Love At Last

The Hostel

Zaara Rosh looked around the room. It was average sized with four single beds and four chairs and desks beside each bed. There was a big rack on the left where she and her roommates could keep their luggage. Next to it was a door which led to the toilet and bath. There were two windows on either side, of which one overlooked the road and the other gave them a view of their college. All in all it was a very neat and cozy room.

Since just one bed remained vacant (all others had buckets, books and bags confirming that they were already booked), she dumped her shopping on it and sat down. As she did so, she noticed that she was facing the bathroom door. Just two steps and she would reach the bathroom. Great. She had to sleep next to the bathroom.

Just as she was pushing her bed away from the door, she heard voices coming from the corridor. Usually she never paid much attention to what strangers spoke. But then, she strained to hear these people... what language were they speaking. Definitely not English or Hindi. Not Malayalam? Tamil?

The voices drew closer and Zaara guessed that they were coming to her room. Seconds later, the door opened and a very fair girl with shoulder length black hair and brown eyes stood in the doorway with, from their similarities, her mother. She noticed Zaara and smiled,

"Hi. I'm Anakha. Did you come just now?"

Zaara smiled back, "Yeah.. Been a few minutes. I guess you left your things here earlier?"

"Yes, I left them here yesterday so that I could book my bed." Anakha said and with that, turned to her mother, speaking something fast in the strange language.

Seeing that Anakha had turned her attention to something else, Zaara started unpacking. It was good to start at a new place. New experiences, new classmates, new teachers, new books... Let it be better than the past, she thought bitterly.

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When Anakha's mother had said goodbye, it was nearly time for dinner. Zaara came to know that the language they spoke was Konkini and Anakha was a Konkini Brahmin.

"So, pure veg, huh?" Miriam asked, smiling.

"No! Not at all!" Said Anakha chuckling. "As a matter of fact, I love chicken and egg. I haven't tried my luck at other non-veg dishes."

"Oh, don't worry about that. I'll help you there because I am the biggest foodie alive!" Zaara said, laughing.

Anakha laughed. Then suddenly, she looked serious. She held up her hand to silence Zaara and after a moment, lowered her hand.

"I thought I heard the dinner bell. Maybe I was kinda hallucinating. Starving here, you know."

"Yeah. Me too. Maybe we should go down and see if it is time." Zaara suggested.

As they went down, Anakha asked,

"Do you think there'll be ragging here? I've heard it is strict here but hey, what kind of seniors don't rag? I bet they'll make us do all sorts of horrible stuff."

"Dunno. Let's just hope that they don't have much time." Zaara said.

After dinner, they decided it better to go to bed since they were both tired (and partly because they thought that the "dreaded" seniors would not enter their room if they saw that the inmates were asleep).

Zaara lay down on her bed and looked outside the window. The sky outside was decked with stars. It was great to just lie there and look at them. She felt better that she could forget everything of her past here.

Her eyes welled up with tears of anger and betrayal as a face came into her mind. How dare he do it to her? How dare he say that it was all her fault?

She wiped away her tears. No. This was the last time she would cry for that heartless person. It was just a stupid crush. And it would remain nothing more than that. She had to forget it as a stupid mistake she made when she was immature.

No one here would come to know anything about her past. It was her secret to keep.

With that thought, she drifted off to sleep.

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