A Stuttering Love Story - Part 3

THE PLEDGE AND THE GUN (18th Aug - 4th Sep)

The dope helped me sleep, but didn't solve the basic problem - how to get SB like me enough to bed me. It was around this time that I told 'J' that I was trying to woo a girl. Knowing my nature, he advised me to be very careful about judging girl's mood and never to disagree with her. Sensible advise. Only not very clear about reading girl's mood part. I wished he could gift me a Saiyan scouter. One click and you get to read all thoughts above girl's head. Sadly, none was invented yet.

On 18th evening, I got a call from SB, telling me that she was indeed staying back in hostel for a week after the term. A million fireworks exploded in my mind. Already I had started fantasizing about the sex filled week. That night I vowed, that I won't jerk-off until I get to fuck SB. Now this might not sound much of a sacrifice, but I had been a serial masturbator since my teens, and this act meant a great deal for me. If this inactivity made me sleepless, I had the luxury of getting stoned.

I was under the impression that SB decided to stay back in hostel because I suggested so. So if she had any doubts regarding me not staying back or giving her company, I thought I should snuff these doubts sooner than later. So when we went for our jaunt the next time, I ask her to let me hold her hand.

"Why?" she asked, taken aback by this sudden request.

"I don't want to be punched after what I have to say to you. That right hook of yours fucking stings." I parrot a dialogue I came up after great deal of effort.

"Really, you didn't wince much that day." She said jovially, referring to the day she decided to practice her punches on my palms.

"Yeah, my palms are hard, my face isn't," I reply, wishing she doesn't counter. We were digressing from what I had on my mind.

"Listen," I say in a serious tone.

"In the coming weeks, I am going to become really selfish." I tell her.

"Selfish? Why?" she asks.

"You know, we don't have much time left together, hardly 20 days." I say to her and pause, trying to remember what my next line was supposed to be.

She nods.

"And I want to spend as much time as I can in your company, and hope that when we are through, you'll fall for me as hard as I fell for you." I say slowly, pretending that I was gathering my thoughts.

"Ankit, I really can't promise anything right now." She says. This dalliance should have rang alarm bells in my mind, but I was just too happy to deliver my dialogues realistically.

"Ok, take your time, I am in no hurry." I say while slowly letting go of her hand. I must confess that holding hands with another person was just as pleasant as holding worms for me. But people more experienced than me (read the Sage) had predicted that it has a comforting effect on girls. I wasn't so sure about this. When people opted for longer than a second handshakes with me, my default response is to squirm my hands out of his grip.

10 days pass by without much happening. In fact, I thought my last meeting had entirely opposite effect on SB than what I intended. We were hardly catching up, or rather she was hardly catching up with me. She had in fact become quite ingenious with her excuses...boils on foot while dancing, going out for eating (would have been credible, if she wasn't using this every other day), sulking alone in room were to name a few. Common sense dictates that given her tepid responses, I should have backed off, let her call me when she wanted to see me. But things that appeared so obvious in hindsight, were completely overlooked by me. Entrenched in the belief that she has fallen for me, I used to rationalize her excuses. Never bothering to take my head out of my ass to assess my situation objectively.

On 28th afternoon, while I was busy finishing off a project before its deadline, I get an unexpected call from SB. Both of us dreaded calls, and avoided calling each other unless it was absolutely necessary.

"Ankit, I had to tell you something," she says.

"Go on."

"My course is getting over on 4th Sep., and I really think that I should prepone my tickets."

"When are you planning to leave," I ask, not really interested, but I needed a few seconds to gather my wits.

"On 5th or 6th."

"Ok," that's all I say.

"I thought I should let you know, since you booked your tickets based on mine," she says with a tinge of guilt.

"SB, when you want to leave is your call to take, not mine," I tell her and hang up. I punch the cupboard before me repeatedly till my knuckles begin to bleed. The cabinet is stuck tightly into its enclosure. Although I hadn't been entirely honest to my self respect lately, I couldn't grovel before SB to stay back.

Only a couple of minutes later, a message from SB tells me that she wasn't changing the flight. I felt like she was holding my dick with one hand and a gun to my head with the other, unsure about what she wanted to blow.

I wasn't sure what to make of the situation. Her tone was serious, but the briskness with which she texted seemed to suggest that she was joking. Either way, I wasn't amused. I didn't reply or call her to seek explanations. She wasn't the only one who could turn cold.

STRANGLED UP IN BLUE (5th Sep - 11th Sep)

Finally, the week I had been desperately waiting for had arrived. Despite her promise that she wasn't going to leave, I still harbored doubts that she will leave any day, leaving me to jerk off or get high on weed by myself. Checking the ticket prices, I assured myself that if she hadn't already preponed her tickets, she was unlikely to do so anymore.

So like Mr. Burns, I was rubbing my hands, thinking "Excellent." Time to harvest the seeds I sowed 2 months ago. On 4th Sep, the entire batch had its exams over. Anyone who hadn't left by the evening, was planning to do so by the next morning. Our corridor, which is always ringing with the noise of cans hitting the floor, became silent. Only one of my friends who had his hands full with projects stayed back, but he too had a tendency to get drunk in the night and sleep till afternoon. So, apart from us rubbing shoulders somewhere around lunch, I was pretty much on my own.

With the intention of inviting her to my room, I asked SB, if I could treat her for a movie (3rd time). Rather than replying to the question, she told me she wanted to go to the city as she had some work to do.

My mind raced to guess what she wanted to do in city - sex obsessed as I was, I could think of only one thing - she thinks that I don't have any condoms, so she wants to buy them from city. Only two days back, she disclosed her reservations about getting raped in Greece (a place she was told was almost as safe as Delhi for women) and that she was warned to carry condoms everywhere. Was she leading me on? I remarked nonchalantly that having spent all her life in Delhi among sex starved men, she would feel right at home in Greece. This conversation was happening in the mess, so the people we were sharing table with were gaping us wide-eyed.

When I took the bus to the city with her, I came to know that it were the loan documents she wanted to collect from the old part of the shithole city. I cursed my excitement under my breath. It wasn't the first time that my wild imagination filled me with baseless ideas that crashed and left splinters in my mind.

The bus took us to a place called cloth market, a cramped street with cloth and sundry outlets on either side. Whatever space on the street wasn't encroached by the shops, was brimming with pedestrians, strays and vehicles. If you walked to the left, you risked being dragged into one of the shops by over enthusiastic shopkeepers, to your right vehicles scraped past. Out of chivalry (and my irritation with shopkeepers), I stayed on the right. SB was adept at warding off shopkeepers with one angry look. She dragged me around to an old Central bank of India branch. The building seemed truly historic. Not in a good sense. There were cracks in the wall, pigeon nests inside the bank, and if my eyes weren't mistaken because of power cut, I thought I saw pigeon dropping on security guard's cap. I spent some 45 minutes in that wreck of a place, while she went about gathering her documents.

"I am sorry, I bothered you for this shit," she apologized.

"Don't be, I had nothing better to do back in hostel," I assured her.

"And I too, had to buy a jean, my last one has been reduced to rags," I tell her.

"Don't get me started on shopping, once I start, I can't stop," she says, and I brush it off as a banality that every girl utters. I was wrong. In the next 4 hours, I spent about 15 minutes to buy a jean and she spent the rest buying slippers, handbags and a suit. I sauntered along, keeping my views regarding her choices to myself. The closest she came to a chemist shop on this tour was to buy a couple of strepsils. Not condoms.

This trip left me really befuddled about her intentions. I was starting to believe that her extended stay had nothing to do with me. She really wanted to get her exchange shit together and my role was simply to accompany her on her missions. Like a faithful boy toy. That night, a wet dream about a random girl broke my pledge. I guess my dick had realized that I wasn't going to get anything from SB, and decided to help itself.

On 7th, SB asked me out for movie in college auditorium. I had by now given up hope that anything physical was going to happen between us. If it had to, it would already have. Not being able to screw her was disheartening. But doubts about my chances were even more bugging.

Somehow, I dread the question 'what if' more than 'why the fuck I did.' So I decided that once the movie is over, I was going to ask her straight. But what exactly I was going to ask remained a mystery to me.

I am not a regular hindi movie watcher, so even crappy hindi movies seem hilarious to me. Such was the case with 'Shudhh Desi Romance.' Many audience leave midway, but I was howling in laughter. True that story didn't make much sense. I didn't mind. The movie was a welcome distraction from the trouble I was facing. And yeah, watching the movie, alone with a girl was another first for me. When the movie was over, I suggested that we take a longer route to campus. When we made it to a sufficiently deserted place, I thought it was right time to pop the question.

"SB, Can I ask you something."

"Sure."

"Since the time we met, has my attraction been one sided? Do you think of me just as a friend or something more?" fumbling, I managed to knit this filmy string of words. We walk for a while before she thinks the question through.

"Ankit, I had told you before, we could never be more than friends. Relationship was out of question for me," she replies. My suspicions confirmed. The struggling flame finally put out. Time to lay all my cards on table.

"When you told me you weren't ready for commitment, I still thought that I had some chance, even if just 1%, to change your mind," I tell her.

"Just remember that, whatever I did, it was for that fighting chance to win you over," my final confession.

"Just to let you know," she says, "you tried too hard."

"If a girl had to fall for you, she would have with half the effort," A lecture straight from the heart. A lecture I really needed to hear.

"You invited me for a movie, so many times, even when I was clearly trying to avoid. Any idea, how uncomfortable it was making me?" She says, her words stinging me worse than any bitch slap.

I didn't bother to explain myself, explain that it wasn't a lifelong marathon I was running to win her, it was a 2 month sprint; and in a sprint you give everything away. I wouldn't have tried this hard if I had the luxury of time.

Instead I say, "I guess you're right, I went too far on wrong assumptions. Forgive me for that."

"One final piece of advice," she says, "No matter how much you like a person, don't stoop too low for her, don't change who you are."

"Hmmm...," was all I managed to mumble. Dismayed less because what she said was true, and more because she had seen through all my acts. Desperate to fuck her, I had become what I wasn't. I knew this better than her. But hearing these words out so bluntly had a humbling effect on me.

"I am sorry if you feel bad," she says when I stay silent for too long.

"Don't be, It was a reality check I badly needed. With things being clear now, I feel at peace actually," I tell her truthfully.

I bid her farewell. As a friend, as an acquaintance, as a stranger. With each step I take I find her magnetic pull sapping. The self respect that I had cut and slashed to be with her will begin to heal soon.

Knowing that I wasn't going to sleep with her, I was free from the pressure to impress her. The lightness that had surrounded me right after she told me that nothing existed between us came back with even greater force. I was gliding to my room on second floor, three stairs at a time, go to Sumit's (the only friend, still remaining in hostel) room instead of mine, where predictably, a booze party in going on. Unconcerned about the people giving Sumit company, I declare, "Bhai, finally ho gaya break-up." As if break-up is possible in a one sided love affair.

"Roll me a joint," I ask him, "I want to take this freedom to new level."

"And to our health we drank a thousand times, it's time to ramble on..." - Led Zeppelin (Ramble On)