High School Romance Revisited

Chapter 1 - The Memories

Purano sei diner kotha bhulbi kire haay

O sei chokher dekha, praner kotha,

Se ki bhola jaye

[This is a popular Rabindrasangeet that talks about memories of friendship]

Yes its really very hard to forget those old times. It remains hidden inside the deepest chambers of your heart. And when suddenly a situation comes that takes you back to those forgotten memory lanes you start wondering what if it didn't happen the way it happened?

No matter how many memories you make in college, university and working days the most precious ones are those made in your school life.

I too had tons of memories. Few painful but mostly happy. The reason I am telling this? Well currently I am about to face that situation of revisiting those memories.

I was lucky to have that same set of best friends I made in school. Three of us – Suchitra Lahiri, Rachayita Mukherjee and me Deepannita Ghosal, a.k.a Chitra, Rai and Deepa, right from kindergarten, were inseparable.

Oh no, we were never called three musketeers rather some of our classmates took pleasure in calling us Mean Girls. But was it our fault if we excelled in cultural activities and studies and were teachers' sweethearts, and literally the entire school knew us?

Many had predicted that we won't remain friends and I was so happy we proved them wrong. Twenty-three years of friendship and still counting. Afterall we had vowed to be friends for eternity like taking those oaths of staying together till death do us part. So now that we have actually stood by eachother for better and for worse Suchitra's family was not surprised to see us taking full charge of her wedding.

But here's the twist, Chitra was getting married to her childhood sweetheart, our classmate Koushik Banerjee which meant most of the guests will be from our class and school which included Koushik's best friend Mahendra Ganguly.

His name comes up in most of our conversations related to school and till today my heart starts beating fast whenever his name is mentioned.

They all knew. Even Koushik knew, maybe that's why he never protested when Chitra and Rai cursed Mahendra. Yes, my best friends hated him and I was the reason.

When Chitra and Koushik announced their wedding I had tears of happiness in my eyes. I just couldn't wait to start the countdown but deep inside I knew those few days there will be a lot of awkward moments. Really awkward! Needless to say, a torture for me.

"Listen I am still trying to digest the fact that my best friend is getting married!" this is for the fifteenth time Rai said it and I rolled my eyes saying, "try repeating it more, that way you will start believing." Rai threw the diary at me. "Hey! Careful. My entire planning is in that," Chitra quickly grabbed it mid-air. Rai sighed and started changing her dress, as we were going shopping today.

Rai never liked the idea of marriage or relationships. Though she strongly believed in love. She was happily single at twenty-seven and was a sought after daily soap writer in the city. Apart from that she worked with big production houses to pen down dance-dramas.

On the other hand Chitra taught at the art college and did exhibition where her paintings were often sold at high prices.

As for me I had opened my own studio after working as freelance photographer for three years. My company not only did photography or videography rather we specialised in making short films for every occasion, which made us popular. I was no more the girl from mediocre Bengali family. I was now counted among the young entrepreneurs of the city.