When the baby was born at last, it was a girl.
The mother held the baby as the father looked on. A twinge of regret lingered on the parents eyes as they welcome their fourth child. They had never doubted for a moment it would be a boy again. The three big brothers were, however, filled to the brim with excitement on the arrival of their new baby sister. The baby was named Khushi, which literally meant happiness. Khushi grew into a shy and helpful little girl, and by the time she was ten years old, she was helping her mother in almost all the household chores. Her parents kept her in a rather expensive English medium private school for girls, as they believed the privilege to speak good English would be instrumental in getting a good husband for Khushi later on in life. She adored her three brothers and loved to watch them, through the kitchen window, play kabaddi or cricket with the neighbourhood kids. Unlike her brothers, Khushi rarely goes out to play, as there were chores to help her mother with. Her mother often reminded her that boys were different and that anyhow,there were hardly any girl her age to play with in the neighbourhood. Even though she could not go out and play as often as her brothers, Khushi found great joy and comfort in books. She would give up a thousand playtime for a beautiful story read. Books always transported her to a magical world and there was nothing more she enjoyed than unleashing her imagination to realms far away from the reality of her small world.

Bright and sunny Spring with trees full green: flowers in all the rainbow shades; colourful butterflies dancing from one tickling flower to another; and birds chirping songs of joy...
A lush green meadow where everyone ran and play new games every day...
Laughter and trees bountiful with polished apples...
A fairly queen with a golden hair and magic wand ...
Sweets, chocolates, pretty dolls and ribbons...

When Khushi turned fourteen, she was like a bud waiting to blossom into a lovely flower.
"Your daughter is going to be a beauty..."
"She must be getting fine proposals already..."
"These days girls are becoming very rebellious and wayward... better keep a good watch over her as she is so pretty..."
The parents and the brothers were always there to see that Khushi led a well 'protected' life.She continued to read a lot and even started to write. She couldn't quite decide whether she enjoyed reading or writing more. Once, she read about Florence Nightingale and the story of courage and dedication of the eighteenth-century nurse during the Crimean War had a profound impression on her. Khushi decided she would become a nurse after her twelfth standard.

Pain,hunger and tears;
Wars, bloodshed, destruction,
Disillusionment and fear.
The wounded soldier, the dying young mother, the neglected and old, traumatized children...
But their eyes lit up with hope when the Angel of mercy comes...
I'm here and there is nothing to worry or fear, said the lady in white, full of kindness, beauty and valour.

There was a boy with a mop of black curly hair, who lived just around the corner of the school where Khushi went. He always stood and leaned against the trunk of the big banyan tree, a yew yards from the school's imposing iron gate. He was there to see her every morning. He smiled at her sometimes, but Khushi always pretended she was unaware of him.

One day after school, the day before the summer vacation, Khushi saw the boy walking towards her as she waited for the bus.
"Er...I...I just ..." The boy stammered when he stood in front of Khushi. "I just wanted to tell you that you're...really pretty."
Khushi swallowed and turned to her three girlfriends, who were keenly observing, a foot away from them.
"Here...I wanted to give you this." The boy held out a red rose and a small piece of folded paper. Khushi felt the increasing warmth on her cheeks as her eyes fell on the rose and paper.
"Please." The boy stretched out his hand slightly more forward, then an awkward, yet charming smile flashed across his face. Khushi gingerly took the rose and paper from his hand. Then, all at once, their little world of adolescence love was shattered by the giggling and tittering of Khushi's girlfriends. The boy turned crimson and hastily walked away.
Her friends gathered around Khushi as she opened the folded paper.

Hi!
I really like you a lot. Can we meet at the park tomorrow at 3 o'clock? We can go and have Lalaji's icecream afterward, if you like.

"Oo la la!" One of the girls nudged Khushi."But he didn't even write down his name."
"Too bad summer holiday is starting, Khushi," said another girl."And you're leaving town tomorrow."
Khushi and her family were leaving early the next morning for the summers at her father's village. But even if she were in town the next day, Khushi knew she would never dare meet the boy alone. If she were to meet him, she would have to lie or make some excuse. Not that she would do such a thing.

That night Khushi dreamt of a garden of red roses and a stranger with a nice smile.

After the prolonged summer vacation was finally over, Khushi eagerly went back to school. But for all her nervous excitement and expectation, she did not see the boy. Her friend, Maya, pointed out to her that the house where the boy and his family lived was vacant. A month or so later, Khushi noticed some new people had moved into the house. A sad ache would tug her heart whenever she glanced at the banyan tree. Khushi often wondered if what had transpired between the boy and her was real. But when she looked at the withered rust coloured rose, she knew what had happened was not just a figment if her imagination.

She never saw the boy again.

Life went on and by the time Khushi turned eighteen, two of her brothers were married; but the youngest of the brothers died after a prolonged cruel illness. She took care of her sick brother in between her chores, school, reading and writing. The brother's illness had drained the family physically, emotionally and financially.
"Only twenty-three years and he's gone." Lamented her father, shaking his head." He was a smart and good lad. He would have been very helpful for the family."

Maybe, I should have been the one gone instead, thought Khushi as she watched the broken countenance of her father.

One night, about a week after the twelfth standard board results were out, Khushi overheard her parents talking about her in the kitchen.
"There is nothing to worry about as she is already getting good proposals. We only have to worry about the dowry." Her father was saying.
Silence fell for a moment, then she could hear her mother's quiet voice. "Since she has done so well in her exams...I was t-thinking... perhaps,it would be a good thing to let her go to college before getting her married--"
"Nonsense!" Her father cut short her mother. "A girl requires no further education or a career for her to take good care of her household and serve her husband. The best thing parents could do for their daughter is keep aside a handsome dowry and find a suitable husband. Enough of this conversation!"

Khushi quietly walked away from the kitchen door, then headed towards the varanda. Once outside, she sat on the doorstep. It was a clear and quiet night, except for the stridulating chirp of crickets.
I cannot grumble, life is not hard for me compared to many other girls, Khushi told herself.
And yet, gazing up at the beautiful night sky, her eyes welled up; and as she closed her eyes, tears spilled down her cheeks.

If life was all about the many hues of Spring and the fresh Summer rain, wasn't it also about the gloomy Autumn wind and the bleak dreary Winter? In between the laughter and pain; the loneliness, happiness and tears, one carried on with life.

Waiting, dreaming, hoping...

Khushi loved to watch the birds fly above. She wondered why God did not give humans the ability to fly.
Perhaps, we would be so free and happy that we would forget about God, smiled Khushi, that must be the reason why.

She felt the 'chains' breaking as she soared high like a bird, flying away to...freedom.
A best-selling author smiling as she signed a book.
A picture of a man - a tall handsome stranger she had never seen or met before, and yet so familiar to her...
One day, her soulmate came riding on a horse. " I have been waiting or you all my life," he whispered, and then they rode off into the sunset... someplace... somewhere...

Khushi was barely twenty when she got married. Her wedding day was filled with flowers, fragrances, weets, music and laughter. The first time she ever saw her husband in flesh was on their engagement day.
"We belong to the same caste,and his grandfather and my father comes from the same village." Her father had informed her as he showed her the picture of her her future husband, a month before the engagement day.

On her wedding night, Khushi sat on the brass queen-sized bed bedecked with flowers waiting for her husband. When her husband finally came in the room, they sat for a moment in awkward silence.
"You must be tired." Her husband cleared his throat."I am also tired after such a big day."
It was the first time her husband had spoken to her, and she wasn't sure how to respond to him. Should she be honest and tell him how nervous she was--
"Why don't you go to sleep...it's been a long day." Her husband said before she could muster up anything to say. He gave her a small polite smile, then simply added, "goodnight."
"Goodnight," she breathed. What else could she say? Khushi took a deep breath and closed her eyes. How ironic to want to cry her heart out or scream till her lungs could no longer bear, on the day that was supposed to be the happiest day of her life!
Later, when she woke up in the night, she saw her husband's silhouette in the varanda, smoking a cigarette.

Her husband was a well-educated small-time business man. He did not treat her bad, nor did he make or show any effort to know her. He was quiet, polite and... distant. Her husband total lack of passion and indifference towards her made Khushi to avoid him as much as possible.
One night, five months into their marriage, her husband came home after having had a good many drinks. It was the night they finally consummated their marriage. After this, there were times when her husband was really nice...almost warm to her. At such times, Khushi found hope that things would be alright after all. But such moments were rare and short lived. Work took her husband away from home most of the time, and in the odd times they spent together at home, unspoken thoughts and silence comprised a big part of their existence. After two years of marriage, her husband remained a stranger with whom she slept with once in a dark blue moon, cooked for and lived with under a same roof.

It was in the early part of April, when the first of the monsoon rains were showering their blessings, that Khushi gave birth to a baby girl. Her in-laws had expected the baby would be a boy, and they did not shy away from expressing their disappointment. Her husband, however, seemed happy.
"She's beautiful, Khushi." He smiled, gently touching their daughters cheek. "But I admit, I was secretly hoping it would be a boy. Nevertheless..."

Life went by with its own pace of hollow existence, uninterrupted by any colossal misfortune or utter bliss, intertwined with some joy, boredom, silence, trivialities and shattered dreams.

When Khushi sometimes watched the setting sun transforming the whole horizon into a fiery red and purple glow, she wondered how such breathtaking beauty could bring tears of happiness to fill her eyes, and yet fill her with desolation beyond her grasp at the same time.

One night, Khushi heard the shrill ringing of the phone in the dining room. She knew it was her husband. He had called to inform her that he would not be home for dinner and would be home late. Khushi knew 'coming home late' meant twelve or one o'clock, or maybe even later. They go through this every so often. Sometimes he conveyed to her that he would be home late before leave the house in the morning, while other times he would call up to tell her. Khushi wondered if her husband was having an affair. A few months back, when Khushi had gone to the city centre to buy something, she had spotted her husband with a woman coming out of a restaurant. She had never seen her husband laughed the way he did, when the woman leaned over and said something in his ear. And as her husband led the woman into his car, he seemed different and...contented. after they drove away, Khushi sat on a nearby bench. Any other woman in her position would be seething with jealousy and anger, but all Khushi could feel was a deep sense of sadness and betrayal. Betrayal, not necessarily by her husband alone; she knew just as she was programmed by some deep-rooted evils of social practice and tradition, so was her husband.
"Sorry. Please don't wait up for me."Her husband was saying on the other line."Goodnight."
"Goodnight."
Still holding the receiver, Khushi looked out the window. The dark night seemed mysteriously calm and serene as the cool summer breeze caressed her. A slight shiver ran through her; she quickly placed the receiver down and reached out to close the window. After drawing the curtains, she made her way to the room where their daughter was sound asleep. Khushi looked down at her sleeping child and marvelled at how much joy and love her daughter instilled in her.
" Sweet dreams, my child," she whispered, then closed her eyes and thought of...

Springtime, a happy girl dancing and playing on a lush green meadow...
Polished apples, a fairly with golden hair, flowers, laughter, sweets...
An 'Angel of mercy' all in white redeeming the hapless and the wounded...
A boy with an adorable smile and red roses...
Love, happiness, fulfillment...
A writer whose pen was like a sword...
A tall handsome stranger riding on a white horse...

When she opened her eyes, her gaze fell on her child--still in deep slumber. Khushi realised the little girl dancing on the green meadow was no longer her, but her precious daughter.
And, all at once, everything seemed so clear to Khushi. If she wanted her daughter to spread her wings and fly like a bird and soar, then she would have to learn how to fly.

Hope and dreams, so feeble, then broken and crushed, were slowly stirring and coming to life from within her, ready to fight.

Tomorrow...yes, tomorrow she would tell the newspaper people that she would be taking them up on their offer. Years of writing and months of sending to them her write-ups , under a psuedonym, had paid off. Just a month back they had offered her to be a regular feature writer for their paper. But the only catch was that she could no longer use a psuedonym to be their regular contributor. She had stalled her acceptance because she was afraid of what her husband, her in-laws and her family would think of her or say to her. But now, she could no longer afford that 'fear' anymore. She could even continue her education through correspondence, as the money they offered her was substantial enough.
What about the manuscripts she had written over the years? Her dear friend, Maya had been trying to persuade her to publish them. Maya was single and at twenty-four years,she was the part-ow
ner of a successful publishing house in Mumbai. She was doing very well and had even bought her own apartment. They had never lost touch since their school days and the last time they had spoken was just two weeks back.

" You are just wasting your talent, Khushi. You're only twenty-three and if you ever decide to follow your dream and walk away from that loveless marriage of yours, remember I am here for you always. Come to Mumbai...you and your child can stay with me."

That was what Maya had told her. Bless her heart, dear Maya, smiled Khushi. She would not do anything so drastic as going to Mumbai now, but Khushi decided to send Maya some of her manuscripts as soon as possible.

She also made a resolution to talk with her husband. Really talk. Perhaps, they could still salvage their marriage. She was willing to try, but only if he was willing to try too. She knew what she deserved and not just her, but her husband too deserved much more that what they were both giving and getting from their marriage. If it came down to her husband and her parting ways, she would accept with fortitude and humility. But no longer would she allow others to do dictate what she ought to think, feel or do. It was time for the trampled spirit of a woman to rise up and take charge. Whatever the future held for her, Khushi knew she would endure it because she believed that women, especially mother's, were created by God with a special gift of insurmountable fight in them.
And for the first time in Khushi's life, the prospect of her future seemed exciting, uncertain and...free.