'Now tell me, what were you saying?' asked the boy rapidly climbing the stairs with nervous energy. His attention towards the girl, who was ardently trying to catch up with him from behind, was undisturbed though. They were climbing the stairs of Anjali Heights; a five storey apartment. By the time they reached the third floor, both of them were soaking wet.

'Just like a rever has different names as it traverses different territories,' the girl said climbing the stairs.The boy was ahead of her but she was breathing harder than him.'Our love too shall have different names as our traverses different births. But the essence, the nature,the taste of love shall remain the same,' she continued.

They continued to climb the stairs.

It was around midnight.No moon, no stars. Only black clouds.There was heavy rain, though, with an interlude of lightening and thunder. There was no one on the streets. Everyone everywhere seemed to be fast asleep. And just when everything seemed like a prelude to an impending doom, the old door of the terrace of Anjali Heights opened with a creaking sound. The sound lingered in the airs for some time.

The girl, dressed in a blue top and cropped trousers, and the boy, wearing a white T-shirt tucked beneath a pair of black jeans, peeped out from the half-open door. The sound of heavy rain hits their ears. They slowly stepped out on the wet terrace.

The moment they stepped out in the open, the rhythmic beating of the raindrops on the floor muted all the other sounds. The sky seemed to relentlessly kiss the earth-just the way lovers kiss when they meet each other after a long time or for the last time. Does the sky and earth, the girl wondered, gossip about spring, summer, and the winter through raindrops?

The girl and the boy, grasping each other's hands more firmly as the rains drenched them, stood still. For the world, perhaps, it would have been just another abrupt shower that year, but for them it was the first rain of confession in eras that was drenching them. There are certain relationships which don't necessarily start when two people meet. Even their first meeting has the vibe of an unexplained continuation. The girl and the boy were in one such relationship even from the time they were not in a relationship.

Standing under the rain, together, they finally understood how much they loved each other. It wasn't that they didn't realize it before, but the journey from a 'gut feeling' to a 'concrete knowing' happened at that instant. They kept looking into each other's eyes. The rain by the. had polished off their appearances, transforming them from stones into glistening diamonds that emanated an alluring desires for the other. Desire gives love it's wings-they understood.

The boy took her to the edge of the terrace. He stood up on the cemented barricade that fenced the terrace, and then pulled up the girl beside him. She was visibly scared. The boy feigned his fear better. They were standing on the edge facing each other. The girl didn't let go of his hand even for a second. They stood so close to each other that they could feel their breaths on each other's skin. Their breaths, by caressing their skin, soon ga e birth to a feeling in them whose wail drew their heart's attention. The latter asked the feeling what it was seeking. A kiss; the feeling told the heart. The latter was instantly alert because a kiss was the heart's only way to share it's deepest secret with the soul. Should the kiss happen, the heart will have to bare open all its secrets, in all its nudity.

The boy brought his hand to the girl's inquisitive face and tucked a strand of her wet hair behind her ear. He then culled her face gently with both his hands. For her, it was like a faint dream within the tiny capsule of reality. For him it was a certain reality inside an uncertain drop of dream.

A few raindrops trickled down her forehead. The boy interrupted one raindrop with the tip of his tongue. When a promise and a prayer come together, a commitment is created. She was the promise, he was the prayer, and the unprecedented feeling their kids triggered within them was the commitment.

Why this commitment? her mind asked her heart. This commitment is an assurance, her heart answered the mind.

'That I'll choose him in whatever form, and whatever, he presents himself in front of me. It's not because our choice will claim we are the best for each other. But just like a student passing out from school knows the basic of everything, we would be the basic of each other.'

The boy sucked hard on her lips. The girl felt nothing for some time after which she opened her eyes to realise her deepest core had evolved. An irreversible ritual had taken place in her heart. With this new self, now, she sucked his lips. Did his heart undergo a similar ritual too? she wondered. Soon the two tongues prattled amidst the torrential rainfall.

The fear the girl had felt after climbing up the cemented barricade had now been conquered. Trust, after all, rinses a heart of almost every fear, eventually. Hope takes care of whatever residual.

Their lips parted. Nothing will be able to wash his imprints off her now, she knew. As their eyes met again, she wondered whether she really existed or had she been a mere fragment of his imagination all these years? Could it be that she was leading a life of death till now? And when he happened to her, life happened?

The boy, in an indescribable trance, sat down by the cemented barricade. He pulled the girl's hand as an invitation to come and sit close to him-and she did. The outside was chaotic, the inside was very calm. In that calmness she could hear her heartbeats loud and clear. The beats seemed to have graduated from mere sounds to a language through which she was translating what the boy had penned on her heart with the ink of love.

A minute passed by. They kept exchanging furtive glances gravid with romance. As the hypnotizing moment was busy making a space within their heart's which both would visit every time a seperation beckoned, the boy leaned sideways and kisses her cheek. She gave him a half-nervous, half-shy smile. She leaned a little more towards him and they kissed again. Only this time the kiss made them slowly swing between life and death, love and despair, destiny and coincidence, choice and consequence, decadence and redemption, forgiveness and revenge, light and darkness, sexuality and spirituality, instinct and experience, fame and oblivion, future and life.

The kiss broke. They sat by the edge of the terrace for some more time; hand in hand. Finally, they both stood up.

'I had to tell you this..' said the boy as they stood facing the other. 'I love you because that's my best bet to mean something to you. My Love for you is only a means to an end. And the end is I want to mean something to you.'

The girl couldn't hold back her tears. Crying is the heart's way of embracing pain. And love.

'I don't know how long this seperation of death will be, but until life gives us a chance to meet again, my soul shall be burning,' she said with teras rolling down her cheeks. In the rain, however, the years lost their distinction.

The boy's body was shaking from an inner catharsis.

'Just promise me one thing,' the girl said, locking her fingers with the boy's.

'Even if death touches us, you shall always remember me as yours?'

The boy nodded.

It was time to carry out their plan.

A middle-aged man is pacing about restlessly in a sophisticated lobby. He is semi-bald, lean, almost to the level of being skinny, wearing black cotton trousers, a plain white half-sleeved shirt, and shining brown Khadim's sandals. He casts an occasional glance at his wrist watch. 7:45 pm. He has been waiting in the foyer for the last half an hour, along with a few others perched at the edge of their seats, nervously waiting for the receptionist to announce their names.

The man adjusts his square-shaped spectacles a little and stands up. He soon locates what he is looking for; a water cooler at the end of the hallway. He ambles towards it, takes out a paper glass from a stack beside the cooler, and pours himself some cold water. He quaffs the water in one go and then pours himself another glass. The moment he gulps it, his eyes fall on a woman right ahead in the foyer where he was sitting. The man particularly notices her because she has raised her hand a little to draw his attention. Also, she is his wife.

She has come dressed in a gorgeous chiffon saree with a matching blouse and sandals. Unlike the other ladies present around her, she has applied oodles of make-up on her face. At her age, her overall dressing looks loud and bizarre. Even though the air-conditioner in the room is on full-blast, the woman keeps pretending to wipe non-existent sweat drops from her forehead and cheeks with her handkerchief. Her hair is jet black, almost like she is wearing a wig.

As the man by the water cooler fills a glass of water for his wife, an intercom buzzes loudly, breaking the otherwise brittle silence to pieces. The receptionist, a young female sitting behind a semi-circular table at one end of the entrance, picks up the receiver on the second ring.

'Yes ma'am, she says. After a few seconds, she calls out to the man by the water cooler, 'Mr Hansul, please go in. You're next.'

Nihil Hansul quickly empties his glass in the cooler's sink and joins his wife, Nishi. The urgency in their demeanor alarms the onlookers.

In his head, Nihil had formed a picture of the woman they are about to meet-middle aged, well past her menopause, and a strict feminist. There was no particular reason why Nihil had that image of the woman. But the person waiting for them shatters his perception completely. This is a girl, and not a woman to begin with. She is wearing a crisp business suit, her hair is neatly done up with a couple of loose strands falling on either side of her face. She is sitting straight with her hands clasped together on the large wooden table behind which she is sitting-a very corporate pose. Her black carbon square specs suit her oval face well.

'Good evening ma'am. May we please come in?' Nihil says hoping he has subdued his male ego enough in his voice. Rarely before has Nihil ever needed anyone's permission for anything. But this, of course, is different.

'Yes please Mr..' The girl galnces at her iPad once, kept besides her, and says, 'Nihil Hansul.'

The couple came in with a pseudo-smartness about them and take seats opposite the girl. Nishi gives the girl a plastic smile and says, 'Mr Sinha recommended you to us.'

'Sinha?' There is a slight twitch in the girl's eyebrow as if she is trying to recollect.