The Unforeseen Path

Epilogue

Two years later :

After that night, I slowly made an effort to really move on. It wasn't like it worked at a swish of a magic wand, it took some real effort. At first, there was this realization that although I still liked him, I didn't anymore want to be with him. The way I was around him, scared and vulnerable wasn't the way I wanted to be around someone I was with.

Junior college ended and everyone took different courses (mostly engineering) in different colleges. The distance helped me in moving on. Initially, I would remember all the funny and nice moments  I had with him. But there is only so many times that you can keep someone alive in memory. Slowly, I started thinking less and less about him. I still sometimes thought about him, but it wasn't as pinching or pricking as it had been before. I soon realized some part of me would always like him, but that was okay and I could live with that.

When I look back at everything now, I realize that I always had thought Mohit knew what he was doing. Just because he was experienced, I would think of him as an adult in my mind who knew how to deal with the feelings of an honest girl who liked him. But he didn't know what to do with me as he didn't like me like that. So he alternated between trying to be respectful of my feelings and at the same time making me understand that he didn't see me that way.

I often forgot that he too had his insecurities, that he too was a struggling teenager trying to gain approval of his friends and getting the girl he likes to like him back. He made a lot of mistakes with me, leading me on at times when he shouldn't have, but I think he too didn't know what to do at that time. Nonetheless, I understand things better now and so I don't mind anything that had happened.

As for the group, we meet 2-3 times a year, and that is the only time I meet Mohit. Everyone is doing their own thing. I am in med school, Tanya has went on to do major in microbiology, mostly everyone else is doing engineering. Vikram too went to an engineering college, but it seeemed as if he landed in a modeling agency. As to Mayra, nobody ever talks to her anymore. As soon as 12th grade ended, she took no time in dumping Vikram and moving on with someone else. Anjali, Sarika, Zeenat too weren't interested in putting up with her anymore.

Surprisingly, whatever it was they always call me to meet up. Anjali, Sarika and Zeenat wish me at 12 am on my every birthday. They still appeared like a close knit group of three, but I learned to enjoy being a spectator in that group. It didn't mean that they didn't want to be with me, they'd fill me up on the gaps in between, but I understood that they shared a different space with each other as I did with Tanya and many other friends .

I met up with them, but I never sought their approval of me anymore. I am who I am and I didn't need to change me to fit in.

As for my relationship with Mohit, it was okay. We talked to each other when we met in the group but nothing more. Even after clearing everything up ,we didn't end up as friends. We cared for each other and respected each other, but that was it. There wasn't a friendship before to preserve it after. And I was okay with that.

Mohit started dating, rather seriously, a girl from our tuition, who was considered to be a simple girl by most of us. The girl and another two girls were a group and she was mostly camouflaged by the other two girls.

When I saw their pictures on snapchat, it did hit me strongly, that he would leave me and date this girl. But then I realized that we weren't the two pieces of puzzle that fit and maybe they did. Whenever we all met he looks nauseatingly happy in his relationship. He even put up a picture of them on insta with the caption 'I am in love.' I found myself wishing that he would never break up with this girl and be just as happy as he is, always.

As for my love life, for more than a year after junior college, I put barriers between me and anyone who was even remotely interested in me. The truth was, I was really scared of being so vulnerable again. Having feelings for someone makes you completely loose control of your emotions and I wasn't ready for it.

Also, I hadn't truly moved on for more than a year and if I had  jumped into something that soon, it would have been a rebound. Slowly, I stoped being scared, and I realized that what happened before wouldn't necessarily happen again. I am a smart, pretty and a funny girl who was worthy of love as much as anyone else. I wasn't a nerd who couldn't defend herself anymore. Also, I was better equipped at dealing with my emotions now than I was before.

So here I am at the end of second year of senior college, and I find myself, spending a lot of time with someone who laughs at my jokes, with whom I share every little detail with, who makes me blush by just looking at me, who makes me feel strong but protected at the same time. I don't know where this is heading, but I do know that for right now, things are  looking up.

Authors note :

Gosh, ending this book seems like the end of an era. I know this is an unconventional story, that isn't exactly a love story, just a story of a girl who is growing up and figuring out life.