Invisible Strings

2. Ahaan

9 years later:

Whoever invented speakers deserves to die the most painful death and rot in hell. I had just came back home from a 12 hour shift at the hospital when I found out that it was my obnoxiously loud neighbour's daughter's birthday. For some reason they thought it would be really good idea to make people deaf by increasing the volume of speaker so high even the monsters in hell could listen to it loud and clear.

I turned in my bed many times hoping to get some sleep, but that was unnecessary seeing that the music wasn't going to stop any time soon. I decided to scroll Insta for some time before I heard the doorbell. I groaned and got up from my bed. Even if I am a doctor and I took the oath to save people, I really wanted to strangle the life out of some of them. Like the unexpected guest on my doorstep. I know that guests are like the God in our culture but fuck it. You can't just show up at someone's place at 10 in the night.

I went to open the door. The visitor surprised me. I had not seen this person since he moved away two years ago. I opened the door and greeted him the way I always did.

"What are you doing here?"

"Oh, hello to you to, Ahaan. How are doing this wonderful evening?", Shivank, my childhood best friend, was standing on the door with a very smug smile.

"It's not evening, Shivank. It's 10, in the night!"

"Is it, I almost didn't notice.", he walked past me inside my house.

"Oh, hey, why don't you come in and bless me with your wonderful presence.", I shut the door behind me and went to sit next to him on the sofa.

"Thank you for such warm hospitality, I really am blessed.", he laughed at his own joke, while I rolled my eyes. We sat there for some time catching up. I offered to make him tea and he accepted it. I really didn't want to make tea but what do you know, I dug my own grave.

We sat for two hours drinking tea and catching up. It was good to talk to someone I enjoy talking to after so long.

"So, I came here with a very serious job. Can you guess what it is?", he looked at me suggestively.

"You finally decided to have a brain surgery.", he rolled his eyes.

"No", he started rummaging his bag, "I am here to invite you."

He must have found what he was looking for because he looked excited before handing me what looked like, a wedding card? I looked at carefully and it read:

Shivank Agrahari weds Priyanka Roy

Oh god! It was really happening. This idiot who couldn't spell orange till 3rd class was finally getting married.

"You're getting married? God, pigs must be falling from sky now.", I laughed at his annoyed face.

"Shut up. You're just jealous that I am not marrying you like we intended."

"I am jealous. How could you do this to me? I mean look at me. I am perfect and you want to throw us away and get married to some girl named Priyanka Roy?", I dramatically exasperated.

"I am sorry for betraying but you are just not handsome anymore."

"Are you kidding? Look at me, I am the definition of perfect.", he snorted, "Keeping the very hurtful comment aside, who is she?"

Then he proceeded to tell me about his girlfriend, now fiance, Priyanka and how they met and fell in love. If I wasn't so happy for him, I would've been jealous of him due to lack of my love life.

"So, you are coming and staying at my parent's place for the wedding, right?", he said a little nervous

"Dude, I will walk through hell if there is free food."

"Good", he suddenly had a look of remembrance on his face, "By the way, I invited everybody else too."

"When you say everybody, you mean..."

"I mean Atharva, Aditi, Vashuki, Isha and Shivaya.", for some reason my heartbeat increased at the mention of her. 

"Shivaya?"

"Yeah, Shivaya. I just gave her the invitation card before coming here.",  he looked at me with a weird expression, "You're okay with her coming, right. I mean, I know you never liked her but we were close."

"Woah! What gave you the expression that I never liked her?", I mean sure we never talked like others but still I liked her as friend. Wait, were we friends? Ah, it's complicated and I'd rather not think about it.

"Well, you both never talked to each other which is not like you two. You are always invading other's personal space."

"Yeah but that doesn't mean I don't like her. We just never had a reason to talk.", well except for that one day in class 9th. It is still one of my most cherished memories.

"Okay, so that means you are fine with her attending the wedding."

"Of course, it would be nice to see her after so long."

We talked a little more and he showed me Priyanka's photo. She was good looking and tall, definitely someone Shivank would fall for. It was almost 2:30 when we bid goodbye and he left.

I went back to bed but now I was thinking about her. I hadn't thought about her for very long time and we lost contact after farewell. Well, it was not like we were in contact before farewell either and the only string connecting us was school. But now we didn't have that. I used to miss her smile sometimes. She had the most beautiful smile ever. Watching her smile was like watching the sunrise. Wait, what! When did I start thinking like a poet? 

I tried to sleep but I couldn't get the scene of meeting Shivaya from my head. So, I did what any smart and mature person would do. Stalk her on Instagram. I opened her profile and saw the picture she had posted over the years. She hadn't changed at all. Well, according to her posts. She still loved books and watched Harry Potter a lot. I chuckled a little before I saw her in the saree she had worn on our farewell. Back then I thought that she was looking good because I had never seen her in a saree before and it was new to me. But she still looked beautiful. 

When I decided to turn off my phone and get some sleep, I accidentally followed her. Shit! I quickly unfollwed her before she could notice it. I took a deep breath, turned off my phone and finally fell asleep.