RENDEZVOUS WITH HENRY

All you guys must have heard about the rondayvoo with Simi Garewal. Well, hear this. Two years back when Faiyaz told me that Henry would be in town (Hyderabad) I naturally wanted to meet him. It was more than twenty years since we had seen each other. One day Henry gave me a call asking for the directions and said that his cousin would drop him off. Not wanting to confuse him with the lanes and bylanes, I volunteered to meet them in the main road, a few blocks from our house. As I stood there waiting for them to arrive, I felt a light tap on my shoulder from behind. It was Henry.
After exchanging warm pleasantries which included words like ‘grey hair’ ‘less hair’, ‘no hair’, Henry slid into a car which was standing nearby. I opened the back door and slid in too. Then I greeted the man in the driver’s seat, which I naturally assumed was his cousin. Imagine my surprise when simultaneously Henry greeted him too. ‘He’s not your cousin?’ I asked. ‘No’ he said. ‘He dropped me and left. This guy’s not your husband?’ he asked me in turn. ‘NO’ I shouted. Seeing a car parked right next to where I was standing, Henry just presumed it was ours. As writers, for both Henry and I, living in a world of assumptions and presumptions is but natural. But just imagine the plight of that astounded man who probably will keep wondering for the rest of his life who the two crazed maniacs were. By the way, that guy (probably waiting for his wife who was buying fruits from the sidewalk) was so flustered he actually did return both our greetings- my Namaste and Henry’s ‘Hello’. How’s that for my rendezves with Henry?