The Lure Of Madness
One beautiful January morning, on a narrow suburb highway in the dusty, old town Chennai neighbourhood, I walked past the 99% perfect girl. To tell you the truth, my eyes met hers. And, it was the most wholesome feeling I ever felt in a long time.
To be honest, she wasn’t that perfect. I mean she doesn’t stand out in anyway. She had an athletic body and that’s probably what got my interest anyway otherwise I quite remember it was her eyes that gravitated me to her. Those eyes had an aura of mysterious sting which appealed to me. But, her hair was not done properly even. It kept falling all over her face.Some strands were still bent from sleep. She paired denim jeans with a star wars white t-shirt. She stood with a hip jutted to one side, her right arm draped across her slender body, clasping the elbow opposite. Her head lolled down to one shoulder casting her bobbed hair onto the faded star wars t-shirt that stuck to her curves. Her static eyes had picked a patch of concrete with nothing to distinguish it from any other patch, it had the same cracks, the same weeds, the same grime. A car back-fired a street over, renting the air as good as any gun-shot, but instead of getting startled , she instead stayed put rather calmly. I wanted a window into her mind, to find out what was going on. Somehow I knew that approaching her with questions was the wrong thing to do. Also, she had a vintage stylish backpack. It made her look old school and modest. But there was a rumbling in my chest the moment I saw her. And that was all I needed.
It was a chilly morning and the sky was still foggy. There was no sign of any light from the heaven above and a strange coldness descended all over the place. There were barely a dozen people on the side street except for the passing vehicles and motorcades that whizzed in the fleeting breeze. I had an early morning lecture in college to attend. There finally a mini-van halted near the waiting lot. I climbed in behind her. She took her seat right across to me and damn she was breathtaking. She looked at me once but I looked away for fear of being discovered the soft spot I had started to grow for her. I couldn’t help my nerves and kept stealing sneak-peeks at her every now and them. Momentarily. Meanwhile, we kept patience for the van to load up. The truth is I wanted to jump into her bones the moment I saw her. Her drawn out look…so pretty and demure. I had always had a thing for the good girls. And, with not an inch of doubt in my mind, she was one.
Following my first sight of her, on that melancholic cold morning breeze, she was all over my thoughts. I was everywhere physically, except that I was nowhere mentally. In the few days that followed, I had started to lose slumber and peace of mind and her thoughts took over my days and nights. Nothing began to make sense anymore. And every miniscule of chores and errands fell away from the realm of normalcy. Until at some point in time, I began to wonder if I had started to lose myself in her and her every invisible whims. In a matter of days I transformed from being a sheer sane individual to an utter madman. A humdrum of voices infected every cell in my being until I had lost all of my being. In the sanity of my own thoughts, I began to talk to her like she were sitting beside me. And, I held her hands and kissed her lips like I would lose her forever. My reality began to lose its colours and the universe came crashing down upon my foolishness. But, in the chaos of all this unsettling and horrifying dilemma of self, I had an unwavering hope of seeing her again. A glance of her, that’s all I ever wanted. And it was the most powerful feeling that ran through my adulterated veins. Somewhere, deep in my soul, I had a feeling that another encounter with her might mend every broken piece of me and I might begin to live again. While amidst the clouded layers of all this mayhem of unintended madness, another surge of mania sprung from an oblivious part of my existence. Hoping and anticipating out of the miraculous power of the universe that she might feel the same about me and we find each other in the arena of love at first sight.
Until then, I let my troubles take over me and my mind wither away in her every imaginary whims.
