The cloud cover was too thick…The stars, the moon all seemed dead that night…There was no wind…But it was chilly… the stillness made the situation even more eerie….The church clock had just struck a dozen of blows…Everything was normal yet there seemed something special about that night….Well the specialty was something very simple…It was the 18th December…A week before Christmas and it was Camellia’s Birthday….The mist about her house was thick..The earth seemed so glum…
Every year it rained on her birthday….It was sort of a habitual fact about nature…that it poured cats and dogs on all her birthdays…
It was not until she was six that she kept a count, but ever since then she used to wait for the rain…For to her it was a lucky charm…she couldn’t accept something different…
Ya! she was those cliché types…To her everything that happened should be repeated…for if it isn’t there must be some omen about it….Now that would seem very strange to most people but that’s the way she was….
Already she was getting paranoid…Her parents had wished her but her reply was very calm...She was not that vivacious and excited about birthdays anymore…She loved herself a lot…but now she also had someone else to Love…Richard ….
“Won’t it rain tonight, Momma”
She had asked with her long eye lashes, quivering with expectation….
“The sky is crimson, dear it should rain , why are you so bothered every year, Now you are eighteen…have you still not grown up ?“ her mother had replied planting a kiss on her forehead..She gave a bleak smile…
She had been making nervous glances at her cell phone…every other minute…She was expecting a call…
It was two in the night…The cold breeze was now quite steady, but there was not a drop of rain….She was getting fidgety…It’s just three hours to twilight, will it nor rain…tonight…
She could not sleep...Somewhere a great pain was raising inside her heart…She was eighteen tonight but didn’t Richard call yet…Was something wrong...She said a small prayer…But time seemed to be in a hurry….
The church clock struck thrice….She pretended to be asleep as her dad came up for water…
But she had no peace of mind…The breeze had stopped, she could see a few stars….too...The sky was clearing out…but now she was close to crying…
When suddenly she heard a “Beep”!
It was her cell phone...She almost jumped up to grab it….An international number…. Yes she was right______ it was Richard calling…
“Happy Birthday “a heavy voice said from the other side…
Forgetting all her anger and annoyance...She broke down in a sob…
“Why were you so late, why did not call…I have been waiting...Do you not care for me…” and much more… Richard had too many questions to answer…
They chatted on and on, when suddenly her paranoia about the rain crept in once again….
“You know “, she said…
“It has not rained on my birthday yet…every year it rains”
“Something seems amiss; I have never had as birthday which went dry…”
Richard never replied…
“Say something” Camellia insisted…
All she could hear was a beep on the other side…
The phone had got disconnected…
Richard never called back that night….It was close to dawn…The reddish tinge now hazed upon the distant horizon….Somewhere Camellia was growing apprehensive…
When suddenly she saw a flash of light, it was a lightening…followed by a thunder and then it started to rain. It rained like never before, drowning the dawn, the windows hazed by the noisy raindrops.
A beep again…..
An SMS!!!
“I love someone else, I always had, but couldn’t face the truth, couldn’t tell you what I really wanted. I was afraid that I would hurt you, but not anymore. Look out of the window, look out in the rain, look at those raindrops and try to forget me, forget I ever meant anything to you….
It seemed so vague….She was feeling numb, would she reply????
May Be Not!
Till feelings turned benign she would let her silence do the talking……
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