It’s Still Complicated: …because I Am Still Waiting (8 page)

Megha had brought this cake for me; she opened the box of the cake and said “It’s your favorite chocolate cake!”

Preeti and Ravi helped Megha in lighting the candles and then they all started singing the song “Happy birthday to you, Happy birthday to you…” I was given a knife to cut the cake; I know it was going to sound surprising but this was the first time that I was actually going to cut a cake on my birthday. Megha held my hand and helped me to cut it. Whenever I used to eat anything I always asked Megha to bite it first, according to me this increases the taste of the food, similarly the first sip of any liquid I used to have, went to her. So when I cut the cake the first bite was tasted by her, and that increased the taste of my favorite chocolate cake. I remember the day when Megha asked me about my favorite cake and I said I had never cut a cake in my life till date but my favorite cake was chocolate cake. She knew that she would make this birthday special by bringing a cake for me and making me do something which I had never done in last 20 years. Eventually this day became the happiest day of my life as I was with such a girl. A girl who always wanted to make me happy by doing beautiful things for me.

After having the cake we all were now inside the car and then Preeti asked me not to touch the FM this time, she said Megha plays the right song. “All girls are same!” I said and Ravi and I burst out into laughter. Soon we reached Kohat and I asked Ravi to take Preeti home and informed him that I would spend some time with Megha and would be back at home soon. They understood my feelings left us alone, and now I was with Megha in her car.

She asked me “How was the cake
Jaan
?”

I said “It was not tastier than you sweetheart,”

She smiled and asked me “Did you enjoy your birthday with us today?”.

“Yes, but I need one more gift from you.” She asked “What do you want sweet heart?”

I asked her to put her hand on my head and take an oath that she would never leave me and would always love me like this. She smiled and did the same. She was a perfect girl who would do anything for her boyfriend’s happiness. As I had wanted to from the moment I had seen her earlier that day, I hugged her and kissed her.

Sadly, the moment when I had to go home came very soon I said, “
Yaar tujhse door jaane me na Jaan si nikal jaati hai, kash mai hamesha tere sath reh sakta, shaadi kar le tu mujhse abhi
.”

She smiled and said she is only 17 yet and is not allowed to marry according to law. The Law was “
Kabab me haddi
this time”, I mean I had no words after this reply.

“Okay see ya sweetheart, enjoy your birthday, happy birthday once again!” she said

“Thank you
, I Love You
…” “
Love you
too…” she replied “See ya”.

28th May, 2011

It was her third birthday with me when we went to D Mall, Netaji Subhash Palace. But on that special day of hers we were unable to plan a proper celebration just like we had done for our birthdays together earlier due to some family problem in her house. So we planned to have a small birthday party just at Haldiram’s at the D Mall. I waited for her at Kohat Enclave Metro station, as usual she was late but it was her birthday so I decided not to get angry with her. She came after few minutes, I went near her car and she opened the door lock. As soon as I entered inside the car she smiled and all my anger went away. Her smile was one thing which could melt all of my anger.

“Are you angry with me?” she asked.

“I was but your smile took away all of my anger and gave me a reason to Love you again sweet heart…”

She smiled and I hugged her. She was looking very beautiful that day; I noticed she was in her favorite pink top and white designed long skirt. She was looking prettier than ever and I complimented her and she said impishly that she always looked pretty and I had to agree with her. After all she always looked more beautiful than ever. We reached D Mall in a few minutes but we both were not feeling hungry at all so we decided to sit on the stairs. Actually those stairs are not allowed to be used except in case of emergency, but as we were love birds we had to make a nest in a prohibited place to make sure that we were alone and no one disturbed us.

She was sitting on the top most stairs and I was on the second one. We were sitting hand in hand and were talking about our families and then suddenly she became a bit sad thinking of her family problem. I knew how to cheer her up.

I said “Never feel sad about anything, as whatever is happening is happening because we do not have control over it, and if you are sad who will take care of the whole family, if you are sad then my happiness will go away; just look at me and smile, I am always with you,”

She knew that when she was sad I also become sad, so she smiled and said “I know you are always there for me, when you are there I feel safe and confident enough to fight all the problems in the world!”

To divert her mood I started clicking her pictures on my new phone and she started giving me seductive poses like a celebrity. This time I did not have any gift for her as she did not tell anyone at her home that she was going out to celebrate her birthday. I wanted to give her few gifts but I had to take care of her feelings and I decided to make her next birthday better than ever.

June 2011 (One more proposal)

I was in my home town on vacation and as usual I was going through my FB profile; I saw a friend request from one of my class mates from 12th, Jyoti. She was the most studious and intelligent girl in our class, I remembered though I was also studious and always in the top five of the class we used to help each other a lot in studies. But except for the studies we did not have any conversation and had not been good friends. I accepted the request and like any other old school classmate she was now my FB friend. A normal conversation between us led to the sharing of phone numbers, and now we started chatting over the text messages instead of on Facebook.

I asked her whether she was in contact with any of our other classmates. She replied that she was in contact with a few of them. She was completely different from what I had thought of her, according to me she was a reserved kind of girl who never shared anything until someone asked her directly but here she was an extrovert and she clearly had the urge to share lots of information with people. She told me how one of her cousins ran away from home with her boyfriend and their family found her, brought her back and got her married to some other guy. The reason behind it was simple; that the people in villages are orthodox, and the girl and boy were from different religions, so they did not accept the relationship.

She then wanted to know about me, whether I had a girl friend or not. I told her about Megha. Then she told me about Apoorva, another classmate of ours who liked me and wanted to talk to me, but I had never talked to her as I never liked her. Then I asked her whether she has a boyfriend, she said she likes a boy but he was from different religion so her parents would not allow her to marry him. She said she wanted to stop talking to him and that is why she changed her number, but she was not able to forget him.

Meanwhile I got message from an unknown number, and it was Apoorva who seemed to have taken my number from Jyoti. Now this was a complete mess for me as I never wanted many people to enter my life and disturb me, as I am a person who has always had limited friends. I don’t believe in making too many friends. I never liked this girl Apoorva and I did not wanted to talk to her, so I bluntly asked her to stop messaging me.

With the passage of a few days Jyoti too got inclined towards me, she said she wants to forget her boyfriend and if I allow she would like to be my girlfriend. I was like ‘What the hell is going on? She knows that I am already committed to someone and still she has the guts to propose me this way!’ I reminded her that I was in a relationship for the last two years and that I love Megha very much. I tried to figure it out but I failed to analyze what was going on in Jyoti’s head. She remained in contact with me for few more months after that but it was just as a friend and I too ensured that I did not talk to her much.

I explained everything to Megha and I was expecting her to get angry. But surprise, she was not at all angry with me. She said “See how lucky I am. When I am in your life a lot of girls are proposing you, and with the rejection of this proposal we have come closer than ever. Now I am more confident that you will always be mine!”

I smiled and said “Sweet heart you are completely unpredictable; you trust me so much that I could never even think of breaking your heart. I’ll always be yours and will never go away from you…”

This was the way in which she was completely different from others, unlike other girls she is not angry and her trust is stronger than her insecurity, but I was completely different, I felt insecure even when she talked to another guy, but this doesn’t mean that I don’t trust her, I did. But like other guys out there I had a sense of insecurity and I always wanted her to talk only to good friends. We always remained reserved from other and stuck to each other. So much so that we never used to interact with other people much and we used to spend all of our spare time with each other or on the phone talking to each other.

July 2011 (B – School)

My B.Com final year exams were over and now I had to do my postgraduate studies. Megha wanted me to stop studying and start doing business as she thought that instead of studying for the next two years if I started doing business, I would be able to buy my own house, and I will be able to create enough goodwill to ask for her hand in those two years. According to her, her father would only allow me to marry her when I had a good business and my own house in Delhi. This made sense as of course every father would like to get his daughter married to a well-settled guy. She was right on her part as she wanted to marry me and she wanted me to become something in my life. But because it was my dream to become an MBA, I promised her that after post-graduation that I would surely start my own business and would buy my own house in Delhi. She let me do so and she was happy for me.

I had always wanted to become an MBA but my relatives suggested that I should do either CA or CS instead of MBA. My family members always wanted me to become a CA, but as I was very weak in Math, I never wanted to go for a postgraduate program which I could not complete. CS was also a good option but I knew if I opted for CS then I would not be able to enjoy college life and to become an MBA was my dream since childhood days. The decision to do an MBA was finalized but due to my poor marks in my B.Com I could not do CAT and MAT exams which led me to search for some private institute to do my MBA from.

I started searching on internet about the top private colleges and I came across the website of IIPM (Indian Institute of Planning and Management), in 2011, IIPM was ranked the fifth-best business school in India in the Zee Best Business School survey results. In the same survey it was ranked first in India in terms of Global Exposure and intellectual impact, fifth in terms of course contents and overall placements, third in industry interface and sixteenth on infrastructural facilities. At the 2011 Asia’s Best B-School awards ceremony, IIPM was judged the 2011 Best B-school in Asia Overall. In DNA’s 2011 National B-School Survey, IIPM was ranked eighth-best B-school in India. In the same survey, IIPM was ranked first in international exposure, eleventh in curriculum, ninth in intellectual impact, sixth in image of the institute, eleventh in placements, sixth in industry interaction, eighth in infrastructure and twelfth in potential to network. In the 2011 B-School Survey of
Mail Today
, IIPM was ranked top of all B-schools surveyed.

I was very excited to get admission in IIPM now. I jumped up to the ‘Contact Us’ page and filled up the credentials; soon I got a call for an interview and a written test for admission. Though I had never given any interview in the past I passed both the written test and the oral interview. They now asked me to choose the campus, and I opted for the Delhi campus. I got very excited when they sent me the selection letter when my admission was confirmed.

August 2011

IIPM called the new students to the Orientation Program in Sri Satya Sai Auditorium on Lodhi Road. The dress code was ‘Formals’ and I had never worn any formals in my life before that. I borrowed the formals from my cousin and I was very excited to go to the Orientation Program. I reached the auditorium at the exact time given in the invitation letter. I was a bit nervous to see so many new people and I didn’t know any one of them. Everyone was well dressed and behaved in a very sophisticated manner. Soon we entered the auditorium and it was filled up like a movie theater. Mr. Arindham Chaudhary gave a very motivational speech along with his wife Mrs. Rajita Chaudhary and then they announced the date of our first class at IIPM.

30th August, 2011

It was the first day of my college. I boarded the bus organized by IIPM from Netaji Subhash Palace. I thought I would be the only one to board the bus from NSP but I wasn’t. Soon a girl entered the bus, wearing a black top, blue denim and a purple jacket having a black purse in her hand. She was slim and beautiful, she came and sat behind me and said bye to her daddy who was sitting in a black BMW. Then entered another girl, a bit healthy not to be confused with fat, she had messy hair which was curly from the top and straight at the bottom, a square face with red lipstick. She was wearing a red top and black jeans, carrying a pink colored bag in her hand. She was wearing a pair of high heeled sandals as she was only 5feet tall. She sat on the right side seat to me and said bye to her daddy who has come to drop her. The journey to college was one and half hour from there and all of us were strangers so we kept quiet during the whole journey. We reached the college at 8:15am and the class was about to start at 8:30am, I searched the classroom and made myself comfortable in the front seat as all of the backseats were occupied till I reached the class. When I glanced at all the faces in the class I came to know that the two girls who came in the same bus with me were my classmates. The ‘Girl with the BMW Daddy’ (as I had referred to her) was Sahiba Wadhwa and the ‘Girl wearing High Heels’ was Simran Chawla. The classroom was completely filled up, and everyone was busy introducing themselves to each other. A guy sitting on my right introduced himself to me, “Hi! My Name is Iman Roy.” He was a Bengali and his accent revealed this. I then introduced myself, “Hi! I am Chandra Kant,”