Finding Love

11

Buzz! Buzz!

Counting backward from ten to one, Ananya picked up the call.

"What took you so long?" Said the usual irritated voice on the other end.

"I was looki-"

"It rang eight times before you answered. I thought you have lost your phone or something."

Ananya gave her phone a look of pure frustration and with all her might restrained herself from chucking it down onto the ground, because she couldn't afford to do it. It cost her a whooping seventy thousand and she would be kicked out out of her house if she did it.

"Why would I lose-"

"Where are you? I have been waiting here for half an hour already! What's taking you so long?"

"SHUT UP, Avinash!" Ananya yelled at the top of her voice, ignoring the stunned looks of people around. "I will be there in five minutes."

Ananya Murthy is going to die one day and she will write Avinash Nanda's name and die. Not in the sense that he makes her daydream and takes her breath away. In the sense that he irritates her to the extent it drives her nuts.

Now the daydreaming and taking breath away part cannot be totally ruled out. As in she wasn't crazy for him and weak in the knee or something. Just that he seemed very cute when he got irritated at her, that the warmth with which he looks at her makes her stomach do somersaults, that he radiates so much fondness when he is around. Okay. Maybe, just maybe, she might actually be crazy. No. Stop that chain of thought.

Ananya needed to focus to find her way out of the waiting area. She and Avinash had booked their tickets to the wedding on the same flight. But, as fate would have it, Ananya had some urgent family commitment that she couldn't skip and had to stay back, result being that she had to take a two hour late flight.

She had very nicely suggested that Avinash went to the accommodation provided and that she was perfectly capable of reaching the destination all by herself. But Avinash insisted they both went together.

However, Ananya's flight arrived early by an hour and so she went shopping totally losing track of time result being that she got late and made Avinash super impatient. It was when she finally took her phone out to see why she hadn't received any calls that Ananya realised her phone was on flight mode. Cursing herself she immediately called Avinash to be yelled at in the worst possible manner. In the fifteen minutes that took Ananya to get to the waiting area, he called her a hundred times.

Ananya has spotted Avinash's back and made a beeline to him. She tapped him on the shoulder to be received by a look of pure distaste. The kind of look your mom gives you when she comes to know you brought your lunch box back home unfinished.

Before Avinash could open his mouth to lecture her about being irresponsible, Ananya drew him into a tight hug.

"Hey," she said, brightly. "I missed you," she added, for good measure.

Avinash, who was so ready to go all bossy on her a minute ago, almost cracked a reluctant smile. Almost.

"I am so sorry, I got late," Ananya said hurriedly.

Avinash gave a disgruntled look, picked her luggage and slung it upon his shoulder. Taking it as a good sign, Ananya sighed in relief. She looped her arm with his and grinned.

"So, what's with the shorts?" she asked.

"What?" Avinash said.

"The shorts?" He was sporting shorts and a black tee and looked rather cute in them to Ananya.