Petrichor

Ice creams and Heartbreaks

It wasn't easy seeing her running around with her hair flying about her face in the corridors, without feeling hollow inside. I knew it wasn't possible, but somehow all kinds of senses drained me whenever she was there. I'd lie if I say I didn't like it.

I remember that day when I first got to talk to her. We were in the tenth grade, and it was a hot summer day. The sun was ablaze at its fullest when our school got over. I was standing by the ice cream vendor when I spotted her, looking absolutely stunning even in that pathetic off white salwar kameez, which was the uniform. I had only enough money to buy one ice cream, so I thought I should just use it for the best.
“Here.”
“Huh?”
“Take it, it’s going to melt.”
“What about yours?”
“I’ve had one. Just take it.”
“Thank you!”
It’s a wonder how I still remember that twinkle in her eyes as she took the ice cream from me. It almost felt like the scorching heat had done one right thing in my life.

It was easy being friends with her, considering she let me in quite easily. No awkward phases, just like that, boom! We were suddenly the best of friends, even though we first met in the tenth grade. I was aware of what was coming, but I kept it down for her sake.

She never caught me staring at her. Or maybe she did, but never said anything. Every little aspect of an average mundane life that threatened to engulf me was somehow swatted away by her presence itself. She was like that much needed gale of cold wind during the hot summers. Metaphors and similes run out whenever I try to describe her in my life. She was something unprecedented in my life, something I’d always prepared myself for, but something which always left me shaken.

I could bet I was not the only one who considered her the universe. The abundance of boys craving for her attention was almost maddening, and I didn’t stand a chance against them. I didn’t stand a chance with her. And I was beyond okay with that fact, knowing we were best friends. True, those pretty little lips drove me crazy and my arms ached to hold her, but helping her with her home work and walking her to school everyday felt precious.

I understood her like nobody else did, I knew when she was about to burst into tears whenever I saw her lower lip twitch. I always knew she was excited to tell me something whenever she jumped on the balls of her heels. I knew how much she craved for those chocolates which she strictly avoided because 'she was growing fat'. Those little earrings which sparkled brighter than the godforsaken sun, I knew she got them from the handicrafts fair. The only thing I wished I knew was what I was slowly getting myself into.

I never told her about my feelings, because I was scared beyond measure. I didn't know how to deal with them, in the first place. And getting rejected would've been the last thing I could've wished for. Part of me didn't care about the void of unrequited love that was forming between us. The other part of me threatened to claim her as mine, and mine only, and forget the whole wide world. I was dwelling on imaginations alone, my thoughts soaring higher than the red balloon I had once bought her. I was irreversibly in love with her, and nothing could've changed my mind. The power of her essence in my average Indian life almost made me believe that somehow we'd make it through, that we might actually have a future together.

Just as I remember that first ice cream, I remember that day when I found a little piece of paper in my pencil case, with those words written on it. It's amazing how they turned my mind into a whirlwind of happy and painful thoughts simultaneously. I had waited for her to say that all my life, and now I realized how hard we were going to hit a dead end. Love never comes so easy, often making it impossible to make it through. And that's exactly what was going to happen to us. We'd have to leave each other. 

Because, she was something my life and society wasn't prepared for. She was this pretty little woman in a small town in India, from a not-so-conservative family who believed in educating their daughter first and then marrying her off to some random stranger before she actually got a job. And that's exactly what happened to my best friend.

My society made me feel like those stolen glances, those stolen kisses, all those moments, they were not something which should've happened at all. My heart shouldn't have beaten for a girl. I shouldn't have counted the stars with a girl. I shouldn't have promised forevers to a girl. I shouldn't have done whatever I did, because I'm a girl.

Starting from that little ice cream to the day she left me, I'd been so worked up with breaking social norms and entangling myself in unachievable dreams with her, that I had somehow transformed this hypocritic, homophobic world into a fairyland of acceptance. And now as I see her walking away in the foreign arms of the opposite sex, heartbreak pouring out of her eyes and getting entangled in her red veil, I can't blame anyone but myself. Because I was the one who had built that igloo of protective aura around ourselves, and I wasn't strong enough to not let it melt.

The sting of my mother's slap and the hurt in my father's eyes made me question that decision of giving her the ice cream on the first day. I've always loved ice creams, just that I can't stand the thought of them now.

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So, I wrote this pretty long ago, and somehow it was saved as a draft. I haven't been able to write for long, so kinda uploaded this. It's a tad different from what I usually write, and criticism will be appreciated. :)

Also, 700+ views. Someone bring me oxygen. Thank y'all so much for reading this. :) Means a lot.

—R