An encounter with Maya

Today I met her.

She was sitting in a corner of the library, pouring over her open Macbook with several books strewn all around.

I took my seat opposite to her with my usual bunch of books and could not resist noticing the name of a bright green book that was lying around on the table: "Dreams". I was almost sure that it must be the famous book by Freud. I struck up a conversation.

"Maya, what are you reading? Freud? May I take a look into this book  if you dont mind?"
It took me almost 20 minutes to compose & speak the above words. She replied with a gentle & sweet smile.

"No. I'm trying to learn Spanish. This is just a book written in Spanish."
"Maya, why are you always so difficult to predict?"
"Maybe because you think that you can predict everything. There must be somebody to challenge you, right? Dont you like to be challenged? I'm sure that you do."

She knows me very well. I think she knows everything about me. I mean, if you're complete strangers, there is still a non-zero probability that you'll see each other sometime somewhere. But only if somebody knows your every movement, your every pulse & impulse, only then she would be able to elude you. For so long.

I asked again, "The warning alarm of the library has gone off. May I buy you a drink, if you dont mind?"
Again she maintains, "Unfortunately not."

"Maya, why do you think we never meet? Is it that I'm too unacceptable?"
"I dont think so. Maybe because I'm too close to you to see. You see me  in every couple holding hands & sharing a smile. In every random cute girl who passes by. In every careless whisper that catches your ear. In every gentle touch. In every tinkling laughter. You cannot see me everywhere and then again want to find me in a single person. Make up your mind first!"
"Why? What is the problem in that?"
"Problem? Your entire perception makes you blind. Blind with expectations. Blind with desire. Blind with pointless agony. If you see me everywhere, then even if I come to you as a person, you'll reject me."
"That is completely not true. Every time in my life, whenever I found even a fragment of you in any single person, I loved you wholeheartedly."
"Yeah. And there lies the problem. You just love the fragment. Not the entirety. You analyse. You criticise. You tear apart all the goodness & badness and try to deconstruct & reconstruct it in your own way. You are always driven by your mind. Do you even have a heart? I have profound doubt regarding that!"

My lips trembled. Do I have a heart? I would like to say that heart is all that I have, everything else is wrapped by it. But I could not say it. She speaks so confidently that it confuses me every time.

She goes on, "Every single time you find the fragment, you think that you can do better. You're never happy with what you've got. You need it all, all at once, in a single piece. But life is a maze. I always come in fragments. If I came in a single piece, we would be instantly annihilated. Some might say in explosion of energy, positive energy if you like to say. But I say, annihilation is always destruction, deconstruction, irreversible. Either you get lost in your mind or in your heart."

She is right, I think. If she would come  to me I would forget everything, all fear, all other connections, all earthly cares. She would be my Lolita. Mine, and only mine. And finally, this will destroy me. Perhaps she eludes me only to save me from annihilation.

"Maya, do you think this will go on like this forever?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, that will I keep chasing your shadow like this for all my days & never find you?"
"Yes. If you keep chasing my shadow I shall float away forever. But if you ever dare to look me face to face, eye to eye, confront me... then maybe your luck would change. But would you? I think you're too much in love with the faceless, nameless, non-existing shadow. It will be hard for you to move into the sun from it and face the heat. Are you ready?"

I kept silence. What could I say? I gathered composure and muttered for one last time:
"Shall we meet again?"
"Like this, I hope not."
"But what if I never meet you under the sun? Promise me then at least you'll not take away the shadow from me."
"The sun always goes down.", she said with a smile.

And she walked away into the darkness of the night.

Maaya, me and the Open Fields

This post is a sequel to Maaya, me and this Warped Space-Time which was originally written way back in 2007!

And then, suddenly, in the middle of my journey we met again. I met Maaya. It has been seven years! It took me seven years to realize that I was actually searching for her again. Seven years to realize that she has been with me all this while and that I have always failed to accept that fact. 

“You still carry that note?” she asked me.

“I do”, I said. The note actually underwent so much wear and tear that I never knew when exactly it had penetrated my head and had found a place to live inside. 

“You look calmer now. Lot more peaceful”, she smiled, “So are you at peace with yourself? Could you interpret that word?”

We were walking down a street. It was spring time and the trees had started growing new leaves. The road has been tanned by the night, only now starting to have slight shades of orange. Six o clock in the morning, the sunlight was in the process of gradually tilting from horizontal to oblique. I could see no one walking down that path. Except us. 

“I couldn’t create love, Maaya!” I said, “I tried but I couldn’t”. 

“Love was never for you to create!” she said, “I am surprised that you even tried!”

“I never wanted to try it”, I said, “But letting go was never easy.”

“You wanted it and didn’t want it at the same time!” she turned her head and looked at me, “What you wanted didn’t exist!”

“I wanted it my way”, I said.

“You know that’s selfish”, she said. “And like all other selfish ambitions it only stays as a mirage, burning in your heart, that you keep chasing all your life”.

“I agree. I don’t want it anymore”, I said.

Her hand was sensing mine all this time. Now her fingers slipped into the gaps of my fingers. A soft feeling, the feeling of being one, slowly started to seep in.

“And what changed in these seven years?” she asked. 

“I knew why I wanted it”, I said. 

She was silent.

“We all require an identity, Maaya”, I said, “A personal identity. How we see ourselves. If we will stay happy for the rest of our lives being who we are today.”

 “So are you at peace with yourself?” she asked me. 

I didn’t speak.

“Are you happy?” she asked after a pause.

“Yes”, I said.

“How can you be happy if you are not in love?” she said.

I stopped walking and so did she. “I think I am in love, Maaya” I said. 

We looked at each other. I saw a twinkle in her eye. She pressed my hand. And smiled. “I know”, she said, “I could sense”.

“But I am not in love with another person!” I said. “This has been such a disturbing thought that I have always struggled to come to terms with it.” My voice shook a bit, perhaps from the immense courage I needed to muster to confess the feeling.

“Look!” Maaya pointed towards the orange of the sky which was now slowly fading into the blue. I saw a group of birds, streamlined into a pattern, flying towards the sun. “They are migrating”, Maaya said, “Aren’t they beautiful?”   

The day broke after sometime. The sun made everything around it warmer. We came across some open fields. I saw a small hillock at a distance. It was green everywhere. We sat down on the grass which was soft as velvet. My hands felt dew. 

Maaya was wearing a frock today. It was white with some petal-designs on it. “You look beautiful!” I said.

“How do you know you are in love?” she looked at me. 

“I can’t stay away from it”, I said. “No matter what I do I always find myself going back to it. Whenever I wish, wherever I wish. Love is all about how much time you are spending together, isn’t it?”

“Maybe you are addicted!” she said.

“Maybe I am”, I said, “But isn’t it all about addiction then?” 

“Yes”, she said, turning her eyes away from me, “Life is too short for frivolity!”

The dew on the grass had started evaporating. I could hear birds chirp now. There was this moistened air of the morning surrounding us. 

“I love solving puzzles, Maaya!” I said. “Puzzles on how things work. Science, they call it. And that’s what I do now for a living.”

She smiled. Just. “I never asked you to create love!” she said, “You have already created for yourself whatever I wished you would create. You see that hillock”, she pointed towards the distant green, “You may just find your violet rose there if you go now!” She laughed. 

“Shall I get it then?” I said.

“Do what you want to do!” she said with a smirk, looking slightly miffed, and those were her last words before she disappeared again, “One day you will realize the things that you don’t do are the things that you have actually never wanted to.”

Writer's Note - You may want to Google the term "Love Addiction" after reading this. Thanks. :-)