She turned and walked to the counter of contemporary saris where the sales-man called her. He was already taking out stacks of saris for her from the shelves behind the counter. She stood at the counter staring at his back preparing her words. She was thinking to ask for Piyali or her husband. As the figure turned at her, her voice stuck somewhere down her throat and her words tangled badly with her tongue.

"'You?" she could only manage a single word but even that sounded very feeble and distant. A pair of dark eyes bore at her and a charming smile greeted her. "You remember me?" Shaurya asked. When she had walked inside the shop, she had expected that she would finally be able to meet the husband and return the bag. If she could know more about Piyali, it would be a benefit for her. She was eager to know more of the woman who wrote such intense letters. But she had least expected to meet Shaurya again and not particularly here.

"I do, I am not forgetful" she finally replied. Although, she had remembered him often for their meeting that was quite an extraordinary one, but she didn't want him to know about that. "What are you doing here?" she asked next.

He smiled again and said, "I want to ask you the same, I have a feeling that you are not here to buy a sari".

She stared at him for a moment, trying to arrange her thoughts and words. "Someone gave me the address of this place; he said that I would find some answers here".

He followed her hands as she took out the familiar printed bag from her backpack. Then he nodded at her, "You had been to meet him". It was a not a question rather a statement.

"I can help you with that but this place is too public for a talk. If you don't mind we can sit somewhere quieter and talk", he spoke as he looked at the row of ladies sitting or standing at the counters rejecting and asking the staff to pull out more, as the heap of saris grew bigger and bigger.

Twenty minutes later, they walked into a Café Coffee day. All the while, they kept quiet. Amrita was too shocked and upset to ask anything. She had realized that Shaurya had something to do with the bag and it hurt her that he had pretended otherwise. Settling in a far corner so that they had some privacy, Shaurya ordered their beverages. Amrita now looked at Shaurya, her eyes boring amazement and her lips waiting to spill out her questions. The first thing that came out of her mouth was "What were you doing there in that shop. I thought you taught in the college?"

"Yes that I do, but today is a weekend"

"I know that today is a weekend but why were you working in that sari shop?"

"I was not working; I was actually helping the others as customers are more in this season". He then sighed and brought his face closer so that their eyes met. "Look, I know that you have so many questions for me. But before you shoot them, I want to apologize for the trouble you have been through."

She didn't acknowledge his apology immediately, she was now too pissed off to do that. Why did he approach her at the railway station? Why did he give her the bag and pretend not to know anything about it? What was his reason? Was he simply passing time with her? Was he flirting with her? Definitely not, people who flirt don't just vanish without saying anything. Moreover, he didn't ask her anything about herself, he didn't even ask for her number. No, definitely that was not flirting. Then what was the game? She now knew that Shaurya knew Piyali's brother well. Are they related? Her heart told her "yes" to that but she wanted to hear it from Shaurya. She wanted answers to all these, but mostly she wanted to know why he kept her in dark, why did he play with her. However, she was too flustered to bring herself to say all these. The situation was so odd right now.

"I really am sorry Amrita, I mean it from my heart", he his fingers brushed her knuckles where she had kept her hand on the table. She withdrew her hand immediately.

"Look, if you are mad at me that's fine. But before you judge me, please care to listen what I have to say. That's a request." He said in a soft voice.

"I am not mad at you, we hardly know each other" she tried to sound distant, trying to emphasize on the fact that his actions could not affect her. But the urgency in her voice said otherwise. She realized that and felt embarrassed. She wished she didn't meet Shaurya again. He was a stranger, but still she was mad at him and that pissed her off. She did what she could do best. She went quiet and waited.

"When we bumped into each other, it was unplanned; an accident. I had actually gone to meet someone at the station; I had not lied about it. But I could not fulfill the purpose of my visit", he looked straight into her eyes and she could only see honesty in them.

"However, I did not find the bag in the platform. I carried it with me there"

"I already figured that out" she said bitterly.

"I was there to hand over the bag to someone, to the recipient of the letters".

Amrita narrowed her eyes and furrowed her brows. She wished that he came to the point fast.

"I had gone to see my uncle, to give him what belongs to him", he still looked at her while he spoke.

A shock passed over her features now confirming what she had doubted minutes back. "You mean to say.." she could not complete her sentence, she was still recovering from the news.

"I am Piyali's son, the girl whose letters you read that day".

Amrita wanted to dig a hole and hide in that, or run away from the café. She felt horrible but she felt betrayed even more. How could he let her read his mother's letters? Letters are so private; they are meant for a particular someone and are not meant to be shared like this. But why was she accusing him, even she was eager to read them. She even read them later, she was so drawn to them when they were meant to be private. Tears of humiliation welled up in her eyes, but she tried her best to hold them back.

Shaurya kept speaking unaware of what was going in her mind. "For years my mother craved for her brother's love; he was her only family after her parents and before she met my father. She had seen more hardships in her life than she was supposed to. After she met my father she finally found happiness, but she never forgot her brother. She had tried to contact him many times over the years but her father's family didn't let her through. My parents never let me know that I had an uncle; I guess they thought it will be hurtful for me to know that I have a worthless and naïve uncle who was so selfish that he thought it was better to leave his sister for a better life." There was bitterness in his words when he spoke of his uncle.

"My grandmother had no significant family; the only family my mother knew as a child was her parents and brother. I only came to know about my uncle when my mother was seriously ill. My father wanted to call him and ask to visit her. But she was too heart-broken by then that she didn't agree. It was then that she gave me this bag. She gave me the letters and other contents of the bag to keep. She asked me to read them when she was gone" his voice almost choked at his last words.

Amrita looked sadly at him. She never expected to face this, how can she comfort a grieving child?

"She died of a broken-heart, Amrita; otherwise no disease would have taken away such a strong-willed woman. She had broke from inside over the years. She had kept herself together so that she could bring me up properly. When I grew up, she lost the purpose of living. She loved my father but it was not enough to fill her loss of a brother."

"I am so sorry, Shaurya. I...your uncle told me about your loss. I know how you feel, I lost my mother too".

"He did tell you that? But did he tell how he disappointed her even after her death?" Amrita could see the rage that was building behind those somber eyes. She should tell him that she knew what his uncle did, but that would not help him feel better now. So she didn't and waited for him to vent out his indignation.

"After she was gone, I read all her letters. I didn't know what she had been through when she was alone. It was so painful to know. I felt anger towards my uncle for been so detached. I could not understand what could have kept him away for so many years.

When my mother died a year back, we informed her paternal family. But no one came to show her last respects. Her brother didn't call either. I am not sure whether he knew. At the beginning of this year, my uncle visited Kolkata. I came to know from a distant relative that he was here. I was not sure whether he knew about her demise, the relative couldn't confirm.

I felt that I should at least meet him once and question him for his insensitivity. I even decided to give him all his letters, which my mother couldn't in her lifetime. I thought it might give her soul some peace to know they finally reached her brother"

The glasses of iced tea and cold coffee that the attendant had left on the table some time back remain untouched. They dripped profusely of moisture over their outer walls and little puddles form around their bottoms, but they stood ignored, somehow forgotten. The air around them had grown heavier and all sounds quieter.

"Did you meet him?" Amrita remembered the day at the station when she saw the old man staring at them.

"I called him and asked for a meeting. He asked me to go to his place but I didn't want to land a foot in that house that had deprived my mother of everything that she deserved. He said he was leaving the next day, so he couldn't meet me anywhere outside. Therefore, it was decided that I would see him at the railway station for few minutes. I was in no mind to spend more than few minutes with him."

Now things started to fall in places for Amrita. She understood why Shaurya was there at the station and why that old man had looked at them forlornly. He was probably already repenting her actions and his lack of gut to draw Shaurya close to him.

"I saw him there standing with his father's family, the family that never accepted my mother. I couldn't understand how could he be so happy and relaxed with them after all that they did to his mother and sister. Then I realized that he may have never thought of them as his own, may be they were just his stepmother and stepsister."

"I thought it was a mistake to have asked to meet him and would have walked away if he didn't notice me. The first thing he told me was that I looked like my mother. How could he remember my mother's face from childhood when he had completely forgotten that she had existed? Probably then, he was lying to me.

I told him that she was gone and he nodded back telling me that he knew. I had to ask him that if he knew, did he feel for once to contact us. You can't believe what he replied to that. He said 'When I have never contacted her in her lifetime, what would I gain in contacting you when she is no more'. How can be someone so stone-hearted?"

It was Amrita's turn to comfort a grieving heart other than hers. She took his hand in her palms and pressed them gently, assuring him that she understood. She knew that his uncle was repenting his actions. Probably he avoided his sister's family because he was a coward enough to admit his mistakes to them or probably he thought it was best that they hated him rather than complicating it further. Whatever he thought he had decided to stay away from Shaurya and his father, and she was no one to advocate them on this.

Shaurya took a moment to compose as he looked blankly at the table. He then spoke, "I told him about the letters she had wrote him over the years but never posted due to lack of address and the phone calls she made to enquire about him, the cold answers that she got from those calls. I also told him that she had his Mumbai address and phone number later, and then wrote a letter intending to post it. She wanted him to know how well she had brought me up. She would have told that over phone if she could gather her courage. But she feared that he might not remember her. Then one day, she convinced herself to call him. She dialed his number and told him who she was but he didn't acknowledge her. She was so broken that she put the letter in her stack of unsent letters. She wrote all these in her last letter.

I held the bag in front of him and asked him 'I brought these for you to take, all her letters and rakhis that she never sent to you. Now it is for you to decide whether you deserve these or not'"

"You will not believe me Amrita that he had the nerve to say 'I don't need to prove anything to you. You can take them back'. We departed then and there."

"And then, then I ran into you. I was so pissed off I wanted to shout my heart out to whoever the careless girl was in front of me. But then I looked at your face."

He now looked at her; his eyes were intense now as they were the first time they met. Amrita shivered a little though the air-conditioning was not too strong. "You looked abashed and terrified. Your eyes had welled up, puffed with redness. I didn't know what would have hurt you and caused you to suffer so much. But I knew the look your eyes shared. The same look that I had seen in my mother's eyes when she spoke to me about her brother, a look of sadness, of loss."

Amrita had forgotten that she was still holding his hand but she remembered it when she felt it move in her hold. His palm now pressed against hers strongly. She didn't know what it meant. May be it was trying to give back to her the same comfort that hers had lent few minutes back. It was odd enough, too forward than she expected from their acquaintance. But it oddly felt good.

"I don't know what I was thinking back then. Something inside me told that you would understand her pain, her loss. Her feelings may feel familiar to you; it may even give you a little comfort to know that someone else ached like you. The letters would have more meaning to be with someone who knew that feeling rather than me who would always be angry and sad with them.

Honestly, I never thought you would go so far and meet my uncle. I never expected to see you again, least like this looking for someone to return the bag. Anyone else wouldn't have cared and forgotten all about it". He kept quiet for a moment but looked gratified. It was enough for Amrita to release his hand and bring her hands safely to her lap.

"I am sorry that I troubled you so much and hurt your feelings" he stopped and didn't say anymore. Amrita didn't know what to say or feel. Her earlier anger had almost faded away by his honest confession. She felt for him. She knew how it hurt when you could not do anything to make your mother feel better. She had seen her mother cry many times over marital fights. She wanted to assure him that all would be fine. But what should she tell? No words could take away his pain.

"How was your Mumbai trip? When did you come back?"

Amrita thanked her God that the situation had passed. She slowly told him about herself, things that she would have never thought to share with someone she hardly knew. But she knew much about him now. He had shared his most valuable emotions with her. What else did she need to trust someone?

As they waited outside the café for her to catch a taxi, he held something in front of her. It was a visiting card. "That's my number", he pointed to one of the phone numbers underlined with ink. "We can keep in touch if...if you wish".

As she rode the taxi home, she thought about her day. This day was so different from the one at the railway station last winter. She only had hurt and confusion in her heart then, and questions. But today she was sober, quiet healed and with answers. She understood now why Shaurya's mother hadn't posted those letters. She had known they would not have made any sense, they would only have created regret, contrived new ties, they would have hindered her brother to move ahead; they would have been like cracks in her own family's happiness. She had let Time decide what was best for her. That was brave. It was learning for Amrita's young heart that would help her to survive. She even thought of Shaurya and his "if" that hung in the air. He appeared in her life accidentally or was it destiny. Meeting him had done good to her. Did she wish to keep in touch? Did she wish more than what they shared today? He had again outsmarted her like he had in their first meeting, leaving to her the choice to decide. She smiled as she looked at the card and then kept in her purse.

She had thought a lot over yesterday night about her father's proposal but couldn't chose between her family and her dreams. Now after she really met Piyali through her son, she knew what she wanted. She would let Time decide for her. Right now Mumbai made sense, no regrets and no ties to hinder her walk through life. But before that she has few more days in her loving city of Kolkata to spend. She had few more days to soak in the rain, to jump over the puddles, to giggle with old friends and wonder aimlessly on the streets, and to relive.

A/N: That's it and no more. However, life does not stop such, only we start afresh every time it pauses for us. I have never come across such wonderful letters, but I have written few myself to my closest ones and I can tell that letters convey much more than you can in person. Sad that letters are almost at the verge of extinction when we have Facebook, Twitter, Watsapp, Hangouts, Skype like stuffs to voice us. But letters always do have a certain charm to them, don't you think so?

As for Amrita, I am not sure whether she returned to her father later or whether she had a friendship with Shaurya. But I can surely tell you that she still keeps the bag of letters.

Hope you like the story. If you did, please spread the love.

Best Wishes.