Metro Diaries: The Last Goodbye

10th August 2013

“The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly.” ― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Source: Google Images

Last night it happened again. After a long day at work I plugged in my iPod seeking for some solace in music when shuffle landed exactly where it shouldn’t – our song – or rather my song that defines you for me. Why is it so difficult for me to still listen to it without thinking about you? Why is that despite having a thousand reasons to hate you I am still clinging onto that one reason to love you with an increasing madness each day. The fact we were refuses to seep in despite me trying to push it deeper and deeper with every passing day. How do I make myself believe?

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Jennifer felt a strange sense of pain engulf her as she finished reading the diary entry for the umpteenth time. It felt strange that some words written by a complete stranger had such profound effect on her. Since the time she remembered she had been using the train to commute everywhere – school, college and now her workplace but never had such a thing happened before. The more she tried to connect the dots the more bizarre the whole picture seemed.

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Few days back Jennifer stared at her watch- 6:18 pm it read. She was in time; the train could arrive any moment now she thought. She looked around and saw crowds of people around her. Stranded somewhere in between, looking for some shore. Her thoughts wandered away, even she was one of them a lost soul who didn’t know where she wanted to go from here. At 26 her life wandered between few stations called home and office never diverting from that route to hear as to what exactly her heart ever wanted.

The blaring horn of the train brought her back. She boarded the train expecting it to be the way it always was. But today a surprise awaited her. As she stood on her toes to put her bag on the rack above, her hands fell on a diary.

Worried that someone might have forgotten something important she picked it up to look for the owner’s info. The address seemed unfamiliar to her. She occupied a seat before the crowd increased in the train clutching the diary tightly.

Piyu – the name on the front page caught her attention. A broken dream, an untold story, a falling star, an incomplete desire with a heart that’s frozen and a soul that’s on fire! These were the words of introduction written just below the name. There was something in those words that hit Jennifer deep somewhere. It felt as if her innermost feelings were suddenly being voiced out through those words. Jennifer suddenly felt as if someone had taken away her soul with all her feelings and was now writing all this through that soul.

Source: Google Images

For the two hour long journey back home that day Jennifer was glued to the diary. Each and every page seemed to be unveiling layers of her soul before her eyes, things which till now were limited only to her thoughts which no one knew , maybe not even her had now taken form. She had almost missed her station that day .

Needless to say that night she couldn’t sleep. She stayed awake reading the whole diary in and out. By the time she finished it she felt as if every beat of her heart had been heard and understood by someone. All that she couldn’t express till now was still felt. She suddenly didn’t feel lonely any longer. She knew there was at least one soul on this earth who could sing back the song her heart so wanted to hear.

Next day she got up with a renewed vigor, she now wanted to find out the owner of this diary. Not only to return her property but also to meet her soul mate, the missing piece of her soul that had made her so complete. Many days of wandering here and there had not leaded anywhere as the address seemed to be incomplete or too old.

But Jennifer did not lose hope. She continued her search trying to think of various ways and means including face book, LinkedIn and all those social networking sites where she found solace at times, yet Piyu remained untraced.

Today at her office a colleague had just randomly mentioned her blog and how it held all the pages of her life tightly together when it stuck Jennifer. Perhaps searching for Piyu through her words might lead to her. And it did. It took her to her blog – The Dream Catcher where Jennifer read some of those diary entries as well. Her joy knew no bounds as she kept reading all that she could and suddenly reached a dead end. On 13th October 2013 Piyu had written a beautiful heart touching poem after which she had not written anything there.

Feeling dejected by this she was about to leave the blog when she saw an About me page on the blog. Clicking on it, it felt as if she had entered Piyu’s personal world. It had her pictures and a brief intro about her with her full name. Piyali Bhatt.

Some more keyboard moves and Jennifer held her breath as the Master Encyclopaedia – Google found out Piyali Bhatt from Mumbai for her. Jennifer closed her eyes tightly and said a silent prayer, only she knew how badly she wanted to meet Piyali and no words could explain her desperation. After what seemed like eternity Jennifer opened her eyes slightly to get the shock of her life.

14-Oct-2013 -Piyali Bhatt, a Mumbai based 24 year old girl committed suicide by hanging herself today. Last night she had written a poem on her blog titled My Last Goodbye before she killed herself. The police are still investigating for reasons.

Jennifer was crestfallen as the person who had rewritten the meaning of LIFE for her was today defining death.