She had said her No, but Rhett was out there in her house for everyone to see, and she could not lie about it being from Cisco, to Surabhi who was working on the same floor - so Surabhi guessed, her parents knew, and everyone slowly started to know.. Everyone who came to their house would pose with Rhett and take a picture, then questions would follow as to where he came from, and she had to hear her stupid lie about it being from her team in Cisco repeated again and again. His first gift to her was something she could not hide or return, it seemed almost as if he did it on purpose. Finally she asked her father who once visited her in Bangalore to take it back to Kochi in train. Back home in Kochi too, Rhett had many admirers and questions from visitors.
He was adamant about taking her rejection to heart, and wearing his heart on his sleeve. The team mates found it hard not to notice, and the manager asked him if everything was alright. His proposal was out there, in front of everyone, loud and clear. Her "No" sounded feeble in comparison.
He once told her he wanted to read her the poem he had written in the college magazine two years back. He took her to their sunset place, the terrace of Cisco, and read it out. It was in Tamil and was titled "The Rejection". He read out the Tamil version and did the English translation for her. The poem was about the protagonist's response to the rejection of his proposal. His agony! The ending line was "My sorrow does not seem real, so does not your rejection. Hence, the appeal...". She was shocked and suspicious. She checked the print - His name was there, for sure, but she could not read Tamil. She asked "Did you really write it two years back". He said - "Then itself my friends teased that I was lying that this poem was not from experience"
The proposal and rejection became a routine for the next few months. He would plead, and once even threaten her with "I quit smoking thinking I stood a chance, now why even bother..". Once he called her out of her house and asked her to take a stroll with him in the night and told her "You cannot go back now, you have only one way." She was stunned. "What do you mean?" "You don't understand. I have lived 21 years without any meaning, finally I find some meaning to my life..My life would be a void without you". She stormed off. She was so disturbed that she made a long distance call to her best friend in Singapore. She seemed amused - "What is new? Proposals are not new to you. I have seen you through the endless proposals you had from every silly guy in the 4 years of your college life. Why are you so disturbed? Are you afraid that you have finally met a "real" guy?" She was angry with her friend. She didn't believe in "Boys will be boys", she was a feminist. Besides, this was more like a child throwing a tantrum just because he was not getting what he wanted.
Next morning she tried to get sympathy from Surabhi. Her only comment was "You are falling into a big black hole, my friend, I don't think there is a way out..". She had actually laughed out loud at the DDLJ heroine's dialogue " Woh aandhi ki tarah aaya... aur mein ek toote patte..". No, he had not even seen DDLJ, but she had, and that dialogue did not seem so funny now. She was determined not to be the "toota patta"! He should realize that No means No.
He apologized to her as soon as he saw her in the office, but she was so angry with him that she refused to speak to him the next few days. She was not going to budge till she saw a way that her parents could be happy about this. He once asked her the DDLJ dialogue "Will you be happy marrying someone else?" (No, he still hadn't seen DDLJ. Being Tamil, he hated mushy, romantic Hindi movies with heroes who acted silly in front of girls. The irony - he found them far too unrealistic and stupid, but was perfectly content living one! Besides, she doubts if he understood Hindi). She gave the time tested answer, the illusion of every girl. "Yes, I will just try to find someone with qualities that I somewhat like, in my religion, acceptable to my parents, and I would be happy". She had not thought too much about the answer, she was just not going to let him win. His response shocked her. He just cried, and said " I wish I could wish that you would not be happy!".
The man who could move mountains for her eventually did, and after 20 years her main complaint is that she never received a proper proposal! ( at least not a traditional one, nothing after she was ready). Now when their son says " I am going to play some more video game, Appa is anyway angry with me", she feels a sense of triumph. That was her sweet revenge. She has succeeded in pitting him against himself.
_~ Her_
© 2019 Shenuja Subhash