Down beneath me, there stands my father with baisakhi under his left arm, my amma sitting next to him with dholki in her hands and guddu on her lap. Guddu my younger sibling of four, is snoring peacefully in my amma's lap, he looks innocent and cute with his face buried in amma 's green coloured cotton saree. It is a day like every other, we stand outside the Victoria memorial and are about to start our every day's evening programme.

I am sitting on the bamboo cross, which is like a chromosome with a centrosome adjusted towards one of the side projects vertically on the ground making a small cross for me to adjust my butt and there is an identical stand like this one on the opposite end too. Both the chromosomes are connected with a rope in between, that rope is my best friend always holding me steady even when I am bleeding badly.

I am wearing a silk salwar kameez of yellow colour with red and black small flowers on it. I have tied my dupatta tightly against my chest from one side and have coiled the other end around my waist tucking it where it finished. It covers my chest successfully without disturbing.

The crowd gets thicker here at 6 pm and so we wait till then.

As my mother noticed the tourists getting interested and clicking pictures, she started her dholki, by now she has become a pro at it, and she can do it single-handedly.

Programme starts with Bunty and Bubbly, my two monkey friends who begin it with their practiced dance and end it with kissing each other. Children of all ages enjoy it in Kolkata. I begin my walk on the rope after they are finished, like everyone else, we also save the climax for the very end.

I start walking, thinking about all the times I have walked over it, over my best friend. She never talks to me but is helpful during my bad times. I think about Rohan who proposed to me yesterday when I was hurrying back from my school to do the preparations for the evening programme. He called out before me "Swati" and I froze. He then walked to me and slowly took my hand in his, I started shivering and so he smiled. At first, he was nervous but looking into my eyes calmed him down a bit and he spoke without beating around the bush "I love you"...do u love me?... I blushed which he knew for certain was a "yes" so he blushed too.

I ran away from there taking my hand from his, in a way taking control of myself again.

I reached chromatin no 2, with all these thoughts swirling in my head. I was 7 feet above the ground thinking about Rohan and how we have planned a date tomorrow at princep ghat. Thinking of Rohan surely makes me blush and try to hide it from the audience but I fail and one of the girl's eyes met mine, she was confused as her expression said seeing me blushing and I wanted to laugh but I just smiled suppressing laughter.

I again started towards the first bamboo cross without thinking about the crowd, the creeps staring at me, my mother's dholki sound, and small children beaming at me with appreciation. I was thinking about how I would dress myself tomorrow, I think I should wear my navy blue kurti, but Rohan likes me in red. He once complimented that.

I imagine the time when we will be on the ghat, how he will hold my hands in his, how he will play with my hair for some time and then tuck it behind my hair at last to take a full view of my face.

I reached the first cross again and now amma gave me a bamboo of my own height. I took it from her and balanced myself again on the rope delicately. It was time for my second round, so I adjusted my hairpin and started walking again holding bamboo on my hands tightly. I heard Baba coughing so I tried to take a glance of him without looking directly for it may lead to my accident and if that happens people would leave without giving any money but I have to earn today to buy medicine for baba and enough pocket money to pay tomorrow, not that Rohan would not pay but I will offer to pay at least.

I reached the other cross within a minute as I have rehearsed this many times, I again started towards the first bamboo and completed the second round easily as usual.

I come down taking all of my body weight on my toes, they get scrapped a little but I am all used to it as this happens every day when my toes reach the bamboo-rope junction. I drank some water from the bottle amma usually brings and sat down beside Guddu who was awake by this time. After some time when the crowd started getting restless, my amma paused her dholki and looked at me giving me a sign to start the third round.

I took the small glass from her side held it with my mouth and once again I reached the first cross, I sat there looking at Guddu, the chariots on the other end, and some horses, tall and proud, some had ribbons on their heads and some on the legs. I always love the sound they make while walking as if it's some music, it has a rhythm. I looked at vendors and people eating and chatting gaily. I think of Rohan's face again and smile. I now invert the glass and put it on my head, I have done this for a week but yet not mastered it so I am a little puzzled, hence I look at Guddu again, he is waving at me that makes me confident so I started walking and thinking of nothing but my best friend below me. I reached the other end and took a sigh of relief. I tell myself "This is for amma, baba, guddu, and ..... Rohan'' I head back towards the first with inverted glass on my head, I don't touch it for that will make people angry. I cannot afford to make them angry today. I took a downward glance at my family, I saw Amma in that same position continuously beating her dholki, Baba had started collecting money, and I saw some of them are reluctant to give any, I got red with anger seeing them but I asked myself to calm down. I shifted my gaze towards the rope when I remembered that Guddu was seen to be nowhere present. My eyes started looking for Guddu worriedly and from the corner of my left eye, I saw Guddu walking on the road going to pop the bubbles made by one of the vendors to advertise their famous bubble-making liquid. I then saw a car coming towards Guddu and I shouted.

It was 7 pm in the evening the next day when I came back home from the hospital. I was thinking about how amma would have managed the expense of the medicines. I was admitted to the nearest government hospital from Victoria so the doctor would not have charged ....but medicines, I was confused about that. I asked about guddu first yesterday as I regained consciousness and was relieved to hear that he was fine. I was thinking about how Baba would have managed all night with such a severe cold and cough. I was dizzy and ashamed a bit of myself. I was almost there I thought. And thinking of Rohan makes me upset too. It was supposed to be a great day.

As I woke from my short nap at 8 I saw Rohan sitting beside me on the bed. He looked a little uncomfortable but happy. He was wearing a white crisp shirt with casual blue jeans. He looked handsome I thought and blushed at him again.

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