So, in Soho.

" मैं ही तो हूँ तेरा पता
हैं दूसरा न कोई रास्ता "

~ माही वे , इरशाद कामिल


This is crazy, Noor thinks to herself. It's been two years since they've met, or even exchanged pleasantries. In this super connected world, however virtual it may be, if two people had not written to each other for two years, it meant they didn't want to or were trying really hard not to. No? And yet here they were, meeting in less than two hours. All it took was a phone call.

Two years ago, when she saw him last, she had left a lifestyle behind, and walked into an uncertain future. Every single day after that day she has thanked herself for having the courage within and the faith in the divine to take care of her, no regrets at all. Not even of leaving him behind. She needed to walk away then, he was the only thread binding her to all that she wanted to so desperately leave. And that wasn't healthy, she knew it. Maybe he knew it too? She also knew that she loved him, but the shadow side of that love and that energy, made her stay where she wasn't meant to. Sometimes, she wonders if he did her a favour by not attaching himself to the anchor she had thrown across to him. His apprehension & eventual refusal had obviously not made any sense to her back then, but the magic of hindsight affords us that ability to see everything, every small piece of the puzzle fall right into the space that was made for it.

Noor still remembered the last time she had seen him, he had walked her out of the building, deliberately taking the longer route, and both deliberately walking terribly slowly, to stop time from turning. But who has ever succeeded in that? They reached the end and said their goodbyes with a hug, she walked further ahead and turned back to look at him. Cliched last look, but he stood right there, watching her walk away, with a smile on his face. She smiled back at him, resisting the urge to break all social etiquette & rules and run into his arms. But if there was anything she was good at, it was hiding her innermost feelings and these deep urges with an outer facade. And she did the same this time too. One last wave and she stepped into the elevator to head down.

In the train home that day, the familiar pinch in her heart, made her scrunch her nose to subside that sensation. Deep breath in, and deep breath blowing out, with a slight opening in her rounded lips. Mentally she repeated to herself, breath in your new life, your new adventures, and breath out the old, the stale and the non-nurturing aspects of all that you leave behind. Everything but him was breathed out. He stayed. In spite of how hard she tried, he stayed, adamantly lodged in the deep recesses, in places she did not know existed within her. In dark sticky little places where he emitted a faint glow, now and then. A scent, a musical note, a colour, a sentence she read in the newspaper, a sip of wine, in deep philosophical material she read, when the urge to share it with someone bubbled up, she thought of him. And what he would have said.

The whole scene of him leaving her that day came back to her as she sat on a low stool, in front of the dressing mirror getting ready for the evening, getting ready for him, but also for herself. She thought about what earrings would go with the maroon red dress she was wearing. She picked up a pair she had bought from a street seller in Jaisalmer, India. She screwed them on while trying hard to think of the last words they said to each other. However hard she tried she couldn't remember those last words - what had they said to each other to soothe the pain, the uncertainty of whether they will ever see each other again? How very little words matter sometimes, she could recall how every inch of her felt in that moment, but she couldn't remember the words they parted with. Maybe they had refrained from saying too much, holding back all that might have tumbled out unknowingly, without control, had they given themselves a chance to express their truest selves with each other. Maybe it was for the better?

As she brushed her hair, she tried to come-up with words they might say to each other today. Scenarios playing out in her mind, one after the other. With every brush stroke, she imagined a different one. If he says this, how should she respond and what if he says that, then what should she say? What should she do if he is ecstatic, and what could she afford to show, how much to hide, if he is lukewarm and dull when they finally met? But surely he wouldn't be dull, after all he had made the effort to call. Surely he would be a bit more enthusiastic about meeting her after two years? To hear all her stories, to hear of her adventures. Adventures, he was so excited for her to embark on, almost as if he was accompanying her on this journey of re-building her life. Surely, he will have stories to tell her, having finished the chapter she had left him at, ready himself for a new journey. Her hair completely detangled and brushed out, she reached out for her eyeliner.

She looked into her own eyes in the mirror, staring deep into what she wanted, from him, from herself and from them. Leaning forward, one arm rested on the dresser and other arm holding her eye pencil, she prepared to draw out a thick black line on her upper eyelid when she detected a tiny tear lurking in the corner & felt a tiny shiver in the hand holding the liner, she placed the eye pencil down and closed her eyes, let the single tear flow out and calm herself. Interlacing her fingers on the surface of the dressing table, she asked herself where this emotion was coming from? They were meeting as friends, and it would do her good to not attach any other meaning to this evening. He might even be in a relationship, or married too ~ two years is a long long time! A self-talk she had given herself many a time with Lawrence came back to memory and she mouthed those words - keep it cool, no need to overreact do not expect anything, breathe and smile.

And yet the minute she was in front of him, all her resolve would slip away. Her normally resilient self would melt to unwrap this feminine feeling of love and warmth. It wasn't the regular puppy eyed helpless emotion of romantics, it was the surety of magic, of a connection, of a transpersonal embrace, that didn't require any physical accompaniment. They could be standing away from each other and sense each others presence. Once they were out with a bunch of friends in a small speakeasy engulfed in their respective groups & in chatter, surrounded by soft background music from the bar, she felt him near her, he told her later that he did too, they had assumed it was an energy that played out only in their own personal emotional fields. Only later was she approached by a common friend who told her every time Lawrence and Noor were together in the group, there was an undercurrent that she too had felt, she asked if they were dating. Noor, used to this question about the both of them, shook her head with a no and smiled, hoping the immenseness of her feelings for Law do not show on her face as she lied through her teeth.

She opened her eyes remembering that speakeasy and picked up her eyeliner again and this time did not detect any tears and continued to draw a line with a steady hand, on one eyelid and then the next, she leaned back to observe the symmetry on both eyelids and sighed with satisfaction. As she dabbed her perfume from the back of her wrists to the sides of her neck, she started humming her mantra to keep her heart from beating as fast as it was. Now that she was all dressed up and ready to head out, it was seeming more real. He was seeming closer.

London at this time of the year was gorgeous. July bought out the best in the city and the city folk, who at other times appeared dull, almost lifeless. She slipped into her shoes, picked up her keys, grabbed her bag and mobile, looked at herself one last time in the mirror next to the front door and stepped out.

She was staying with friends she always stayed with while in the city, he had known through an Instagram post that she was here. She almost wasn't going to pick up the phone when it rang yesterday, she hated speaking on the phone. But now that she was working on her own projects, she needed to be disciplined to attend to calls or return them in case she missed any. That sense of duty made her pick up a call from an unknown number, and she heard him say 'so you're in your favourite city in the world, guess what, so am i!". She almost asked who he was, and then she recognised the lilt in his voice and the chuckle in "so am i!", "Lawrence, is that you?" she asked, only to give away that she had deleted his number from her phonebook. I have changed my phone was not a valid enough excuse to give when you could import your phonebook so seamlessly to your new phone these days.


She had hoped he would let it go, but he chided her for not having his number. They chatted about this and that for a bit, stuff that she couldn't now recollect because frankly she wasn't paying any attention to what he was saying and how she was responding, because hearing his voice was too surreal at that point in time. She had to yank herself back to reality when he said "Shall we meet?". She, of course agreed.


Walking to the tube station, she remembered how they had had a discussion about London and New York, she had obviously chosen London and he had scoffed at her choice. He thought nothing in the world beat the effervescent energy of New York and her people. In her trip to the City after that conversation she had tried to connect to this energy he had described, and in fact she could recognise the thrill in it. But it didn't make her feel surrounded by beauty and joy as London did. And so she still ranked London over New York.


She disembarked from the tube, got out of the station and walked towards the street in Soho they were supposed to meet on. He wanted to get burgers at Patty & Bun - his love for burgers had stayed intact. She re-invited her mantra to her mind and continued to mentally chant it, to prevent her from collapsing with anticipation in the middle of the street. It was six 'o clock and every one was out, celebrating the end of the work week. It was summer, beers were flowing, so was music and loads of glasses of spritz and pimm's. Soho was almost as though you had walked into a carnival. She had experienced this energy many times, but every time London enthralled her. She was so busy looking around, at the sights and sounds, that she missed him standing at the corner of the street, looking at her. When she spotted him, she stopped walking and stood still.

Here they were in front of each other, a few feet apart, two years seemed like an eternity now. What should they do now? Her old urge to run and jump into his arms came rushing back, throbbing behind her chest, threatening to spill out and express itself finally without her consent. She pushed it back down, gulping down her emotions, telling herself to calm down. All the while looking at him, unable to take her gaze away from his eyes, lest he disappear, lest all of this be but a dream. Magical London, with her gorgeous beauty faded in the background, only he existed. And her. And this distance between them, that was so pregnant with silence and anticipation, it was about to cry any moment. Amidst all the hubhub of the street, this distance between them was silent. And patient. Breathing and waiting for their next move. Who would make it?

She couldn't see her face, but she could see his, he was trying as hard as her to stay grounded and act calm, to not break out into a dance or a run. So he just smiled. She continued to stand still, her legs had given away, her mind willed them to walk towards him slowly, but they weren't listening to it at all. And then she said to herself, "screw this, I'm going to run to him" and she did, this message, thankfully, was carried all the way down to her feet, and they ran. He titled his head back, broke into a throaty laugh and waited for her to get to him. As she came closer he opened his arms to hold her in and they held each other tight, in the corner of two intersecting streets in Soho, that warm July evening. Maybe time did stand still for a tiny second, enough for him to say "I've missed you so much, why did you leave?", enough for her to gather the courage to reply "why did you let me?".