Neil and Avni landed on the Coimbatore airport at around 10 am next morning. Even though it was a domestic flight only, the entire family had made time to come together to the airport in the morning to see the couple off! 

As they left the airplane, Avni rubbed her right shoulder wincing in pain. In the plane, Neil had largely slept, and that too on Avni's shoulder. He was really tired as he had been working late into the night to cover his cases while he was away. There was always phone to continue working while on honeymoon but Neil wanted to cover all loose ends before leaving. He had delegated work to DD and his subordinates before leaving and asked them to send him their daily report even if he did not ask for it!

As they landed and collected their luggage, Neil asked Avni to stand by the luggage as he tried contacting the driver his father had organized for.

He came exasperated about fifteen minutes later! 

Avni - "Kya hua Neil? Did you not find our driver?"(what happened..)

Neil (running his hands through his hair) - "Nahi yar! Pata nahi his phone is switched off and I checked the cars in this parking lot. There is no one who was sent for us or is holding a placard of our name"(no..i dont know..)

Avni  - "Arre Neil. It is OK na. Thoda sa hum non-privileged normal logon jaisi life bhi jeena seekhon. We will get something impromptu outside the airport!". Saying this she winked as Neil got more irritated but smiled playfully. (... learn to live life a little like us unprivileged people..)

As they exited the airport and went towards the pre-paid car rental stall, a couple of touts ran  up to them. They started bothering them with better and cheaper rental prices if they went through them instead of the pre-paid counter. Neil ignored them but Avni said - "Neil, let us get it closed na. They are anyways offering better prices, what can go wrong!"

At this Neil started talking to them and went with them for sometime. He came back with a car that he had chosen out of the ones that the touts were offering. It was a simple AC sedan in good working condition, nothing luxury but more than enough for their needs. The touts wanted to drive the car as well and drop them at the location but Neil wanted to drive himself. He submitted an ID with them and paid the security deposit for the number of days he was taking the car. 

And then they drove out of the airport embarking on their road journey to Coonoor. Neil was looking much more carefree now as he opened the car windows given the cool monsoon weather. He and Avni had a great time talking throughout the journey. They had lunch at a nice dhaba and then left for the last leg of their journey which was primarily driving uphill through decent tree cover in some stretches of the hills. Sometimes the trees were so dense with branches growing out above them, that they could not really see the sky. And this being monsoon time it was raining heavily all the while. Luckily Neil was a good driver and especially trained to drive in all terrain given he was a police officer. 

It was growing dark now and rains were unleashing the fury of the skies. Avni was a little tired and had dozed off. There was a signboard for a safety-pin turn ahead so Neil slowed down, and took a blind u-turn around the corner..

And then he got blinded and had to shut down his eyes..