Chapter 01: When Harry met Sally
"Is mid-twenties blues a real thing or just an urban legend?" Payal asked running pink shimmer gloss on her lips.
"It is complete bullshit," Khushi replied not taking her eyes off gaming console as she deftly killed seven roman soldiers with her long blade. "Where are you off too P? I see lots of war paint being applied." Khushi asked.
"Turn around and check," Payal said tapping her stiletto. Khushi mumbled something and continued her game.
The innocuous tapping finally got to her and she hit pause on the gaming console with a dramatic sigh. "You look awesome, as usual. New guy me suspects." She said cheekily.
Payal smiled drolly and waved blew her a kiss. "You have been out of relationship for a month now. Don't you think you should start going out again?" Payal asked checking her profile for one last time.
"I am fine where I am right now, thanks." Khushi said and fell on her back. She slapped her hand around her sides and found the huge chips packet she was looking for. Without bothering to get up she managed to nudge through the opening and grabbed a handful of them. Payal cringed when Khushi shoved the bunch of chips in her mouth and munched noisily. Crumbs fell on her neck and t-shirt and Payal grimaced at her.
"Whaaa?" Khushi asked, mouthful.
"It's Saturday night Khushi, why don't you come with me? It would be our usual gang." Payal said in a cajoling tone.
"I have no interest in coming to the club where I can't see properly half the time and have to yell loudly over god awful loud music. Thanks but no thanks. Besides, if I go with you I will run to him." She said sitting up suddenly.
"Manish isn't going to be there. I checked with others." Payal answered. "Do you still like him Khushi? Is that why you are holing yourself up in apartment and playing his favorite game all the time?"
Khushi fell on her back again. "That's not true." She said slowly. "I am over him. I am so over him that when he comes in front of him, he will see me flying fifty feet above the ground. And I play this game not because it's his favorite but it helps me strategize better," Khushi ranted.
Payal rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Are you coming or not?" She asked in final tone.
"Nope," she said popping the 'p'.
"Alright then. Have fun alone," Payal said and walked out of their shared apartment.
She heard Payal close main door behind her and slowly sat up. She switched off gaming console and packed the peripherals. She had picked up gaming obsession from her ex-boyfriend, Manish, who spent most of his waking moments playing some game and the rest talking about gaming. To connect with him on a much deeper level, she learnt gaming and unfortunately gaming sucked her into its universe. For three months she slept little and played whenever she wasn't working. Payal had boxed her ears when she found out that Khushi had been taking her laptop to the loo.
But the magnificent relationship had a falling like unwanted meteorite. It fell badly, nastily in a barren land where no one could see the glory of its burn. She had hopelessly fallen in love with Manish but he hadn't seen anything past casual dating phase. After being dumped awkwardly and very publicly, she sat in a corner and cried for fifteen minutes before pulling the console and drowning herself in the land of Azeroth.
The constant failure in love department had her believe that she was one of those people in chick-flick movies who were constantly failing in love but in the last twenty minutes of the movie they would get the man of their dreams and more.
She was waiting for those last twenty minutes since she was sixteen but unfortunately it was no way in sight.
It was little over seven and she was already bored. There were times during weekends when she desperately craved for work just so the loneliness could be dissolved into something productive. But she wasn't in a mood to do that either. She paced her cluttered room back and forth – as much as the junk on the floor allowed her to and wondered what can be done to eradicate this mind numbing boredom. Her eyes fell on her bookcase with one rack broken and books standing on the verge as if they were about to fall from a cliff and die. It had been several months since she last read a book. She was with Manish for three short months and all she did during that time was gaming.
Before that she was with Rajeev for almost eight months where she was waiting for him to go on one knee but he had turned out to be a lying and cheating bas***d. Rajeev was an intellectual snob who looked down on anyone who was trying to have some fun or be goofy. She liked her fair share of documentaries but that didn't stop her from watching a silly rom-com to unwind which made Rajeev wrinkle his nose. Their relationship had turned for the worse when he called her "immature" making her slam the door on his face and break his nose in the process. Poor Payal had to eat copious amount of jalebis she bought for them to eat while she bitched and moaned about overzealous self-proclaimed mature men.
She decided to start reading books again and flush out the interests which were induced by her ex-boyfriends. Her bookcase was almost empty and she had no freaking clue what was going on in the world of the written word and printed pictures. She had a weak spot for comics and her undying lover for them had made her pack the ones she had had and shove it in attic – away from Rajeev's preening eyes.
Happy with the way things were shaping up in her mind, she decided to visit the bookstore she often did before two boyfriends in succession took over her life as their hostage.
*****
She breathed in the fresh smell of paper and air freshener. The vast space housed a decent load of books and there was one point when she knew every employee there by their first name and also knew their birthdays. She had decided to totally lie about her absence – 'Work related foreign assignment'. That would bring her mini solace to act out her secret fantasy in front of total strangers. It bummed her a little when the first three employees turned out to be new as they politely smiled at her.
She wasn't looking where she was going – which was most of the times and while walking towards 'Fiction' section, her elbow touched intricately arranged books making them topple over to the ground. She quickly turned around, grabbed a magazine on display and hid her face behind it as if she was reading it intently all along.
"That was smooth escape," she heard a man's voice filled with humor. She turned to look at a guy, whose eyes was the exact color of Bournvita – chocolate brown with caramelized dark brown flecks on edges and five-oh-clock shadow.
Bloody hell.
Why am I not surprised? RB, anything you serve is enjoyed with relish. Bring it on...
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