He saw her for the first time after 10 years, while waiting for his connecting flight. He could not believe his eyes and for a moment he wondered if he was imagining it all again. But then she pulled out her phone from her bag and started talking to someone. That's when it really hit him that it was indeed her and contrary to what he always believed he would feel if their paths crossed again, he found himself drawing a blank. He felt absolutely nothing. He could very well be a stranger watching another stranger taking a call simply because he was a bit bored. People watch as they say.
And as he watched her, their years together started playing out in front of him.
The first time he saw her was at a metro station. He was already in the train and was almost drowsing while standing, "like a horse", as she told him later. Apparently she saw him first before he saw her. It was probably her gaze which woke him up from his half-slumber. Anyway, he saw her waiting on the platform for the compartment door to open but for some reason it did not. He was wondering why she was not running to the other door (which was already open) or even to the next coach (where all doors were open). She just stood there with a lost and yet content face. Then just when all other doors started closing, this one opened. And with a small chuckle she entered and stood with her back to him. Right at the side of the door and plugged in her earphones. He could see her reflection on the glass panes of the door. Wondering if he would see her again (something told him he would), he resumed his drowsing. And sure enough, after 20 mins they got off at the same station. Their college was another 15 mins walk away. There was of course, another college in the same vicinity and she could very well be going there. But by now he was sure, they were college mates. Not just by her 'jhola' but also by the books that were peeking from it - nope, definitely not a medical student. He remembered that, at the time, this thought had made him oddly happy. It was not that he felt extremely interested or curious about her. But as he walked lazily behind her, he found himself still wondering why she did not choose to take the open doors of the train. And why had she chuckled ...
She would later tell him that she wasn't feeling like going to college at all and had made her mind that if the door did not open, she would happily return home. "...And yes, I knew that particular door was faulty, which was precisely why I stood at that exact point. Also, I had to catch your attention!", she'd told him with a cheeky grin.
Even today it made him chuckle. He remembered that of the many things that he fell in love with, these quirks were his favourite. Setting weird conditions to do everyday things, smiling to herself every now and then, smoking just one cigarette a day and only when she needed to focus on something.
After that first day, he saw her every now and then on campus, often surrounded by her group of friends. At first, she was just a familiar face, like other faces on campus. But soon he found his eyes searching for her on days when he did not get a glimpse at least once, throughout the day. He did not think much of it though; even then, crushes or infatuations were not his thing. He was an old soul, as she termed it. (Whatever that meant, he still had no idea.) Nor did he find her particularly attractive (at least not in the way 19 yr old attractions worked). She had just become a ubiquitous part of his days, like the college building itself or the canteen. Like it was a normal day when he saw her at some part of the campus, and the days that he did not, automatically recorded itself in his mind. For almost a year, he did not even know her name, let alone talking to her and he was perfectly fine with this situation. Sometimes if their eyes met, while passing each other through corridors, they would just exchange a smile or wiggle eyebrows at each other. Yes, it was both silly and weird.
It still made him snort remembering how they first spoke to each other. He was dating a classmate at the time, and like most couples on campus, spent late evenings romancing his girlfriend around the canteen and Quad. That day was like any other day, his girlfriend had just started snogging him when he saw her walking by. Not that he kissed with eyes wide open but his body seemed to always know her presence and it flew open just in time to meet her eyes as she walked past them. She somehow looked extremely amused but gave him a quick appreciative smirk before disappearing around the corner.
The next day he found her at the canteen waiting for her order. He could not explain why but he felt he wanted to give her an explanation. Snogging was in no way uncommon on their campus (quite the contrary), so technically there was nothing to it. But he still found himself walking up to her side and saying while looking at the menu, "Sorry if it made you uncomfortable yesterday, usually I don't do ... that ..."(he waved his hand vaguely trying to explain "that").
"Don't do what ... kiss your girlfriend? How is she still with you then?" She asked with a serious face while taking her plate of noodles and chai.
Now he was not someone who laughed easily but found himself giving a surprised laugh. She looked amused too but he could not understand if she was amused at him or his reaction to her stupid joke.
And on that note, they spent the next few hours chatting and arguing about everything under the sun, including if noodles and chai really go well together. Normally, that should have kicked off their 'romance' but not them. They became thick friends, their respective groups automatically merged and his girlfriend moved to another boyfriend (thankfully without tears or fights). He wondered why it did not start off immediately; looking back at it now, it did feel very odd that two 19 year olds with such a strong mutual attraction would decide to take their own sweet time. Was it because both of them always knew that they would eventually be together for life?
"Well, both of us certainly got that part wrong", he muttered with a sigh. Just then, he saw her giggling into the phone. Current lover, perhaps? But then the giggle turned into a snort and then it was a full laugh. "Oh..that's Pip on the other side.", he thought with a smile. Only Pip could make her laugh like that. A fact that always made him a tad jealous..he would have bashed Pip's head long time back if the idiot weren't so in love with Pippa. He tried to remember who exactly was Pippa or what her actual name was, but in vain.
Seeing her laugh like that again should have done something to him right? What was he really expecting - pain? anger? longing? But nope, blank again. Is it because he could see that she was no longer that girl he once knew and loved? There certainly were some drastic changes. Weirdly she looked taller now, had gained some weight ("Thank god!"), her hair was no longer the messy mass of unruly curls (which he realised, he still misses), she now wears it short and straight. This suits her too though. And her eyes ... "nah still the same" he thought with a strange fondness. The same lost and content look.
And yet, when they were together, these same eyes always frustrated him. No matter how much he loved them, (still loves them) - he found them impossible to read. He never understood what she was thinking unless she articulated it. And articulate she never did - this part of her which always gave her that lost and content look. It was a look that screamed that she needed no one. That she would never be fully attached to anyone. That she would never show her depths to anyone, one could get a glimpse of it, but only through the surface.
Is this why he broke it off? Was it really that important to him at that time? That she could read him like a book and he could only scratch the surface? No, that can't have been the reason, it had to be the other banal reasons - they just grew out of love? Changed as individuals? They wanted different things in life, their ambitions (and boy were they ambitious!) were different?
Then why is it that all he could really remember was this anger that he felt, all the time, at his utter inability to fully get her? To know her inner world. Was it really that important to him, to possess her like that, even more than herself? So what if she did not need him with the same desperation that he needed her. There was certainly no question that she loved him. He saw it in her eyes, he saw it in all the little ways that she would make his day brighter, in her terrible jokes, in her silly pranks, in her laugh, in her hums, in her bear hugs and her kisses, or when she lay in his arms, in their fights and arguments and in the way that she always seemed to know, exactly what he wanted or was thinking about. Just by a mere look. Yes, she loved him. But he loved her more and this was all it took for him to walk away from the very person he had claimed to love so desperately. Did he really love her at all?
And at that moment, all the pain and anger that he had locked away came flooding back. He realised how much he still hated himself - that boy who had walked away and broke her heart, because of whom it's not him she is laughing on the phone with now. It's not him sitting beside her reading while she chatters away about some silly thing that she saw on the internet. Because of the utter arrogance of that infantile boy all those years back, he can only watch her today from afar.
"There, at least some feeling." He felt a little relieved that the state of blankness was not the nothingness rearing it's head again. Just his senses processing her presence after 10 long years.
He saw her gathering her things, still on the phone..must be her boarding call. She then got up, hung up the phone and walked away towards the elevators. That broke his reverie. It almost felt like he just woke up from a dream. He looked around but it was as if she had disappeared in thin air.
He could have at least said 'Hi', that would not have been so strange, right? What would have been her reaction? He knew, she was never the one to hold on to bitterness. Before they were lovers, they were friends, surely that should have been reason enough for him to go and say a 'Hi'? Wondering about all this with a pang in his heart, he did not realise when he had started walking and found himself standing in front of a cafe.
The barista smiled at him and he slightly embarrassed, started looking at the menu to order something. But the barista pushed a coffee and a takeaway sandwich towards him and said, "Here's your order sir, ma'am has already paid for it." He was about to tell her, it was a mistake but she gave an even bigger smile and said, "One cortado with sweetened milk and one chicken grilled sandwich without mayo or cheese, just butter and pepper. She said you were very particular about your sandwich, so we made it exactly like you prefer it. She also said you would be coming in a few minutes, so we kept it ready".
His heart was hammering so loudly that he was sure the barista could hear it. He asked weakly, "I'm sorry, surely it's a mistake.." "No mistake sir, she pointed you out to us, you were sitting over there.." She pointed to the seat where he was sitting, and yes, though far away, one could clearly see his recently vacated seat, from the cafe. "She said you'd be coming this way soon, so we should keep your order ready. Is ... something wrong? We can change it, if you want."
"Oh no, thanks! She is never wrong." And with that, he took his order with a broad grin and laughingly took a large bite of the sandwich, while slowly walking towards his gate. The feeling that told him all those years back in the metro, that this weird girl who had waited for a faulty door to open just so that she could stand right in front of him, the feeling that had told him that he would see her again very soon, was back.
"You again."
