Till Death Tears us apart...

Vijay Thakur is going through tough times. He has had nothing but a horse that was in his last leg, in fact all its four legs were in their last leg. But he got to make do with what he has, if he has to reach his love of his life, Lakshmi Kumari. He had no kingdom to swap for that horse., but he did swap his fathers (unknown to him, ofcourse) expensive television and his scooter for the horse and some money. He knew Lakshmi’s father had forbidden that she could not meet him; ever. But he had challenged that an old man can never stop his true love; and here he is on the horse, the only thing that could take him through the ravines of Hambal to Lakshmi’s village. He knew he had to be very cautious; he had just fought a gang of 10, who perhaps were sent by his would-be father-in-law to break his every haddi; they did succeed a bit, but when they tried to steal his horse, it was last straw on Vijay’s back – he “un sabko apne naani yaad dila diya”. As he passed through the ravines, he heard gun shots and suddenly the bullets whizzed past his ears and one even nicked his hand; but that did not stop Vijay from drawing his gun from the rucksack he had, looked directly into the sun, see the famed dacoits of Hambal and shoot each one of them. Funnily, as the dacoits were shot, they fell in somersaults; and some even fell in a way that would have put Greg Louganis to shame. Having warded them off bravely and one of his hands bleeding and his throat parched, Vijay Singh Thakur galloped on – on the horse that saw so much action that it forgot it was on its last leg; Vijay was tantalizing close – far away he saw Lakshmi running towards him in a slow-motion… On cue, his horse collapsed, he was now on the plains that separated him and his love of his life and started running towards her; strangely he heard a song as he ran towards her…

Lakshmi Devi was on the other end of the plain, on a bullock-cart that was part of the caravan. She was in the middle of the caravan, and the people around in the caravan wearing colorful dresses were singing and dancing as the caravan moved forward. Earlier just before the dawn, she had gone to the terrace of her house and climbed down the wall, bruising herself badly – she knew this was just the pain she would go have to go through – the love of her life – Vijay was waiting for her. Lakshmi had plotted her route carefully through the mangrove so that none can see her; except those five ruffians from the village, who happen to be in the mangrove that time. They started chasing her; one even caught up to her; but the stray-dog she had lovingly fed came to her rescue; she escaped his paws (the kamina's and not the kutha's); and the chase re-started - miraculously she evaded all of them; but they were gaining; as it was getting dangerous for her, she heard the sound of the cowbells and creaking wheels of bullock-carts; she ran towards it; the five ruffians who were chasing her gave up at the sight of well-built riders of the bullock cart. SLakshmi thanked the leader of the bullock-cart profusely, who although did not ask as to what she was doing at this early hour, but said he consider her to be his “beti”. That was this morning; in the interim, there was a chorus song by the people in the caravan; and over fire and over brunch, Laskhmi sang soulfully about her love, pining on to see Vijay and her future life with him. All of that was coming to fruition; they were in the edge of the plains and she saw Vijay in his horse; as soon as she saw him, she jumped off the cart and started running towards him. She saw Vijay doing the same and running towards her in slow-motion. She also heard the song she sang in the morning in her, but it was the joyous version of it…

Vijay ran, Lakshmi ran; and they ran as the birds sang, flowers bloomed... They were very close – with 20 meters separating them; and in a minute, they’d fall into each other arms and live happily every after…

“Engeetham stopped his writing and read through what he had written. It looked so déjà vu and he realized that this is the story of every other movie that gets made. He shook his head and tore what he had written into two, crumpled them, threw it in the garbage and left the room to have his coffee; hopefully that will induce some creativity”

...as Vijay and Lakshmi ran, suddenly there seemed to be a big divide appearing in front of them; They could no longer see each other; a crushing-searing pain passed through them…