It was when he had seen her with a boyfriend that the realization had first struck Mukundo. His fascination with Piyali was no longer just that of an adult for a precocious child. But that of a man for a woman he desired. It was a disturbing realization. The woman was really a child, who had grown up in front of his eyes, still barely on the brink of adulthood, the same age as his students at the university. She was in the forbidden territory. Until now, when he had worried if his interest in her would make her uncomfortable, it was only a consideration for her apparent shyness before him. But now he knew that he could actually be guilty.

He had resolved to keep his distance and do so discreetly so that nobody, least of her she, noticed any change. But over last two years, she had made it difficult for him to do that. Because a childishness that had never manifested in her when she was actually a child had started creeping into her behavior in the first years of her formal adulthood. And somehow, he seemed to be the only one noticing that. He didn’t hear any murmur of concern from either his or her parents. Perhaps because she was so sharp that despite missing classes, hanging out in the company of people who didn’t look reassuring to him, and having even tried drugs on an occasion or two, she had managed to do well in academics. That was enough to hide her growing reckless and wild side from both sets of parents. While he was bound by his words of not poking his nose into her life, he couldn’t help noticing what was going on and worrying over it. Once in a while when he had found somebody at home wondering where Piyali was, he had gone to look for her and brought her back from places he would rather not have set foot in.  The only reason he noticed, he told himself, was because he was at the university every day. It was impossible not to notice. What he overlooked was that a lot of things happened at the university, which he wouldn’t have liked. He was perfectly capable of ignoring them. But not her.

Then her final exams were over and Mukundo thought that it would rid him of the constant torment that came from watching her. Torment from his desire for her and torment from worrying about her. But yesterday she had disturbed the precarious equilibrium he was still trying to achieve. It was a Saturday morning. It had been raining hard since last night. And she was nowhere to be found at the breakfast time. Soon everyone started worrying. Her phone was not reachable – and the task for finding her naturally fell to Mukundo. Rains seemed to congest the mobile networks for some inexplicable reason and it took him some time to reach out to her friends.  Apparently, a group of boys had left last night for Muktamanipur. A group of girls was supposed to meet them that morning, have a picnic and then come back by the evening. But none of the girls left that morning because of heavy rains. Could Piyali have? How?

Her father’s scooter was missing.

“She was angry last night,” Debendra confessed.

“What for?”

“She wants to go to Delhi for her post-graduation. We didn’t think that was a good idea.”

She wanted to leave Kolkata!

To everyone present he announced, “I will drive towards Muktamanipur. She couldn’t have reached far in this weather.” He hoped for that more than believed it. You could never tell with Piyali. What was wrong with this girl? Was it the culmination of a slow suicide mission she seemed to be on for at least two years now?

Even the car was difficult to handle in that downpour. How would she have managed an old scooter? Mukundo was driving slowly, partly because the visibility was negligible, and partly because he needed to keep an eye out for her and her scooter.

After getting out of the city, he drove for almost half an hour before spotting the scooter parked by the road. But she wasn’t there. He panicked, braked hard and jumped out of the car. A few meters off the road, there was a thick tree and he felt like he got a glimpse of a bare arm behind it. He ran towards it and called out her name, “Piyali!”

“Wait!” he heard a panicked cry and stopped in his tracks, “Don’t come yet.”

It was difficult to make it out in the rain, but he heard what seemed like scuffles and then she emerged. Thoroughly drenched. But her top looked a little better. She must have taken it off behind the tree and wrung water off it. He wanted to do two contradictory things. He wanted to hug her tight and thank God that she was all right. And he wanted to scream at her and shake her hard until she came to her senses and promised not to repeat such a stunt ever again.

But he did neither. “Let’s go home,” he said in a calm voice as if he was picking her up from the university.

She hesitated and then said, “The scooter!”

Screaming ‘to hell with the damned scooter’ was his instinctive response which he curbed again.

“Let’s park it off the road. We will send somebody to pick it up.”

“It won’t start,” she said sheepishly and handed him the keys.

He nodded, unlocked the handle with the key, dragged it off the road and parked it behind the tree so that it wasn’t visible from the road.

He drove her home without speaking a word on the way and after handing her to the care of her parents, locked himself up in his room.

—

He couldn’t take it any longer and after agonizing over it the entire night decided to confront her this morning. He sent Sonelal – their old house-help – to her and summoned her to his study. He hadn’t asked her into his study in a long time, not since she was in school and he would tutor her. At the University, where he taught Physics, she had opted to major in Maths and had only a few Physics courses. Hence their academic paths hadn’t crossed much. But he needed to feel and act authoritative for today’s confrontation. And he hoped that the study room, where he had been her teacher a few years ago, would help him with that.

All that preparation came to a naught when she entered the study. Her nose was swollen and red. She was barely able to keep her eyes open.

“You are unwell,” he cried out, “Why did you come then? You could have told Sonelal–” He forgot his self-imposed restriction of not touching her. He held her arms and helped her into a chair.

“I wanted to thank you for helping me yesterday,” she said.

That brought back all the anger that had diffused on seeing her plight.

“Thank you?” he spoke through gritted teeth.

She didn’t notice his reaction, and added, “And sorry for all the trouble.”

“For God’s sake, Piyali,” the dam broke, “I am not looking for your sorry’s and thankyou’s. What I want to know is what has come upon you? I will not even speak for your parents or mine. Why should I? I am sure they have conveyed to you how much they care and worry; and perhaps you even understand them. But what about me? I have been witnessing your recklessness for God knows how long and it has worried me to death–”

“Stop pretending, Mukundo Babu! You hate me, you hate my family, and I know it. There is no need to—”

—

To be continued