Holy Crap!!

"Life was never so calculative before… time was never meant to be spent or saved, it has always been there just to live" I put a thought to Akshay.

"Absolutely… I completely agree with you my friend! And have you noticed how everything around us has changed… in… in… just a couple of years?" Akshay responded, chugging his beer down the throat. He seemed like a starving baby, getting nursed after hours of sleep. But straight off, the 'rational me' decided to put an end on my ongoing beer-baby thoughts and asked me to focus more on our conversation.

"Really bab(y)… I mean bro… two years, just two years back we were having beer on this very table, discussing about writing some story, starting a play, setting up our own business, planning a backpack tour... riding our bikes into the mountains of Ladakh, laughing at strangers for no specific reasons. And now… now, here we are, trying to be reasonable… reasonable with our lives, with our fucked-up goals, with our baseless actions, reasonable even with the time we are spending. Bad news bro, we have also gotten into this circus of settling down in life." I added briefly.

"You know what, Darsh? I am getting that feeling of something being terribly wrong in my life… the last I felt the same was when I stepped out of college and entered this corporate shit life. It took me a whole year just to acknowledge that my college life was over, I am no longer a blithe student now and I need to get serious about this job shit," Akshay said.

"I am completely aware of that feeling, bro. You remember the time when we used to bunk BussCom classes and go together to McD and how we used to ask Aarti to place the order and used to look out for corner seats. I still remember, a few people here and there used to occupy complete table seating alone and I always used to promise myself that whatever happens tomorrow, I would never eat out alone, without my friends… never in my life... silly me!" I sighed and placed the Bud between my lips to let loose some more control over my head.

"Responsibilities are shit," Akshay uttered a loud cry and smacked his bottle down at the table, "It just takes away our friends… I hate you… you… you responsibility!"

"I hate you too," I added, without making any sense of it.

"Hello boys!"

We looked back and then at each other's face and without uttering a word more we just finished our drinks, in a single go.

"Don't drink much," a suggestion came in the same voice which called us 'boys' a moment before… it was Aarti, my wife!

"She has not changed a bit; she is still the bossy type, isn't she?" Akshay murmured.

"Uh huh," I managed to reply.

"But you guys still love each other, right?" Akshay enquired, aloud this time.

"Of Course man, I still love her like crazy!" I affirmed and looked at Aarti with a smile, for confirmation, but instead she looked away from me and then gazed down at the table.

"Akshay… actually, I wanted to talk to you about this from a very long time; there is something I wanted to share…" she responded by adding some depth to her voice. Hearing her conerned voice Akshay looked at me with 'What the fuck have you done now' look. And in response, I just tried to look away from him.

"You know what Darsh has done?" Hearing Aarti say so, Akshay was all curious by now.

She continued, "He… he has… Why did you make me laugh, you dog? I almost had him," and bursted out laughing. I too joined Aarti in her laugh and Akshay was clueless as to what just happened.

"I… I was just kidding, Akki. Everything is fine between us but look at your face," Aarti confessed and the laugh continued.

"You guys are pathetic… I am not going to ask anything to you both… from now on… at least when I'm drunk," Akshay said in resentment.

"Aww, my poor-kind hearted-single-friend… haven't found any girlfriend yet," Aarti teased him more. We always used to pull his leg, the good old times I guess!

"One more round of beer?" Aarti enquired and this time we were in unison.

Sometimes, it's just about that extra round of beer with your friends backed up with some carefree laughs which makes your day! Definitely, it doesn't make your problems any less in life but it could help you enjoy some of your time without worrying about anything else and that's how memories are to be made... I believe!

"What are you reading?" Aarti asked from behind my back.

"Naah… nothing, just some old stuff from my diary when life used to seem unfair but at least it was normal," I responded and closed the diary.

"Finally, you got some time to read even if it's due to pandemics," she said and hugged me from behind.

"Yeah, life… what can I say," I acknowledged and gently crushed her in my arms.

"Beer?" She enquired softly.

It was a rainy day; a guy was busy saving his laptop bag from the rain when he saw a little puppy on the street, struggling for some shelter. It was all drenched in rain and was unable to find anything to get covered. Suhas, the-laptop-saving-guy, ran towards it and lifted the pup up in his hands and carefully laid it down in his car's seat. Looking at the pup, shivering, he immediately wiped it off with a napkin and turned on the heater to make it comfortable.

He brought the pup home and since then it has been with him all the time; then it might be the healthy morning walks or a playful evening at the park, a late night snuggle on the couch or an early morning face licking session in the bed, sharing of  those unexplainable emotions or madness of howling together by looking up at the moon, the happiness of watching it wag it's tail in excitement or sometimes, barking on its master in disappointment; Suhas has seen it all and the happiness of pup knew no limits with all the attention and love and care it received from its master.

It went all good for initial few years but gradually Suhas' involvement with his dog reduced a bit and eventually he got busy with all his stuffs - the office, time for his girlfriend, friends and parties resulting in spending less time with his pet. The pet was unable to understand as why it's master is not spending time with it and now, whenever it sees it's master getting back home, instead of wagging the tail in affection it started barking at him.

This took Suhas by surprise and he started ignoring his pet more often, thinking it is behaving strange, without getting to know what was actually happening to his pet, emotionally.

He observed it's behaviour for few more days, the same, unreasonable barking continued, and he started tying it down more often which resulted in less communication between the two. After a month of regular barking, suddenly the dog stopped barking at all and perhaps stayed at it's pet house even when he was not being tied down but it has lost all it's liveliness and excitement.

Suhas found it even more surprising as the pup, who used to play all day long, roam freely everywhere in the house, started sitting quietly in one corner. But still he couldn't manage to find any time for it as he got busier with his work life.

One fine day, after he got a little relaxed from his work, he decided to take out his dog and play around for the whole day, like the good old times. He checked for his pet, in pet's house, it was not there. He searched the whole house but was not able to find it. He enquired to neighbors but no luck, and then finally checked at the security gate of his apartment and came to know that the guard had seen it few days back leaving the apartment but was not sure whether it came back since.

True, that we cannot always take time out of our busy lives but it doesn't mean we can hurt the emotions of the ones who cannot speak for their own.

“Do you see the sparkle, the star?” Neeva asked, pointing her left hand towards the dark sky while placing my hand close to her heart holding in her right, as tightly as possible. We were lying down on sand, at night, on the paradise beach, looking up towards the sky. The pair of our shoes and few beer bottles were the only things that accompanied us during those late hours on the beach; it was all dark and peaceful out there. The sound of the waves mixed with cool breeze had a completely different sense of soothing upon us, we could feel our senses getting relaxed.

On an impulse, I looked in the direction of her hand, the star was shining so brightly millions of light years away reflecting its sparkle into our eyes, letting us focus on nothing but it’s light. But still my useless mind managed to run on completely different thoughts, the only thing it cared was the feel of her heartbeats against my hand and how abnormally it was beating.

“Ransh…” she inquired again, shaking my hand.

“Yeah… Absolutely dear, it’s so bright and beautiful that I am not able to take my eyes off it,” I answered, looking at her face instead, the side of her face was shining brightly even under the pale moonlight.

“And do you see that another star just next to it, seems very tiny one na?” she sounded a little excited this time.

“Hmm, hmm…” I responded in agreement.

“And look, these stars are switching its places… how cute!” she exclaimed.

“Wow... Amazing…” I didn’t know what she was talking about but yeah, I knew exactly how many times she has blinked in last few minutes – 64!

“Ransh,” she called my name again.

“Yes Ma’am,” I acknowledged customarily.

“So, if you had enough… Can you please stop looking at my face now?” she requested with a straight face, still looking at the sky.

“What?” I was taken aback by her words, “No, no, I was looking at sky.”

“Stars are switching places… really? And you should know, I can feel the warmth of your breathing on my cheeks,” she said as plainly as possible.

“Oh! Is it?” I said and moved my face a little closer to her, “But I can see those stars in your eyes.”

She immediately turned her face closed to mine, looked me in the eyes, and giggled playfully, “Where? Show me.”

I placed my hand on her ear and started exploring side of her face with my thumb, she closed her eyes in response and pressed the tip of her nose on tip of mine and while rubbing it gently she whispered again, “I asked you something.”

I inched forward and placed my lips softly onto hers, without any further hesitation her lips befriended with mine and the moment simply took over us. I enveloped her body with both my hands and pushed her closer to me, letting her body completely rest upon me. I guess, we were blank at that moment and the mixed effect of that tipsy night and soothing beach intoxicated our senses completely.

It was 9 in the morning and I was still in my bed. ‘Oh fuck! I cannot be late today for the meeting,’ I mumbled hastily and jumped out of the bed. Somehow, I wrapped up my morning routines and ran towards the car. My cell phone beeped for the last time when I placed it over the dashboard. And when I checked, ‘12 Missed Calls!’ the mobile screen shouted at me.

“Hey Hiren, sorry man… I am on my way. Will reach in 15,” I said over the phone without even caring about his ‘Hi.’

“I am calling you from last half an hour, man! You better be quick now; our CEO will be up for our meeting any time soon and our manager is shouting on me like anything,” he made his point in a single go.

“So sorry buddy, but please handle him for next 10 mins or so… I will reach as early as possible,” I replied with all my energy.

“Yeah doing so, but I don’t understand as why our manager wants his every member to be present for this meeting… as if the CEO really cares about our presence while delivering her speech,” he oozed out his frustration over our manager.

“Seriously man… Why would she give a damn about some executives like us? I even doubt she knows our Manager’s name or even, who the Manager is…?” I guffawed.

“Funny. Now just arrive, bye.” He said and disconnected.

But fact to be told, everyone was eager to meet or rather see our new CEO, whom, everyone has described as nothing but beautiful.

I have managed to reach office just on time but to add it to my bad luck they just entered the Conference room a couple of minutes before.

I checked upon my shirt one last time, tucked in nicely, and, I entered the room.

“May I join in, please?” I asked at the lowest of my voice. Manager gave me the deadliest look possible while nodding his head while our CEO, whose head was buried in laptop screen lost her valuable seconds of life by my distraction. And, again, within next second her gaze was glued on her screen but even for that split of a second, I have witnessed the stars in her eyes… again!

This morning our teacher was asking everyone in the class about our most memorable moment and when my turn came, I answered, when my pet, Coco, licks my hand.

And everyone started laughing at me as I couldn’t have any fancy moments like Rihan or Namita or Pari who had been to Singapore or Paris or Goa and then they all asked me to ‘have a life.’

So I have also answered them back, better you ‘have a pet.’

But is it really a better moment Mumma to visit these places than Coco licking my hand? My nine year old girl asked me on the dinner table, playing with her food.

“Have you thought about anything of these when you were playing with Coco this afternoon?” I asked her looking at her innocent face.

“No, it didn’t come to my mind at that time. I was playing na Mumma,” she said in a plain tone.

“I am very scared Maa, I am not feeling good at all,” I cried like a child (Oh wait! I was a child back then).

“C’mon out beta, Mumma will take care of everything… I will not let anything hurt you,” she said in cutest way possible to make me believe her words. Well, I never had doubts about anything she says and neither had any brains to create any during my growing years.

I was hiding under the table in living room which was preceded by my act of horrific screaming and run-for-my-life performance as the shadow on my bedroom window started zooming in and dancing weirdly due to the flicker of light coming out from window. And well, which was sufficiently enough to scare the hell out of little me. But those simple words from Mumma – I will not let anything hurt you and the way she made me feel while holding me in her embrace were enough for me to overcome any damn fear in life during those days, as I knew she would always be there to protect me.

“Ohh… I miss those days so badly!” I exclaimed and gently pressed the hand which I was holding from quite a long time now, “The least I need to do back then on any of those stressful situations was to run to Mumma and just hug her tightly and I knew that the rest is taken care of by her.”

“I wish life would have always been that simple, my dear,” Prisha added (almost in the tone alike which I used to hear from Mumma) and placed her other hand on top of mine, stroking it gently, “It’s okay dear… don’t worry, everything will be fine.”

“Yeah, I hope so,” I said, more like comforting myself.

“Come, lets go inside… its chilling out here,” she suggested and got up from her seat, still holding my hand. I was in no state to reply her back and I just followed her; my mind still stuck on that childhood memory.

“Who is my brave son?” Mumma asked in her usual, playful tone while I was still holding her tightly.

“I am your brave son, Maa,” I mumbled; my head still buried in her stomach, holding her tightly.

“That’s like my son, now come on it’s the sleepy time and remember Mumma is always there for you,” she said and planted an affectionate kiss on my forehead.

“Can I hug you for some more time Mumma?” I asked innocently.

“Can I hug you once?” I asked Prisha out of nowhere.

“Yeah sure, why not? We can hug each other, right,” said she, swiftly.

And even to my surprise, in double quick time, I hold her tightly in my arms with my head resting on her shoulder. I guess, I badly needed that hug. She took her time to react over all these, and gently stroke my hair to console me a bit and whispered, “It’s okay Namit, this is not the end. Take it in a positive way and remember, I am always here with you, to help you. You are a brave man, dear.” She sounded exactly like Mumma with the same concern and love towards me.

“I don’t know Prish… I am always jumping from one thought to another in my head, I don’t know how to make myself at peace,” I struggled to get those words out of my system, “Will I always be like this? I don’t get joy in anything I do… I am a complete mess right now. I seriously want this to end right away, I cannot take it anymore… I just can’t.” I said innocently like a child I used to be.

“It is all the part of life, Namit. You cannot change it or end it in a go. You must keep practicing things you like, to avoid any such distractions and these thoughts will always be there, you have to learn how to control it,” she said with a conviction in her voice.

“I agree, and I do understand these things but when it comes to practicality I just go blank and again the old cycle repeats itself of getting caught in this endless loop of wandering over directionless thoughts,” I explained her further still holding her in my arms.

“Yes dear, that is true, and the cycle will continue as it is if you do not take any initiative to break the same. First, you need to burst the cloud of ‘Everything is a problem – which need some solution to get fixed.’ This is not true, sometimes you just need to experience things and let go, there is no need to categorize everything into problems and solutions; there are things which do exist beyond this concept and that is nothing but acceptance. When you start accepting things then only you could allow space for some new things to happen in your life or you will always be caught up with same things and the cycle of endless thoughts continuous. And stop blaming yourself for everything in life, take it as an experience and just let it go,” she retorted in her own, caring way.

“Yes, but… then again, it looks very simple when you serve these words in plate for others, however when you are the one who is facing the same reality, all together it becomes a different story; you cannot control your mind, full of random thoughts, just like that, and accept the things as they are.”

“Of course not, and that’s why I asked you to give it some time. You need to focus on what you want to achieve out of any situation and not on how hard and serious the situation is; as, always you might not get the favored situations in life, but you can always get the desirable results by focusing on what you actually want! And no doubt, it absolutely takes time but all you need to do is invest in desirable results and make it happen rather than hopping from one possibility to another or one situation to another or one thought to another.”

“Why you always sound so mature?” and with my stupid question I cut her words short.

“Because you make me sound so,” she responded and giggled.

“Mumma… Mumma… come inside, I want to show you something,” Vinamra declared innocently and started dragging Prisha by hand.

“Yes beta, easy, easy… Mumma is coming with you na,” she said hastily while being dragged away by our six year old son.

‘How would I spend my whole life with these two peacemaking Satans being out of it?’ again a new thought popped up in my mind.

‘I should not let go the only happiness I have in my life. No matter how worse the differences have grown between us now, we can always try to have a talk for one more time,’ and thinking the same I just picked up divorce papers from table and tore it into two. I ran towards them and hugged them from behind who were busy examining the random lines and circles painted on the wall in living room by Vinamra and whispered in Prisha’s ear, “I am not going anywhere, Prish coz I am your brave man; let’s start afresh.”

Next day when I reached office, I was thinking to share this incident with someone but eventually got hold of me keeping in mind that it will be unfair on that girl as it was her personal thing and I should not keep telling the town about it. Harsh was busy since morning in some issue and had not left his seat since then, so after finishing lunch the first thing he wanted was an affectionate smoke.

“Mrigank, let’s go onto the terrace dude,” he whispered to me.

‘Terrace?’ I recalled the word and last night’s associated incident in my mind.

“Are you coming?” he asked again.

I nodded in approval and followed him.

“So, when did you leave last night?” Harsh questioned while puffing the first satisfactory smoke from his cigarette.

“It was around 10 or so,” I said in response.

“Is it? But your e-mail came at 9, I guess,” came the next question.

“Ahh, I came here for a while after finishing my work,”

“No shit. Since when you have started smoking, dude?”

“Not for smoke, man. I was here to do exactly opposite of what you are doing right now. I was here to fill my lungs with some fresh air and not to befoul it,” I retorted.

“Whoa, easy buddy, easy!” he exclaimed, trying to act cool.

“Excuse me, can I talk to you for a second?” came a voice distracting us from our conversation which wasn’t that fruitful anyway. It was a girl, beautifully dressed in a long, cherry red salwar suit, making her stand close to 6 feet of height. Her eyes could get the attention of any damn being on this planet as the way she was appearing due to that kajal-look. She was holding mobile phone in one hand and a cigarette in other. Man, she was beautiful!

Harsh turned around to her and answered with a fake smile, “Yes, tell me.”

“No... Actually, I was asking your friend,” came the brutal reply.

‘What?’ I said to myself in disbelief.

“Ohh yeah, absolutely... will excuse myself then. I will catch you up downstairs, Mrigank,” Harsh stated and left or maybe ran away to digest her brutal reply.

“So... tell me, what it’s about?” I said softly, not sure even she had heard that right.

“I am alive,” she said excitedly by puffing out the cloud of smoke.

‘I am alive,’ I repeated her words in my mind and tried to deduce something out of it. What the hell that suppose to mean?

She was looking at me as if she was anticipating my reaction, a reply on what she had just said now.

“And... I am Mrigank...?” I said, not sure what to say at that moment but she read my confused face, clearly.

“Okay, let me put it this way then....” she said and again the smoke been released in a puff, “I haven’t died yet... since last night,” she re-phrased it this time and it clicked.

“Whoa... you are the cry-girl from last night.” I don’t know what was I thinking, “I am so sorry, it just came out erratically, I mean to say that you are...”

“Its fine, doesn’t matter and although I was crying, right, so it’s okay,” she said with a little disappointment in her voice.

“But wait... how you recognised... are you spying on me?” I said and she lightens up a bit on my last comment.

“Yeah, indeed! I am a spy from TCS, working undercover as Sr. System Engineer,” she claimed in a lively tone, her eyes sparkled animatedly while introducing herself.

‘No way, does she happen to be the same cry-girl?’ I questioned myself.

“Ohh great... and I am the poor SAP consultant from Infosys who is being spied,” I smirked.

“Nice to meet you poor SAP consultant,” she said extending her hand, still holding the cigarette in between ring and middle finger.

“Same here, spy girl,” I tried to create the momentum but I guess, that is best suited only when a girl does it.

She looked and smiled in the gentlest way possible, “Actually I over-heard your conversation with your friend... Sorry for the last night, I was not myself in that time.”

“Naah, it’s nothing... I mean not about your expression but it has happened to me many a times; sometime it’s good for health, you know, to let your emotions flow freely... to get that out of your systems. The best thing to do is what you have done... I guess, I was on the wrong place at wrong time.” I don’t know from where this has come to me because when you talk about spontaneity, I will be the last one in the row.

“Won’t you ask me the reason?” she reacted, surprised by what I just chattered.

“What difference will it make? Am just happy that you are through,” I said in a casual way.

She looked at me and just smiled, “Wow! I must admit I haven’t met anyone like you yet, you are... you are...”

“A character,” I interrupted her.

“No stupid, you are... kind of unique; your way of reacting is unreal, so unusual,” she said while searching for words to express herself.

“Oops, I am so sorry... I just called you stupid,” she giggled. And in a moment, she made me unique and stupid at the same time. I looked at her one more time and couldn’t help myself to not to have a smile at her innocence.

“Why are you smiling, is anything wrong in what I have mentioned?” she enquired.

“No... I mean not like that, I just try to be genuine, sometimes.” ‘And exactly the reason for being single as well... being genuine is a curse,’ I reminded myself.

“Cool! I like genuine people,” she affirmed.

‘Wait, does this imply that she like me or it is simple I-like-genuine-people statement,’ the frustrated-single-me made its point.

“So...” she said puffing the last smoke out in the air, “See you around.”

“Yeah... definitely,” I don’t know why I smiled saying so.

“Hey buddy”

The moment I heard Harsh’s cry I knew he is going to assign some unnecessary work to me because his ‘Hey buddy’ never comes alone.

“Mrigank, that asshole has again raised a ticket for Production issue and every time he want resolution on urgent basis. I need to wrap up things early, man; my girlfriend is coming to my place today.  Please look into it yaar. I am assigning this ticket to you,” he said and without waiting for my consent his face was back to his screen. And even before I utter ‘Okay,’ the ticket has been assigned to me.

I had no choice but to sit after office hours now and get the issue resolved. Anyway, I was not having anything important to do at home that evening so I thought to help my poor (bastard) colleague.

It was almost 9 at night by the time I resolved the issue and was finally off to work on Friday’s eve. Whenever I get late in the office, I usually go on the terrace to enjoy some quite time by myself, it helps me to relax a bit after the day’s work. And the view of the city it offers from the top has always been incredible. I feel like I am at peace at the time.

I held the terrace rails strongly by both hands and stood quietly doing my usual business, which is to close my eyes and listen to the sounds of strong yet peaceful wind racing down numerous thoughts and letting me experience the hollowness within. It must have been few minutes I closed my eyes when I heard some distinct sobbing. At first, I thought I must have been over heard something but in a while the sobbing got intense and I had to open my eyes to get myself into the situation.

I turned around and looked into the direction of that sincere cry and the words which  spontaneously came out of my mouth were not the descent ones.

“Oh fuck, what the hell?” Well, what I witnessed was really terrible at that moment; a lady sitting in the corner with head buried in between her knees and hair laid down freely over the legs, it took me few seconds to realise the actual posture of that lady and distinguish it as a human being in the first place but by that time I have already expressed my emotions aloud.

She parted her hair in the middle, lifted her face from knees and looked at me (which was a little scary) with watery eyes almost red may be due to intensive crying and shouted in a painful voice, “Get lost you creep.”

May be my earlier over-reacting words to her posture has caused her to say that. I went closer to her to apologize for my words, “I am sorry ma’am for that but do you need any help?”

“Just leave, please,” she uttered somehow and again started crying heavily.

I didn’t want to leave her like that but there was nothing I could have done at that moment as well. A part of me was saying to be with her and calm her down as a lady was crying in front of me on the rooftop which makes higher chances of her jumping from the top or something stupid like that but other part of me just wanted to get out of that situation and leave it all to her as she is unknown to me and I don’t want to add to her troubles.

I wisely listened to my other part and walked towards the elevator but while entering the elevator I bawled the stupidest things ever, “No matter how hard it may have been, please don’t die!”

And the answer came, “Fuck off! You go and die.” So now I was really sure on one thing, getting the intensity of her words, that she is not a quitter.

‘Well done boy, you just made me proud by saving a life here,’ a sarcastic voice came within me. Never the less, I was happy that she is not going to die.

I have many complaints as the way I have progressed, the way I have matured though I never lost hopes of being with myself. I have never quite on myself at any moment of time. But now as the time is into its final phase for one last change; I have to surrender myself completely to follow the divinity of nature.

Well, I was standing in front of him, before giving up on everything I have achieved all these years.

I looked him into the eyes; he was fearless, flaunting the array of settled emotions on his expressionless face yet appeared so appealing. I knew by then; I would have my moment anytime so without further ado, I rightly hit the conversation.

"I heard that you are going to be with someone else now," I said in a painful voice. "What? Who told you this?" he said, acting surprised.

“Is she better than me... beautiful than me?” is all I wanted to know at that moment.

“She… Who? I don’t know what you are talking about,” he said, trying to hide the truth. “No need to hide it now, I already knew!” I fretted. “No... It's nothing like that… just don't get me wrong dear,” he articulated with a false confidence. “I know... She is Afterlife na?" I affirmed.

“No Life, I mean yes, it's Afterlife but I love you too. It's just I have to move on with her now… there is no other choice left,” he stated.

“It's okay, I can understand that… I have to understand that now; it's not in your hands!” I exclaimed with a smile.

Next day, I took Naisha out for a lunch. We were at ITC Maurya. Though I was thinking about my favourite Murgh Chandi Tikka all the time, right from the moment we stepped in there and the thoughts led me to do the worst in a way as unplanned as possible. I have told her everything I discussed with Parth a day before and I hate myself more for starting that marriage conversation before letting my tongue to have a taste of the beautiful flavors of chicken.

“Are you out of your freaking mind?” she shouted at top of her lungs and stood up on her place, “This is insane… you are insane.”

“But Naisha...” My justification ended then and there itself, even before it started.

“I don’t want to listen any of your crap now. I am leaving,” she confirmed and walked off from the conversation. In the heat of the moment she lurched away from me somehow managing to collect and carry her cell phone, hand bag and shrug in one hand; not even realizing that we came in my pinky Nano. After putting few steps she must have realized the same, ergo she stopped throwing her feet on the ground and stayed unmoved, standing next to the exit door. I looked at her red, incensed face and then again at that mouth-watering Tikka and unwillingly decided to walk out from the hotel to drive her home back. She didn’t utter a word while going back home and an awkward silence has filled the air making it more difficult, even to breath in that moment. Finally when we reached our destination, she slammed the car door on my face and left without saying anything. I was blank at that moment, thinking, I have to face those life sucking cries of marriage from my parents again… for my whole life now.

I was driving back to my home, absent mindedly as if I have missed my last chance to live an excited life ahead. I was about to reach home when my mobile phone started making endless sounds. There were a series of texts from Naisha on Whatsapp,

“First of all, that was really very weird of you to even think so.”

“Means… how could you?”

“I am sorry for the way I have behaved back there during our lunch but you have to accept that it was all your fault.”

“Need to talk, call me once you reach home.”

“I tried to give some more thoughts to your weirdness and was just thinking…”

“Why not!”

“Or should be not… Argh… Wait I am calling you.”

And the very next moment I received a call but I couldn’t understand why it was flashing Parth’s name on the screen.

‘Are they both together right now?’ was my very thought.

“Hello,” I picked up the call, hesitated.

“Dude, I need a favor from you,” he started and I could able to see another number flashing on my screen in waiting list; that was Naisha.

“Not now yaar, will call you back in some time,” I answered in a hurry to pick up Naisha’s call.

“Can’t wait… its urgent bro,” he shouted, trying to save the call. I thought of killing him at that moment.

“Okay, tell me,” I said irritated.

“I need some money, urgently,” he said, stressing the last word as long as possible.

I closed my eyes, breathed in a heavily and said calmly, “How much?”

“How much do you have?” he questioned and that was enough for me to lose my control.

“Just fucking tell me how much you want dude?” I shouted.

“Uhhh… Ten thousand” he uttered.

“OK. Done,” I confirmed and disconnected his call and the very next moment I hit Naisha’s name on my mobile screen to call her back.

“Hi… sorry yaar, a friend was there on the call, he was in need of some urgent help,” I said deliberately avoiding Parth’s name as I was not sure how she would have reacted to his name at that crucial moment.

“Hmmm… you were saying something about marriage,” to my surprise she started directly with the ‘M’ word.

“Yeah… I was just thinking that… you know…” I was about to utter those difficult words but briskly her next question broke in,

“So, when should we get married?”

“Parth, please meet me at Café 121.” I demanded over the call.

“Whaaa…?” and even before listening to his reply, I put the call down.

 “This has to be really important dude; I have come all the way from Connaught place, skipping a very important meeting,” he said in a hasty voice.

“Important meeting?” I said, repeating his words and looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

“Shikha was joining the meeting yaar…. And apart from that it was a monthly strategic meet,” he said sensing and covering his excitement about Shikha, a bit.

“You are married dude,” I replied in disgust. I know he always babble over such things just for fun but even then, I like taking pleasure by pinpointing that he is no more a bachelor now.

“So what?” he replied back with the same intensity.

“Anyway… how the hell do you know that I am sitting here, I have asked you to come at Café 121, right?” I asked.

“Once again, I would like to remind you my dear friend… I am a smart ass,” he said with a wicked smile and continued by pointing a finger at my Nano, “It was easy, the pinky parked out there… Urgh, means who buys a pink vehicle, man!” and ended up by rolling his eye balls.

I did not respond to his silly comment rather looked away from him.

“So, whats the catch?” he asked, taking a sit beside me on the bench.

I took some time to answer his question as I was busy filling my lungs to its fullest with some fresh air and started in a go, “Don’t get angry and please advice with full honesty.”

“Yes, please… bark now,” he said in his usual I-don’t-care tone.

“What do you think, man…? Should I get… married or something?” and finally I spited it out somehow.

He burst out laughing.

“I…” he tried to say something but again started to laugh uncontrollably at me.

“Okay sorry, but I remember someone saying, I am not going to get married, ever…” he said making fun of me and continued patting my back, “And why the hell would I get angry on you, it’s your life bro, do what you want to do… go get killed.”

“Ha-ha… are you done now? Can you just help me to figure this out… should I or should I not?” I said in an irritating tone.

“Kabir, my friend; do you know what is more important than anything… when you think about getting married?” he asked.

“Hmm-hmm, go ahead!” I exclaimed.

“The most important thing… is to have a GIRL who will be willing to get married with you,” he affirmed.

“And that’s exactly why I asked you not to get angry,” I answered.

“Means…? Don’t tell me you are gay,” he postulated.  

I closed my eyes shut and confirmed a name, “It’s Naisha.”

“What?” he shouted on my surprise, “Naisha… Naisha Kaur? My ex?”

I nodded in agreement.

“Are you serious? And what she has to say about this?” he enquired with a hint of seriousness this time.

“I haven’t asked her yet,” I replied, face down.

“Kabir, what’s going on in your mind man?” he asked, concerned.

I looked away from him and continued, “See man, I was sure you will be mad at me and you should be… you have every right to do so but I am really very fed up with my parent’s concern about me getting married, their daily emotional doses and all this marriage crap all the time.”

I took a pause to have a look at him; he was listening very carefully, his hands were entangled and face grew more serious by now.

“Anyway, Naisha has also decided not to get married and so do I, and that’s exactly why I am thinking to ask her for marriage which would appear as a marriage for everyone but for us it will be just like an agreement, we will stay together as good friends, as room-mates and we both will be free from everyone’s cry for getting married. What say?” I put exactly the way it come to my mind.

“Bullshit!” was his response. “Are you even listening to what you just said? And on what grounds do you think Naisha will say yes to your stupidity?” he made his point.

“I don’t know what she has to say over this but I just want to give it a try and apart from this, we are good friends, respect each other, understand each other really well and even she is pissed off by her parent’s cry for marriage… so why not? Worth a shot, isn’t it?” I put it as casual as possible.

“But after you two get married what if your so called contract thing doesn’t worked out well? Then what will you do?” he was really touching the good and practical aspects of the conversation at that time.

“See yaar, we are just staying together that too after getting married but the only difference would be that we will be staying as roommates so what possibly can go wrong. She will have her own life to live, unchanged, as it was earlier and I will have mine… as simple as that,” I clarified.

“And you know it well why she has decided to not to get married, right?” again a question from him.

“Yes I know. She has gone through a really bad phase, her accident was brutal which has left her devastated but that was her past and moreover, as I said, it’s not an actual marriage for both of us… I mean… it is, for the society and the friends and the family but for both of us it would be like moving in with a new roomie,” I tried to make it more clear to him.

“What can I say, man… go ahead but make sure it would not lead to any complication,” he said and sighed as if he can do nothing to change my mind now.

“And… will you be okay with this?” I asked.

“Yeah man, I will be and come on man, it’s my friend’s contractual marriage so why will I not?” he said sarcastically, “I am happy for the fact that you have decided to get married but I just don’t get the reason right for you getting married; that’s it.”

“Don’t worry dude, everyone will be happy by this decision and we two also can stay as… happily unmarried!” I said and smiled looking at him.

“But that will be when she agrees on this, my bro,” he said with raised eyebrows.

My very first Book ”Confusingly Interesting OR Interestingly Confused” 

I was busy in my own thoughts when I noticed a muscular guy, walking towards me and giving me some dead expressions. I was a little scared thinking that, this girl might have called somebody to beat my ass. And I was literally about to say sorry to that guy, when he dropped a brochure on me and walked away, without even saying a word. He doesn't even bothered to know that I would read it or not. But what choice did I have, rather than to just kill the time. I heaved a sigh and started reading that brochure; it was about some medical coaching, showing its class and performance during past couple of years and on back of it there were few sample questions related to PG entrance examination. I was going through few of them when a girly voice distracted me from my great work, “Hey, can I sit here?”

I looked above from the brochure and found the same comment girl standing infront of me.

“Yeah… sure,” I said and stupidly showed her the place and signaled her to sit next to me. Surprisingly, she did the same and got herself busy in a book which she was carrying.

“Are you from Bangalore itself?” I asked her out of nowhere.

“No. I am from Chennai,” she said softly and closed her book in response.

“I am sorry, if I disturbed you,” I said politely.

“No, it’s okay. And… you are from…?” she questioned me this time.

“I am from Pune,” I said in a proud voice.

“Oh that’s great. So, how you find Bangalore then?” she asked again.

“Bangalore is great, I really like this place. In fact, right after the exam, me and my friends are going to explore a new place today… Nandi Hills,” I answered her honestly.

“What are you going to do there?” again a question came from her.

“Admire the nature’s beauty,” I said as soon as she asked.

“Ohh! Like going there and say, ‘What a nature’ and come back. How boring…” she said.

I smiled on her comment and said, “Not like that but anyways, what you would suggest then?”

“I would suggest you to go to some Pub or Disc and have a life…” she said and paused for a while. “Why this Scooty is staring at me?” she came again by pointing at a purple Scooty, parked infront of us.

At first, I thought she was a psycho or something, to spontaneously say some crap like that, but then I realized something and asked her rather than answering her stupid question, “Do you write?” She nodded yes to my question and said, “Blogs.”

“Ohh that’s really great,” I praised her. “So, what you write about?”

“I like metaphors,” she said in a thrilling tone, “Something like… You know there must be few people in our lives who are not so expressive or hides some or the other things from everyone and if you ask them anything about themselves, you would get the same answer everytime, the mystic people… I call them Cabbage people. As if you peel a layer of cabbage you would get the same thing inside it. These mystic people are like cabbages only… so, Cabbage people.”

“Hmmm… that’s nice yaar. You are really good at it…. and by the way miss writer, what you do for living?” I asked again.

“Thanks! By profession, I am an architect!” she exclaimed.

“So… a creator,” I said.

“Not really. I think, I am a destroyer; I destroy humanity,” she said.

“How come?” I questioned.

“See, all the time I sit in an AC office creating some designs for clients. The clients by sitting at their AC offices approve the designs and sells it to their clients who might be sitting at some other AC offices and our work gets appreciated but I think, the people who actually work to create it, the workers, who work day and night to make it happen goes unnoticed and on top of that the people who actually create it doesn’t get a chance to live in those expensive structures or houses. So in short, I increase the gap between the rich and poor and ultimately destroy the humanity,” she explained. I didn’t have any clue as what the hell she meant by that but nodded yes in her agreement.

“Can we have a walk?” she asked out of the blue and stood up at her place. I didn’t say anything but did the same and walked alongside her. She started opening up with me like anything and we shared almost everything about ourselves. We shared about our most wild boozing experiences, our childhood memories, our families, our friends, our favourite movies, books and what not. She even told me about the qualities she would look into her life partner and I simply was enjoying the time with her.

“Who is your favourite super hero?” she asked me this time.

“Wolverine,” I said confidently.

“And why so?” she said.

“Because he is powerful and strong, and… because he has these self healing powers as well,” I said excited, like a small kid.

“How old are you?” came again a random question from her.

“25,” I said.

“You don’t look like. You are still a kid… you are a baccha,” she said playfully and laughed softly. I also smiled with her. I looked at her and she suddenly stopped her laugh and looked directly into my eyes. We were looking at each other in complete silence, for few seconds, and finally the silence was broken by that noisy alarm, which was the indication of completion of two hours of the examination. We didn’t recognize how those two hours came to an end, being into each other’s company, and we walked together towards the examination hall. She was waiting for her cousin sister and as soon as she saw her sister, she bid me bye. I smiled back at her and did the same; meanwhile Mrudali also appeared infront of me. I hurriedly took her to the nearby cafeteria and explained her the whole story.