The Perfect Photo

Chapter 9

We walked back to the hostel in silence. Some of our hostel mates walked past us exchanging a friendly 'Hi' while passing by. Neha responded back; I was just mute staring at the ground. I had a lot of thoughts bouncing back and forth inside my cranial cavity. My focus was not in the present.

"So the Pritam saga is over right?", asked Neha as we approached the hostel. "You now know what happened, you've gotten your revenge and settled the issue with them. We can effectively put all of this behind us, correct?"

"I am not very sure..... yet", I said with a big heavy sigh.

"What do you mean you are not sure? He is two years younger to you, and he was forced to come and talk to you. What do you plan on doing?", she asked raising her voice.

I climbed the hostel floors two steps a time trying to create some distance between us so that I can pretend I could not hear her. Our room was on the second floor. I couldn't keep running away and avoid her altogether.

"Did you even hear me ?", she caught up to me.

"I am not sure", I repeated. "I don't know."

Why can't things be simpler?, I thought to myself. If you liked someone, then should anything else matter? It doesn't seem simple, though. My brain was playing out many different scenarios trying to predict the outcome of each. So many what-ifs. I didn't know why I had to overthink stuff so much.

"Let me tell you what you should be doing. You are going to go freshen up, and then you are gonna hit the books as usual. You'll get over this incident like it had never happened", said Neha.

"Hmmmm.....", I muttered.

"As usual", it was easy for her to say that. But I haven't been my usual self. I double checked to see if I was approaching my time of the month. Maybe my behavioral change could be attributed to that. But that was not to be the case. It was something different, something I have never experienced before. How I wish I could pin these emotions to my cycle.

My body moved autonomously. My mind was totally obsessed with Pritam. What is wrong if I do pursue him? Will the world around me not talk right about me being with someone younger to me? But should I be worried about the world?'. I changed into comfy pajamas. Why can't I wear this to college instead of my rugged jeans? I couldn't because there is a dress code and I conform to that. Should I listen to the unspoken code in this case as well? I kept thinking.

I opened my textbooks. But couldn't look into it for more than a minute. I felt puckish, and my stomach was constantly turning. I wondered why my body was reacting in such weird fashion. I closed my textbook and opened my laptop instead. I fired up iTunes which started to play my playlist in shuffle mode. My iTunes always knew me and my moods best. It played Demons from Imagine Dragons. Somehow the song's words expressed what I was going through,

'They say it's what you make

I say it's up to fate

It's woven in my soul
I need to let you go.'

The lyrics kept repeating in my mind. Neha was right. Pritam had no intentions to come and talk to me. Neither did those boys planned for that to happen. Neha was the intended target. But fate had other plans. Incidentally, I happened to be in her place.

I tried to close my eyes to flush my thoughts away. Like a blocked drain, it all came back to the surface in no time.

Should I be trying to let this go? I was not sure. On the other hand, I am definitely not the kind of person who stands up for herself, leave alone standing up for others. But I have done things which I would not have dreamt of. Would I have done such things if anyone else had been in place of Pritam? I have pushed myself to do things for him. Maybe this is when people should realize that the someone is their best match, the person for whom you would do anything for.

I laid like a dead body on my bed. My head was feeling heavy. I wished a fairy would walk into my life and start taking decisions for me because I was awful at this.

My phone vibrated. I took a peek. A rush of serotonin engulfed my body, and I jumped out of my bed, my body not under my control. I twisted and turned and fell to the floor.