Living In Oblivion

16

"I specifically told you not to add green chilies, didn't I?" Divit snapped at the man behind the food truck. The man nodded, deliberately avoiding eye contact and tending to other customers.

"Are you even listening?" Divit's narrowed gaze locked onto the man. "If possible, please exchange this plate with someone who ordered the same thing." He pushed his plate forward onto the counter.

"Sir, no other order for an omelette has been placed yet. I apologize for the inconvenience, but if you can adjust, please eat it by removing the green chilies," the man replied in a monotone, focusing more on his cooking.

"And look, sir, there aren't even many," the man added, tossing a green chili off the omelette with his knife.

The man smiled at him, a smile that clearly said, "Eat the hell out of it and stop standing over my head. Go away!"

Suppressing his annoyance, Divit sighed and rubbed his forehead. He glanced at the people waiting for their orders and those eagerly devouring their food. Despite his hunger, he resisted gobbling up the omelette, knowing his last proper meal was lunch. Munching on chips and wafers didn't count as food.

With a tired sigh, Divit picked up his plate and headed back to where Avanti, his devil of a roommate, was sitting. Avanti playfully tossed a piece of her omelette to a brown dog, sharing her meal with the stray. She leaned against the car's bonnet, lost in her own world.

Glancing at the brightly illuminated food truck amidst the foggy surroundings, Avanti couldn't help but count the twinkling bulbs. The dogs by her side seemed hopeful, their tails wagging.

"Aren't you eating too fast, buddy? I'm not even halfway through my meal, and here you are, begging for more," Avanti scolded the dogs, playfully mocking their eating habits. Her ramblings were interrupted when she heard Divit mumble in disbelief.

"Somebody please tell me she's not talking to a dog," Divit muttered, his face a mix of horror and confusion.

Ignoring his reaction, Avanti pretended not to hear and continued her conversation with the dogs. Divit couldn't believe what he had witnessed. Was she truly conversing with street dogs about their eating habits? Was she mentally okay?

"Sir, your plate!" Avanti shouted, snapping Divit out of his thoughts.

"Hm?"

"It's about to fall," she pointed out as the omelette threatened to slide off the corner of the paper plate.

"Oh," Divit quickly adjusted the omelette, walking closer to Avanti and placing his plate on the bonnet. He shooed away the dogs, their eyes still fixed on his plate.

"What took you so long?" Avanti asked, curious.

Divit considered his response but shook his head. "Nothing."

Unfazed, Avanti resumed feeding the dogs, and Divit couldn't hold back his curiosity any longer. He frowned, narrowing his eyes at her. "Were you... uh... talking to the dogs?"

Avanti paused, looking from the dogs to her remaining morsel, then back at Divit. She nonchalantly shrugged, glancing at him. "No, they were talking to me."

Divit's mind spun with confusion. He wanted to say something but couldn't find the words. Keeping a straight face and shooing away the thought, he glanced at his watch and rolled the shawl over his coat, that kept slipping again and again from his shoulder.

"Here, let me" Avanti moved closer to fix his shawl, tucking the corner behind his shoulder and tightening it across his frame. He squirmed at her proximity, feeling an unfamiliar sensation welling up within him.

His face turned pale, his eyes involuntarily tracing her features from her white cheeks to her rosy lips. He quickly moved to the corner of the bonnet, realizing they hadn't been as close as he had thought in the first place, yet again his eyes darted towards Avanti. The chill in the air seemed to intensify the rosy hue of her lips, captivating his attention.

Avanti seemed lost in her own world, a world that appeared beyond the grasp of any ordinary person. Observing Avanti's peculiar actions over the past few days, Divit couldn't help but wonder what she was made of.

Sometimes, his mind hinted that maybe she had a secret stash of weed from Shimla hidden inside her room, and she kept getting high on it from time to time. But then, at times when he thought like that, it made him wonder, on what weed was he exactly high?

After all the job hunting fiasco, not to forget physically assaulting a man and then blasting the meter of the same cynical Sardar Ji, he had thought that she might cry over not getting the job or what she was going to do now. But all she had done was give unabashedly inappropriate curses, some of which even he wasn't aware of, during the whole drive and manipulate him to stop at this food truck because she was hungry. She had even suggested that if he didn't, she would go back and chop off the balls of that Sardar lad.

Avanti was lost in her thoughts, thinking about whether Rohini aunty, their neighbor back in Shimla, had bought her mother's medicines or not, and if Riddhi was reprimanded again for the fees. She tried to recall how much money she had exactly in her savings account, excluding the rent, with which she had planned to pay Divit for the house.

Her attention drifted to the black dog that tried to climb over the car using his paws and wiggled his tail, looking at her with expectation. Her lips tugged into a faint smile, and she picked up her plate, which was left with only a few morsels, and dropped it on the road for the pug.

Pulling her legs up, she sat comfortably, crossing them, and leaned forward to rest her chin on her knees. Her eyes met the flame of the bonfire a few feet away, around which people sat on their toes, leaning to feel the warmth. She focused on the flames, which rose golden and in shades of orange, while the blue in the center struggled to make a mark.

Divit observed the silence carefully, his eyes shifting from the crumbled pieces of bread the dogs were feasting on to her, as she seemed the most oblivious to it all. A voice from his heart strummed the strings of his mind.

Was she living in oblivion?

To Divit, it was weird how, despite their differing personalities and experiences, he found himself fascinated by her. Finishing his meal, he climbed down from the car, discarded his plate in a nearby bin, and turned to Avanti, unable to resist prying into her thoughts.

"So, what are you planning to do now?" Divit asked, aware that he might be delving too deeply.

Avanti looked at him, a small smile gracing her lips. She shrugged, meeting his gaze. "Nothing. I'll just work harder."