart\u201c<\/span><\/p>\n Another pause\u2026\u2026 I could see in the moonlight, his eyes were moist\u2026.. his gaze was fixed on the moon\u2026\u2026 he went on\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cHer lap was my pillow\u2026 her eyes were my mirror\u2026.. she loved me\u2026.. ever since the day she stepped into my home\u2026.. what had I done for her to deserve such unconditional love? She kept awake till I came home, and shared her food with me\u2026 I came home early to make sure she ate in time\u2026.. at times, she fed me\u2026 and I used to playfully suck on her fingers as she fed me\u2026 Though we could never conceive, I could see a mother\u2019s love in her eyes\u2026 That was enough for us\u2026.. we were each-others\u2019 child\u2026..\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n He was now breathing faster\u2026.. his voice betrayed a silent sob\u2026\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cShe loved me\u2026.. I loved her\u2026.. unconditionally. She cared for my happiness unconditionally\u2026.. do you know what she said when kissing me good night, the night before we got her admitted?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201c\u2026\u2026.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cShe said if she died, she\u2019d be with me in spirit. She said in her next birth, she would want to be my wife. I said in our next birth I want to be her wife, and she must be my husband\u2026. I could repay her kindness in some way\u2026.. And she asked me to remarry if she died. I broke down and refused\u2026\u2026 She knew I would say no\u2026. she knew my love for her\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Rangan was now in tears\u2026.. I could do nothing about it\u2026. I was trying not to cry myself.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cYou say it\u2019s JUST 2 years\u2026\u2026 I remember every single day of those 2 years. Every single minute\u2026. She lives, my friend\u2026. She lives now in me\u2026.. Do you think loyalty is just physical? When we tied the knot we circum-ambulated the fire 7 times\u2026.. I promised her that I\u2019d be faithful to her in thought, word and deed. And faith to me, is not just physical. Her physical frame is no more, but her soul lives in my heart. And till God lets me meet her in the other world, I shall wait. That\u2019s my respect for my sweetheart\u2026.. I am waiting to be united with her, again\u2026\u2026 because, this bond is eternal\u2026..\u00a0 It was sealed with fire as witness\u2026. Agnisaakshi\u2026\u2026. No other woman shall ever have me\u2026..\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n I could not help my tears\u2026.. Ironically, he had to cheer me up\u2026..!<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s time\u2026. Let\u2019s go home\u2026 Amma will be waiting. You must have dinner at my home today\u2026.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n We got up and started\u2026\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n I did not know what I\u2019d tell his mother\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n I just wished, Padma heard his words\u2026. Or perhaps, she lived in his heart and knew\u2026\u2026.. Perhaps, she heard….. perhaps she rose \u00a0with the moon every poornima, and came eagerly to see her husband sitting under the very same tree to that sacrosanct spot\u2026\u2026. She\u2019d know he\u2019d come there\u2026 It was agnisaakshi\u2026\u2026..<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" He had kept his appointment to meet me at the beach\u2026. My friend Srinivasarangan was…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[707,500,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-literature","category-short-stories"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","featured_image_urls":{"full":"","thumbnail":"","medium":"","medium_large":"","large":"","1536x1536":"","2048x2048":"","covernews-featured":"","covernews-medium":""},"author_info":{"display_name":"\u0baa\u0bc1\u0bb5\u0ba9\u0bc7\u0bb7\u0bcd\u0bb5\u0bb0\u0bcd","author_link":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/?author=210"},"category_info":"English<\/a> \u0b87\u0bb2\u0b95\u0bcd\u0b95\u0bbf\u0baf\u0bae\u0bcd<\/a> \u0b9a\u0bbf\u0bb1\u0bc1\u0b95\u0ba4\u0bc8\u0b95\u0bb3\u0bcd<\/a>","tag_info":"\u0b9a\u0bbf\u0bb1\u0bc1\u0b95\u0ba4\u0bc8\u0b95\u0bb3\u0bcd","comment_count":"3","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39794"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39794\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vallamai.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}