Incipimus Iterum

His mind was racing – uncontrollably impatient. He had been harsh on time, keeping a close eye and a colder mind one every passing moment. This was time’s revenge.

It had been months now that this war was rambling its way through the background silence. Uncountable efforts were spent in waging survival, let alone victory. How many days were spent in a lifeless continuum of uncertainty?

But one never realizes the existence of a turning point until one is at the crossroads. This day was special. A rather ordinary event would change his life forever.

Walking down the crowded subway, feeling like an alien to the entire human race, he comes across a familiar face. Unlike the last time they came face to face, this time there was no one else with them. As far as history is written in stone, just that far the future is contingent. A complete set of events could never repeat themselves in time.

But they passed each other by, just like the last time. Aware, conscious! Was time this unfair? Would love pass them by twice just months apart? No!

Once again she turned swiftly like she did the last time. ‘Hey’ she yelled.  Just what he wished for! He knew this wasn’t going to happen. But it did. Why? It doesn’t matter.

He, too, turned this time – and recognised her. The last time, he under the effect of a gruesome fear, he left the walkway with a cruel indifference. This was a recreation of history. He had imagined this over many times. This was the moment in history that he wished to rewrite. This day was a day in history.

Despite the so many ways that he wished this day would go different, one thing was common – he knew that his life would change forever now. It will never be the same again. Never. Ever!

There had been a glitch in time that night. This night there will be another. And it would reset the course that time would have taken by itself, had the zillion other factors not interfered.

“Wow!” he said.

She giggled at the absurdly sweet disposition that he had taken to reply to her address.

Everything was about to change, and none of them could afford a single glitch in time again. But this was not the time to think about glitches, but about perfection- the perfection that lies in chaos – the perfection the lies despite the chaos.

Time had slowed down. The minds had slowed down. Their love had poisoned the weapons of time, and it was eating into itself. The sheer power of this moment was up-surging - like it would rip the cosmos apart – that it would rewrite destiny. The stars would bow to them –in a way that gods would help them do it.

“We have been here before, do you remember?”

“How have you been?”

“Where have you been?”

“I know”

“I do too”

“Why”

“No”

“Imagine the whole last year never happened.”

“Is it possible to do that?”

“Try. Imagine that we have been standing here since that night”

“Why?  What would you do differently?”

“You were like gravity. I’d let myself fall.”

Breathless, both of them – choking from the inside out! If they were to die right now, they’d be the happiest people on earth who’d ever die. But the whole universe would mourn their death and would collapse into nothingness. The world could not exist without them. Not anymore.

This doesn’t happen often, this doesn’t happen soon. There was something inexplicable about the time then.

“Where do we go from here?”

“Just stay.”

“Are you for real?”

“Why don’t you stay & find out?”

“Oh, I’m staying. I’m not going anywhere, anymore.”

“Do you know what....”

“Shh... I know”

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Not until today.”

“The trains have arrived. Where do we go then – your way or my way.”

“Like I said – just stay! Stay and..... stay. We’ll get there in time.”