sound of rain drops by sannapureddy &swatee sripada (books for new readers .TXT) 📖

daughter closed the door and tried to lay close to her, Sarojamma asked her daughter, “is there no other cot dear?”
“Why Amma?”
“ this cot is too narrow for me , night I couldn’t sleep at all. I’ll sleep alone . you go to some other cot. …” she said.
Heart came in to her throat and Gowri felt restless.
She might have known the thing that happened at night. Shrinking with shyness closing her eyes tightly she walked to the door. Slowly she opened it , went out and bolted it. With a run she reached Shiva and leaned on to him.
As she enjoyed the thrill she talked about her mother noticing their secret deeds.
Morning Sarojamma started to her village.
“Uncle may create a nuisance at home. If he knows that you have come here he’ll kill you. No Amma, don’t go. You stay here only. “Gowri cried with tears.
Sarojamma didn’t talk, but didn’t stop her journey too……
‘Leaving everything to God’ soothed her daughter and clambered the bus.
But through out the journey she was thinking about her daughter and herself.
The thoughts of VeeraReddy moved her heart completely.
After that about her daughter, her present life condition, the last night’s incidents…………..
The threads cot on which her daughter slept moved in her eyes again and again,
Day time she examined it, it’s the cot of neem fiber, if lies down with out a sheet, pressing of the thread makes marks on the back.
Daughter, whom she brought her up with out even letting her to climb down, now, leaving her sleeping on that rough threads cot………….
If the loved one is with what matters whatever be the cot? Even if it is a heap of sharp stones or a bed of thorny fruits ……………………..

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4.
When Sarojamma stayed two days there, she felt the anguish for her daughter is still lingering in Shiva’s eyes. How much was she worried about ……. her daughter’s welfare. How much she was worried for her …… for her daughter’s taste, Giving her coffee even to her mouth, feeding her giving morsels of rice to her mouth, giving her a bath, changing her dress, combing her hair, giving final touches to her make up, adorning flowers in her plait , …he felt all this too strange. She behaved like a mother who convinces a teasing child.
After Sarojamma left Shiva felt that his responsibility has increased. As it was not related to the family but as it was regarding Gowri he couldn’t even escape it.
As he started obliging the new responsibilities willingly for Gowri, he himself felt surprised.
Responsibly taking care of her food, of her decoration, and spending his time only for her……
To acquire vegetables that give a new taste everyday to the tongue was a difficult task.
As per the need just grinding salt and mirchi, eating hot Sangati with it fast and going out washing their hands was the habit of villagers.
Shiva was also the same in the past who could have sangati with burned red chilli smearing on the fish and can go to the work easily.
But now when he goes to food Gowri’s delicacy was coming to his mind.
When he watches the pickle in the plate he could see Gowri’s face with tears in it.
Though he saw to it that everyday some dal and curry were made, even that bored him. It was difficult to get vegetables there in that season. Morning the green leaves sellers will come. Taking a few grains and bargaining for green leaves, making the whole street resound with their jostle was the routine there. The cool morning resounds it.
Boiling the green leaves, draining away the water keeping and pressing it in a basket, and mustering it with mirchi and dal powder makes it so tasty.
Pleading with the shepherds, giving them a bundle of beedis Shiva managed to fetch a kind of plants, imploring the other boys he managed other green leaves from the hills.
All these when cooked will be tasty with sangati. Some of the leaves would give an excellent taste to dal. If brinjals and new leaves of tamarind are added, the heaven comes down to the tongue.
It would suit either sangati or rice or roti.
As he enters the field his eyes would search for cooking greens.
As a good rain blessed the earth nature turned pleasant. All the trees with new leaves started looking resplendent. The vines that crept onto the trees dropping all the dead leaves are again looking lively with greenery.
They were crawling on fencing bushes like green snakes.
Now every plant with new leaves began diffusing greenery in that green empire. It was the time that was utilized entirely by nature to smear green colour to its body.
Even the barren lands turned green. The short grass became a thick long grass bush.
The sheep herds that went to the hill for fodder started returning to the villages. When it rained in the nights they rested in heaps on elevated areas making them stink with their urine and droppings by the morning.
Some gathered the sheep in their fields under the bore wells.
As Aslesha crossed no leaf was moving. Nature looked tensed. The west winds that started in Rohini gradually turned into big Avadi and small avadi winds and now completely slackened. The air developed frigidity now.
As it rained another time wetting the land, the cereals were planted.
One or two tried dipping motors in bore wells but still the underground water has not yet recovered.
Shiva planted mirchi in the field under the bore well.
He planted at the rate of six kilos of seeds in an acre.
Even as the agricultural work was looked after the Makha was already in the middle.
Sarojamma arrived with new clothes and steel tins filled with eatables.
She prepared a few snacks on her own, fed her daughter herself.
Gowri thought of sitting with Shiva but it was not possible before her mother.
Sarojamma understood the tastes of that place when she visited last time. Morning itself grinding chutney and making Sangati ……swallowing a lump of it and running to the fields …..if possible some may cook a curry for the midday meal. Otherwise they adjust with the chutney itself. In the night those who can, go for rice and dal. In many houses they have dal only once in three four days. Coming to these sweet meats like all other villages, only for the most important festivals all the villagers make same variety of sweets. Arishes and vadas of alasandas for sankranti, for ekadashi the laddus of pelapindi, for the new year (Ugadi) sweet chapathis with gram dal and jaggery inside, for sriramnavami soaked moong dal and jaggery water, for musalamma festival pulagam and chicken, cooked grams and for vinayaka chauti kudums. The same tradition throughout the village.
Sarojamma felt anxious that her daughter should look special when she was in the village.
On the very first day of her arrival she went and met Shiva’s friends who were known to her. Went to their homes and squatted there. She went even to Shivamma’s home. What she told them all was the same. How she brought up Gowri without even allowing the sunrays to touch her, and even here she would look after her without any scarcity, she would bring good clothes as in town and would give her a good life. As a part of it how she brought the things and snacks and sweets.
“ just to have a look on her, in case if they ask her to work, or if they trouble her – to notice it.” Finally she told them.
Just before coming out concluding her conversation, “not many days, I think even before the New Year …as soon as I can get rid of my rowdy brother I’ll take both of them to town. There they can live happily looking after my shop. What is here? However hard they struggle in the mud it’s not even enough for their food and clothes” she said.
Many thought that what she said was fine.
They felt happy that at least Shiva’s life would be alright. But when she talked about her daughter’s welfare and requested them to see that Shiva looks after her properly they couldn’t control their laugh. They went out and laughed a lot for her request. No husband in the village ever looked after his wife in such a manner as Shiva treats Gowri. That only they couldn’t digest. “Still better way means he should carry her on his shoulders” commenting this way they went on laughing.
As soon as they saw Shiva they went on conveying the message given by his mother in law. “Look after her in a still better way. Carry her on your shoulders, if you put her down, you’ll be punished with slippers” they started mocking at him.
Shiva too felt like laughing. He laughed heartily along with Gowri.
He went to the field to see weather water was there in the bed of rice plant.
The rice plants emitting green colour looked very pleasant, looking so beautiful that eyeballs may explode. ‘Should ask mother to put a scare crow’ he thought. As water was less he pushed it along the canal and turned it to the bed.
Here and there in the burrows of edges he could see the movements of the crab.
Those who laid the seeds recently, kept flags to avoid the cranes stamping it.
“What my boy! Your luck is good” Reggayala Duggaiah from the neighboring field said.
“What is it?”
“Elders say the omen of good luck –from the day your wife arrived, your luck has turned to the best. Your field under the water is the best one. Before the crop comes to hand, town life is assured. What a fortunate future”
He looked at him blank. “Your mother in law said, she will take you to the town and hand over her business to you, that will be better for you instead of struggling in the mud...”
Shiva didn’t talk another word. He heard of Sarojamma talking it to many people in the village.
Pretended that he never heard it or cared it, but it was torturing his mind. He had an experience of some perilous waves rushing towards him. Previous night even Subba Reddy said the same thing.
“Where can I go leaving you all? Without doing your marriage how can I leave this village?’ he replied with a laugh.
He was joyous and joking with his friends and looking passionate but feeling a commotion within. Though he tried to indulge in conversations, the turmoil remained the same. He thought of talking about it to his best friends.
He felt the need to share it with the closest to get an advice.
He could not recall who the closest are. But the mayhem remained as it is. Eating or talking or working whatever he did, it went on announcing its presence.
He continued to search for the friends to wipe off this problem easily with their hand…
Suddenly at a particular moment he understood that the searching friend is none other than Gowri and only she had the strength of reducing his disorder.
On