DOES ANYONE LOVE ME?

23.12.04

It was around 5:00 p.m., when little Jia’s cousin brother, Abhi, who was returning to India for his holidays, called up her aunt (his mother) and said, “Mumma, I have reached”. His mother knew that it was just a few more minutes before she would see her son again, and with this thought she lighted up and checked for the last time if all arrangements were properly done or not. Even Jia got excited and she ran to the balcony and was watching out for the car to arrive.

At 6:30 p.m., the car arrived and she ran to her aunt to inform her. When the doorbell rang Jia’s aunt opened the door while Jia hid herself behind her. Her brother took the blessings of his mother first and when she took him into a hug, he hugged her back tightly, while he ruffled Jia’s hair affectionately. After that, they all went into the room.

There everybody sat comfortably and everyone was having snacks and small talks with him. Jia sat at one corner, feeling shy. Abhi noticed her and told her, “You have grown so much in a year. You look like that actress. A tiny bit.” She shook her head in denial and looked down instantly, blushing. Later when he opened the bag and started distributing gifts to all, some got chocolates and some other mugs; he called her while taking out a woollen jacket. Handing it to her he said, “It was only you whom I remembered while shopping.” She was really very happy, because at that instant she could not remember when she had received such a special gift from anyone. She was happy because he made her feel special. He made her wear that jacket at that instant, and when he did so; she pledged to herself that she will not let anyone take that jacket away from her, that she will never give it to anyone else.

One has said, “Happy times need to go so that they can come back.” But it is not always true. Sometimes when happiness is lost, it never returns. Even after months of Abhi’s departure, the house did smile, until one day when they received a call...

18.05.05

It was the call of one of Abhi’s colleagues. He just said, “Abhi is dead, he is no more.” Those words were like a sudden, violent storm, and when it passed, it took away with it the smiles of the house. Although there was bright summer sunshine outside the house, the inside turned completely dark, everything motionless and everyone speechless. A freak car accident had not taken only Abhi’s life, but it also took a bit of everyone, here, thousands of kms away.

Everyone was shattered. When Jia’s aunt got the news, she almost fainted. She fell on the ground and started crying badly, cursing her luck. It went on for days, till Abhi’s corpse was brought, laid in a coffin, and with sunset his body was cremated with all the Hindu rituals.

PRESENT DAY

Years have passed since that incident happened. Jia’s aunt, does not say anything directly, but even after so many years she cries internally and just wishes that she could get her son back by some means.

Little Jia is a grown up girl now. Whenever she gets lonely, or a good scolding from her parents and she feels that she has no one in this world whom she can share her grievances with, or that she has no one in this world who cared for her or loves her, she recollects what had happened on 23^rd December,2004. Thinking of it, she sometimes feels that it was nothing but her dream, nothing of that sort had ever taken place. But the very next moment, just to make sure that whether that cousin of hers was really a part of her life or was just one of her imaginary characters, she starts looking for the jacket. Having seen it she gets reassured that he was certainly a part of her life, a part of her reality and that...
 She had someone on this earth who cared for her.
  She had someone on this earth who really loved her, and that 

 She had someone on this earth who remembered her most amongst all...