Bitterness - A form of Love?

All the characters referred to in the below blog are fictitious and bear no resemblance with anyone living or dead whatsoever. Any co-incidence is purely co-incidental and unintentional.

Tring Tring!!!!

Jignesh calling. Jahnavi’s heart always skipped a beat seeing Jignesh’s name on the calling screen of her mobile. And Jignesh would never miss any of her calls even if it meant to stop his bike while and attend to the call, or even an SMS. Were they laying more importance on each other than needed? No, absolutely not, both of them needed this importance, though they always maintained a stand contrary to this to each other. Do not give me so much of importance. Gathering herself, she picked up the call.

Jahnavi: “Hello!!!”

The words spelled magic and poured honey into Jignesh’s ears. It was like an oasis in a desert.
Jignesh: “Hi, what’s up?”
Jahnavi: “Nothing, I am in office.”
Jignesh: “Can we meet in the evening?”
Jahnavi: “Ummm, ok.”

Jignesh had been mustering courage for the meeting since the past few days. How on earth is he going to tell this to Jahnavi that they will not be meeting after today, probably not or at least they are not going to talk on phone. They will be buddies, but buddies that’s it, might be chatting, blogging and commenting on each other’s posts. It was not all happy in Jignesh’s family about his getting close to a non-Gujarati girl, so he had to take a decision. Either tell his family that he cannot give up on Jahnavi and lose all credibility or tell Jahnavi to sever ties with him forever so that there are no problems in his family. But Jignesh has been known to find alternative and un-thought of solutions to serious problems. He knew Jahnavi would understand him, and support him. He was waiting for her in the corridor, thinking about how to put his thoughts across, just when he saw the hurried steps of Jahnavi racing towards him.

Jahnavi: “Hi, how are you? How was the day?”
Jignesh: “I am fine. The day was fine. How was yours?”
Jahnavi: “Hmm it was OK types. So tell me, what is it? your breath sounded a bit tensed.”
Jignesh: “Yeah…. actually, just wanted to ask you….”

Words were playing games with Jignesh, or was he trying to play some games. Jahnavi was petrified knowing that still Jignesh needed to think before speaking to her. Though she fought off her irritation, and put it straight across to him, as she knew it had to be only one matter.

Jahnavi: “Everything’s fine at home I guess?”

Jignesh was almost taken aback, Can she read my thoughts, telepathy!!!. The thought was both a boon and a bane for him. Boon as half of the work was done, she knew the matter at least, it will be easy to carry over from here, but the bane part of it was more perilous as it highlighted how close they were emotionally, mentally, spiritually and it will be all the more difficult for them to increase distances. But who said Life is easy. He had to carry on and so was the case with Jahnavi as well. She had a tougher life he thought. He had always thought this.

Jignesh: “No, not everything is fine. Actually that’s why I called you to say, we might not be able to continue the way we have been going. We need to increase distances, if you want me to put it straight.”
Jahnavi: “Hmm I can understand Jignesh. I had been fearing this day will come soon. Good that it came while I was unprepared, otherwise you know the fears of a lurking danger are more fatal. It is OK….”

She almost fought her tears, damn it. Do not pour out now, I will grant you a more private moment, she seemed to be telling to her tears. This time they obeyed.

Even Jignesh was no less aware of the mental condition of Jahnavi. He also thanked her tears, otherwise it would have been more difficult. He took control of the situation, using Jahnavi’s words to console her.

Jignesh: “I will not call this just love as it limits our relationship and this is what we don’t want to do. You only told me that ours is a complete relation which covers all aspects of a relation between not just a male and a female but between two individuals. And is it some kind of a rule or what, that whenever there’s Love between an unrelated male / female it has to have a romantic angle. I do not have any qualms saying that Love exists although there exists no logical explanation to justify its existence. And in the absence of such an explanation, society just picks up the easiest one, ROMANCE, huh?”

Both of them were surprised at the flow of words coming from Jignesh. Jahnavi had at least not expected this. But Jignesh had more to say. He continued. Jahnavi listened, awestruck.

Jignesh: “The easiest way for this is Bitterness, Jahnavi. If I start getting bitter with you, things can be easier, right? But the saddest part is that even our bitterness for each other is nothing but another manifestation of our love for each other. Life has been such that we are better off handling bitterness, so by being bitter to each other we are just helping the other person cope with the situation. Making life easy for the other person. Paving a way to generate strength for the other person. Is it not our love for each other? To me it is, and staying away is also a form of LOVE. We are burning ourselves as fuels to lighten each others lives. What purer form of LOVE other than this can exist Jahnavi tell me?”

Jahnavi had drifted to a different world. She was in total awe of this person standing in front of her and was rendered speechless by his views. She started respecting him all the more, not only because he used her views to explain himself, but also because Jignesh had acknowledged this relation with the emotion of LOVE. He could use this name, as normally men have a problem with this word. But Jignesh was unique and Jahnavi was proud of him. But she was not able to express her pride for him as it will make him weak and she did not want this to happen. Here again she was applying Jignesh’s principle only, Paving a way to generate strength for the other person.

Jahnavi: “Are you done with your lecture. Actually there’s no need for all this. You could have simply told me, ‘GO AWAY’ I would have happily deserted you. I am getting late. Thanks for everything so far.”

Jahnavi left from there. She wanted to compete with her tears. They should not step out before she steps in her room. Jignesh kept watching her till he could. All he could do is pass a smile, thinking at the tepidity with which Jahnavi had applied his thoughts to practicality. Indeed bitterness is the best and hitherto unexplored form of LOVE. Make the life of your beloved a little bit easier without you, when you know, the current logistics do not allow you to be together.