The Imperfect Couple (Complete)

Chapter 14

The day was as fresh as the blossoming lilies along the road. Charu took a deep breath taking in the scented air flavored with the zeal of the morning sunlight. Never had she ever been on an outing like that. She often probed her mother to take her out of the city, but she was always busy ... sometimes in work and sometimes in her unfathomable stress. But today she for once wished if her mother was with her ... Her mother had probably not even tasted such magical happiness of being far from the overcrowded city... far from the daily stress of work and home ... Only if she could erase the lines between her forehead that appeared to have stayed there forever ...

Her chain of thought was suddenly distracted as a hand waved in front of her face. Looking up, her heart suddenly skipped a beat as she saw him sitting beside her with a confused yet amused face. She was sitting alone on the window seat in the fifth row, as both her friends were already sitting together when they came. 'They' - that reminded her of him. She threw a quick glance on the other column of seats and the sudden parching of her throat told her that she was scared ...

But scared? Hell! Why was she scared? What if he saw her with Karan? It surely won't matter to her, and that thought accompanied another strangely depressing thought ... it won't even matter to him...

Suddenly feeling low, she raised her eyelashes and smiled at him to cover up for her inappropriate reflexes. Karan noticed with confusion as her smile somewhat depicted fear or maybe disappointed but not any hearty welcome ... He smiled back simultaneously, wondering the extent to which this girl was a paradox. At times, she would stare at him continuously with her heart in her eyes when he wasn't even paying attention to her. And then on other rare occasions when he decided to know her or come closer to her, she just - simply looked - lost! Shrugging off the engaging thoughts of her enigmatic personality, he tried to start a conversation. "You look tense! Any problem?" he asked cordially.

His question was sufficient to make Charu more conscious of her facial expressions and make her thoroughly regret her initial show of late reaction. "No, not at all," she said shrugging her shoulders showing her nonchalance.

But deep down inside her chest, there was this psychotic pumping machine called 'heart' that threatened to break out of her rib cage. Thank God he was busy with his friends and those lunatic fans who always got him engaged...

"If you aren't feeling good, I can come later", Karan offered quietly disappointed and agitated with the sluggish girl.

Both her brows rose instantly in confused urgency, as that was the only reaction she could manage with that troubled state of mind... Sure, she loved his company. At any other circumstances, she would have found herself on the ninth cloud after getting so much attention from her only crush... Many a time she had even plotted ways to grab his attention... So many times she imagined the way she would speak to him...

But that day - at that moment - she couldn't even give an appropriate response, or any response for that matter. She watched him make his way back to his seat in front and sit with his friends. She thumped on the back of the seat.

What demon had just possessed her? It was like she was just offered an ice cream and it melted in her hands before she could taste it even once. Darn her and her tube-light nature! God! What must Karan be thinking of her? She must have then cleared all his doubts about her poor psychotic mind.

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Aditya struggled not to look at her as she passed him, making way to a seat behind him on the other side. Although he was successful in his resolve of not looking at her even once, yet he knew she was sitting alone. No matter how he fought the urge, he had to give up at last and he stole a glance at her sitting quietly near the window with her eyes apparently lost in the scenery outside the window of the bus. With her black long untamed hair enjoying themselves flying as far as they could, she kept changing her expressions with her course of thought... sometimes smiling and sometimes furrowing her brows... The thing that amused him was that she could even 'think'!