by Durjoy Datta
‘Get over her!’ Mittal told me.
‘Mittal, it’s just a break.’
‘That is exactly what I am trying to tell you. She will come back. Just wait for her. Why do you have to follow her around!’ he explained and lit a cigarette. He blew two smoke rings, the second one smaller than the first, and blew the second ring right through the first one. He smiled, impressed with himself.
‘I am not following her around.’
‘You are … if you had it your way you would have gone to the movie hall today and waited till the movie got over,’ he said.
‘Movie hall?’ I asked.
‘What? They have gone for a movie, right?’
‘Who? They?’
‘Kabir and Avantika.’
‘What?’ I said, as I spontaneously internally combusted.
Shashank, who had been quietly working on a case study all this time, now spoke up, ‘Stop kidding, Mittal.’
They exchanged a nervous stare. Shashank knew too. They had gone for a movie and I was the last one to know. Simply fucking great! Mittal told me her whole study group had planned to watch a movie but people had dropped out, leaving just the two of them. Fuming, I left the room, despite the repeated pleas of Mittal and Shashank to relax. I went to my room and checked the newspaper for the places where the movie was playing. A quick permutation calculation told me that I had to be at ten places at the same time to be sure I could catch them after the movie; there was no way I could have guessed where they had gone.
I decided to wait.
My heart pounded as my eyes followed the second hand on my watch turn. I left my room and headed for the main gate of our college. I walked around in circles, sat, drank cups of coffee, answered roughly to the guards, who seemed concerned, and desperately tried to make time go faster. My eyes were stuck on the approach road to MDI and I looked for his car. I had been waiting for four hours for them to come back from that wretched movie.
I saw both of them sitting in the car, laughing, as it whizzed past me. The car did not enter the MDI gate, it just went straight ahead. Where the fuck are they going now?
It was eight in the night and she had switched off her phone after my twentieth call. The classes of the other sections were over and students had started idling in the open grounds of the campus; joggers were out jogging.
They had been together for seven hours now. Exhausted and angry, I walked around the campus, directionless and lost. As a last-ditch effort, I called on Kabir’s number but a woman said in an irritating voice, ‘The phone number you’re trying to reach is out of coverage area.’ I slumped down on the bench. I waited for Malini to run past me.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked Malini.
‘Nothing.’
I sighed and put my words in order. ‘She is out with Kabir today.’
‘I know. I saw them leave the campus,’ said Malini and added after a pause, ‘Don’t think too much.’
‘I wish.’
‘You want to talk about it?’ she asked me.
‘Maybe not.’
‘I am stinking right now, so let me just come back in five. And if you’re still here by that time, we can talk,’ said Malini.
‘I don’t want to talk about that bastard,’ I said.
‘Fine,’ said Malini with a grin and walked away.
I held my head in my hands and waited for her to come back. I had once asked Avantika, when we had started going out, what she would think of the girl who would make me cheat on her. Avantika had said she would not blame the girl. ‘Why shouldn’t she have her share of fun?’ she had asked. But I blamed Kabir. He knew everything about the two of us, and was still trying to charm his way into her life.
It was dark and most of the students had returned to the hostels to complete assignments, prepare presentations, and maybe, just to catch up on some sleep. Malini, smelling of fresh flowers and detergent, came and sat next to me.
‘Did you ask her how the movie was?’ asked Malini.
‘That’s not funny.’
‘No, it isn’t,’ she said as she lit up a cigarette. ‘Want one?’
‘No, thank you.’
‘Want to talk about what happened?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know. She just wanted a break for a little while. It has been more than fifteen days now. Now, this Kabir issue, it is totally freaking me out and I don’t know what to do.’
‘It’s just a phase. It will go away. You want me to talk to her?’ she said.
‘No, it is fine.’
‘Please let me do something for you. The guilt is killing me. And it won’t go until I see you both together,’ she said and I saw those tears again in her eyes.
‘We will be together,’ I said. It was more of a wish than a belief.
‘I hope so.’
‘Anyway, how’s your boyfriend? Samarth, was it? Did you tell him?’
‘There is nothing to talk about him.’ She looked away from me, closed her eyes and blew the smoke out from her nostrils. ‘And I don’t want to talk about him.’
I sat there wishing her life sucked more than mine. She took long drags on her cigarette which burnt to a bright orange. She said, ‘He cheated on me.’
‘Did you use me to get back at him?’
‘Do you think I would need to use you? I could have used your friend,’ grumbled Malini, ‘Mittal. I kissed you because I was angry and drunk. That’s all there is to it. It was a mistake. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be.’
‘I am. I really didn’t intend to use you.’
‘I was just thinking you did it to me because you thought I was hot,’ I joked; it wasn’t even funny to me.
‘You are irresistible,’ she mocked and lit up another cigarette. While it hung limply from her lips, she muttered, ‘Don’t you see all the girls lining up?’
‘Don’t push it.’
‘I have been told my sarcasm is endearing,’ said Malini.
‘It’s not,’ I corrected.
After a while she said, ‘Avantika wouldn’t like it if she knows that you were with me.’
‘She is out with Kabir, isn’t she?’
‘Revenge won’t help you win her back,’ she said.
‘It’s not revenge. Shashank and Mittal are both sceptical about the way I am reacting to the whole situation, so I really can’t talk to them. And I don’t want to tell anyone else about it.’
‘Why do you care if they know?’ asked Malini, and as if to prove that she didn’t, she waved at a couple that passed by us. ‘I seriously don’t give a fuck.’
We sat there for an hour, and we didn’t talk; she smoked and I hoped there was nothing to worry about.
That night, as I ambled around the cafeteria, fiddling with my phone, avoiding eye contact with my classmates lest they saw my reddened eyes, I saw Avantika walking to the library, bundles of notes stuck precariously in her armpit, a pen clenched between her teeth. Our eyes met for a brief awkward moment. She hurried past me before I could say anything.
Back in the hostel, Kabir was sleeping, still in his shoes. Suppressing an urge to smother him with a pillow, I walked back to my room and opened the research methodology book with the hope of studying for the pop quiz next day, but the thought was ambitious. Almost involuntarily, I dialled her number and she cut the line immediately.
I texted her to ask where she had been the entire day, and she texted me back telling me she was busy and she didn’t have the time to read my texts. Kabir’s ugly face flashed in front of my face, and he was laughing, cursing and telling me that I had lost Avantika, and that he would be the one taking her out on dates and movies and romantic sojourns. Angry and frustrated, I called Malini.
‘Hey,’ she said.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked her.
‘You seem to be angry.’
‘That is because I am,’ I said. ‘Can I see you at the canteen?’
A few minutes later, Malini and I were walking towards the canteen nearest to the
library. She was carrying a book on retail finance in her hands, the pages of which were folded and colour coded.
‘Do you need to study?’ I asked.
She laughed. ‘No, not really. I’m hoping to pass the exams by my undeniable charm. Where’s Avantika? Did you get to talk to her?’
‘Library,’ I said.
‘Slow down,’ she said as she tried hard to keep pace with me as I walked towards the canteen. She touched my shoulder in order to tell me to take it easy; it was awkward and she withdrew her hand.
At the canteen, we ordered noodles and pulled up chairs under the solitary street light. The noodles were hot, watery and spicy, just as I liked them.
‘So how long do we plan to sit here and look at the library? I could have got my stalker binoculars,’ she said. Then added wistfully, ‘You are so hopelessly in love with her, aren’t you?’
‘I am just okayishly in love,’ I said, trying not to sound sissy. ‘I am sorry to have got you here.’
‘I am the very reason you are here. You needn’t be sorry. I needed to get out of the room anyway,’ she said.
I ate my noodles in silence and she flipped through her book, making small notes in the margins as she went. When distracted, she would tell me about her life back in Toronto—about her school, about the beautiful freckled white boys she dated as a schoolgirl. I listened to her intently as I finished her noodles as well, which she said were too spicy for her taste. Time and again, she would ask me about my old days in school, and I would tell her about my weight problem, and how I was teased for being fat and unhandsome for the greater part of my school life. ‘Thank God you look dapper now!’ she said. ‘No, I don’t,’ I said.
There was no sign of Avantika.
‘Let’s go,’ I said.
‘Where? Library?’ she asked.
‘No. Back to the hostel. I have wasted enough of your time. You really need to mark the hell out of your book and use some more highlighters.’
‘As you say,’ she said.
As I walked past the library, I saw Avantika, her head buried in a thick book, and she looked rather fine. Right across the table, Kabir sat with the same book, underlining furiously.
‘He’s there, too,’ I grumbled. ‘He was in his room an hour back. I saw him.’
‘You should have killed him when you had the chance,’ responded Malini with a straight face.
I tried not to smile. ‘I should have.’
27
Kabir and Avantika had started to spend a lot of time together. They had become like a word from a dictionary which when newly learnt mysteriously pops up in every article that you read. Wanting to get back at her, I started to spend a lot of time with Malini, hoping she would notice, feel jealous and helpless and come crying to me. I would, then, heroically sacrifice my bond of friendship with Malini to keep her happy; and in exchange would ask for nothing but for her to banish Kabir from her life. But she couldn’t care less.
Has she moved on? I found myself asking the question.
I often argued with myself that I should not be around Malini, but every time I saw Avantika with Kabir, I just had to call Malini up. If it was hard for her, it was hard for me too. I needed someone too. Malini was my only way out of depression. That day, we had planned to watch a movie together since Shashank had told me that he had seen Kabir and Avantika hanging out together at a mall where he had gone with Farah.
It was hot and by the time we reached the movie hall in my old Maruti Zen, which had seen much better days in the past decade, we were sweating and I was embarrassed.
‘Should have taken my car,’ pointed out Malini.
‘I guess,’ I said; my shirt was wet and stuck to my skin. I stood in the line to buy our tickets, flapping my hands and jerking my head like a drenched dog.
‘What is love to you?’ asked Malini.
‘I don’t know,’ I said irritably.
‘Don’t be so lame,’ she said as we stood in line for popcorn.
‘I can’t put it in words,’ I said. ‘My shirt’s still so wet. Should I go stand under the dryer in the washroom? That should do it.’
‘We are in a management course. This is what we should be good at.’ She smiled.
‘Fine. Let me try.’
‘Please do,’ she said.
‘Love isn’t a feeling for me, it’s her. She is pretty much my definition for it. I mean she taught me what it was. She made me feel what it was. She made me do all the insane things that I did for her, things that we did together, things that she did for me. Over the last three years, she has been love for me. She still is … always will be. I had once heard in a movie that the power in a relationship lies with the one who cares less. Before Avantika came around, I had always been powerful because I cared less and always protected myself from getting hurt. Avantika changed that. She changed me …’ I paused. ‘We should go in …’
The movie started and people rushed in.
‘We should stay. It’s cold inside and with your wet shirt, you will catch a cold. Anyway, this is better,’ she took my hand and pulled me to the food court. She ordered lattes for both of us, and I ordered french fries with extra ketchup. ‘Continue.’
‘Continue?’
‘Whatever you were saying about love … and her,’ said Malini. ‘Interesting stuff.’
‘I said what I had to. I just love her. I don’t know what love is, or how it is supposed to be, but she is the closest I will ever get to it.’
‘She changed you, you said. So what were you? A player … because you don’t look like one.’ She laughed.
‘Whatever.’
‘Aww! But you do look cute, when you get all lovey-dovey and stuff. No wonder she adores you. You’re like a little lost puppy.’
‘Thank you, but nowadays, she adores that son of a bitch.’
‘C’mon. Don’t be such a kid. She will come back. Kabir is not her kind of guy.’
‘I know. Somehow I fear she will not. I cheated on her and now, I am sitting with the same girl I cheated on her with, while she is on a break. And I didn’t say that to make you feel guilty again.’
She shrugged. ‘Samarth got drunk and made out twice with two different girls in three days. It is acceptable, as long as the girlfriend doesn’t get to know. But I do know now. Guys should either learn to lie better or just keep their dicks inside their pants.’
‘What did you do?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Hurt?’ I asked.
She told me she was crushed. ‘He’s there in Canada and I’m here. I think it was my fault I thought this could work. But love is different from lust, isn’t it? I mean even if he makes out with someone else, he can still be in love with me, right?’
‘Yes. Probably.’
Malini told me that she first met Samarth on a summer camp when he was a freckled, frail teenager. They kept in touch and he grew into a buff, strong guy, and she, into a womanly girl. They had to be together, she said wistfully while playing with her fries, her voice devoid of sarcasm. I saw the love-struck side of her, which was adorable yet out of place. No matter how much she tried to show how tough and brave she was from the outside, from the inside, she was soft and mushy, like melted vanilla ice cream.
28
‘Where were you? I have been calling you since fucking eternity,’ Shashank asked.
‘With Malini. Where else?’ quipped Mittal. ‘I told you that you will get over Avantika. Malini isn’t a bad choice, Deb.’
‘I’m not over her.’
He shut up. I couldn’t recall the last time Mittal had not thought from his dick. I did not blame him though; he reminded me of a caricatured old me, with a little more hormones raging in his veins and his pants.
‘What’s going on with Malini?’ asked Shashank, in a gruff tone. It seemed as if it was his responsibility to take care that I didn’t screw up anything I had with Avantika.
‘Nothing,’ I said.
‘He wants to bang her,’ Mittal said. H
e lit a cigarette, took a long drag, and blew it from his nostrils, eyes closed as if meditating. ‘That’s what every guy wants to do with her.’
‘… I have to keep myself occupied,’ I said.
‘Deb needs to keep his dick occupied,’ retorted Mittal.
‘Mittal, will you please shut the fuck up?’ Shashank said angrily.
‘If you say so … but just remember, it is all about sex,’ he said and walked out of the room. We could hear a ‘hello’ in the background. He was on the phone again.
Shashank continued, ‘Now, what is the matter? Tell me. Why Malini? Are you trying to make Avantika jealous?’
‘Part of it, yes.’
‘It’s a stupid plan, Deb,’ said Shashank, furiously tapping on his laptop. He was days behind on an assignment that he had asked Mittal and me to do, but we couldn’t make head or tail of it.
‘It makes my days easier,’ I said. ‘Besides, she is with Kabir.’
‘It’s still a stupid plan.’
I did not want to talk about it; it was already hard enough not to think about her. Frankly, I had had enough of advice from people who had never been in a relationship before.
In a split second, Shashank went from my relationship troubles to shouting at me for not attending the organizational behaviour classes. The professor took class participation seriously and gave a hard time to whoever missed his classes. Shashank said I had exhausted all my allowed leave and I should go prepared to his next class. As always, he had marked whatever I needed to study for the next class and told me he would personally ask me questions from it.
I browsed through the chapter, and nothing really made sense so I crammed it all up. Mittal left the course midway, saying that the professor would call me for the presentation, not him, since I was the notorious absentee. Management education is like being in an army camp with unfit, non-charming, ridiculous-looking jug heads. Deadlines are sacrosanct and absenteeism is looked down upon. The first battle lines of the corporate world are drawn in the management campuses itself; everyone’s looking over their shoulders, wondering if they would be the ones laid off after ten years in the company that decides it needs to cut down and hire young blood and outside candidates.
