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Chapter 9:
Mohabattein Chapter 1
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The cinema hall seemed hotter than usual, his senses heightened to levels where he could literally feel his sweaty back rubbing against the poorly cushioned seat, his fingers that curled around the thermocol glass felt sticky thanks to the strong fizz of Thums Up spraying its beads all over his grip. Nikhil had to calm down and see himself through this. He dared not look to his right, and he was thankful that the darkness around would allow him to focus at the screen in the front. She's right here! He kept telling himself to pretend that it was just him with his own family. But for every time he tried, Pooja would lean forward to check if Jyotsna and her company wanted some Pop corn or samosas. "No thanks!" he heard her voice, but he kept looking forward. He had to play statue for the next three hours. Sharukh Khan made a queer entry with a violin in hand, and the theater erupted with hoots and cheers. That seemed to calm Nikhil down, and he could finally find breathing space in his very confined seat. Whistles came for every character in this star studded movie: for known faces and unknown, both got their share of whistles; it seemed like a successful formula in movies these days, to pepper the story with actors even if they weren't relevant to the plot. Nikhil kept his eyes glued to the screen, and stared past the intro song, and those powerful dialogues. He dared not look to his right. Why is this so hard? He experimented by turning his head slowly to catch a glimpse, and the corner of his eyes found her sitting in a white tee, she had tied her hair into a bun, and looked just the way he had imagined. 'Take the red rose or the yellow rose' he heard himself speak to him. He wasn't sure how long he had positioned his neck in that painful angle, but he couldn't stop trying to catch a glimpse of her from the periphery of his sight. "Take the red rose or the yellow" he heard it again, only this time- that voice boomed across the entire hall. And the words weren't in English, but in Hindi. He turned to the screen to make sense of it, and to his shock he saw a clueless actor on his knees, holding out a red and yellow rose in each hand, proposing to some lady in the middle of a street. 'This can't be happening!' That pop corn Nikhil kept churning in his mouth came to a standstill as he watched the scene unfold, and he was back to keeping his eyes glued to the screen. 'Jyotsna is watching the same thing! She must be laughing at me!' That actor met the same fate as Nikhil did: she took the yellow rose. 'That's how every love story should end' he thought to himself angrily as he sat exhausted in his seat 'How much more can I take?'
A few idiots in the raucous theater added to his frustration as they passed unwarranted comments to get the party going. Then came a scene where a lady with an enormous rack would dance around with no care in the world. A perfectly innocent scene turned into vulgarity when another idiot in the crowd flashed a laser pointer on to her bust, tracking movements and pointing at where her nipples were jutting out of her bra. "Which kind of an ass would do such a thing?" Nikhil silently watched the red dot hover around the screen intermittently, making its re-appearance as many times as the busty lady. "...Stop it...!" he thought he heard a voice coming from the left. "Niku, this is NOT funny, STOP IT RIGHT NOW" he heard her voice louder this time, to find his mom screaming from her seat, pointing her finger towards the screen. At first, nothing made sense until he saw Pooja and his dad's angry faces as well. 'They think it's me!' He realized and he frantically raised his arms in the air, crying innocent. Pooja pitched in "I know its you!" loud enough for the entire row to hear. By then, the red dot stopped appearing on the screen. His anger seethed through his teeth as he said "It wasn't me!" For the first time, he found courage to look right at Jyotsna to clear her doubts of him being such a pervert. "Only she would understand". He found her and her company looking right back, all appearing as angry as the rest of his family. His mouth could only mutter after that, so he used his hand gestures instead which made him look more like a person who had lost his bearings. 'It's done' he heard his mind again. The movie concluded, and the lights came back on. Even that asshole who proposed on screen ended up getting the girl of his dreams. People around shared sleepy glances at each other and said words like 'nice movie' and 'good acting'. For Nikhil, it was another story of a meltdown. Jyotsna and her family made way towards the exit. He found her slowly hobble towards the door, not looking back. With that, he saw her slowly walk out of his thoughts as well. 'Her every notion of me has changed', and he didn't care anymore. He wasn't sure what that meant, but a part of him was relieved that she probably hated him now for being the pervert he was thought to be. It's done. |
