The time factor....

"Gosh...you are a kid"...he smiled the same lopsided grin that had tugged at the strings of her heart in their very first meeting.
"Don't call me a kid"..she retorted with a fake anger which was more see-thru than a bride's flimsy veil.

5 years...is that long enough for one person to call another a kid ? She didn't think so...But then he was gloating over his graduation certificate when she was just being weaned away from her staple diet of 'Nancy Drews' and 'Archies' of the world. He was bursting with anxiety and apprehension of the first day on the first job when she was all smiles with her new school bag. Skewed...the timelines were skewed....the scales were tilted...the blind lady holding the scales had mocking eyes peering down at her through the blindfold, flimsier than her put-on-anger.

"Yes Mr Old Man..." she recovered from her reverie..."what were you saying?"
She bit her tongue the moment the words disturbed the air around her in little waves of ups and downs. Did she really have to say that and drive a wedge in the already wide age-gap?

He seemed not to notice the comment...and carried on with whatever he was saying.His eyes widening as he spoke and then squinting into tiny slits when he came down to explaining the nitty-gritties. Babyish eyes with pink eyelids, she had described to her friends over their usual friday evening coffee. They had all rolled on the couch with laughter- their mocha's and latte's coming dangerously close to the rims.
"Goddd......u r a dreamer maann....whats wrong with you? Pink eyelids...what is he ?
A hippopatamus or something?" More peals of shrill girlish laughter.....!!
SCHOOLGIRL-ROMANCE they had labelled it...!! Any attempts at further explanations would be cut short by exasperated-pair-of-rolled-up-eyes or lets-see-how-long-this-lasts-harumphs !!!!

"Hulloo.....I was saying something", he was waving a chubby hand in front of her face.
"Yeah...I am listening"...she half-mumbled.
"You are such a disaster of a person....", he chided her.
She just smiled in retaliation...a far cry from her usual reaction to such comments.
She was a fiery person...pouncing on any and every one who would throw such jibes at her. The boundaries between humor and insults were an astigmatic blur as far as she could see....and that made her a perfect target for all her friends' comments and jokes. But she was a light traveller...moving through life with a very minimal emotional baggage...no grudges hauled on her back, no revenges slung by the shoulder.
And that made her more perfect than perfect as the butt-of-jokes.

"Maybe its something to do with your sunsign"..he had said over coffee one evening..."Yours is a very fiery sunsign. You act or speak first and then think...very very spontaneous."
The stars...how conveniently you could blame them for any and everything that goes wrong in your life. Or maybe, with yourself. Why was she born on the day that she was born? She could have been born 5 years earlier ? Or maybe 4 ? Would she then not be called a kid ? Would perspectives change ? Would she still be the same person that she was now ? Or would a calmer, more sober sunsign possess her into demurity and serenity of mind ? All if and buts stacking up in her troubled mind.

She could vaguely recollect a scene from a movie she had seen ages ago. A lady caught in the midst of an extra-marital affair trying to unwind that one moment when she met the 'other-man', albeit in her thoughts. Trying to take a path which would piece again the shards of her shattered marital bliss....
The idea had seemed nothing more than a sinner's retreat to her then...a 'fallen womans' attempt at rising from the depths of her guilt.Regrets at having taken the wrong lane...and being caught in the middle of a drunken-driving rush on the expressway !!!
But now the idea fascinated her....what if she could unwind time....go back in time to the hospital and carry the puny pink child tagged with a number...sleeping in the immaculately nursery to a faraway hospital 5 years back in time...next to another puny kid with pink eyelids and a lopsided grin in another immaculately clean nursery...!! Or maybe 27 wasnt a very flattering age for a woman. The pink eyelid-ed kid wud have to be zapped into the future...lopsided grin et al !!! :)

She let out a sudden guffaw !!!! They were walking towards the lift. The discussion had changed track. His one-sided talk was chugging along the lines of job-shift and alternate careers while she was lost in the deep dark chambers of thought-lined time machines.
"You are a creative person. You can try out new options....do what you feel like doing. Your's is a blessed generation"...his face was wrought in seriousness...not even the proverbial hint of humour. She could just stare at him with naked shock.

The lift stopped on the floor with a bing-bong. He got into the lift. There was no space for an extra person...definately not for a 'healthy' person like her.
"I will take the next one..." she murmered through the closing doors of the lift.

Where generations were concerned, taking the next lift wouldn't make a difference. What had been done by 5 years couldn't be undone by 5 seconds of time.
She reached her floor. The door opened to an empty lobby. He hadn't waited for her.
She walked on...a wiser kid....!!!