LEECH

CHAPTER ELEVEN - YASH (NOW)

My nails are digging so hard into my clenched fists, I think a few moments more and I'll draw blood.

I can feel Srishti's pointed glare on my hands, and I know that if I turn, I'll find her with a disapproving look on her face, but I couldn't want to be further away from her anytime than I do now.

The whole auditorium is practically bouncing up and down as students howl and sing along to Malhari which is being performed on stage by a bunch of boys, but all I can see is Aisha standing to the side of the stage.

After four years, I can finally see Aisha, just a few feet away but more out of reach than she was all these years.

She's grown up well. Beautiful and radiant. She's taller than she was in my memories, which is obvious, but for me, she's immortalised as the tiny girl who could barely reach my chest.

She's laughing with her friends, one of the girls who was on stage with her before and another taller one in glasses. She looks at the stage, claps and hoots when the hook step and the chorus come up. A boy currently performing turns to look at her and winks. She grins back.

I see red.

He winked at my Aisha.

She isn't yours anymore, a small voice whispers in my head adamantly, and I acknowledge the sense in it. It's right. She's not mine. The boy on stage might be her boyfriend, her boy, and none of that should concern me.

It does, though. If we were still at Bayview, no guy, and I mean none of them, would have even dared to step near her anyway.

If we were still at Bayview, none of this would have happened.

It's crazy — how much I love her still, and how much I hate her for putting me through that when she knows that I loved her so.

The noise in this room is getting too high. It's grating on my nerves, making me frustrated. From a corner of my eye, I see Sanket, who's sitting on the other end of the row, doing small dancey moves and screaming along with the lyrics. He nudges Srishti, who just chuckles and shakes her head.

Sanket. Some of these days, I miss him, but like a lot of what happened, there are some things which just can't be reversed to their previous state.

The boys' performance comes to an end. It was brilliant and energetic; now the whole crowd is brimming with zeal because of them, yet I couldn't care less. I just want to get to bed as soon as I can and collapse, and hope that I don't dream of her.

But none of that even matters right now because Aisha has suddenly vanished. She was right there, laughing and smiling and clicking pictures right in front of my eyes and now she's not here. Again.

Again. Again. Again.

Deja vu.

I grit my teeth, pushing back the memories of that night on the rooftop. I don't want to spiral right now. Not today, not here. Riva isn't seeing my ugly side. I'm here to win. Let's focus on that and that only.

But all thoughts of focusing anywhere flee my head when I see her walking up the stairs to the podium, her hair down and sashaying behind her as she fixes the microphone, shining like a star in her gleaming white kurti.

Her hair is way longer than it was back then. Her parents didn't let her keep long hair, said it was troublesome and distracting and all that. She used to whine and complain to me about how she wished she could have long, Rapunzel hair like Srishti's. I remember she had made a pact with her parents to let her grow out her hair after tenth. I guess it bore fruit.

The mic makes a keening noise, and I wince. Every single noise seems too much and too loud right now. That is until I hear her voice.

"Good evening to everyone present here, esteemed Principal mam, respected teachers, my dear friends, and our lovely guests! Welcome to Cluster 2k24! I hope you enjoyed watching the programmes we had organised for you."

I enjoyed watching you, but that's beyond the point.

"We sincerely wish for this year's Cluster to be a success. For that, we need your cooperation as well. I know competitive spirits are high, but remember, rivals on field, friends off of it. At the end of the day, we are all just here to have fun aren't we?"

Not really. I couldn't care less about having fun. That's not why I'm here.

"Now, I don't wish to bore you or exhaust myself by my incessant droning, but there are some guidelines which need to be shared. I'll be quick, don't worry. Firstly, —"

One stark difference between my Aisha and this Aisha is her confidence, the way she commands the stage and the room as if she was made for it, as if she was born prepared for this. She wasn't. I know that because I was there with her when she had a panic attack over a speech competition that the teachers had nominated her for without asking her. Aish had always been good at speaking, but she despised speaking before crowds. But this girl whom I was looking at right now, she seemed like a person my Aisha would have been a fan of.

And that itself was a testament of the development that Riva had brought her. That she'd brought to herself. Without me. Without us. Without Bayview.

It felt as if the Almighty himself wanted me to let go of her. And I probably should. Definitely should.

But how can you ask a sailor lost in the dark, desolate sea to let go of his North Star, his only chance at reaching the surface?

It was cruel, but as Aisha always said, such is life. And when life happens, it just happens. You have either two choices — brave the storm and emerge victorious, or be swept away under the huge waves, lost forever to the world and its glory. Aisha chose to be the former. I? I was definitely the latter.