HALF MOON This book is purely fictional in nature and all persons appearing in this work are fictitious. Any to any real person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. © Pritpal Kaur (Author). All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced by any means, transmitted or translated into another language without the written permission of the author. CHAPTER1 Morning was heavy, hot and humid. Not too bad, but as hot as the first week of April in north India can be. Mehar was terribly tired and so was the whole family, which included her mother, husband, ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER- 2 Sitting there on the steps of the cremation ground, Mehar was looking at the burning and listening t o the Ragis sin ging Shabad, celebrating the love of Almighty and His omnipresence everywhere – “those who believe in Him do not ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 3 After dropping the bomb shell Rajinder went inside to tend to his evening schedule to have a bath, change into a kurta pajama and after a cup of tea, to come to the outer veranda where invariably some patients would be sitting and ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 4 Just after lunch around three in the afternoon when Surjit wanted to have her in the comfort of a bed, Janab Singh insisted on starting the journey. He asked Surjit to take her brief nap in the car. It was a premier Padmini fitted with a little fan on the front console, but it was not very effective. Janab Singh had an air conditioner installed with the engine of the car, which made car a little noisy but provided some solace from the heat and dust. It was early eighties. Maruti had been launched ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 5 It was more than a week and there was no news from Mehar. Rajinder not worried, he would seldom get worried but he wanted to know what was happening there. He knew he had been too harsh on Mehar but he had no other way out. This woman was so headstrong, if he did not keep her under constraints she would be soon out of his hands. She had a high opinion about herself and her family and thought that what she or her parents said was correct. They tend to forget that this ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 6 For the first time in their married life of six years she behaved like typical wife. She wanted to know if all his colleagues spent so little time at their homes with their family. And Rajinder felt uneasy to answer her queries, his brave front so far, his belief that he was beyond questioning on account of his being the man of the house was being challenged and this irritated him to great extent. He felt that Mehar was crossing her boundaries. He was comfortable with her soft manner and disinterested ways. For almost ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 7 Life has its own way of unfolding and then taking you by surprise, sometimes and sometimes throwing in your way some not- that-easy to digest lessons to learn. Both Mehar and Rajinder were contented with their own individual lives, though walking parallel to each other, as their paths did not meet often. Mehar had created her own circle of friends and acquaintances where Rajinder was not know nor seen much. Rajinder continued with his own ways, his life as he had designed before he was married and this had little space for her besides ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 8 Emotions do make life beautiful to look at but when one has to live on daily basis, one has to live on the hard ground of reality, where you can walk at your own pace and look at life from the widest possible angle, from an angle where you can see all contours of its face, all hues of its intrinsic colors, every facet of its inherent beauty. Mehar had to deal with life now with the stick of her inner voice in her hand to hold her straight as the path she had ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 9 Night was silently, obediently passing by her. Mehar watched it with eyes filled with of joy mixed with sorrow, heart sinking with every beat deeper and deeper in her own ocean. Darkness in the window turned to sweet silvery moonlit square peeping at her lying half awake on her bed. She had taken a shower a few minutes back. Her blue nightgown felt fresh to her still aroused and at the same time blessed contours. She closed her eyes and felt Giriraj's brash lips on hers, bruising her with pleasure she never knew before. ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 10 Mehar is on the sea beach sitting on a reclining chair, a large umbrella her head, trying to save her from harsh sunlight. She is sitting with her eyes covered with dark sunglasses. Sun's rays are sharp as the air of this small coastal village is clean and fragrant. She is sitting savoring the scene in front of her. Indian ocean is turbulent, as the nature has designed it to be. It is roaring keeping pace with every passing moment. Wave after wave of turmoil keeping it boiled to its core with froth of ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 11 They were heading towards Bikaner. Mehar waited for more confrontation. It was brewing up the air. It was building within her and she could feel it building in Rajinder as well. She could feel the heat coming towards her, she herself was getting cold deep within. Her depths were rapidly turning down temperature. She was feeling her hands getting colder with every passing moment. Her feet were already stone cold. She could not feel them anymore. Her shoulders needing warmth had begun to ache. She rubbed her hands with each other in order to ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 12 The day she got ready to hit the road with vigor for a new of life. A friend of hers called to ask when she was going to join her job in Delhi. She told him that it might be from the beginning of the next week. He asked her to postpone it for a fortnight as that was the day shraadh period was starting. Mehar, as she was born into a Sikh family and they generally do not practice this, would not observe shraadh. She told him so. He insisted. But as she ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 13 She lay awake by her mother's side, though she was tired and sleepy. She thinking about all the years she had wanted to live in this house with her parents but she was never able to. Now even now, when she had left her life behind, it seemed she had left this too behind in that fold of by gone years. Now what she had on her platter in the name of life and future, did not have much space for this house and her parents too. She could not live in this town ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 14 That night when she reached Ganga Nagar, Janab Singh did not seem to be the mood to talk about Rajinder or for that matter even about Ranjit. That made Mehar worried. She waited till they reached home but there too both he and Surjit a voided this topic. Mehar could not h old her self longer. She finall y asked them why was she called and what was there to hide from her. Janab Singh sat trying to find appropriate words to express. Finally he spoke, “Rajinder has refused to send Ranjit. He has ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 15 Cremation took place the very next morning and bhog of paath after five days. day of the bog all relatives, friends and community people were present in the large court yard of village home. Janab Singh and Surjit too had arrived for this ceremony that morning. After the langar and bhog of the path, people began to take leave of the family members. Mehar was with other female members of the family. Surjit sent someone to summon her. As she came and sat besides her parents in the baithak near outer gate, Rajinder too ...Read More

HALF MOON CHAPTER - 16 Next few days passed like whirlwind. Mehar packed her bags. Sent Tarabai once again her friend's house whose family was more than happy to have her back. Then she had to face Ranjit's school principal to get his school leaving certificate. He was not amused by their acrobatics of getting him admitted and getting his TC so often but he showed as if he was. By this time everyone knew about her turbulent personal life, a fact she badly wanted to keep under wraps. She reached Ganga Nagar with Ranjit in tow, and the ...Read More