Coffee @ Au Bon Pain

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This is an imaginary story. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. 

The year was 2015. The month was January. There was no corona or covid or black fungus or white fungus or yellow fungus or green fungus in this world. No one knew about this chinese communist virus. Life was normal for all of us. There was no need to wear masks and wash hands with sanitizers. We could go every where and mix with people without any fear. In Calcutta restaurants, shopping malls, nightclubs used to be over packed with people and discos used to be open till 4 a.m. on Saturday nights.

One night Rahul was in his bedroom and he was reading random blogs of random people. He got lost in the world of blogosphere and kept on reading till late in the night. Then suddenly he chanced upon the blog of Rakhi. He really liked her blogposts. Her words were too funny on one hand but also very heart touching on the other hand. Rahul kept on reading her blog till dawn and then went to sleep with a smile on his lips.

The next day he again started reading Rakhi's blog. He also posted some comments in her blogposts. He loved the tone of her blog so much that he named her the 'Amelie Poulain of Calcutta' in one of the comments. She really liked this name. He found her out on Facebook and sent her a friend request. He had to wait for a few days before she finally accepted his friend request. Slowly they started chatting on a regular basis in Facebook Messenger.

Rahul kept on reading Rakhi's blog. She almost used to put up a new post every weekend and he really looked forward to it. Rahul also had his own blog and he also used to write regularly but his blogposts were not that good when compared to Rakhi's blogposts. Many people used to regularly comment on Rakhi's blogposts and only very few people ever commented on Rahul's posts. Anyways he accepted the fact that she was a better writer than him and peacefully moved on in life.

Rakhi was an advocate. But that was her day job. Her real passion was in fashion designing. She used to design interesting sarees and blouses. She also had a fan following in this regard. Many women used to buy her sarees and blouses. Rahul once thought of buying a saree from her and he wanted to gift it to his then girlfriend. But eventually his girlfriend turned out to be a total psycho and she cheated on him and therefore he broke up with her.

Then one day he saw that Rakhi has designed an amazing stole for men. He saw the picture of that stole on Facebook. He immediately wanted to buy it. He instantly sent her a message stating his desire to buy it. She agreed to sell it to him. He asked for the price. She told him the price. The price seemed reasonable to him. So he asked her to meet him after a few days. They agreed to meet on 26th February at around 7 p.m. at Au Bon Pain at Park Street.

On 26th February Rahul reached Au Bon Pain around 6:45 p.m. He sat on the table which was next to the glass windows. That was his favourite spot in this restaurant. He loved looking at Park Street through the glass windows. Rakhi reached at 7 p.m. sharp. She was very punctual. They decided to order coffee and chicken sandwiches. She gave him the stole in a nice paper bag along with a hand written note. He gave her the money. But Rahul also had a surprise for her. He also carried a jute bag with him which was filled with all kinds of gifts for her. One by one he started giving those gift items to her. Here is the complete list of those gift items :

1. A long Peacock feather.

2. A very cute Bookmark.

3. A small toy monkey. 

4. An old coin of the British era. 

5. A small pink coloured notepad. 

6. A medium sized poster of Farhan Akhtar. 

7. A children's colouring book.

8. A set of crayons. 

9. A cd of Rabindrasangeet by Kabir Suman. 

10. A kaleidoscope. 

11. Joy Goswami's poetry collection Volume One. 

12. An activity book meant for children. 

13. A dvd of the French film 'Amelie'. 

14. A huge poster of Heath Ledger as Joker. 

15. A red lipstick by MAC.

16. A red nail polish by Bobbi Brown. 

17. A fake plastic lizard. 

18. A red rose. 

19. An old 90's Sunday magazine by The Telegraph. 

20. A colourful Fidget Spinner.    

Rakhi was really surprised, amazed and impressed by these gifts. She had a lovely adda with Rahul over hot cups of coffee where they discussed everything from present day politics to post modern poetry. After more than an hour she decided to leave as she was getting late. She wrote a thank you note for Rahul in one of the Au Bon Pain table napkins and gave it to him. She also insisted on paying for the two cups of coffee and the chicken sandwiches. From Au Bon Pain Rakhi took a cab and went home. Rahul decided to walk for some time at Park Street and smoke a few cigarettes...

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