I entered LT-F about 10 minutes before the class was
supposed to start. My eyes scanned the huge lecture theater and found a seat
which was fairly distant from the ones occupied by confident looking guys and
girls. I sat there, wiped the sweat off and waited for rest of the students and
the professor to arrive.
The few students who were already present seemed to know
each other, as I could tell listening to their conversations. But if they knew
each other why would they sit so far from each other and almost have to shout
to let the other person hear them? I turned around a little bit and noticed
some white bits of paper stuck to the front of the tables. There was also a
number written on those bits. Were they seat numbers? And then I remembered 65
written on my class schedule. My seat number was 65 and I got up from my seat
and searched for my original seat. I found 68. It was occupied by a beautiful
girl, a girl who I thought would never want to be my friend and for some
reason, I didn't want to be her friend either. I loved simplicity and she didn't
look like a simple girl. She looked like one of those who love leading any
freaking social cause in Delhi colleges, love dressing up in a mix of ethnic
and western clothes and love to pretend that they are bringing change.
My low level of
confidence never allowed me to be friends with confident looking beautiful girls.
So, I moved on from fixating on her and found the empty seat of 67. Moving in
the same direction, I found 66. I blushed.
She didn't seem very good looking, nor any simpler than the
girl on 68 but she looked cheerful. I don’t know what was making her so happy
but the way she smiled, I couldn't resist smiling too. And what made me happier
was that I was supposed to sit next to her.
So I pushed my chubby body through whatever little space
there was to reach seat number 65 and sat down, pretending to be alone in the
class. I wanted to turn to my left and introduce myself but wouldn't that be weird?
Wouldn't she creep out? And not only her, wouldn't the other students as well
think of me as a weirdo? And if I decide to introduce myself to her, wouldn't I
have to introduce myself to others as well, moving from one seat to another? So
many hassles in being a friend. It appeared so difficult to be friends with a girl,
at least back then. But Priti changed that for me.
She must have sensed my loneliness in class and perhaps that’s
why asked about a screen guard for her laptop, took my number and would make
excuses to talk to me. Eventually, I got comfortable with her and she no longer
had to make excuses. I couldn't wait to get to class and hide her stuff, or
push her chair down and she would laugh so much, like a baby playing peekaboo.
The sound of her laugh was evilish but seeing her happy gave a different high.
She was into poetry which was my ticket to become her best
friend, or maybe it was something else but who cares as long as she called you
her bestie in front of her friends. She made me like sufi music and introduced
me to spirituality and I knew my life had been changed. She seemed like someone
who was sent by God to help people overcome their pain. There was nobody who wasn't
hated by at least one person and there was nobody who disliked Priti even a
little bit. The ones who did, were just pretending, as was made clear later on.
Priti didn't have types, anybody could be her friend and
once they were, you couldn't hide anything from her, she was that easy to talk
to. All this, kind of made me proud to be her best friend and also scared me as
I didn't know what I would do without her after we’re done with our course.
And this fear, often made us fight. We both liked each other
a lot and expected each other to feel the same way. And whenever, this didn't seem
to happen, we would fight. We would fight because the other person wouldn't have
enough time to talk and as a punishment, we won’t talk to each other until one
of us would apologize.
But we still remained friends. Priti loved dhaba food and I loved
going out with her, knowing too well that dhaba f weren't a part of my weight
loss diet. I loved spending time with her and with our different
specializations, we didn't get enough time together or at least not as much as
we would've wanted. So, there was no question to turning down an offer from
her.
There are a million more things I can say Priti, which would
make this the longest blog in the world but I’ll say the most important thing.
We've had our share of fights. They have been minor on you being late for going
to city and major, like the one we had recently. There’s no denying that our
bond has weakened but there’s no doubting that it’s going to last forever nonetheless,
no matter what.
