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Darsha woke up to find an intense beam of sunlight streaming through her window. Had she overslept? Her room in the hostel faced west. She got sunshine only in the evenings which supported her habit of sleeping late, her lectures being few and far between. She was an undergraduate at the Faculty of Arts.
She squinted through the window. It was morning. A mirror like contraption hanging outside one of the rooms from an adjacent hall of residence was reflecting light at her window. It was from the boys’ hostel. One which was mostly occupied by those engineering guys who thought the world of themselves. This probably was another of their useless projects. A solar powered windscreen wiper or something similar. She smiled to herself. They always thought their products would save the world. They would probably remove their gadget tomorrow.
The reflector woke her up early on the next day in similar fashion. And the next. When it did so for the fourth day in succession she decided she had had enough. There was such a thing as a limit to what a reasonable girl could be expected to tolerate. She didn’t mind being occasionally inconvenienced by an aspiring engineer. But to be treated like a kettle on a solar oven day in and day out was not her idea of fun.
To find out who the resident of the room was was simple. She just counted the number of windows. She relayed the information to her friend, Mangalika, whose boyfriend stayed at the same hall and by afternoon she had not only the name but a whole load of other information about the boy. Mangalika had assumed that something akin to a binocular relationship was afoot and tried her best to please Darsha.
Apparently the machinate boy never went for lectures. An haughty type, thought Darsha. Probably thought he knew more than the lecturers. The problem was that she couldn’t meet him at the faculty. No. She would have to go to the halls. Maybe she should take Mangalika. They could pretend to be going to see Prasad, Mangalika’s boyfriend.
They left early next morning, Darsha having woken up prematurely due to another cock-crow sun bath. Darsha was fuming and Mangalika walked slowly to try to get her to cool down. Mangalika’s thoughts on the merits of rising early and the vitamin content of early morning sunshine fell on red, deaf ears.
A message sent through a student aimlessly loitering in the canteen brought the offender down. When Darsha saw him she did a double take. This one wasn’t one of those arrogant mobile phone toting guys. He was more of an unshaven collarless-T-shirt-to-the-knee types. He was chubby with a prominent paunch. The stubble on his chin seemed longer than the hair on his head. He had a round face which appealed to Darsha. She liked him. Her carefully planned reprimand evaporated.
He raised his eyes quizzically looking from one to the other.
“It’s your gadget, it’s shining into Darsha’s room.” said Mangalika, thus stating her problem and introducing Darsha all in one sentence.
The boy looked puzzled.
“The one you are keeping outside your window,” Darsha blurted, “It shines light straight into my room in the morning. And I find…”
Light dawned in his eyes. He raised his fist and gave himself a powerful knock on the middle of his scarcely protected skull. The girls winced. He was very apologetic. He had started on this new project and forgotten all about the mirror. He would remove it at once.
He surprised both of them by inviting them to have something at the canteen. As they had little else to do they accepted. He was going to the movie to be screened at the Arts Theatre that evening. He asked them whether they would be going too. Mangalika and Darsha had already planned to go with Prasad. And Ruwan (for that was his name) could join them.
The quota of entertainment campus students receive is minimal and when anything such as a movie or an exhibition is announced they flock towards the advertised location in their numbers. The Arts Theatre was half full when the foursome arrived and by the time the movie started there were standees in the aisles.
The heat became unbearable after fifteen minutes into the movie. Some students were leaving already. Darsha wanted to leave too, but Mangalika didn’t. Ruwan was also sweating. After another fifteen minutes Darsha couldn’t take it anymore. She got up and elbowed her way outside. Ruwan followed. They sat down on the decorated staircase, next to the grim looking lion statues, and started talking. Despite his bovine look Darsha found Ruwan an excellent talker. So involved was she in their conversation that time passed very quickly. She was surprised when the theatre spat the crowd out at the conclusion of the movie.
During the subsequent week Darsha and Ruwan bumped into each other frequently. Darsha was not at all sure that most of it was coincidental. His appearances at places ranging from the canteen to the bus-stand at the most unexpected times were at first bewildering but eventually Darsha began to enjoy his company. Her normally balanced emotions started wavering and she could not identify her relationship with Ruwan. Was it love? Was it infatuation? Or was it protective feeling born out of her observations of his helplessness in matters other than mathematics and machinery? Was it a combination of all these and other issues on which she could not place her finger? She needed to confide in somebody. She resolved to have a long discussion with Mangalika that night.
As far as conversations went it was a one sided affair with Darsha asking and answering her own questions, interlaced with an occasional expression of self doubt or uncertainty. Mangalika was an extremely good listener and that helped.
“ I’m confused,” Darsha repeated for the umpteenth time, “I feel he is a great guy but I am not sure about his background. He looks so poor…”
“But I don’t mind all that,” Darsha repeated for the umpteenth + oneth (as Ruwan would’ve said) time, “I do like him.”
“But he has a belly and he’s semi bald” countered Mangalika.
“How can you be so insensitive,” Darsha said, “those are not things you look at in a person. Besides he looks sweet. But I’m so confused …”
“You’ve decided then?” asked Mangalika not at all sure on what her friend was supposed to be decided on.
After several more similar conversations, punctuated by ice-creams and movies sponsored by Ruwan over the following weeks, Darsha made up her mind. She was for him. He was her future. If he was poor, tough luck. Her parents would have to accept the fact.
To celebrate the beginning of their affair Ruwan presented her the mirror-contraption which had been instrumental in bringing them together. Their friends gave them a bucketing that night at their respective dorms and Darsha was up in the clouds.
She landed back on earth with a loud thud the next week. Although Ruwan looked extremely haggard and shabby he had never asked Darsha for anything. She would have loved to have given him something. They were mooning one afternoon when a boy hurried over to them. He approached Ruwan. Someone had fallen violently ill and they needed Ruwan’s mobile phone to call for an ambulance. Ruwan explained that he didn’t have the phone with him but he proffered his room key which the boy took and rushed back.
There was an uneasy silence after his departure. Students falling violently ill at dorms was not unusual at campus. In fact what was unusual was that most of them managed to stay reasonably healthy in spite of the quality of food available at the canteens. But that was not what was worrying Darsha. A mobile phone! What was Ruwan doing with a mobile phone? Her eyes spewed fire at Ruwan. A lesser man might have bolted for safety in the cover of the night but not Ruwan. Even if he had wanted to evacuate premises pronto he couldn’t have because of his generous paunch. He knew what that look meant. Come clean or be devoured alive. And he wasn’t sure about the come clean part. But come clean he did.
He was not as poor as he made out to be. He was not super rich but his family was well above average when it came to money. He had been watching her for months. He had fallen in love. The mirror had been planted on purpose.
The truth came gushing out in spurts.
He had wanted to be sure that she genuinely loved him and that was the reason for his charade. The others had known but had kept it to themselves.
Darsha’s feelings during his confession ranged from extreme incredulity to severe disappointment and finally to cool fury. She got up, turned round and walked back to her room without looking back. She found Mangalika reclining in her room and gave her a similar stare. A university education had not been wasted on Mangalika. She rose, grabbed a water mug from the table (because that was the nearest thing to her) muttered she was thirsty and hastily withdrew to the safety of the unlit corridor.
Darsha paced the room. How dare he. How dare he? She had been used. She had been taken in completely. All of them were plotting against her. She kicked the bed. Why hadn’t she noticed? His bearing should have told her something. She had been blind. Blind silly girl. Blind silly girl in idiotic love. She felt like she’d sold herself. She bashed her pillow up and cried into it. She paced the room again.
After an hour of raving and walking around in circles she calmed down. She had to put things into proper perspective. After all what had happened? He was probably even more insecure than her. The late afternoon sun was streaming through her window. She squinted through the sunlight and could see Ruwan staring into space at his window in the opposite dorm. She could see his shining scalp even at this distance. She sat down. Should she forgive him?
The mirror device was on top of her cupboard. She picked it up, went to the window and focused a beam of light into Ruwan’s face.
Original Short Story by
Rumey Jiffrey
76/1, Matale Road,
Akurana.
25 Mar 2000.
All material in this page is under Copyright.
Copyright © 1999 Rumey Jiffrey