Story of that one day
When I woke up on that fine Monday morning, while the alarm roaring on my head and me trying to plead and argue with it, 5 mins more please, I didn't know that this would turn out to be the day when my life would change forever. I had a hectic day ahead of me with the project sign-off getting closer and my ‘not-so-good’ initially and ‘nobody-can-part-us’ lately, friend was in town and wanted to see me. Being from a Punjabi clan , he wanted to pay his visit to “Bangla Saheb” and though not a Punjabi but I wanted to do the same.
The cab , reached on time at 6:50 am and I was late, as usual.
Cab Driver : “Madam please time pe aa jaya karo”
Me ( with full confidence): Bhaiya missed call hi nahi milti time pe. Aap call karna bhul gae hoge ( Of-course I lied, I didn't have a better excuse).
With rather confident and ‘don’t-disturb-me-anymore’ expressions, I sat throughout my Cab journey till Manesar. Headphones plugged in, world does not exist anymore.
The day was great, My manager took my suggestions on a couple of things , my name was recommended for a high-value project, a couple of jokes here and there with colleagues and I could download a movie with 100 kbps downloading speed , that too in office. Yeah right, as if such a day could possibly exist. The day sucked as usual, my leaves were cancelled because of some so called BIG project coming up. I was supposed to leave early but instead I didn’t get a cab back at half day so I had to tag up with a few offices chaps playing songs like “Tau hat jaa” with full volume. The traffic made the journey worse and by the time i reached home and could change into a suit it was already 6 pm.
Mom: Beta , ab kya karogi jaakar, wapas aane me 10 baj jayenge.
Me(bringing the confidence back): Nahi nahi maa, airport metro haina, 15 mins me New delhi se Dwarka pahuchaati hai. So i would be back soon. ( as if it could happen)
Mom: Its raining outside. Avoid it if you can.
She finally gave up because I made a please-let-me-go-i-would-do-everything-right-for-a-week face.
Being a tomboy, carrying a suit initially felt awkward but I managed. I had to de-board at Rajouri Garden metro station and then tag along with my best friend. He found me first amid-st the crowd and stood there surprised and took a photograph of mine and for the first time i blushed. He said, you look like a girl and a pretty one. I blushed again. ( What is wrong with me? Stop with the hopeless smile)
He didn't take his eyes off me throughout the entire journey and I was feeling something different between us this time. He had just returned from Commando training and had become amazingly fit and good-looking (or something was wrong with me?). He was charmingly beautiful, his smile had an innocence and the golden-ish brown hair looked perfect on his rather pink-ish complexion. In that moment I realized I have always wanted him more than a friend, more than my best friend. he asked me if you could walk to Bangla Saheb and I nodded (I didn’t like walking, what was I doing?). We had a best friend problem sharing session at Bangla saheb. While going back, he held my hand and made me cross the road and I didn’t want to let go of his hand. We reached the Shivaji Stadium metro station and there was an urge to ask him if he felt the same. The day was going to get over and I wanted to hear so much. Paced up heartbeat, increasing pain of the day getting over and his ohh-so-charming smile. I gathered all my guts and said after 15 mins, “I want to tell you something”. He turned towards me and said “What? Tell me”.
In that moment, i went through what he has been to me, how much he meant, I might loose him forever and finally words came out of my mouth “Nothing”. He judged that it was not the case and here came “Dwarka” . I said “This is me. We will meet soon”. He said “ I would de-board with you and drop you home. I am not leaving you like this and I shall not leave you till you tell me”. This was so un-usual of him. Usually he was a quiet, self controlled person who didn’t ask a question and here he was jumping on his toes, wanting to hear what I had to say and insisting on me telling it right away. After 15 mins of the insistence and denial class I finally gave up and said “ I don’t want to fall in love with you and (long pause)……. and I think I already have”. He bent down, held his knees with both hands,head bowed down. I was about to leave, loosing everything, hope, love and my best friend when he stood up and said “It took you so much time to say that”. For the first time I saw tears in his eyes and for the very first time he hugged someone and that someone was me. Life has never been the same after that and I am very happy that I wore a suit that day.
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