Jerry Mannel

[Runaway Groom - Prologue]

This real life story is set in the past, some 5-7 years ago. Well lets not leave any room for uncertainty, 6 years in the past.

George, a Delhi-ite who had a penchant for movies, good food and almost loved everything under the sun – almost! He hated two kinds of people. Pledging – all Indians are my brothers and sisters – never really included two kinds of people for him. A deep aversion for Malayali girls – they smell of sticky coconut-oil, burps and have no idea about a process called waxing . And finally Tamilians – for him they were dark people who cried for the Kauveri water and more water, though they never understood the idea of taking a shower.

Arathi Srinivasan was born to a well to do ‘gelf’ settled malayali parents. Hailing originally from Kuttanad, but brought up in Chennai by her maternal grandparents because her parents were busy milking the camel for gold and oil in ‘gelf’. A beauty in herself with stunning eyes, cascading hair, polyglot, smart witty and focused in life.

With the IT boom and the blooming job opportunities, both of them found themselves working for the same multinational in Bangalore. Though they had common friends, Arathi was like double-jeopardy for George. Deep down he hated her, though he would give a polished smile once in a while.

His nightmares started, when his best buddy Sundareshan Nair a.k.a Sundaran, started to fall for Arathi’s features. With Sundaran never having the courage to ask her out, George found himself being the ‘messenger’ of Sundaran, having to go up to Arathi in asking how she was and what she was up to. Every time he had to do that, his molars wore down by 100th of an inch.

Finally he decided to end this torture and fix things up between Sundaran and Arathi. He fixed a Saturday evening dinner with Arathi for his buddy Sundaran, who had almost turned into his foe. Sundaran spent the following days plucking flower petals against ‘Aru loves me, Aru loves me not’ and the nights telling George about what he thought would be the best place for him and Aru to settle down an have a few kids.

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D-Day, 5.5 years ago, Chung-Wah Restaurant Koramangala:

George reluctantly had to accompany Sundaran to the restaurant as Sundaran developed last minute cold-feet. They sat across the table waiting for Arathi to turn up. She arrived half and hour late with her friend. On seeing the guys seated ,she walked straight up to the table and sat next to Geroge.

To this day, George swears that this is what was exactly going through his mind – “Why is she sitting next to me? Why cant she sit with him? What the fuck is wrong with her? I can smell the coconut-oil on her hair… Sundaran fucker i’m gonna kill you for this”.

But Sundaran was all long faced by that time. Unwillingly, they ordered food and ate and left. All through out the dinner, George just listened to the conversation and only answered to questions directed at him.

That was the start of everything. Arathi took interest in Geroge and she finally seduced him. But still we have two conflicting versions of the story here. Arathi says that though the feelings were mutual towards each other, she wanted Geroge to confess it first. But George denied everything 3 years back. He said he was being tortured, and the only was out of it was to feed the wolves what they were looking for and get back home. So he said what Arathi wanted to her and left the place.

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Fast-fwd to 2009 and we have a couple who are getting married in less than a month. They make plans for their future.

“Georgie, we will buy a house and covert one of the rooms into a reading room. We will have a big shelf and lots of books to read. Our kids will read and learn”

“But Aru, we shouldnt forget the shelf for the original-uncut-director’s edition DVDs i have collected over the years and the home theater that you promised to buy after the wedding”

They fight and Aru calls him, “Georgieeee” in a soft, stern and confident way and George just smiles and obliges.

George and i still meet for drink and he says, “Fuck man! If only that Sundaran had balls, i would have been still single!”

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Epilogue

As George says these days, “Never hold prejudice against anyone, ever! You might end up marrying them”

“So what’s your New Year resolution…”

“Nothing much, I’m getting married..”

“Awwhhhh!!!”

Depending up on the tone, length and energy that takes for that ‘awwh’ to come out of the person, gives me a fair bit of idea about what the person wanted to say and then reduced it as an ‘awwhhh’. Nevertheless, i will be married in 2010. Why 2010? That’s because she said she wanted to get married in 2010. (She has already started dictating me around)

What gives me the at most confidence is seeing total misfits work out magic together. Misfits.. that might bee too naive, misleading and lessening of a word to use to describe the two main characters in the following narration.

This is the story of George and Arathi. To the reader who know me, this is not the story of Sandy(@2s) and Soumya(@soumyageorge). Ohh they fit very well. Every time i meet them i see The Batman and The Joker and the immortal dialog spoken between them (add the arrow bubbles above heir head) – “You complete me!”. Though i wont say who is who in that context.

But George and Arathi were different and it was causalities that lead to their union.

Disclaimer:

All characters in this short story has been conceptualized from real characters and bears absolute resemblance to living people (none of them are dead yet, not at least for the next 50 years). This is not my story and i’m not dumb ‘now’ to do that. If the characters happen to read this then they owe me a pint each!

Happy Reading.

[Link to Story]