Is God against Love? - My entry for the Get Published Contest

That love is a fragile little thing is a bitter pill most of the lovers swallow when circumstances turn grey for them. When we fall in love, we undergo a sort of metamorphism; we build a new dazzling horizon for us, placing therein a brand new moon. Suddenly, we get wings; start flying over our new horizons of love.  We indulge in fantasies, our attires being dreams. But then, when we return to our stakes … when we try to push our love to its logical conclusion, we begin to see the ugly face of realities that come in the form of family honor, casteism et al. Love once made our life sparkling now goes to ashtray. We become mental wrecks when the blossom of our love get drooped and dropped by reasons that go past our comprehensions and expectations.

What makes the story real?

This story is both fictional and real. While failed-love is not uncommon in the realm of life, Raju, the protagonist of this story, attributes his failed-love to the machinations of God who sometimes seems to be not kindly disposed to love.

Extract

Raju looked up at the sky. The moon was young, but intriguing. Nandini stood beside him, unmoved. She couldn’t look at Raju’s face for tears, but she feigned a shoot in her eyes. Raju had never thought even in his dreams that his love would go the way it did. ‘Is God against love? If not, why he had turtle down the apple cart of his love, created a sort of family compulsions and hurdles that made Nandini call off their love’, he thought plaintively.

Hooting a horn, a blue train chugged into the station. Raju shivered, thinking the zero hour had at last come and his Nandini would part with him for good. ‘How awfully he looks? looks beaten and scared’, Nandini thought, looking sideways at Raju. She felt guilty for having allowed family hurdles to get rid of her love.

The train was about to move. But, the star crossed lovers were still standing on their tracks, looking at each other and fighting tears. The Guard’s long whistle stirred them out of their trance. Nandini reluctantly dragged herself into the compartment and settled on a seat by the window. She was still tongue-tied, weighing down by her guiltiness. But then, her two eloquent eyes had spoken to Raju what she wanted to speak.

The train now started moving. Nandini waved hands at him. ‘This bloody train would take her to a new bizarre world. She would soon get married, would become a wife, mom and granny.’ Raju thought running along the train until he got exhausted. He stopped in his tract, caught his breathe, trying to smother his sobs and gather his falling heart. His sight now fell on the retreating train. It didn’t look blue, but black- the color of his frayed heart.

This is my entry for the Harper Collins- India Blogger Get Published contest, which is run with inputs from Yashodhara Lal and HarperCollins India.

[Image courtesy: Google]