‘It feels as though we’re born for each other,’ he felt hopeful. ‘It’s clear that she’s attracted. Oh, don’t her eyes carry the poetry of her passion for me? Anyway to get infatuated, or to love even, is one thing, and an affair could be altogether different. But mercifully, I wouldn’t be losing track of Roopa, unlike that Ganga-Kaveri girl. What an incredible fortune to meet this one so soon after losing that one! There could be a chance to make her my own some day, who knows?’
‘Wasn’t my hand languid in his clasp as if to feel the pulse of his love,’ she sighed as she recalled the sensation of that incredible moment. ‘Didn’t his touch, touch the woman in me? And when he pressed my hand with passion, wasn’t I possessed for his possession. If only I weren’t married and he hadn’t been betrothed, oh, what should’ve come in the way of our wedding? But well, I have to suppress my love, if not for fidelity, at least for friendship.’
‘Even if I can’t live with her,’ he felt peaceful in the end, ‘I would be able to love her still. If I weren’t destined to have her, well, my passion in time could transform into a sublime affection for her. Being privy to our mutual affection, won’t we nurse a fond feeling for each other? But then, would my distraction for Roopa affect my attraction for Sandhya? Oh, don’t I know that my love for Sandhya springs from the depths of my soul. Surely, Roopa seems to rein in my heart, but won’t Sandhya remain the soul of my love?
‘Thank God,’ she consoled herself. ‘We would have enough opportunities to meet. Won’t I see him and be seen by him? Oh, I would be able to adore him while he admires me. All said and done isn’t he mine, being Sandhya’s man? Won’t I get a feel of him while I make love to her?’
~~~~~~
As day broke that 7th June, the chain of leading ceremonies for the momentous wedding commenced in right earnest while Sandhya clung to Roopa all the while.
‘I’m too excited to be on my own,’ Sandhya repeated all along.
‘To me, your marriage gives,’ said Roopa heartily, ‘an idea of the mythical wedding of Rathi and Manmath.’
‘You look no less than an angel,’ said Sandhya.
‘Of an enamored kind,’ said Roopa alluringly as Sandhya laced her endearingly.
By dusk at the kalyana mandapam it was all din. Clad in a white cotton dhothi, Raja Rao like a robot obeyed the unceasing commands of the purohit via unending vedic mantras. As his hands were at exercising the rituals to the purohit’s rhythmic renditions, his angavastram had a tough time balancing by itself on his bare shoulders. When Sandhya was brought seated in a bamboo basket by two of her uncles, all the way from the anteroom, to the decorated dais and well before the pretty load could be unloaded opposite the eager groom, a makeshift curtain was raised between them to preclude the ogling of the betrothed before the sumuhurtham.