A Love Story.

July 2007: A young boy is playing football in school; however he is not sweating as much as he wants to. Yes you read that right he isn’t sweating as much as he wants to.  He is in grade 8 and it’s the last class of the day and its games. His cousin in the school across has told him that one of her friends finds him cute and she’ll make him meet her after school near the place where all the buses stand.  He had somewhere heard that all girls like macho bad guys so he wanted to be all sweaty, but somehow he failed, so when the bell rang he ran to the washroom and literally gallons of water on himself, that much water would have been enough for a family of 5 for a week maybe. Yet he wanted to show that he has played football and now he is sweating like the total badass he is. So he goes and meets his cousin and she introduces him to the girl and all he says is the fastest “hi” in the history of human communication and then after exchanging pleasantries with his sister he goes. Why would he behave so rudely? He thought girls would have liked an attitude.  The girl however thought of him as it was later learnt as a boy with chubby cheeks and a small belly protruding out who looked very dirty and was very rude. Well that was that, the girl moved to another city and the boy carried on in the same school still under the impression that he gave a macho impression to a girl who had forgotten all about him. He adds the girl on Facebook after a while, though neither of them clearly remembers it was the same people who met outside of school that day. Apart for a brief conversation online they don’t speak.

                       ***********************************************************

July 2009: The boy is in his bus and as the bus starts leaving he is looking outside the window and he sees two girls fighting like Lions over Zebra for a 5 rupee orange bar, its clear that they are friends though. Then suddenly he sees the face of one of the girls and it takes him a split second but then it hits him like a thunderbolt that it’s the same girl from 2 years ago that he met at that very spot. A self made up sense of destiny and her smile after winning her ultimate prize made him realize that if there was ever such a thing as love at second sight he surely was experiencing it. He got home, looked up the girl on Facebook and surely she was back in the same city and in the same school. She was 10 feet away and yet a 1000 miles away at the same time. All this while she had no clue that a guy who she met for 60 seconds and spoke online for maybe 10 minutes was now in love with her.

    He saw a couple of wall posts between his cousin sister and the girl where something like a phone was mentioned. That’s when it happened one of the most embarrassing moments of his life. He had to ask for her number and he did so in the most unabashed way possible. He inboxed her saying “ Wow, you gave your number to my cousin (who has been her friend for 4-5 years and her best friend that too) but you didn’t give your number to me  ( who you have spoken to for eleven minutes in three years, how could she?). However even though he is still ashamed of this moment to date, It worked and she gave her number. Probably the worst decision of her life.
    Why? Because from now he texted her as soon as he got back from school he would text her for hours on end, sometimes she would talk(as later she would say she did only out of courtesy)  at others only one word replies, politely signaling me to fuck off. But she was the girl and couldn’t be lost.  Also he was behaving this way because he hardly had any experience of chatting up girls and he was too excited. Excited is an understatement as within 2 days of taking her number he asked her out (all this while she was hoping and signaling that he shouldn’t message her so much, its annoying). She said no, obviously. But what’s worse is that she was dating someone for 7-8 months. As they say “uski toh band bajgayi”. Yet what made him love her even more was that the norm those days was if someone asks you out and you say no, you guys usually stop talking or atleast get awkward but she would have none of it. She said he was her friend and nothing will change that.  He was happy that he atleast graduated to be her friend but was devastated at being “friendzoned” in the face.

  They continued to talk or rather he continued to talk and she continued to reply. Looking back she was being a sweetheart because the amount he used to annoy her with endless texts after texts and stupid jokes on which even Sidhu would not laugh she never told him to buzz off and the reasons for that are unkown to this day.

A month after this scene they decided to meet after school somewhere where  they could sit and talk and grab a meal. They lived far off from each other so she said lets meet  in the middle and that’s what they did. They met 10 mins from her house and 50 mins from his. At a later time she made him meet someone who was her closest friend and would eventually also turn out to be his closest friend, Avani was her name. The first time he met Avani was at the metro station where she danced on ‘apni pode’ and climbed on the wrong metro. One of the craziest, funniest and mad creatures they both know.

   Even though she would reply only in one word and who could blame her he sent her atleast about 75000000 texts a day, he figured out it wasn’t working so he started to call her, and being the polite person she is, she would pick up. But once she picked up she did the thing he likes about her the most. She talked, and she talked and she kept on talking. Nonstop stories about random people he hadn’t the faintest idea about, a trait which never left her and he would somehow enjoy all this beyond limit, a trait which never left him.

About a couple of months after he had asked her out he learnt that she had broken up and for good. (All those starting to think that here comes the happy ending, you couldn’t be more wrong) This was a potentially good situation from his point of view and yet he managed to screw it up again because of his happiness and inexperience with girls. He asked her out the very next day. Yeah he did. Well no prizes for guessing the answer. But yet again she did not break off links with him and no hints of awkwardness in the friendship.

 Time moved on and he began to accept that this was never going to be. He showed the happiest face but was distraught and heartbroken from inside. He looked for rebounds and even got one or two, which I will talk about later.

                 *************************************************

    He finally began to accept the fact that she wasn’t his but deep down he knew that he wasn’t over her and so he started to look for rebounds to get over. But like the total screw up he is he began dating a classmate of hers only and even though everyone knew it was the most stupid relationship ever. Neither really had any feelings for the other and it lasted just 10 days in which they met once, nor was the maximum they said to each other “I like you.”  They both then wisely mutually decided to breakup, but then something major happened, that would change his life for a long long time. The day he broke up with her classmate he decided that enough was enough he will tell her everything he felt in one heartwarming message and he did, only she was in school and even if she had her phone would not be able to read it then. Then he gave his phone to a friend in the bus to listen to music and went off to sleep. Now that friend thought he was sad because of his breakup (when infact he was sad because she was not his and his heart was hers) so he like a good friend sent one big ‘Come back to me’ message to her classmate. Guess what? They both opened their phones together sitting on the same seat and both of them had a long text from his phone asking them to date him. The only thing was he only sent one. As you can guess all hell broke loose and a huge fight filled with abuses, insults,etc ensued and his friendship with her also ended and that too for one whole year. They both hated each other and that too with good cause. She hated him for a month maybe and then stopped caring; he hated her for 2 days maybe and started loving again (though she had much more reason to hate to be fair).

     Over the course of the next year he tried to get over her by dating other people, he had relationships. Three to be precise and they lasted for 14, 17 and 23 days respectively.  All of them cut short because he knew they weren’t the one and only she was. He was in 12^th so he decided to concentrate on studies and forget all this. He managed to do this, for a month. He then sent a text to her. No reply.  Same process went on for quite a while sending everything from ‘hi’ to ‘santa banta’ jokes. He went to her school fete and even saw her but didn’t muster the courage to talk because of all the bad blood he created. She messaged him that day saying she saw him and she liked his t-shirt. That made his day! She liked his t-shirt and she told him! He replied and they texted for a while after like 6 months. Awkward courtesy conversation, but a conversation all the same. The next day? Back to square one he texted no reply. The texting became nonexistent as time went by he stopped after a couple of days of trying. However his heart was not done and as the school timings got shifted he got off later than her school did so he used to bribe his gate keeper 50-100 rs a day just to go out and watch her leave in her bus. He did that everyday for a month and a half. He once thought of going to her place and sorting it out, and he did go also but froze as soon as he saw her and returned without her seeing him.  Many such incidents happened but he never spoke to her.                                                                                    

   Then the boards came and during the boards to wish her he tried her number everyday to wish her. Everyday it was switched off. Then one day after the boards it rang, oh yes it rang like Beethoven to his ears and he was so excited. She didn’t pick up but soon after he got a text saying hi and he replied with a hi. Everyone was joining coaching for entrance exams and he had an option between two equidistant places but one was more easily accessible. But the more tough to reach place was closer to her house and he assumed she would also take coaching in the area so he may bump into her. He did.

As time went by they became more than friends they were inseparable and this time she used to text him too. They were speaking exactly after one year and this time he kept his excitement in check and didn’t message all day. They hardly attended coaching and used to chill all day long. Eventually the liking started as much as he tried to control it, it was back. The difference was it was from both sides this time. Things he never experienced started, lovesongs being quoted on the sly to each other giving hints. Hints were not needed. They both knew they liked each other but neither said it. Lovely times. They got to the saying part also but still didn’t start dating.

  One fine day he decided enough was enough, he knew she liked lemon chocolates he went with his friend on his scooty. Roamed all of Delhi before finding them, picked up a rose, prepared a speech and went to meet her. When he finally got to asking her out  he got very nervous. After 4 years of meeting her and 2 years of liking her he finally had a fair chance of dating her. He was so nervous his heart was in his mouth. He forgot the emotional speech and just blurted out “will you go out with me?” (most unromantic ask out ever). Thank the heavens for him that she said yes and relief was all over his face. Finally she was his. Finally.

The End.