Jayalakshmi : First Love

This is my true non-erotic recollection, just names have been changed. Locations are described accurately, but anonymously. All feelings, events and expressions are accurate.

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The first damsel who kindled the flame of love in me was Jayalakshmi, my school mate of Class VI and VII. It was one of the better co-ed English Medium schools, with kids from the better circles, usually Govt and Defence officers' families. I had joined in the sixth standard, and she halfway thru. We were just pre-teens. We were mere classmates for about a year, then suddenly it happened one afternoon after lunch break.

Jaya, had a smile, which I knew she kept only for me, when I got the better of my classmates and would have the teacher call out my name. I was alone in the classroom, reading a Phantom comic book. I heard someone come in, glanced up, and it was Jaya, with that special smile. I looked at her and I felt different. First, I felt a bit giddy. I pushed the comic into the school bag, and tried to stand up. I could not. I was breathing hard, but felt really good inside. Soon, I was smiling at her, albeit in a shy way.

That moment, the smile meant something else for me, and my world felt totally different. She came close to me, and sat on the bench besides me. I spoke, or rather croaked, Jaya, you mean a lot to me. She seemed surprised, and replied, What do you mean? Drinking some water from my bottle, I cleared my throat and said I don't know. You have a special smile for me, and I just realised that that smile meant a lot to me. The class started filling up, and we went to our respective seats. All through class, I was distracted and submitted one of the worst class assignments, drawing a remark from the teacher, as to whether I was running a fever. She held my wrist for the racing pulse, and a warm forehead and sent me to the school nurse!!

As I left the classroom, I glimpsed at Jaya, and saw her with a worried look. I smiled back at her, and winked. I knew it was only Jaya fever. As expected, the nurse asked me what I had for lunch, and whether I had sneaked out to the shop outside to buy treats etc etc. She soon had me drink some vile tasting fluid and asked me whether I would like to go home right away or sit out in the common room. It was soon break time, and I spied Jaya coming over to the nurse room. I came out and asked her whether she would come for a walk. She was still worried, and as soon as we were out of earshot, she asked me if I was fine. I said I was, and that I could not answer the questions in the assignment as all I could do was think of her smile. She giggled, and said she would spoil all my assignments hereon so that I would be thrown out of class.

I tried to pinch her for her comment, but she dashed off. I sat down on the bench, and she came back and said, I have been spoiling my assignments for the last two years thinking of you, and that it was mean of I to hold it against her. I had that giddy feeling again, and knew I had to hug her. We walked back as we heard the short bell, announcing the 5 minute warning to end of break. We got our chance near the side staircase, and we whispered our happiness to each other. She knew about falling in love, she had just taught me how to. She would teach me more, as we started spending more time together in school.

I learnt to stop thinking of her in class, but it was getting very difficult. It took a couple of weeks, and I somehow managed to compartmentalise the two, and maintain my old position in class.

We took walks in breaks, sat doing assignments together, and shared the small events of the day and what we thought of them. She was sensitive, and never interrupted me, and bore my interruptions with great patience. Coming to school was a joy after that, and we used to hate school holidays.

One day, while walking together and chattering away, she stopped as said, I want to invite you home for my birthday. Oh it would be lovely, I replied. I wondered what my parents would say, and luckily, they never even asked me the name. I had some pocket money, so I bought her an Enid Blyton, and a bar of chocolate. I wore my best party clothes, however, they looked real shabby to me.

To my surprise, I was the only person she had called for the birthday. I was expecting that she would be having others as well. I was also distressed to learn that her parents were no more, and she was staying with her grandmother. No one at school knew this, and I guess, no one had the need to ask. A real sweet lady, was her Granny, and who later took me aside and revealed to me that of late, I was the only person Jaya would talk of at home. And the suggestion to call me over for Jaya's birthday was her idea of her special way to make the day brighter for her.

I later hugged Jaya, and told her that she was the special person for me, and that I would love her forever. We had no inkling of sex or anything near that. It was pure love for a person to another. All we knew was to kiss each other, shyly at first, gradually to hug and kiss, and hold each other in tighter and tighter embraces. For a wisp of a girl, she was surprisingly strong in her arms. She would speak of her loneliness and gratitude for my special friendship.

Her house was near the sea, and I soon discovered that I could cycle to her on holidays on a shorter route than the one taken by the bus service. We would trek the short 10 minutes to the beach and play in the sand. We would sit near the water line and let the waves run up to us. There was nothing more we liked that to do things like that. At other times, I would give her a ride on my cycle, Jaya sitting sometimes on the crossbar, sometimes on the carrier, and just once, on the handle bar. We would do this in her gravel driveway, and sometimes, I spied Granny watching from the verandah. She would keep away from us, knowing that this playful time we spent, was a balm to Jaya and brought joy to her lonely life.

There were other times we climbed trees, our favorite being a old mango tree, with two crooks, where we would each sit, angled to each other. We could see the fishings boats out at sea, and we would daydream about various roles. Like I was a fisherman, she was my wife, who sometimes came with me on fishing trips. Another time, I was a king and she was my queen, helping me to administer the citizens. This was her favourite, and we would generally act out the Akbar-Birbal stories to an imaginary set of subjects.

We once went to a movie, it was called "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad World", a hilarious slapstick comedy of those days, and we enjoyed laughing at all the jokes. At, interval time, we shared a popcorn and Gold Spot, which she liked more than others like Coca Cola or Fanta. Her Granny picked her up from the theatre and I took the bus home. It started to happen that I would often go to her house whenever there was a holiday, and I generally could convince my parents that I was going to a friend's house.

Those were seriously innocent days, and our pure affection for each other, was expressed in tiny ways. I would take a flower from the wayside, while cycling to her house, and she would luagh and put it in her plait, which she wore just one, while at home. She would share chocolates, I would bring her books to read.

In my innocence, I never foresaw how things tend to be taken for granted.

A month later, my father received new posting orders and we had to move out of town, and it was to be the last time we would meet each other. It was shattering for me to understand what it meant, and even more so when I broke the news to her, with the heaviest of hearts. She dashed off to the girls' room and emerged a few minutes later with swollen red eyes.

We wept, we hugged, and I talked of running away from home. She hushed me, and said to write with my new address. She took my right hand and placed it over her budding left breast. I could feel her heart beating rapidly, as she hugged tighter than ever. She, likewise, clasped me on the chest and squeezed me, and I her. Literally, tearing each other hearts, the separation was not easy. She ran off without looking back.

We did write to each other, regular letters in 1972-73, used to take a week at best, sometimes 10 days. We would share the news, each cycle of letters sometimes taking a month or more. She wrote of her achieving womanhood, and how she particularly missed me then. We would write of school work, and how we missed doing assignments together.

As a year passed, she would ask me if I had made any another special friend in my new place. It was a boys only school, and contacts with girls were very limited as it was a very conservative town. Once she mentioned about another boy, Bharat, who she said had joined the school. She asked me not to be jealous of her friendship with him, and said that I was the first love she found, and no one could take that place. She frequently asked me whether I made any in her place, but there was none, and the place in my heart always felt empty, till I met Saroja. Gradually, the frequencies of letters declined, and as we found other friends and activities, I guess, the pangs of separation slowly declined. I had saved her letters for a few years, until they were mistakenly thrown out as rubbish by the maid, and burnt by the gardener in the compost bin.

After, 40 years, I sometimes think of Jaya, and where she would be, and what she made of herself in the peculiar turns and twists that we know as life. I always remember her for the way she showed me to care for a new person in life, taught me about new ways to experience life, perhaps did more to change my thoughts and feelings about the other gender in our species.