If I Could Have Said It A Bit Earlier

I wished I said it a bit early, maybe things would have been different , maybe I could have went to India with her.

“Hello, is this seat beside you free?” She kindly questioned me. “Yes, you can take a seat here” I answered gently. Without even saying a thank you, she immediately sat on the seat. I found her very rude and arrogant. I started to think, what kind of girl she is? huh, she has pride of her beauty!? Of course, she was beautiful, and with that black tee-shirt and light blue denim, she looked stunning, with strands of her hair falling over her light pink lips. Any guy could fall for her, but not all. Did she think that I was hitting on her?

My thoughts were interrupted with the announcement that the bus driver/guide made, “Hello Crazy people. We will now depart for our trip to 2 Capitals. Our first is Vienna and then we will go to Budapest. You would be provided with hostel facility in Budapest, and Vienna we complete in one day. Have a safe journey and sleep tight. See you all tomorrow morning.” As the announcement got over, the bus departed. Lights in the bus started to dim as all the people were about to sleep.

I didn’t know why I was thinking so much about her. But there was something in her that made me curious about her, and I felt like knowing her. I have never felt so deeply for a woman before. I found her to be rude, just because she didn’t say thank you, but I didn’t want to judge her on that.

A conversation at midnight

At midnight we took a halt in Munich for 45 minutes. She woke up and got down the bus. I smiled at her, but she just didn’t see and went away. I don’t know why was I acting like a desperate man. I told myself, “Krish, you are not suppose to do that. You are a gentleman, don’t act so desperate’. Maybe that was not desperation, it was just curiosity.

She came after 10 minutes, took the seat, I didn’t look at her, and turned towards the window and started  to gaze outside the window. In the meanwhile, she said, “Excuse me please!”.

Ohh God, her voice was so sweet. I turned around, and politely with a smile said, “Yes.”

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“Would you like to try some chips?” she said it with a bitchy resting face. I was not able to refuse, not because I was hungry but because I thought that this could be a way of developing conversation with her. I took it and said Thank you with a smile, and for the very first time she smiled back.

“Hello, I am Krish. What’s your name?” I asked it with a fear in my mind, for she was very intimidating. She with a smile said, “Hi I am Meher.”  This is how our conversation started. She was very friendly, jolly and a fun loving girl. She was simply perfect.

We talked a lot on our way to Vienna that night. I learned that she took time trusting boys and she never gets into a conversation with any stranger easily. She was straight forward and always spoke her heart out. We talked a lot over world politics, Bollywood movies and life away from home in foreign land. She didn’t tell me in which city she lived in Germany and didn’t even tell me what she was doing. I only knew her name and that she was from Pune and a Punjabi. But even talking world politics was not boring with her. She was beauty with brains. I was falling for her very hard.

Falling in love in a foreign city

We both roamed around together in this trip. She was carefree and a free spirit. She didn’t bother what people thought of her. We were walking on the bridge in Budapest near Danube river and she started singing loudly, for a moment I thought she was drunk, but she was just enjoying doing it. I looked at her with sparkling eyes and asked her, ‘Meher are you okay?” “Krish, I always wished of doing this in a foreign land and I am loving this” I didn’t stop her, no matter I felt embarrassed as people were staring.

She was amazing. I was in Love. I was in Love with her madness, with her secretive nature, with her pretty face and her intelligence. I was in Love with everything about her, I was in Love with her soul. I decided that very moment that before this trip ends, I will tell her about my feelings. I was very sure that I want to grow older with her. Though I didn’t know anything about her except her name and that she was Punjabi from Pune, but I decided to even wait for her. I wanted to be with her life time to solve the mysteries that she hid inside her.

Unsaid goodbyes

On the last day of the trip, I decided to tell her. We both were going to get off the bus in Karlsruhe and I thought that would be the perfect moment to tell her. We all got in our buses in Budapest and were now set to go back to our respective cities. She didn’t climb in the bus. I was worried and tensed. I went down and asked the guide, where she was and he said that she left for India. She had a flight to India and left yesterday midnight. My heart sank. I broke down. Tears rolled down. I somehow felt like I lost her, something was missing in my life. The guide gave me a piece of paper and said, “Krish, take this. Meher asked me to give this to you”. It was a letter. I sat on my seat and opened the letter and  it read :

“Hey Krish. I am flying to India and it would have been hard for me to say good bye to you and so I didn’t tell you that I was flying. You are a nice guy Krish and I truly enjoyed being with you. I don’t know when will we meet again, but I hope we meet soon. I hope to hear it from you soon. I know there are no ways to get in touch with me as I am not on social network. But here is my landline number of India – . Anytime you feel like calling me, just feel free. Take Care Krish . 

Meher”

The wait that would never end

I was overwhelmed with her letter. I was happy and I decided to tell her on phone once I am in Karlsruhe and once she reaches India. I waited for so long to tell her, I could wait one more day. I called on her landline number after a week, as I was a bit busy with my work. “Hello” came a voice of a man from other side.

“Hello, Namaste. I am Krish, Meher’s friend. Is Meher there?” Suddenly the voice on the other end turned heavy and I could listen that the man on the phone was sobbing.

Someone else took the phone and said, “Hello, who are you? ”

“Hello , I am Krish, Meher’s friend.”

He took a sigh and then said, “Hello, I am Meher’s uncle. The person you were talking to was Meher’s dad.”

“Where is Meher uncle? I want to talk to her.”

Her uncle again took a deep sigh and said in a heavy choked voice, “I am sorry to say this Krish, but we lost Meher just a day back. She met with an accident while she was crossing the street”…My heart literally sank. My mobile fell from my hand and it broke. I stood there in shock. I started to cry, I started to sob. I felt as if my soul left my body. I was shattered.

I came back to India, to Delhi to my home town. And since then I never visited Germany. It has been 3 years since all this happened. I promised that day to myself that I will wait for her and I am waiting. I adopted a girl and named her Meher. I wished I told her that day in Budapest itself that how much I loved her. I planned of getting older with her, but now I am getting older only with her memories.

I wished I said it a bit early, maybe things would have been different , maybe I could have went to India with her and went along with her on streets and crossed the street with her, and maybe she couldn’t have met with an accident or maybe I could have called her up the very next day and told her. I of course feel bad, that she is no more, but I regret it more that I could not tell her how much I loved her.

First published here.

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