All the characters and incidents in this story are factual. Any resemblance to fictitious characters is a mere coincidence…
Characters:
Mr. Aloof: You know him already. However, for this story, my dear readers, you should imagine an All-Edges-Smoothed version of Mr. Aloof (‘All’ includes hair, beard and heart). He is wearing a mildly seductive perfume; to be precise, it’s AXE, but not as destructive as the name suggests. Otherwise he may behave as if he has been on a staple cactus diet, but today he is in his chummiest, plumiest self.
Ms. Melodrama: You know her too. A perfect bitter chocolate; it melts too fast and is absolutely essential to neutralize the cloying sweetness. Just like bitter chocolate needs constant refrigeration, bitter-chocolaty temperaments require coldness that some young men have in plenty. To give some angelic touches to her personality, Ms. Melodrama has wrapped herself in yards of white clothing.
Cellular phone: An electronic extension of Mr. Aloof. Whenever he tries to attain heights of purgation or practices novel ways of burning fat, it acts like a parachute to bring him safely back to solid ground.
Action:
A few hours before our Knight-on-Unicorn actually arrived; Ms. Melodrama could not catch more than 25 winks an hour because though her mortal eyes were closed, the third imaginative eye was still open. Some real hot thoughts which crossed her mind during that hour made sure that she felt warm on that January afternoon.
And there he was…her heart performed striking experiments in percussion. He plonked himself on the sofa with his fingers laced together and placed comfortably on his belly, thus covering the newly acquired circumference. During any conversations between Ms. Melodrama and Mr. Aloof in full possession of their faculties, fights popped up naturally. But today all pop ups were blocked.
He began with a business like hug. (A business like hug is based on the principle of minimal, platonic contact between humans.) Then they sat shoulder to shoulder on the sofa with an eye each on the door as if the door could have opened any moment with just a “khulja sim sim” She was sitting perfectly nestled up against his strong arms, her head resting at a vantage point from where she could indulge in his voice ringing close to her ears and his breath tickling her cheeks and his heart going pit-a-pat. Mr. Aloof’s system has an in-built weighing scale. So he cannot help weighing anything that his hands fall upon. Naturally, when he lifted her off the floor, it was due to this obsessive compulsive desire to weigh her. I could not hear the lovey-dovey cooing on this tender occasion. Firstly because it was subsonic and secondly, Venus, Aphrodite, Jove, Eros and Cupid, had made a picnic spot of the place and were gossiping too loudly while hovering right over the duo.
But gods (especially the libido god) are not pleased without lip service. The very glance Mr. Aloof cast at her had a kiss in it and his puckered lips told her something more than what puckered lips usually tell. (She has not yet revealed that “how to read puckered lips like a book” wisdom to me!) So first their hands and then they themselves were tangled in a WWF hug with a 78 kg teddy bear parked right on her chest and his podgy hand caressing and exploring the mortal underbelly of her angelic façade. At this point, I hope, the passion that steamed up my eyes did the same to the glass panes of the open window. I wiped my eyes and tried hard to see. I could see nothing except the divine backsides of Cupid, Eros, Aphrodite, Jove and Venus jostling each other for a better view. But the smooching sounds and a sudden rise in temperature was enough to know that they had finally buried their differences in a deep kiss.
