𝘊𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘨𝘢𝘳𝘩, 2017
𝘋𝘪𝘷𝘺𝘢𝘢𝘯𝘵

Every time I had contemplated that I was perpetrating a misdemeanour to be in love with a girl who was out of my faith, the endless and divine - the very driving force because of whom faiths were formulated and humans were divided, persuaded and bestowed me some other paradisiacal and incredible things, making me self-conscious about the love I had for Pritika.

Was it a sin to love someone out of caste or religion?

That day when Pritika had called me her fiance, her would-be husband, something inside me had wriggled off and played a somersault in the free space creating sensations inside me I had never known and perceived of. The more I was trying to vamoose away from her, the more the cosmos and even the boo girl was sweating in partnership against me to make me fall remarkably hard for her such that I wouldn't get up again.

It was as if, the more I wanted to scamper off, the more the magnetic forces of love was attracting me towards the love 'fields' of the miraculously magnetic Pritika. It wasn't just the physical attraction, every time I had met her I don't know why there had been a feeling always pummelling in my heart as if we had known each other from so long. As if she was a lost friend of my past life whom I was meeting again and again.

In the helter-skelter of my escalated & stumped feelings and of course, the indisputable inclination towards her jovial personality, I had asked her out on a date and on the last day I had to cancel it, rashly as I knew the more we'd meet the more rebellious and insurgent my emotions would become for her.

But the destiny had always its own tournaments saved to be rivalled against me and my nincompoop-like heart.

I was plodding towards the men's section as I needed to buy some formal shirts and belts for me when I saw the accelerator of my heart coming in my direction with a baby in her wings, completely engrossed in bulldozing that hapless baby who might be already languished because of this Gabbar like Boo-girl. I chortled a peal of laughter and removed my shades, gawking at my heart's accelerator whose single appearance had already heightened my heart rate and enlarged the goofy smile on my face.

"You browbeat kids too with your 'BOO', my bubble gum?" I tantalised Pritika vivaciously whose eyes were wider than the Amazon, the expression of hysteria and incredibility emblazed on her grimace. I had held her strongly as this lady wasn't paying heed to where she was going, she surely would've won many prizes and medals in being careless and clumsy.

Time for filing a petition for the Olympics committee to add competitions on being clumsy and careless, I mused carelessly. Pritika would surely make our India proud.

Noticing her change in expressions, I knew what she might be already pondering about, wanting to just dig a hole in the earth and hide inside it, don't you, I chuckled and made her stand properly. This girl never disappointed to entertain me and bring a smile on my smile-resistant face.

I noticed her aghast expression and she was looking unusually cute in that. Yesterday night only she had agreed for our friendship and later our cancellation of date and today now, she was facing me and again with a 'BOO'. She was embarrassed as well as shocked, her face was an open book to narrate all this in audacious letters. The baby too was out of the burrow of Prtika's neck and her beautiful, omber eyes caught mine.

"Is she your niece?" I asked quizically as the baby looked quite intrigued with me the way she was passing me those shy and cute smiles. Wasn't she resembling the Himawari of Shinchan?

Pritika still didn't answer, why was she so much appalled, I didn't know! "Hey, Pritika? Do you remember me? Me, Divyaant, you, Boo?" I tried my best to drag her out of whatever world she had settled her memory and conscience in.

"Boo-ing is your favourite hobby, remember?" I tried to help her but couldn't control the chuckle that came out automatically.

After a pregnant silence, she stammered, "I'm sorry," and looked down as if she was the most modest girl in the whole universe, I could see her cheeks that were burning red too due to embarrassment?

What?

How come that girl was flustered and demure so much who had frightened her never-existing fiance with her Punjabi Jooti? How come she be so shy who had pricked me, a complete stranger with her safety pin? Had she taken her antibiotics today or not, I looked at her sympathetically and later at the kiddo who was already showing me her tiny arms, signing for taking her into my embrace.

I took the baby in my arms and together we started giving pitiful looks to the petrified Pritika who still was in her own sorry world of god knows what repentance she had committed.

"Wait, why am I feeling sorry when you should be feeling sorry! Why did you cancel the date when you were to roam inside the mall? Tell me? And Noor, already changing the party? And you are laughing too? Huh," the Boo girl definitely had not taken her antibiotics or medications today whatever chemical therapy she was going through, I hee-hawed along with the lamb beside me. Her aunt surely was an antique masterpiece meant to be placed inside a Vintage classic shop.

"Now I am perceiving who's more eager to take this friendship to the next level," I vocalised with a Cheshire cat-like smile adorning my lips that would've surely impacted her the way her two Rasgulla stuffed cheeks turned crimson red. "I..I...who told you that?" she couldn't complete her sentence and looked down again. You are surely affecting her Divi, 100%, I patted my back for my wisdom and converged more on her profile.

"I was just casually asking, but was your meeting held in that Gaming room from where you might be coming from? Tell me, Mr Divyaant?" frown marring her beautiful features, where a pinkish pimple was adorning her area below her nose, she articulated in an accusing manner, making me breathe profoundly at her way of complaining. Her hands were clamoured on her hips, giving her the perfect look of an Indian wife complaining because her demands weren't fulfilled, I chuckled at my ridiculous thoughts and thinned my lips to suppress the smile before she could kill me with her optics.

Just a rolling pin was left to complete her look of a typical, demanding Indian wife! Chuckles came again and tickled my lips.

She surely was excited about the date, wasn't she? I smiled and the baby in my arms too giggled at her irritated aunt's antics. "My meetings were cancelled, that's why I came here with my family. My nephew and niece are playing in the gaming room. And, if you don't mind, we still can continue our date?" with an impactful resilience in my voice, I uttered out resolutely and the baby beside me started clapping her hands for God knows what reason but it sounded like even she too was blessing us to commence our date.

"No, I don't want it," my bubble gum huffed and the cute pout was worth kissing, a sudden thought popped up inside the illicit part of my mind, the very part where a boy preserves the thoughts and fantasies of his one and only lady love. "Okay, then we'll do date with this cute, sweet bunny? What's her name, by the way?" her response didn't hinder my confidence rather it gave me gaiety and another opportunity to grin at the cutesy side of her.

"Harnoor," she responded languidly looking anywhere but me.

"Beautiful name for a cute baby girl," I grinned and glanced at Harnoor who was now busy in playing with the shades that I had placed inside my breast's pocket.

I just needed a chance to prolong the time of me and Pritika talking together face to face. This was soothing, splendid, tranquil, even the reticence between us felt like some sweet, melodious tune was playing in the backdrop.

"She's your niece, right? She's adorable," I praised the beautiful baby who too stared at me and presented me her eight-teethed & dimpled smile. This surely was the first baby whom I was handling with such convenience and valour otherwise my adventures with babies were just not very memorable.

"Yeah, she is," it wasn't Pritika but another man's voice which I got to hear in return and I immediately looked up and saw a Sikh man standing beside Pritika with his hand placed on her shoulder.

My jaws clenched as I just noticed how bewildered and delighted Pritika became after seeing that unknown man here. Before I could've even blinked my eyes, they hugged each other like best friends do and parted away after a much prolonged pregnant period.

She hadn't even shaken her hands with mine and here she was already hugging an unknown man?

'I'm in love with you and it scares me, I don't want this feeling to fade, I want you to be happy but I want you to be happy, with me,' this was my jealousy screeching inside the burns of my heart.

'There's no true love without jealousy,' the philosopher side of my brain sided me and vocalised in a domineering manner.

"Who. The. Hell. Is. He?" I gritted out snubbing the fact that Noor wasn't in my arms anymore but in that man's arms where she was cheering gleefully, scratching at his beard and Pritika too was looking at the man like he was so dear to her, overlooking the presence of the same man with whom she wanted the date so eagerly.

~**⁕**~

VERY IMPORTANT NOTE:

August 3rd, 2020 onwards, I will finally be in fourth year and placements too will be knocking on my door in a few weeks time. I am writing this to you as I have mentioned something in my CV:

1) In co-curricular activities, I have written that I have completed two novels on Wattpad (LSWAB will be very soon completed)

2) Also, I have 2K active audience on Wattpad.

Can you help me achieve that? I want a plain answer?

Yes or no?

Silents readers, I need your voice? 

This is serious!