[a desi bus romance] Vijay and Nila have only one thing in common - they take the same bus at the same time everyday. What if this mere commonality steers their life into a whirlpool of uninvited feelings, wholesome conversations and unexpected conn...
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Vijay wasn't talking to his mother.
"Yeah, she tells you not to talk to her again but you keep talking to her. I didn't even tell you to stop but you stopped talking to me. I don't understand how this works. It's all because of you, you know?" Vijay's mother pointed at her husband with the dosa spatula.
"What did I do?" Vijay's father asked, his face peeking out of his morning newspaper.
"If you also stopped talking to him, then he'd have no other choice but to talk to me. Since you are taking his side, he's seeing me as the villain."
"Yeah, this is all my fault," his father drawled and folded the paper into a neat rectangle. "How does it feel to be seen as the villain for once, Shantha?"
Vijay's mother made a disgruntled sound and disappeared into the kitchen. Vijay sighed. He hated how both spoke about him as if he wasn't even there. But Vijay couldn't blame them. He'd been talking over his mother the same way to convey things to her. It had been a difficult few days without constantly annoying his mother with some random shit he came up with but he'd live. He had to get the point across to her: She cannot shit talk his girlfriend and get away with it.
Vijay gulped the remaining coffee and stood up. "I'm going to meet Krish. I'll come back only in the evening but I'll be here for dinner," he informed, loud enough so that his mother could hear him. Then he grabbed his phone, his sun hat and walked out of his house.
It had been a couple of days since Vijay met Nila and swore to her that he'd never give up on her. He really wasn't planning to. It was just insulting that Nila thought it would be possible. In the past few days, he had been thinking about the issue at hand. He wondered if he should call Nila's sister and talk to her – introduce himself and maybe explain the situation. Nishanth hadn't introduced him to her but he'd heard enough from him to feel like he knew her personally. From what he had described, Kayal seemed to be someone who had a strong will and a tough heart but channelled it in the wrong area of her life. She was level-headed, enduring and big on sacrifice. Vijay knew how she'd let Nishanth get away with his shit.
Nila was similar.
But unlike her sister, it was all an act.
He had noticed multiple times how Nila's eyes lit up when she caught him looking at her, when their hands accidentally grazed and how she'd bite her lip in contemplation whether to hold it or not. He had watched her smile the realest smile when Vijay teased her or complimented her. He'd felt the shiver that ran through her skin when he tucked her hair behind her ear and watched her lean into his touch. And oh, she loved to show him off. She'd stare at the comments on her Instagram stories and posts, smile smugly and hold his arm tighter when another woman checks him out and grab the edge of his sleeve when they were at a public place.
The instances when she'd put on a brave front, ignore what she wanted and choose someone else's choices instead, suppress her emotions and be the epitome of picture-perfect could all be easily picked. The light in her eyes would be snuffed out, as if the moon was overshadowed by something bigger and opaque, but it would only be for a moment. One would easily miss it if they don't watch for it. But it was there --- the sharp waning of her light. It bothered him so much.
