They both squealed in delight as a blob of rain fell on their faces.

‘Can I come along?’ Rano asked hopefully.

Rajjo’s answer was drowned in the noise of a shrieking oncoming train.

4

KARAM, tall, handsome and light-eyed, invited shy glances from the ladies who had gathered in the courtyard in their finest silks. It was just after five and the festivities added a sweet caramel flavour to the evening. Rajjo’s house sparkled with flowers and smell of the feasts being prepared in the back of the house. The cows and the calves ignored the mingling crowd and stood in their corner. In the milieu of merry-making, Karam’s eyes searched for Rajjo. She had turned nineteen last week and had fought with Karam because he had not got any gift for her. While his eyes searched for her, the ladies in the courtyard devoured the handsome man. The younger lot looked on, hopeful for his restless gaze to settle on them even briefly.

Groups of ladies sat around a woman working with a henna cone, drawing intricate designs on their outstretched palms. Reet, the bride, had covered her arms and feet in henna motifs as a mark of festivity and celebration. She was getting ready to meet her husband soon, and hoped for a dark tinge when she scraped off the dried henna from her body. It was believed darker the colour, deeper the bonding with the mother-in-law.

To the family’s pride and relief, Reet was marrying well. The groom’s family had come in their own tractor and they owned a white Omni van as well. Everything seemed to flow smoothly but Reet was acting like a crazed bride, with her entire focus on the cameraman who had taped the event. She wanted him to capture her from every angle.

Her errant podgy brother, regardless of the camera or the taping, ran helter-skelter, inviting Reet’s wrath, and their mother was having a tough time controlling her daughter and gently reminding her to act like a bride.

As Karam made his way through the festivities and deluge of women folk, he wondered when Rajjo would get married to him. Will her henna have any colour at all, given his own mother’s obvious dislike for Rajjo? Karam shrugged the unpleasant feeling away and hunted for her.

‘She will be your undoing! She will ruin your life, mark my words…if you keep running after her like a love-crazed lunatic when she doesn’t even look at you!’ He could hear his mother’s shrill voice ringing in his ear. Karam silently swallowed the insults partially because it was true.

It seemed to Karam that the entire village was privy to his personal life and unrequited love for Rajjo. For them it was an ongoing saga that continued even when the electricity went off for hours together and the rickety TV sets remained shut. They sat in the fields, looking up at the sky passing time, worrying about the violence and terror that had gripped the state lately, wondering if life was going to be as uncertain and then worrying some more about the bills and the groceries, the rain and the fields, the government subsidies and life. Perhaps latching on to the local gossip and having a laugh or two about Karam and Rajjo’s situation gave them some welcome relief.