It's so long since it got published and while writing a synopsis for the book I realised I had forgotten some parts of it. So I reread it and found that I now had enough distance to appreciate the good parts and the sincerity of effort form my side. After an initial phase where I felt a tad embarrassed, i felt it flew nicely. The characters were honest and I could still feel what I felt when I wrote it in 2010.
The story is about two youngsters with completely contrasting backgrounds ideologies, goals and aspirations, who meet as passionate and idealistic collegians in the 1970s in Bombay and are deeply attracted to one another. But they have their issues and their goals and aspirations and decide to preserve what they share instead of destroying it; kind of using it to fuel them on in their life than to let it drag them down. Its an unconventional decision and they decide to meet again after thirty years on her 50th birthday. The story is about how they meet, what they share and whether they are able to honour their promise and meet on her 50th birthday.
Here's the latest synopsis I wrote.
Logline
A young boy and girl with contrasting lives and goals, meet at a college festival in the 1970s, find the perfect connection, fall in love, but decide to part and preserve the beauty of what they share forever. They promise to meet after thirty years. Why they made that unusual decision, what happens to them in these three decades and whether they find the beauty of their old relationship in the end is what the story is about.
Synopsis
It’s 2005.
Mumbai. Isha, daughter of Meghna and Pankaj Mathur, has just got married to her
childhood sweetheart in a grand wedding. After a hectic week of handling guests
and arrangements Meghna wakes up to a household that’s asleep. She is enjoying a
quiet moment for herself when she sees a date circled on the calendar. Her 50th
birthday is coming up next week and it reminds her of a promise she had made thirty
years ago to meet someone on that day. She wonders if she should go. But when her
son Siddanth makes plans to celebrate her birthday with the family, Meghna refuses
saying she promised to meet an old friend in Goa that day and will not be
available. The family is curious. Decision
made, Meghna is ready to visit her past and find some answers.
1975 in
Bombay. A nineteen year old happy go lucky, carefree, collegian from the
Railway Colony in Dadar, Meghna Rao, wants to make it on her own and be a
successful executive in a PR and advertising firm, an unconventional choice in
those times. Her friends, Kalpana, Reena and Maria, and her family have limited
aspirations, as most middle class families had then. But Meghna has built the
perfect resume, filled with academic and extra-curricular achievements, and
balances her academic excellence with mischief– treks, movies, escapades and
Inter Collegiate competitions.
At an Inter
Collegiate festival at St Joseph’s College, Meghna participates in the debate competition
on the merits of capitalism and communism. Out of nowhere, a long haired, slim,
competitor appears at the end and rebuts her arguments for a capitalistic society
with well-articulated, strong views on social justice and equal opportunity. She
is taken aback at his arrogant demeanour. But after the contest he comes to
her, talks politely, lights a cigarette on stage caring two hoots for the audience
and judges and leaves before the winner is announced. Meghna wins, looks for her
opponent and finds him acknowledging her victory. When she looks again, he’s
not there.
Meghna’s
friends tease her about him. Aditya is from a well known boy’s college St
Peter’s, a loner, the only son of a rich father, who lost his mother early in
his life. He and his father do not get along. He’s an enigma – arrogant and
rude - and no one can get close to him. Meghna defends him against her friends’
accusations that he is a fake socialist.
Six months
later, in an Inter Collegiate festival in Goa Meghna meets Aditya again. They talk
easily before he invites her to explore Goa with him. She agrees and the two disappear
into a world of their own discussing everything under the sun – food, books,
movies, their lives. Meghna reveals her deepest thoughts to Aditya, drawn to
his vulnerable and honest eyes. Aditya sees a rare strength and understanding,
a connection he had never felt before. Despite the stark contrast of their
lives and goals, they are alike at the core.
One day
stretches to two. They both acknowledge that they are soul mates. On the eve of
their departure, they’re walking a moonlit beach at midnight. The moment is
ripe and the silence growing. While Aditya is finding the right words to say,
Meghna waits, with a ‘yes’ on her lips. Aditya says – “Meghna, we should stop here before I destroy
this beautiful thing we share.” Meghna cannot believe what she has heard. But
we’re perfect together she says, what we share is rare. Aditya tells her he is
not the person that he is with her; he is difficult and complex and knows he will
end up destroying their perfect relationship. To keep this rare relationship they
share forever, he suggests they get on with their lives, finding strength in
the memory of their beautiful relationship. That way they can sustain their
relationship and there is hope to meet again – else they will lose everything. Meghna
looks into his eyes and knows he knows exactly what he was talking about. She
tells him its her 20th birthday. They celebrate.
Before parting
the next afternoon she asks when they would meet again. On your 50th
birthday he promises, at this same place, enough time to fulfil their dreams –
she to become a high ranking executive and he fighting for causes he believes
in/becoming a painter. That’s it, she asks as she is about to board the bus. No
letters, no meetings if I want to meet? But I’m always with you – all you have
to do is look at the sun.Always. They
part with mixed feelings, and a vague, youthful hope.
Back in
Bombay Meghna joins the top PR agency in Bombay, O’Reilly, works hard and makes
her mark. Her good work earns her a chance to go abroad to the US on a foreign
assignment, where she meets her charming colleague Pankaj, who woos her and proposes
to her. Lonely and homesick, and falling for Pankaj’s charm, Meghna agrees and
they marry.
Meanwhile, Aditya
has left his father to live with a painter who paints film posters in Dharavi. His
father dies eventually, leaving a fortune to his only son. But Aditya leaves everything
to a Trust and moves to Kerala with his friend, teaching in a local school and painting.
His paintings make him famous but he remains reclusive.
1985. Five
years into their marriage, Pankaj’s father dies and Pankaj is caught in a bitter
power struggle with his greedy uncle who wants to wrest control of the company.
When she talks to her mother-in-law, Meghna realises Pankaj is losing the
battle to the wily uncle and makes the difficult choice of sacrificing her career
to help her husband. Meghna slowly settles with the uncle and turns the company
around slowly but surely. Insecure and jealous of her popularity in the
company, Pankaj clips her powers in a petty manner and an upset Meghna leaves the
company vowing never to set foot in it again. She cannot get over the fact that
Pankaj could be so petty when she had given up the most precious thing, her
career, for him. But now she is pregnant and not in a position to restart her
career. She feels stuck and let down.
First a
son, Siddhanth, and then a daughter , Isha, in a couple of years, and Meghna’s
stuttering career comes to a halt. Sensing her growing frustration, Pankaj’s
mother makes amends for her son’s stupidity, and makes Meghna Chairperson of a large
Foundation for Arts. Meghna realises that though she has all the trappings of a
good life, this is exactly what she did not want to end up as. She feels no one
understands her. She wonders what Aditya is up to.
In Kerala
Aditya’s friend finds a child at his doorstep – his son. The mother died of HIV
and the boy is HIV positive too. When the painter abandons the child Aditya
adopts the kid who reminds him of himself. But the child remains closed to Aditya’s
love.
1990, 15
years since Goa. 35 year old Meghna makes enquiries, finds that Aditya is an
artist, sponsors an Art exhibition and invites Aditya anonymously. They narrowly
miss meeting each other at the exhibition but their eyes meet, just like at the
first debate, and they know that what they share exists.
When Meghna
meets her friends, she finds them independent, self-made women in charge of
their lives, leading the kind of life she wanted to lead. When she goes as chief guest to a college function Meghna meets a young
girl who speaks exactly like she had when she was in college. She wishes she
could be like that again. She revisits her albums, her diaries and wonders what
had happened to her. Her frustration grows and she cannot share her angst with
anyone, about the potential she has lost. It seems hopeless. She wants to meet
Aditya. That’s when she finds out that his son had died and that he had stopped
painting. She would like to be there for him but he is nowhere to be found.
2005. It’s 30
years since Goa. Pankaj has drifted away and found new distractions in drink
and other vices. The children are grown up and married. Meghna realises that
she has nothing to look forward to in life and panics. She remembers the
promise to Aditya, a final chance to find her old self. Maybe even restart her
life and live it instead of dying meaninglessly every day. She decides to go to
Goa knowing that things at home may never be the same again. But her mind is made
up – between a purposeless life and a distant chance to find her old self, it
is the latter she wants. When Pankaj asks her if she will return she says she
does not know. He puts his men to trail her secretly. Meghna sets out, not
knowing if Aditya is alive, whether he would come and if they can find what
they shared thirty years ago.
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