Certain roads in life are straight; while certain abscond you puzzled as to where they are leading you to, with their turns. Same goes with the feeling they christen `love` on most junctures you don’t discern if its love or scarcely a deliberation that you are in love.
It dates back to preceding summer break. I was in my hometown for my accustomed break off with KGP for two and a half months. Few days passed and I chanced to meet HER. Our foremost interface was over net, date I don’t remember, one day she revealed that she would call up at 3 and I hurried home to formulate that nobody gets hold of the phone before my hands seize the receiver. She was dot on time (which I discovered shortly), the phone tinkled at 3, an opening slice of interaction, all the invariable mind-numbing stuffs….hobbies, likes, dislikes…blah blah. I solicited for her number; she notified that ….she is a gal so…it’s a bit intricate. Better. I thought….the magpie that I was. The calls begun to come on alternate days….and then in an affair of days I got her number too. As any Arian would ask, I asked her out for a date.
DATE…IN GAYA??? Are you in ur senses??
Toh…you don’t want to meet or what??
Nahi aisa nahi hai..par you know…
No I did not know. How could I? All I wanted was an outing where we could talk face to face. After two or three days of making excuses, she finally gave in.
11 am, (don’t remember the date again) I receive a call from her, I had to dash to a restaurant which was nearby , at a place known as KASHINATH MOD inside 15 minutes, if I sought to discover her that day. I had to, and well, I rushed. As I said, she is punctual, she greeted me well out there….had reached before me, and I was awed, really. I thought ….GOOD. She then furnishes me an idea that her best buddy is dropping to meet me too, I was …like …’why not’. Which MAN would escape a prospect of congregating with two picturesque females on the same day and time? I just endeavored to reminisce as to whose face did I glimpse in the sunup, could have been none other than that of my sugary lil bhatiji tashu `s.
Anyway, things moved on, after some time, her friend dropped in, attired in pink to murder. My mind prayed,” Oh GOD!, why don’t these gals swap names?”…and what luck. I would have acquired whatever I sought that day, for they actually had switched their names. INTERESTING. It was actually the later gal which was destined to come first, I mean she was my actual fresh friend. The other young lady hinted appropriately that its not ethical to disturb two (of opposite sex) friends, so she left. And to her and my gratification, I let her.
Now the talks with the real one. We got to coagulate well, as they say, and I knew that things gonna roll pretty swift, as I didn’t have a great deal time left in Gaya, not at least for that year.
The rendezvous got ended with the fixing of next date, and amid the two, myriad calls were exchanged, from either surface. I was watching every budge of hers intimately as to what does she crave and does it overlap with what I covet. She had gifted a lot of handcrafted friendship cards, that disregarded some ingredient of my mind’s that corner, which had clogged to believe that I can have just-friends in gals too. But that was unquestionably not what I wanted, and her moves proclaimed that she too for sure wanted something better. BETTER?? THAN FRIENDSHIP?? FORGET IT.
Yes, we both craved for something else, leave better, something exciting, as far as I was concerned. Days were evaporating, as my registration date in KGP was looming me. The last DATE was designed, accordingly. And there I was, on the last date with her before I go back to KGP, I had the train the very next day. Encouraged by my childhood friend Amit and my optimistic Arian etiquettes, I contemplated that this is the absolute day, fix it or forget it. Meeting time and situate were the same. Only alteration was, we both had promised each other a surprise. I didn’t discern what was hers, but mine was a red rose and a `BE MINE` card, with an in-written love note. I veiled both the rose and card inside my jacket and reached the restaurant, where she was already present, as forever, before me. And guess what….there she was on this very special day (at least for me) accompanied by two of her high-quality friends. I was devastated, to say the least, but proscribed myself somehow.
So, whats the gift you told you had to give me?
Haan ..i have it, ruko na , dungi thodi der mein, let them go, my friends.
She was pulling me, I knew and the giggles of the threesome worsened the tension indoors of me. “For god’s sake, leave”, I yelled within my heart for the two trespassers. Seems some enchantment worked…as they attended my most earnest implicit petition and departed. Leaving only two of us there. Alone and only.
Yah ! what about the surprise now??
Ruko bhi…accha why are you sitting opposite, come here sit next to me.
God..Something was in store for me I discerned; I went and located myself on the seat next to her. And something inside me began to beat faster.
Ok! Much of suspence, Will you reveal the surprise, if you have any ,ya nahin??
God, can’t you wait for a second kya aashu??
Off cource I could, but that one second seemed like a year to me, and she knew it , and was enjoying it to her giggles .
Ok ok, dikhati hoon, close your eyes,
Fine…so I am gonna get a first hand smooch on this date kya, exulting haan.
Shut up!! You…
Things were not as rosy as I thought, but they were ornate anyhow. She put something in my hands, whence I unbolted my eyes, I saw a very dedicatedly hand-crafted picture portrait boasting my name written in diverse ways and with diverse things, and inside, when I opened with great buoyancy, was written~ TO MY BEST FRIEND, WITH LOVE~
ALAS! I thought, A BEST FRIEND?? All this dramebaji and a best friend? It’s a pity, how unthoughtful I can become at times when there are times like this. No, I won’t defy her reliance in me, I won’t let my enigma out onto her, I decided and said,
I am goin back to the opposite seat; it won’t be good if someone sees us in this arrangement.
Arre ! kyun..dekhne do jise dekhta hai, I don’t care.
I don’t care, said she. As if I did. Did i?
Ok fine, yahin baithta hoon, don’t say later ki I didn’t warn you ok na.
Haan ok, be here only.
She kept on enquiring me about my revelation that I had promised her, I said that I forgot it at home and that I didn’t bring anything, but to be honest, I was annoyed from within.
How can I read her hints so wrongly, was that all she sought to say?? What about all the things done and difficulties she and I had taken just to converse or meet each other?? Do we do this for best friends?? Yes we do. But what’s to hide in that. Best friends don’t proclaim their friendship in a secluded restaurant, they do not cut the phone line when their mumma`s watch them chatting. Do they? They don’t.
Nah... I wont let her amuse with me like this…I said to my self and then to her..
I thought I wd better give her the surprise.
Close your eyes , I have to give u something.
Hey I am not closing, tumhara kya bharosha??
C’mon!! bharosha nahi tha to milne kyun aayi thi??
Off..i am kidding baba, kya hai?
Nothing..just close your eyes.i have the surprise for you.
Her eyes closed…once I thought how do we say, do we say it directly with a kiss? What if she slaps me back? What if she bursts into tears? What a pervert I was turning into. Ultimately, I chose the better way. I put the rose in her hands and took the card out… and asked her to open the eyes….looking in her eyes, I read the words that I had penned down in the cards…and off course they ended with…` BE MINE`
There she was, with a twinkle in her eyes, and maybe a tear or two …
Could you not say it earlier Aashu….you are a real rascal.
God..and what is this big best friend thing that you have cooked, haan?
Toh main kya karti…..i thought you are not interested.
Arre… how can you think so when I said......off course I was interested
I fancy sometimes as to “WAS I REALLY INTERESTED”. And if I was, what was it basically that I was interested in. In her? In loving her? In making her my beloved? Or just flirting with her? These are the questions I have never dared to answer, neither to her…nor to myself. But I know for sure…there is a time …which awaits both of us. to face the truth…and that is LOVE for you, topsy-turvy and unexplainable ..just the way some turns (like the one at KASHINATH MOD) in life are.
Aashu
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