Chapter 11: lucky or the other way round?
Bottles
tossed up in air, and sound of beer cans opening with the fizz filled my ears,
as I took a sip out of the exclusively mine Coca-Cola.
Time
had come when Mumbai Indians battled the mighty Royal Challengers Bangalore
once more on the battlefield set in Bangalore’s cricket stadium during IPL-2010
Munchies
were getting lesser and lesser, and alcohol poured like tap water.
My
excitement for the match was dampened due to the fact that Lia was in the
stadium with her family, and I couldn't shake off the feeling that something would
go wrong.
I, on
the other hand was a mere quiet spectator of this legendary or rather hyped
match at my own home.
“Bring
me some more fucking beer”, said an irritated and at this point, well, pretty
high, Dhruv.
“Wait,
I’ll help you with it.”
This
was the pretty Zeesha... Dhruv's girlfriend, and an angel in disguise.
“Why
are you so fucking quiet today?” She asked, looking at me, with her strange yet
caring tone.
Now,
you can see how these two were made for each other... just saying.
I couldn't say a word. As the time of the match broadcast drew closer, gripped by fear, my limbs getting numb by the second.
It is
said that if you love someone with all your heart, you can almost sense any
danger lurking over them.
That
memory stays recorded in my mind like a Blu-ray movie. Loud, and extremely
clear.
17th
April… The match was scheduled to start at 4 p.m. and it was quarter past 4
already. To pay no heed to the vibes around me i dug my head in the household chores that I would have never bothered about otherwise.
Dhruv, busy quaffing had now been surfing random channels since a while, when alas!
"Two low intensity bomb blasts have been reported in the
proximity of stadium that hosts today's match. Reports conform at least fifteen
people injured, although no fatalities have yet been reported." said a T.V. reporter.
Dhruv
Sat up, and called us to see the news.
The time ceased, yet rushed at the same time... and I rushed to the T.V.
All
tries to make calls to Lia were in vain as all telephone lines were jammed in a
matter of seconds.
(Image courtesy: Jayanth Maiyya)
Watching the news wasn't helping either, as the "Braking news" was finding of a third bomb that was thankfully diffused.
“Oh,
another one now?” Dhruv said.
It
feels sad to say but we, the public, have dealt with the similar tragedies in the worst possible ways, making these events a part of our lives, and moving on.
Till none we know of is in danger, it doesn’t take much time for the imprints of such activities to be
erased of the blueprint that our mind is.
For now though, someone i wokeup everday to look at, was in grave danger.
Dhruv
and Zeesha noticed me frantically making calls. Dialing numbers from my cell,
then the landline, their cellphones, everything.
Anxiety
levels were at the peak, and both Dhruv and Zeesha seemed inaudible to me.
“What
happened?” Dhruv asked, nearly shouting, probably sober now, seeing me going
crazy.
“Lia
had gone to see the match. I can’t get her to answer my call.” My eyes, all
watery, and throat choking.
“Okay,
calm down. Who is Lia now??”
I had
totally forgotten in this chaos that we had decided to keep our relation under
the wraps. But this wasn’t the time to answer any queries.
“Oh My
God! Are you fine? I have been trying to call you past fifteen minutes but it
wasn’t of any use! How are you? How is every one?” I started and kept going on
and on as soon as I heard her voice saying ‘Hello’.
“Relax.
Please calm down! All is perfectly fine here. Just some minor blast I suppose.
We all are perfectly fine.” She said, trying to console me.
“Okay”
breathing heavily I continued, still trying to hold back my tears.
“So
you are on your way back, right?”
“No.
Of course not. We are already in our seats... match is starting now!" she said, in an almost deafening pitch. What followed was the roar and chants of "Sachin! Sachin!" this girl was beyond my utmost levels of understandings at times, but fearless, brave too.
After
a few minutes that I took to settle down and be normal again, did I notice
Zeesha and Dhruv looking at me with their eyes fixated!
“Alright
then sir. Mind telling us now who the fuck Lia is?” asked Zeesha in her patent
tone.
••
“Alright…
Lia is your girlfriend now? And you didn’t even care telling us?” Zeesha’s voice was stern for the first
time.
“And
Zeesha is a recent friend. I have been your friend since past five fucking
years! Couldn’t even tell me, huh?” added Dhruv.
“Really,
there’s no need to get emo…” I was cut short as I tried defending myself.
“Shut
up. Now tell me everything. How you two met? Are you serious about her? Is she
serious about you?” continued Zeesha, her voice pitching to several notes.
“Okay,
is it just me? Or does that whole ‘tell me your story’ sounds ultra-gay??
Anyway, you go ahead with that. I’m going to watch the game now. And lookout
for anymore bomb blasts” Dhruv said, and what followed almost instant punch
right on his face.
“Fucker.
Go ahead with your story” he said, covering his face this time.
“Alright!” I said, looking Zeesha right in the eyes.
“You remember
Tej, right?”
I
continued as I got an affirmative response from Zeesha, with her head bobbling.
“Okay
well, Tej and Lia were pretty good friends in their old school, and then he
moved to my school and we clicked and became really great friends in no time.
He told me some things about this girl Lia, and I just had to look her up over
the internet.
I
still remember, that sky blue top and in a black back ground, with a lock of
hair sliding down and covering her right cheek she looked nothing less than angelic.
I
tricked Tej in letting me use his cell phone at times, so that I could pretend
to be him and talk to her and try to get to know her more." I said, ignoring the loud crunches Zeesha continued making with the pop-corns.
"Anyway, then one day I, as Tej, told her about 'one guy who has a serious crush on her' and that's when she came across my name, for the very first time.
After
begging him for days together, he finally agreed to introduce me to her.
I
still remember, she walked down the stairs of a restaurant, and I swore on
every dead man’s grave I would walk down the aisle with her.
But,
so much for hopes and dreams. She barely looked at me, and all that I could say
to her in that first meeting is precisely ‘hhhhhh… hi… you know Tej?’
That
sure wasn’t the impression I wanted to put on her, but the damage had been
done.
She
looked at me, made a face, and said ‘Yes, I know Tej, who just introduced me to
you’ and looked away, giggled and left.
Well,
that day she walked away, and Tej had two things with him now. Something to
laugh upon, and a story to tell to the whole college” saying that, I paused, smiling with every thought of Lia.
"We
started texting each other all day, every day.
And
then one fine day, she seemed perplexed. Lost in her thought, totally confused.
“What
happened? Anything wrong? Anyone troubling you? Let me know” I told her over messages.
“No,
no one’s troubling me. Actually, do you mind if I talk about guy issues with
you?”
“No no, not at all! Go on” I said, thinking to myself ‘Atta boy Suraj. Girl sharing troubles with
you? You are so going to get her’
“There’s
this guy in my college. He is a senior to me.
He
proposed to me today. Till now we had been pretty close friends, but I am
really confused about how I feel about him.
I
know I am just out of a serious relationship of three years with a jerk, and
then there was this guy Satish, with whom I went out for only a couple of days,
but still, I don’t know if I am over this jerk, and if this would be a genuine
relation, or just a stale hook up and a rebound. What do you think I should
do?”
My
lower jaw, with my mouth closed, dropped down to the ground, or that’s what I
felt.
The
pain of this, was compensated by the sense of achievement of finding someone who has had
crushes as much as me.
Don’t
lose her big boy. Stick with her and talk her out of it. Well, that was the plan.
“Alright,
this is what I think honestly. You have already had two people in your life,
who weren’t true to you, and hurt you. Now it’s up to you to decide what’s
right for you, and what’s not. Close those big beautiful eyes, and let your
heart tell you what’s right for you.” I
stated, making my opinions pretty clear, at least that’s what I thought, until…
Next
morning I woke up with my phone buzzing with her name.
“Hi Suraj. Thanks for your advice. It really helped.
I closed my eyes, and could only picture him. Not all guys are jerks, right? I
want to give another try. I think he’s worth taking the risk for. I Have a
boyfriend now J love you buddy. Thanks again for the favor”
Just
the shock I needed, to wake up and lose all my sleep.
“She
went out with another guy? And you, although unintentionally but most definitely helped her hook
up. Wow, you must be a special kind of dumbass. The biggest one I have ever
seen” Zeesha lashed out.
“Hey,
I didn’t know what was on her mind, alright? I did
what I thought was supposed to be done!”
"And this is what was supposed to be done?!"
“Anyway,
you want me to continue, or not?”
“Yeah,
sure… go on”
“I
backed out from talking to her all the time. Slowly, there was no conversation
at all. One day she called up to confront me, and asked what was wrong.
Well,
I didn’t think it was worth keeping inside anymore. I told her all I felt. She
uttered a few words, and hung up.
I fortuitously
had a friend Janette and her boyfriend George who happened to be not only her classmates, but also her close friends.
Updates about the events of her life, and her love life were regular.
“Bro,
sup! Hey we got some info for you dude. Trouble in paradise! Lia talks about
you all the time to her guy, and it makes him quirky to no avail! You are
beating that mutherfuckah without your knowledge!” Janette revealed in a secret
message kind of manner.
Well,
yes, Janette was more ‘guy’ than George for sure! And she needed to cut down on
the movies she was hooked on to. The ones appealing to her pseudo-Caribbean side.
“Alright.
And you want me to do what exactly?” I asked.
“Go,
talk to her! Make her yours! It’s your only chance” she said, as if stating the
obvious.
“Well,
it’s not my last chance, I know of that for sure. And anyway, I break them up
and we get together, what are the odds that this won’t happen with us? She’ll
be mine if she is destined to” Reading ‘The Alchemist’ had left me with a deep
impression on my mind, and rightly so.
“Well,
suit yourself! dumbass” concluded Janette.
In
another one of our conversations, Janette revealed that the ‘couple in news’
have had one of the ugliest breakups the world could ever witness! Weren’t
really happy together and were trying to reignite the fire needed to go on, and
then one day, Lia’s parents reached home a bit earlier than expected. You can
guess what happened after that”
“Whaaa…
sorry. What?” Zeesha didn’t expect this ending to the story of this couple.
“I
know! I tell you, there is somebody up there.”
“And
you made your move after that right?”
“Not
exactly. Have patience my dear, I will get to that!”
“You
still waited? Oh you pussy! Even I would have proposed to her by now!”
“Well,
I could have made my move then and there, but don’t you see, she’d have turned
me down in a matter of minutes.
And
well, I really love her, so you see, it was more important that she had someone
to talk to, someone whom she trusted, someone who stood by her.
I
wanted to be that guy. Knowing her family would hate me every single bit, I
wanted it. I had to be there, to let her know that it’s all going to be alright
very soon now.
Cause
if I could not do that, I might as well not try to be with her at all.” I
replied, in a manner, hoping my point gets through to her.
“I
will say what Janette told you, and rightly so. Dumbass”
What
is it with me and long speeches? Why does nobody get what I want to say?
