The Sun was about to set and Lorcan was sitting on his chair, zoned out, watching the sun set and sipping his coffee. Music in the room was quite loud and he couldn’t hear his phone ringing.
After a while as he entered his room, he switched off the music. The minute he checked his phone there were three missed call from Myra and without thinking much he dialed her back considering her attempts to reach him.
“Hi Myra, sorry I was occupied with work and missed your calls. How do you do?”
“Lorcan, where the hell have you been? Never mind, I am at the library across the street. Meet me there, there’s something important I want to discuss. Don’t have much time, got to go. I’ll catch up soon.” The urgency in her voice was quite clear as she hastened through the call.
In the library, Myra was lost in a book. She had been here since the afternoon and since then she had formed her own little world on the table she was sitting. Books and coffee, that’s all she needed. She did get her phone out thrice to call Lorcan but that was it.
It was almost 8 now and she could feel the sense of hunger in her stomach.
“Ooh I’d give up anything for a Pizza now, she thought to herself.”
“What happened? Is everything alright? You scared me” Lorcan appeared out of nowhere and he sounded terrified. It seemed he had run all the way to the library and now he was gasping for air.
“Ssshh, everything’s fine” Myra whispered without looking out of her book.
Lorcan was now puzzled.
“Sit down Lorcan, I want to share something with you which will leave a dent on your mind” Myra was still whispering
Lorcan scanned the room and saw there were very few people but sitting almost on the other side of the room. “Okay, stop whispering Myra. I can hardly hear you”
Myra was submerged in her thoughts. She pulled her bag and got a book out of it.
She placed the book infront of Lorcan and said “Treasure of words”. The title of the book read, “Fountainhead by Ayn Rand”.
“I want to read something to you” She opened the page which she had bookmarked, later turned to Lorcan and said “We hold our ideals and principles extremely dear to us right? You know I have always seen us standing by them strongly and honestly that makes me happy. I’ve always wondered how with time things change, human nature changes and for a matter of fact ideals too. But what do you think Lorcan should ideals be changing? Or they should be like the strongest pillar in our character?”
Lorcan closed his eyes for a minute feeling the gravity of thoughts.
“Don’t you think change is the only constant Myra? Everything changes with time. Why emphasise on these factors so much? We grow every minute and this growth multiplies to modify the basic traits which later comes up as a change. You think it shouldn’t be changing?” Lorcan posed
“It’s all about perspective. Yes I agree things change with time, but after reading what i am about to share with you, the conjecture states something else. It states how we end up compromising our ideals at times, both knowingly and unknowingly” Myra with her eyes widened, moved close to Lorcan and whispered “We should become Immortal”
“Immortal? Are you introducing me to an Elf?” Lorcan uttered humorously
“Not funny Lorcan, Ayn Rand writes, a person can be immortal if he/she understands living life in alignment with one’s ideals and principles without compromising them in any situation” Her voice was quite serious.
“Don’t you think this is an important thread that we need to imbibe in our mind?It’s afterall a thought but it can go a long way. See, this book is a legend. Now i won’t give spoilers to you, so that you read it in future” Myra opened the page and started reading
“I often think he’s the one who’s achieved immortality ( This is the part where Dominique is talking about Roark, for the benefit of those who have read The Fountainhead). You know how people long to be eternal. But they die with every passing day. In any given hour, they kill some part of themselves. They change, they deny,they contradict and they call it growth. At the end there’s nothing left, nothing reversed or unbetrayed, as if there had never been an entity, only a succession of adjectives fading in and out and out on an unformed mass. How can they expect permanence which they have never held for a single moment”
“What an intriguing passage Myra! I have never thought about Immortality this way. Staying true to your beliefs and ideas, well that’s one way to live a life”
“That is why I was so eager to meet you today. I wanted to discuss this with you, I knew you would like it. Now, I know you are on Harry Potter reruns, but I want you to pick up Fountainhead so we can have more such conversations. This book is filled with such thought provoking excerpts.
Anyway, I am starving, let’s go discuss this more over a Pizza.
Myra packed her bag and handed the book over to Lorcan, “This will open a new world for you, embrace the ride”
