"Krishna... look at this. Is it firm enough?"asked Subhadra showing a bowl with prepared dough. Krishna poked into it " it's good aunt. Please cover it with a cloth after applying ghee over the surface." " okay". Krishna added "aunt, we'll prepare jaggery syrup while we wait for the dough to rest for sometime." Okay. I'll get a small weight to smash jaggery. You look over here and tell me if anything is needed." Subhadra went to get the weight. Krishna got up and looked around to see if anything missing. She observed roasted bengal gram is missing. Meanwhile Subhadra came and started smashing the jaggery into powder. Krishna "aunt we are missing roasted bengal gram." Aunt replied while smashing jaggery "oh! I thought that I brought it here. May be that will be in the store room. Can you go and get it?" Krishna nodded. "It will be on the third row on the left wall of the room." Krishna went and brought that. She added a little jaggery powder, roasted bengal gram, three cardamom in a mortar and grinded them into fine powder to it she added grated dry coconut and mixed it. She kept the mixture aside and took out an iron vessel and put it over the stove, added water, after that is slightly heated she added jaggery powder and two cardamom and brought it to boil. Syrup began to thicken and it is transfered into another pot and is kept aside. "Aunt ,I've completed preparing syrup and now shall we go for poori." Krishna asked excitedly. "Okay. I'll be flattening the dough balls and you fry it okay?" "Okayy" Krishna took out a pan for deep frying poori. She added ghee enough for the poori to get fried. They made many poori's and are kept beside syrup. Subhadra "oh we've come to the last stage. Are you ready?"," yes aunt. Anytime" they sat opposite of each other with syrup and pooris along with gram powder they prepared ,right in the middle of them. Subhadra took the poori and spread gram powder around it and passed it to Krishna. Krishna dipped the poori into syrup after folding it half and took it out. That completed sweet poori is kept in a separate plate. Like that they completed preparing sweet poori. They made it happily while chatting about various things and finally completed.
They put the plate aside after covering it with a cotton cloth. They took the used utensils to the well to clean them.As they were cleaning "mother, get me some water" Karunakar shouted from the front yard. Subhadra " this stupid son of mine! Krishna I'll take care of these. Can you attend him for a while.?" Krishna hesitated for a while and" okay aunt. Then..." left cleaning to aunt. She took a small earthen pot from the kitchen and grabbed water in it and went to Karunakar and handed it to him from behind. He thought that it was his mother " why did you come out late? I'm hungry. Get my meal ready...." whined continuously and turned towards her and freezed on spot with his hand mid air. His brain stopped working. He thought " ahhh, I should marry her as soon as possible." As he was in his dreams Krishna reached out to his hands and took the pot and placed towel on his hand which is still hanging on air. She turned around to leave ,he called " Krishna Priya? " she halted. "Did you come here for Aparna?... or" he couldn't complete the sentence and Krishna "hmm. I haven't seen her properly since a month. She just comes and goes after looking at my face. I missed her so I came here." in a warm tone. Karunakar felt a little jealous of her sister whom Krishna misses. He internally screamed "but we haven't met once in this month since the memorial day. Don't you miss me? aaahhhh?" without any visible change in his countenance. "Has Aparna returned? " Karunakar asked with a gloomy face. "Not yet". Karunakar hmmed. Subhadra, who's still cleaning the used utensils at the well," Krishnamma, I think it will take a little more time here. Serve the food to Karunakar, or else he might be late to work." Krishna " okay aunt. I'll take care of that." Krishna let Karunakar lead the way into the house.
Karunakar just sat on the floor in front of the flat table. Krishna brought all the food items. Started serving the food. Both are too nervous to look at each other. Karunakar's mind " ahhhhhjhh. I really want to marry her now."
Silence filled the area around them but there is warmth in it. Warmth that is so soft that makes one lower their entire guard. Karunkar , after offering the prayer to food,he started eating and soon completed with curd rice , got up to wash his hands, Krishna followed him and handed over a towel to dry his wet hand. He took it and cleaned his hands. He went into the home and sat on the wooden cot, Krishna went to him and "can you have a sweet poori now?"asked with her hands fidgeting with the corner of the free pleats of her half saree. Karunakar hmmed. Krishna immediately went to the kitchen and brought three sweet poori's on a banana leaf and handed it over to him. He took that and took a bite right at the center of the poori. She smiled a little when he took the bite right at the center reminiscing that he used to eat like that since he was a child. Karunakar "what is it made up of?"with his mouthful. "Jaggery and wheat flour " she replied. He " hmmm .....,wheat flour and jaggery... it's too sweet" looking into her eyes. She flinched as their eyes met mid air. "Is it not to your taste?"she asked. He replied " no , I like it",taking her right hand with his left hand as gentle as he can. Right then, his father Obulesu came from the front door.
.....
After washing the utensils, Subhadra went to Kamala's house straight from the well;-)