Parineeta

The Past!

"Nandini I know Manik from the time when he was just Manik, plain, simple Manik. We were in fourth when we'd met, actually in third, but never really talked in third because he and I were actually two different kids. He was this sweet, innocent kid, pampered and everybody's favourite, he had the cutest looks, he had a chocolate face and a smile that could melt anybody, and I well..."he took a pause and looked away.
"I was.. tch.. Nandini I came.. come from a broken family and as cool as I seem right now, I was the exact opposite then, just like Manik, while he was a bubbly, smiling kid, I was the one kid who was a rebel, I practically hated everybody because I'd seen what my parents were like and so I thought everybody was the same and I used to treat people the way we treated each other at home.. so I used to be that kid, who would sit in a corner, alone have like a dark metaphorical cloud over his head, the kid that didn't pay attention in class, did not talk to anybody, never nicely, never smiled a bit around people, and never hung around with the other kids or played with them, kind of anti-social" he explained and I looked at him shocked. This guy, the one person I know can never stop talking and teasing and annoying someone was an anti-social, I could never imagine Cabir hating people or being alone for any reason and all of this was indigestible for me.
"So everything was like going fine, I was the same uninteractive, irritated by everyone and everything, and Manik was everyone's favourite until we entered fourth grade and realised there were other classed above us, we had seniors, seniors who could actually be difficult to deal with" he continued. I couldn't where this conversation was headed but I wanted to listen to all of it.
"So when we entered fourth grade, the first half of the year went fine but gradually I saw Manik a little less chirpy, alittle less talkative, something was changing about him, his looks, alot, his behaviour alittle, it was as if he was trying to look unlike himself, and you know, I hated approaching people to talk to but one day when I saw Manik seat himself in the corner of the class away from the crowd, I reached out.. I walked to his desk as a bunch of sixth graders entered our class and stood at the gate as if searching for someone, I hardly cared. I looked at Manik who at that point looked terrified.." he chuckled slightly.
"You know Manik has turned himself into The Manik Malhotra so much that he probably doesn't even remember all of this, all of how it actually happened, how The Manik Malhotra came into existence but yeah so that day I sensed Manik's discomfort and I was curious to know what was so terrifying for him that he'd stopped talking to people and stopped coming into notice.."Cabir sighed and I was hooked, I did not care anymore if this whole story was to defend him or make me look at him in a better light, I just wanted to know whatever happened before I came into his life.
"I was anxious, since I was never into the talking, and hated engaging with people more so, I was having thoughts, second thoughts but that particular day I brushed away all of it and stood right opposite him on the other side of his desk as he looked at an open book, alittle apprehensive.. I did not say anything and he kept his buried in the book for the next five minutes as I heard some shuffling of steps 'he's not here' I heard someone say followed by 'aye He nai it's a She man.. such a girl that guy, even looks like a..' the voices faded as the senior guys from the sixth grade left the class disappointed.
I turned to look at Manik and his body posture was bent as if trying to hide away, sweat beads on his forehead, I couldn't understand what had happened to him and so not being able to contain my questions, I leaped towards him bending over the desk and he, as If on cue, jumped back..
'hey' I'd said as he'd looked up at me like I was a monster who'd eat him up and I had let out a soft chuckle..
'kya hua, you don't talk?'  I pointed at the hapf empty classroom around us, it was lunch break and most of the kids had jumped their into the playground and usually Manik used to be one of those excited kids, who would run to the playground as soon as the bell for the lunch break would go off, he loved playing football, since forever" Cabir muttered the last piece of information in a softer tone and I looked at him shocked. I had never seen Manik play football, infact never even heard of Manik and any sport in the same sentence.
"But I never saw him.."I was trying to phrase my question when he let out a soft sarcastic laugh.
"That's because he stopped playing, long back, he doesn't anymore, since The Manik Malhotra came into existence, he moved on from his love for sports, anything that had anything to do with a playground"he said and I was getting irritated by the suspense.
"Cabir.. this suspense.. is it important?"i asked him, trying not to sound rude but it was really getting on my nerves and he smiled.
"It is and is not, I'll try to keep it simple.. so that day I felt Manik wasn't feeling himself when he did not answer me and pretended that he hadn't heard me before he left the classroom, I was a little taken aback but something in me told me that we could connect so I decided to be by his side.. we gradually did.. after a few weeks of just hanging around him, being a friend he did not ask for, he began to open up.. it was after a few months of us being friends when he finally told me why he'd started staying back in the class, stopped talking to people, stopped coming into the spot, Nandini.. Manik was being bullied, for the way he looked, for the way he was always surrounded by girls, how teachers used to call him cute.. those sixth graders used to bully him... And so much so that he often had nightmares about it.. it was a torture for him, he was too young to be able to deal with it and whenever he used to try to fight back, they would put him into worse situations" Cabir broke the mystery and I gaped. The Manik Malhotra was bullied?
"Why didn't he tell his mom or anybody in the school about it?" I asked the most obvious question.
"He wanted to, at one point, he really did, but those bullies made him believe that he would be too weak to be complaining about it to anybody.. and one thing that Manik hated the most and still does.. infact even more now.."
"Is to look or feel weak.."I completed Cabir's sentence as he nodded.
"He always wanted to be able to handle his problems on his own, and the more the bullies pushed him the more he decided against telling anybody about it.. he decided to deal with it all alone even if it meant hurting himself.. Nandini he was being called a girl.. a gay.. and things that a nine year old can not process and it wasn't time before the bullying had taken the form of ragging.. everyday after school the senior guys would corner him somehow and bully him.. I could never catch hold of moments when it would happen but I would get to know of it later, the next day.. I used to get really angry at Manik because be never let be around him when any of it happened"Cabir's voice had hurt in it, he really felt that anger again, I could see it in his eyes.
"So one day, I fought against Manik and stayed, stuck around him, waiting for thise stupid seniors to come around and when they did, I managed to blow them off because of me rebellious behaviour, my anger that had been building within my own self because of everything that went on within my family, I took it all out.. on those senior guys.. a nine year old, fought back against those seniors and that seemed to have given Manik some strength.. that day we went to his place after the fight, a part of him was dreading complaints from those senior guys but I did not care.. we reached his place and he and I started behaving like nothing happened, I realised he was equally good at hiding his inner turmoil as I was and that was how we became besy friends... Days passed, the were no signs of any complaints against us in school but things kind of fell back into place, the guys did not come around for a long time, but one thing that had changed was Manik, it seemed that he'd picked up the anger from me, felt like he'd realised if he became like I was nobody would mess with him.. so he grew distant from the people at school, his behaviour changed again but this time it was a mix, he was not all chirpy but he was not all rebellious, he was sweet where he needed to be and strong where the situation demanded, he developed the The Manik Malhotra attitude by the end of the fourth grade.. now we both had the same attitude towards the world, sweet  onlyto the people who knew us, who were close to us, and arrogant, uncaring about the rest of the world.. and everything started going down well.."his nerves calmed down from under his skin. I looked at Cabir intently as realisation hit me of how remembering things from the past could be so painful even years later and it had just been a year to my past.
"The year came into an end, and everybody saw a different shade of Manik.. from being the ever so sweet and charming guy who always used to be surrounded by people he went from an arrogant guy.. still with the charm though.. he became the guy who intimidated people.. he stopped hanging around everybody.. it was just me and him.. and it felt like it was just me and him against everybody.. he did not know about my life so much then but he knew we had to be there for each other.. he became the brother for me that I never had... I started spending more of my time with him, at his place and he never asked me why.. we entered fifth grade and Manik and I grew more and more tight.. we did talk to alot of people.. just each other and anybody who tried to be friends with me would either be ignored by us or humiliatiled by Manik just like he was humiliated when the bullying had started... It was as if Manik wanted to feel the strength that those guys used to feel when they bullied him.."he continued.
"Everything was going okay until one day those senior guys came to face Manik again.. in that moment when I had looked at Manik, it seemed as if he was waiting for this moment, like he was prepared for it and he was indeed.. uss din those guys.. they again tried their tricks with Manik.. but this Manik wasn't the same.. he had learnt how to fight back.. and he did that day.. infront of the whole school.. he did with them what they had done to him.. the bullies were bullied and the whole school saw the rough side of Manik Malhotra.. aur uss din The Manik Malhotra came into existence for real.. uss din se sab darne lage humse.. Manik se to be specific.. nobody wanted to mess with us or come around us.. and Manik liked the power that be had suddenly gained.. I liked the power that we had.. things changed in the next few years.. Manik never disregarded the rules of the school or the teachers or the authorities and so nobody could take any action against us.. infact alot of the faculty in school still liked Manik and over the years even me.. I had changed too.. i was no longer the angry Cabir.. I was arrogant now.. but the rebel in me had taken a backseat.. i was enjoying this life.. I had the bestest friend I could ever ask for.. we had a power in school.. as we grew up I told Manik about how my family was and why I was so angry always and he seemed to understand.. time passed we met alya.. in 8th grade.. she too was struggling with her family.. her parents loved her brother.. Harshad..alot.. He was in our school and was one of the guys who used to best friends with the seniors so as to be able to be backed up if he screwed so despite whatever he did he used to get away.. and his parents always pampered him.. and that's what has got him to this today.. he thinks he can get away with everything since he started picking fights with us as we hit 6th grade but we could never get the authorities to punish him, Alya was breaking on the inside, all throughout because she didn't get the love and affection from her parents that she deserved, not even one bit.. we understand her and she understood us.. Although she was not in our school, she was in our coaching classes but our encounters with her brother and her distance with him got us to be friends instantly and with her we met her best friend, Mukti in tenth... All of us
Nandini.. all of us were struggling in our lives and we found each other at times when we really needed somebody to hold us close and make us believe everything was going to be okay.. Mukti too was struggling with a toxic family and finally Dhruv, Nandini Dhruv had lost his parents at a very young age, be was depressed for years, bullied by people, catcalled for being an orphan.. all of us existed like the unwanted in the spheres of our lives until we were brought together by coincidences and situations and we decided to stand woth each other, firm like a protective walls and Manik it seemed like he had taken it on himself to protect all of us, he never had a family problem but he always got us, understood ours and stood with us like a pillar and even his mom and dad, we became a family, the five of us, The Fab5 and Manik's parents.. it finally felt like home.. by the time we turned fifteen, we'd found our music, the only soulful escape since we'd understood that this was a cruel world and as much as Manik's parents wanted to stand right by us,we had to deal with some of our problems on our own, fight this world together, because it was us only, arrogance became a part of us, we walked into places with an attitude that we owned every room we walked in,  people feared us, nobody messed with Fab5 because one for all and all for one, we preached that the attack on one was an attack on all of us and we wouldn't be attacked, we were not bullies, we never initiated a fight but we never backed off from one either when somebody pushed our limits" he gasped for breath and everything fell into place. Fab5's arrogance, that care a damn attitude, their always gaurded behaviours, their defences, the way they were never alone, Fab5 was the friendship that situations had created and was now extremely important to each one of them, they couldn't survive without each other and it's not even about fighting the world anymore, it's just about the love that's grown among them that cannot be matched by the love of any girlfriend or boyfriend. Probably that was why even after Alya broke up with Manik, he was still putting his everything into this making this wedding the best day of her life. It now became clearer how Manik always had trust issues with the outside world, there was nobody he trusted more than these four people and even though it wasn't fair, I couldn't blame him anymore.
"Nandini those years during the school, Manik had become a different person, a guy who used to love being showered with attention had begun to hate it.. he used to hate when somebody used to try to get friendly with any of us, he knew we couldn't trust others, everybody out there was selfish.. even the times when a girl used to  approach him, he used to turn her away.. he's humiliated tons of girls in all this time.. he never felt any feeling even close to affection for anybody except Fab5 and his parents.. it was almost he'd shut the world out and was not ready to let anybody in.. at times Nyonika aunty used to be worried for him.. even us.. Nandini, Manik was always a guy who would never do anything that he did not feel about dil se.. all of us have hooked up, have had relationships as teens, the fun flings but Manik never did, not once, because he believed he wasn't made for those.. he wanted something true.. he was looking for someone who he could truely believe but he never once let his guards down for anybody.. practically making it impossible for anybody, other than us to, to understand him and so nobody even tried.. but.. things.. changed.. Manik changed.."

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Hello beautiful people,

So I've heard you, and what you want is already planned for but you know na ths story needs to reach somewhere and I can't just put scenes in between, you'll get your confrontations, you'll get the Manan scenes that you're waiting for, you'll gst everything that you're asking amd wishing for... Everything is coming..
So make way for better thingss!!!
Till then keep reading, keep loving the story and do leave your reviews!

Stay safe,
Loads of love
Sri