For some years, both of us loved walking together every morning for about forty five minutes. We would talk on many matters, ranging from sublime to ridiculous. I think I talked more; not because I am a better storyteller; but I found in him greater happiness as a listener. We had a fixed place, not far from our homes, where one of us would stop and wait for the other.
"I can easily make out from the sound of your footsteps that you are coming, even if you are at a distance, behind ", my friend once told me . On another occasion he waited for me on the way even before reaching our usual waiting place, driven by telepathy that I was surely coming.
This type of bonding has always been an enriching experience. "I would be off morning walk for at least three days due to viral fever", I once wrote to him, so that he did not wait for me on the way for at least three days. He must have prayed for me. His prayers brought in rain so that he too was off his morning walk for three days.
For a few months, he has not been keeping well. I walk alone, keeping him in my mind. I visit him occasionally, speak to me on phone. A few days back he told how he has been watching me almost every morning now, for about a month, standing behind the window, returning from my walk, on the lane that saw both of us together for years every morning.
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