"Gulal!" I exclaimed standing up in a shock. I immediately checked my hands even though I was sure that despite being exhausted I had cleaned up all the color from my hands. They were clean as expected.

"Which one of you had been naughty?"I asked with a smirk.

"Believe us Lekha, it was not us. We just came in to wake you up" said Vasundhara.

"Moreover we girls are a team. Why would we prank you?"Said Gayatri in a way of explanation.

"Then..."My thoughts went to the only person who could have done this but I quickly averted my thought from him least it reflected on my face.

"We will solve this mystery later. We have to go watch the fun as the boys wake up. Come on Lekha just wipe your face. It's only gulal it won't leave a mark" said Gayatri. I felt relieved as I didn't want to solve that particular mystery at that moment. Hopefully they would forget all about it, I thought as I finished brushing my teeth and cleaning my face. We were absolved from taking a bath in the morning on the day of Holi as we were bound to get dirty and washed only after we had done playing with the colors.

As I entered my room we heard sound of movement from Vikram's room so rushed towards it. He greeted us with a smile, which could only mean that he was yet to look into a mirror. Our smiles soon turned into huge grins looking at his face, as did his smile turn suspicious looking at us. Suddenly he was hit by enlightenment and he rushed towards the mirror on the wall, turning our smiles into giggles.

"I will not leave you girls. I will have my revenge" he shouted as the quick thinking girls sprinted off ahead of him. The wise old me took the wiser path as I stood there with an innocent smile on my face. As he glared at me I simply shrugged my shoulders and looked at the way the girls had run. Well in a way that was not lying, since my shrug could have meant anything. Since I was the new addition to the family and was now officially fiancé to his elder brother, it was a kind of an unthought-of thing to mistrust me. He ran after the girls shouting threats at them.

I quietly slinked out of his doorway to go downstairs where the girls had headed to. They seemed to have woken up the whole household with their laughter and screeches. I saw Udai bhaisa and Suraj come out of their rooms rubbing their eyes making the paint look even worse than before. I hid my giggle and moved towards the stairs to be on the safer side, if they grew suspicious about me. Sudden laughter erupted from below and as I looked down at the verandah, I saw most of the family members looking up and laughing at both the boys.

"What happened?" asked the boys in unison and then looked at each other and then actually looked at each other. Both of them burst out laughing pointing at each other and then realization seemed to have set in together. The laughter stopped as they stared at each other and then turned to look at me where I stood giggling. It was my signal to start running and I did just that before any of them could grab me. I picked up my lehenga(long skirt) so as not to trip on the stairs . I could hear them coming my way, so turned to look at them to gauge the distance while still on the run. I hit a wall which held me in his arms before I could fall down. I looked up in surprise to find Rudra smirking down at me.

"Running away from the consequences again...Lekha" he drawled.

Udai bhaisa and Suraj stopped midway seeing Rudra with me, unable to decide what to do next.

"Your main culprits are being chased by Vikram outside" said Rudra as I looked at him gratefully for saving my skin.

"Let's help him. One against two is quite unfair"said Suraj giving a wicked grin towards Udai bhaisa, as they moved towards the courtyard.

"So you cleaned up your face before coming out" he said slowly confirming my suspicions.

"I didn't mean to ..."I stopped mid sentence, as he lifted my chin up with his one finger.

"Lekha... it's alright. It's Holi. Everyone is excused today... no hard feelings"he tried to assure me.

I smiled back at him feeling much relieved. I turned towards the dining area with breakfast in mind as my stomach had started the timer the moment I had woken up the first time.

Two hands grabbed my face from behind softly and before I could realize my whole face was covered in gulal. I looked back to see who the culprit was and found Rudra grinning widely at me.

"Holi hai! (It's Holi)"he said."See no hard feelings. Isn't it my prerogative to be the first one to put color on you?"

"You are a cheat" I accused him with a smile.

"And what of the person who enters..."I clasped my hand on his mouth to make him stop as he was being too loud. He smiled through my hand making me suddenly very conscious and I removed my hand just as quickly.

"That person is a thief... "he whispered to my bent head. I was grateful for the gulal covering my face as my face felt hot. I ran towards maasa who came towards us from the dining area. She must have been coming to gather all of us for breakfast.

"Who colored you Lekha... this early in the morning" asked maasa with a smile as she looked past me and saw her answer standing near the pillar.

We heard lots of screams and shouting coming from outside so rushed out to see what had happened. I saw Vikram holding on to a struggling Gayatri while Udai bhaisa and Suraj seemed to have just accomplished their mission of dunking Vasundhara in a huge trough full of water.

"Kakisa ... help me" shouted Gayatri as soon as she saw maasa.

"Come inside for breakfast after you people have done fooling around and mind you... I don't want any wet people dirtying the seats so better change your clothes before coming. Come Lekha... you can join us" said maasa ignoring the scene before her.

"Traitor..."shouted Gayatri at me as I followed maasa meekly. I looked back at her and grinned at her plight.

Rudra followed us back inside. The elders had already finished their breakfast so only Rudra and I had to finish ours, till the others felt like dropping in. Since maasa was there to see to our meal both of us ate in silence, till Udai bhaisa rushed in half wet. When I say half wet, it seemed he had fallen on his side in some kind of muddy water. Before maasa could open her mouth to reprimand him, he raised his hand in surrender and took a step back from the threshold.

"I am not coming in..." he clarified. "Both the girls and the boys are all wet and dirty and want to continue playing Holi, so they have sent a request if ... a little food could be delivered outside."The last part he said with a bit of hesitation unsure of how maasa would react.

"Alright I will send the maid out with some food but make sure everyone washes their hand" said maasa with an indulgent smile.

"Sure maasa. Lekha... bhaisa are you not coming. Everyone is waiting for you" said bhaisa with enthusiasm.

"Udai, please warn everyone that the maid is neither to be colored nor got wet, no matter how enthusiastic all of you are. I don't want a repeat story of last year. We all have plenty of work to finish before we can go out for the Holi. The person to disobey will have others taking his punishment along with him." warned maasa as bhaisa turned to leave. He nodded his head and hurried out.

"Last year they had dunked two maids in the water and also covered them up with gulal when they had gone out to serve food to some guests" said maasa with a smile on her face and a shake of her head. I could feel her love for the whole lot despite them behaving like hooligans sometimes. "This time I have arranged for food to be served outside beforehand so that we ourselves can serve the guests and the servants can have their fun too" she explained.

"Both of you finish your breakfast as people will be coming over soon from the village" she said getting up to prepare plates to be sent out for her unruly children. Lajo came in soon after.

"Did I miss anything?" she asked looking sleepy.

"No" we replied in unison, making us smile.

We heard drums beating in a rhythm from somewhere far.

"Hurry up Lekha or you will miss the fun. It's your first Holi here so I don't want you to miss out on anything" he said smiling at me.

Leaving Lajo to finish her meal we hurried towards the entrance of the house. The sound of the drums grew louder and we could see a big pole with a flag attached to it approaching from far. The people carrying it were hidden by the bushes.

"Come let's go on the terrace" said Gayatri as she dragged me by the arm.

"I will miss all this" I cried, unable to understand this sudden change.

"No, you won't" assured Vasundhara as she dragged me by the other arm.

I looked back at Rudra but he simply smiled at the antics of his sisters. Both the girls were still wet and I wondered if they didn't feel cold.

"But why are we going upstairs and not out there where everyone is going to gather"I asked still quite puzzled.

"You wait and watch. This will be more fun" said Gayatri.

As we reached the terrace I saw some of the girls from the village had also come over, making me wonder how they had all arrived without me noticing. They were all covered in gulal making it hard for me to recognize them and also because I had had very little interaction with them. They were gazing at me curiously as I was the only one whose dress was still untouched by colors and only my face had gulal on it. I smiled at them and in return got to see them all smile back showing their pearly whites which were quite a contrast to their darker colorful faces.

Buckets filled with coloured water were lined up along the terrace wall and there were also huge pots holding the colored water too. I was surprised at the arrangement and wondered if it had been done while we were sleeping. We could now hear the drums quite close, making all the girls rush towards the terrace wall to look at the scene below. We were positioned directly over the entrance making things even more visible. I saw the crowd entering slowly into the courtyard whose huge doors had been opened wide today instead of the small door which was used to enter generally. There was a man entering in the lead wearing a beautiful colorful turban and sporting a huge moustache.



"That is the village pradhan (headman). The procession will start from here as they have come to greet bapusa and kakusa, as they are the clan chieftains. As it's a men's gathering we all can watch from here. That flag over there represents our clan. We have the same kind of procession in our place too but since this is the village of our ancestors' bapusa likes to celebrate Holi here. It reminds him of his childhood." explained Gayatri.

The village headman joined his hand and bowed his head in respect in front of tausa and bapusa. He was pulled into a hug by both one by one. I couldn't hear much of what was being said as there was lot of laughter, greetings and singing all mixed together. Some of the youngsters came forward one by one and greeted the elders by touching their feet. The boys of our family too touched the feet of the elderly headman. Soon after this a chant rose from the crowd "Holi hai" and the drums began beating again with people throwing colors at each other, even the singing grew louder.



Pichkari

"Get the buckets ready girls "shouted Vasundhara above the noise. Some girls immediately lifted the buckets while others filled their pikckari(water guns) with the colored water from the pots. The colored water was then poured down on the revelers below. It took them by surprise, as some ran helter-skelter. There were came shouts from the crowd below challenging the girls to come down and play and some comments on how they were cowards to do a sneak attack from the back. Some even stood there bravely with their hands on their hips throwing the challenge that they wouldn't move from their till all the water was exhausted and the girls got tired. It was all laughed off by the girls with even more smarter replies at their end and more water being poured on the brave souls. It was a great occasion for the young men to show their brave stance to the girls of the village.



A break was announced when somebody shouted that taisa and all the elderly ladies were coming out. All of them had thaal (big plates) laden with sweets and savories in their hands. The boys came forward to help them with the thaals. The elders were the first to greet them with joined hands while they too greeted back with the same gesture, while the youngsters again came forward to touch their feet. Everyone was served the sweets by the boys while one stood in the side with water to help wash their hands before eating tough not all the color could be washed off but the hands were comparatively clean. All of us girls also playing the part of a good host had got sweets for the girls on the terrace from downstairs.

After playing a bit more with the colors the crowd soon started departing back to the village singing songs on the beat of the drums. The party was to continue in the village as each house was visited in a systematic way.



All the girls stayed back a bit to play Holi with us. I never had so much fun in the Holi's I had celebrated in the past and the best part was that I made few friends from the village as we teamed up against another group of girls.

The worst part was the bath we had to take after the celebration. We had each been given a bowl of gram flour and curd mixed together to scrub off all the color. Reetha (soapnut) had been soaked in a big utensil the previous night itself by the thoughtful maasa for us to wash our hair.



Reetha for those who want a natural herbal shampoo :)

By the time the boys came back from their revelry in the village we had all dressed up into cleaner clothes. It was a timely intervention from maasa which prevented them from getting us dirty again. They seemed to have got into a fresh revenge mode the moment they saw us, all squeaky clean but we weren't in a mood for another bath.

Rudra being the eldest just stood there grinning at the antics of his younger siblings. Ours eyes met at one point as we all laughed together making me lower my head down, as I had been caught staring at him. I could see his grin grow larger at that, through my lowered lashes.



Merry Christmas everyone :)

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