Sahasrasagun

Part 3

Train stopped at a station. Sagun could not see the station name. It was nearing dinner time and songs were still being played in his player. People started boarding the train and it was uneasy for everyone to get into his compartment as he was sitting on the footsteps. He went back to his seat to see Pavithra sleeping. He woke her up and they both had dinner.
“You were lost in thoughts and I did not want to disturb you.” told Pavithra. Sagun gave a smile and did not talk anything. They quietly completed their dinner. He went again to the door and sat at the footsteps. Pavithra was surprised and she wanted to follow him. But she did not. The train was already on its full speed and Sagun went back in to past with same speed. He pressed the play button of his player.

emaindi ee vela..yedalo ee sandadela
mila mila mila meghamala..chitapata chinukeeyu vela
cheli kulukulu chudagane …chiru chematalu pooyanela
ye shilpi chekkenee shilpam..sarikothaga vundi roopam
kanureppa veyaneedoo aa andam..manasulona vintha mooham
maruvaleni indra jalam…vanalona vintha daaham

…………………………

Sahasra was thinking about him for about a week and she was not sure why she was thinking much about him. After all, Sagun was a fellow passenger. She shared her feelings with her friends and they all said not to feel much about nothing.
Sagun was on cloud nine. The moments spent with Sahasra had a strong effect on him and they never left him even for a minute. After he came back to Rameswaram, he did all the research about the locality of Pace engineering college, its timings, its bus routes, hostel information and general places in Rameswaram where Pace college students live outside the college. He reminded her when someone discussed about their journeys, when he saw someone eating samosa in the canteen and even in the classroom; he started dreaming about empty berths in a reservation compartment.
He decided to go home every weekend in the same train and reserved for the same train for next weekend. On the other end, Sahasra, though decided not to think about him anymore, reserved her ticket for the same train on the same weekend just with a hope that she would meet him again. She also thought that this would be her first and last attempt to meet him. If not this time, she would never give a voluntary try to meet him.
Both were waiting for Friday evening to catch the train. Both started to count hours in every second.
On that Friday, they reached the railway station by the time the train was about to start but at different times. Both had got berths in the same compartment but on different ends. They boarded the train from different entrance doors. Because of the crowd, they could not see each other. After an hour, Sagun listened to TT saying “Tickets Please!!” He had shown his ticket and convinced the TT to see the charts once to see Sahasra’s name. And he found it on the chart of his compartment itself. He started going towards the other end of the compartment and at the middle, he stopped as he could see her sitting in the last. He was delighted and went into a dilemma. His mind made 2 statements. One was to go and meet her. The other was to stay where he was as she might think bad about him, that he was following her. The compartment had a couple of exits in the middle along with the 4 exits at the end. He stood where he was right now and was seeing her from the distance. He was not looking at her continuously but at irregular instants so that no one noticed it. He started doing things like this. He thought these were basic symptoms of love. He also stood at a position where he was visible to Sahasra. After couple of hours standing like that, he observed that she looked at him and recognized him. But he was still. His heart started to respond and without his intent, he walked towards her. She was so happy on seeing him and there were no bounds to Sagun’s joy.
They started a formal conversation and the first thing they did, was to exchange their contact numbers and email ids. Sagun fought with the TT to get a berth near to her while the TT was doing his “Ticket Please” work.
From next time, they never travelled alone. Both reserved tickets to travel on same day. Email was the only communication between them although it used be costly. But most of the time, they used to exchange letters and spoke over PSTN phones. They used to meet once a week initially, that changed to daily or alternative days.
They both got jobs with decent salaries in Chennai in campus placements, different employers though. They were about to complete their engineering.
Ten months later, it was going to be their last travel from Rameswaram to Nellore. They completed their final semester exams. Both Sagun and Sahasra met a day before they were leaving Rameswaram. They both went to Rameswaram temple, prayed God for whatever that had been happening. They understood each other well from past 1 year and Sagun wanted to let her know his love towards her. Although he was confident that she would accept his love, there was not enough courage to express his feeling. He made up his mind that day. They were walking along the shore, the sea was calm and the waves were touching their feet now and then. At such a place, normally he would feel light and delighted but that day his heart’s weight got increased. The pressure built up and he seemed to be moving slowly. But actually he was moving with great difficulty.
“I had a weird dream last night.” said Sagun.
“What was that?”
“You were asking me, what is the meaning of your name ‘Sagun’? I said good qualities”
“Oh then”, asked Sahasra
“I asked you, what is the meaning of your name ‘Sahasra’? You said ‘A new beginning. I thought the meaning of your name is “thousand” and I always felt very happy clubbing our names “Sahasrasagun” because that gave a very good meaning ‘1000 good qualities’. That means when we both are together, we have a huge number of good qualities in us. How good that is?”
“Oh really!” she said and was silent.
Sagun said “Do you agree to make it real?”
She stopped there and looked at him. He repeated “Do you?”
She looked in to his eyes and he was serious. At that moment he could feel his heartbeat in every part of his body.
“Yes, I am with you” is the reply from Sahasra, after few seconds.
Sagun felt his weight decreased ten folds and his soul jumped with all the happiness. She could see his happiness in his eyes. She was also happy because he proposed at least on the last day.

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