The Boxes We Are Put In

Chapter 9

The ocean waves frothed around the sand. The wind blew gently in my hair. This was nice. I could breathe again. Nikhil was beside me. "Why the beach?" I asked him. But I was so glad that it is the beach, though. Though we drove like an hour to reach here.

"Just... I feel like the sea is the best way to cheer anyone up. Like you can't see this and be sad..." He indicated the sea. True.

He looked at me for some time, maybe trying to figure out if I am still sad or felt better. "Hm.. you want to go in?" He asked, indicating the waves. "Let's go in," he added.

He took off his footwear and rolled up his jeans. I followed. And then he held out his hand, with a kind of naughty, but confident smile. I raised an eyebrow at him, but he did not let his hand down. I remembered how easily he slid his hand to mine while he took me to the bike. When did we go to the holding hands base??

He was waiting. Hopefully... Now, kind of nervously. And again, nervous Nikhil is too cute to decline. I slid my left hand to his. There was a very triumphant look on his face.

We walked on the beach, with the waves gently caressing our feet, his hand still linked with mine, and I was getting accustomed to the warmth of his hand. His hand was only a bit larger than mine. They were smooth and soft enough. His hands were kind of pretty. And the way he held my hand was nice, it was with the right pressure. Not that I had anything or anyone else to compare it with. The point is that I did not dislike this.

I hesitated for a while before bringing it up. "Hm...Can I ask what happened?"

She was silent. "You don't want to talk about it?" Still silent. So I left her at that. I did not want to press the issue and break this moment. We were holding hands. I did not want to do anything that will stop her from wanting to hold my hand.

My mobile buzzed. I took it out of my pocket with my other hand. It was Adwaith. Shit... I switched my mobile off and put it back in my pocket before Arya could notice. As I said, I don't want anything to break the moment. Also, I don't want the added distraction and burdening thoughts of the responsibilities I just broke.

And by Arya's expression, I could see that she was feeling better. I smiled. But I was curious though, about what was bothering her. I have always thought of Arya was invincible. The fact that she may have cried was shattering my heart.

Somehow I kind of felt that Shruthi could be a reason for Arya's off mood. Why else would she say she did not want to be in college? That means her current mood is related to something or someone in the college. And I already heard that Shruthi speaks shit about her.

"I heard that you and Shruthi were friends," I started. "And that Shruthi is mean to you afterwards,"

She shrugged. "Why did you guys break up?" I asked.

She left my hand and walked up to the sand and sat down. I joined her. She looked at me. "Hm... we were friends only for a while during the first year. But even then we were not like too close or anything. More like something did not match," I nodded. I could get that. It's not like I knew Shruthi too much, but from whatever I knew, I could not understand how she and Arya could ever have been friends. They have so less in common.

"We just happened to sit near each other on the first day of college," Arya was saying. "And ended up talking. But things were always about her, you know..." I nodded. "She was just so..."

-happy.

"Full of herself?" Nikhil prompted.

No. Happy.