Sunday, 6th February - 06:00 pm
My account is turning out to be a story of the endless cousins I have - but I guess it's understandable given that I am meeting all of them after a long time and boy! has time changed things. ~P is one of the most vivacious girls I have met in my life. She's always full of life, slightly on the louder side but never in one place. She's one year elder to me and I, as all other cousins, am closer to her elder sister than her. I have never talked to her much. I remember going out with her into the forests close to our ancestral house and playing some obscure games when I am really feeling lonely.

A few years ago, when some relatives met at my place in chennai, there were talks doing the rounds that she's getting depressed too often these days, and hence has been shifted from Kannur (my birthplace) to Ernakulam (where I am in right now). Some years later, all seemed ok again and she went back to Kannur. But I was not at all ready for what I saw this time - she was totally aloof and reserved. There will a bunch of people talking, about 15 of us including her mother, brothers and sister. She would be sitting close to us but alone, away from the circle. I tried talking to her twice or thrice but after a couple of minutes, there would be strained silence and my mastery of malayalam didn't help at all!

Mom tells me that she's always quiet outside home and that girls go through such phases. But I know better, I have seen her in umpteen weddings and she's not 13 or 15 for going through introverted phases. She will be getting married in a year. What really freaked me out was her eyes - they were empty. Really empty! as if there was no soul behind those eyes, no emotion, no life. I have never seen eyes like that before and I can tell you - it really freaks me out. When I was about to leave on monday, she had an expression of someone who was about to cry. But I didn't know why coz it's unbelievable that she actually felt bad that i was leaving. She didn't cry - as I disappeared round the corner, I could see her staring from near the gate. The same empty expression.
- posted by Super Ted @ 1:48 AM