Chapter 5: Dates & Revelations
The following days after the crazy night had been calm. Purvi had been especially pleased as Onir was constantly out of her sight - which wasn't a problem for her, of course. However, what she wasn't pleased about, was the fact that her own teammates were bagging on her for what happened. She sighed and slammed her locker shut after gathering her week old gym clothes that had been stuffed in there. Purvi was beyond glad that the season was over, especially since she was failing her classes and she would have been on probation anyways; giving her teammates another reason to hate her.
She rolled her eyes once she heard Onir's name pop up in someone's conversation. Just as expected, her name popped up shortly after. Purvi angrily shoved her clothes in her bag and began to make her way out of the locker room. However, once she heard a rude remark about Arjun, she instantly turned around and went back to the bank where her teammates were.
Purvi clutched onto the strap of her bag as an attempt to calm herself down a bit. "Excuse me," she began; tapping a girl, Simran, on the shoulder. "Maybe you should keep my boyfriend's name out of your mouth," she forced a smile, while only drove Simran crazier.
"You're actually dating that freak?" Simran's voice was shrill, nearly hurting Purvi's ears. "There's already enough stuff that people say about this team and now they can say that we mess around with weird, mafia freaks too," she rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. "Smooth move, Purvi."
"He's not a freak!" she immediately protested. "You don't know him, so you wouldn't understand him," Purvi shook her head; almost feeling sorry for her teammate who clearly won't get the chance to ever meet anyone as great as Arjun. She opened her mouth to talk again after realizing that her words weren't enough to beat Simran's, but someone had already beaten her to it.
"You're one to say things Simran," Ovi joined the scene after applying her last coat of lip gloss. "You're the one who sleeps around, am I right? That gives us all such a good reputation," she rolled her eyes before tossing her lip gloss in her purse and rummaging around to find her eyeliner.
Purvi peered over at the girl and shot her a small smile. She had a weird epiphanie - Ovi wasn't THAT bad of a person, she was just a bit complicated. Simran glared down both Purvi and Ovi, which phased neither of them. She felt her phone vibrate in her back pocket and sighed. "I've got to go," she turned on her heel, but turned back around after realizing something. "Say shit about me, but don't say ANYTHING about Arjun."
Ovi watched, clearly impressed, as Purvi increased her hold on her bag and walked back out of the locker room. Simran was clearly stunned and didn't even notice that the other girls were murmuring things about how badly she was told off. She slammed her locker and groaned before taking all her anger out on her teammates.
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She headed over to the flower shop where she had first bumped into Arjun. Purvi smiled to herself at the memory of it. She was still heated from the locker room incident and didn't realize that her red face was much more noticeable since she had put her hair up in a ponytail. She groaned and decided to just leave it, since she was too lazy. Purvi took a look at the outside of the shop and couldn't help but notice a familiar bicycle parked in the driveway.
Purvi grinned and went inside the shop. Her original mission was to buy herself some sunflowers, however, now it had become to find Arjun. Luckily, the sunflowers were on display and she managed to pick up three along her journey through the aisles. She knew she had seen Arjun due to the leather jacket he had on; different from the one she still had stowed away at home. She got up on her toes and covered his eyes. "Guess whooo?" she asked in a chirpy voice. All of Purvi's anger had slipped away once Arjun put his hands around her wrists.
"I wonder who you could be," Arjun chuckled before Purvi removed her hands from his face. "Hi," he greeted simply after turning around to face her. He cupped her face in his hands and pressed his lips against the side of her head.
His touch made her feel so warm and good on the inside; the feeling was indescribable. "Hey," Purvi returned his bland, simple greeting with a huge grin. "What are you doing here?" she asked Arjun, studying the yellow roses in his hand. "And who's that for?"
"I'm just buying flowers," he stated the obvious and laughed a bit. "Um... I'm just shopping for a really special person," his eyes lit up as he thought about the woman that meant the world to him. "She liked yellow roses a lot, so I figured..."
"Mmm," she stroked the petals of one of her sunflowers with her thumb while looking down at it. She figured that the special girl was probably a family member, so she went against the idea of pestering him about it. "I like yellow flowers too... especially sunflowers," she looked down at the flowers in her hand and felt a small smile returning to her face. She looked up at Arjun before looking back down at her flowers. She took one out of her hand and gave it to him. "You look like you could use some sunshine in your life."
Arjun handed the flower back to Purvi who happily accepted it; though she was good at hiding the happy' part. "I already have my sunshine," he patted the top of her head, which caused her cheeks to turn all sorts of different shades of pink and red. They continued their small talk as they paid for their flowers. Afterwards, they headed over to the small cafe a few stores down.
"Am I the sunshine you were talking about earlier?" Purvi asked nearly 13 minutes later, as the issue was still bothering her. She sat across from Arjun in a tiny booth and couldn't be anymore happier. Arjun chuckled and nodded his head. He noticed the waitress coming towards them with a tray of 2 cups, so he reached over for some sweetener. After the waitress set their cups of coffee down on their table, Purvi revealed her big smile that she had been hiding. "You're like the sunflower in my life. How was that? Cheesy enough?"
"Perfect," Arjun laughed and ripped open the packet of sweetener. "You know, I actually have to be somewhere soon," he sighed at the fact that he had seen Purvi more often when they weren't a couple.
"And I have to go back to school soon too," Purvi frowned and mixed the contents of her drink with a stir. "Math tutoring," she rolled her eyes in disgust and took a sip of the strong coffee. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing you should be worrying about," he smirked; his mysterious aura coming back once again. "Hey, you know... I could actually help you in math," he raised his eyebrows and began swallowing down his warm, hot coffee.
She was taken by surprise. In fact, Purvi would have never guessed that a guy like Arjun was actually that annoying genius that no one in class would like since they threw off curves on exams. He finished her review sheet in a breeze and was actually really good at teaching. Arjun used the same methods of tutoring as everyone else did, but Purvi just understood it better for some god forsaken reason. "Okay, so... when it's like this," she began, placing the tip of her pencil on one of the problems on her worksheet. "You just multiply the bottom and top?"
"Exactly!" Arjun eyes lit up, which Purvi took note of. "See, you're good at this!" he said comfortingly, after she had revealed that math was one of her weakest subjects. In fact, all subjects were her weakest. He put his hand on top of hers and squeezed it tightly.
"That's weird... hearing that from you," she said under her breath. She had learned one new thing about her boyfriend that day - he was a genius. The boy was simply a genius. He had even promised to help her come up with tricks for memorization in history the next time they spontaneously run into each other. "We should just start meeting here," she smiled at the idea of having a secret meeting spot. It was something she saw in those romantic movies that her mother always dragged her along to. Her mother would always gush about how Onir reminds her of a character out of a John Green or Nicholas Sparks book, which only made her want to puke.
"I guess... but I don't want to leave you hanging in case I can't come," he sighed. Though their relationship was new, it was already becoming a bit difficult to handle.
"That's okay. I can just get more sunflowers in case you don't," she smiled at him; her smile acting as a wave of comfort for him.
"You're cute. I kind of want to just take you home with me," Arjun chuckled a bit and got up from his seat. Purvi finished stuffing the last of her books in her bag and stood up too. They began to walk outside together with the air still as crisp and fresh as it was earlier.
The wind caused wisps of Purvi's hair to fly in her face as she talked. "Well, why don't you?" she asked, clearly not thinking.
"Listen, I really have to go," Arjun sighed after glancing at his watch. He wished that he could just stay with her a little while longer, especially since Purvi looked so upset. He used his finger to raise up her chin and then pressed his warm, soft lips against hers. She was caught by surprise, but quickly melted into him and grabbed onto his jacket. Before she could even say goodbye, he was gone; leaving her missing the warmth and safety that he had gotten her so attached to in such a short amount of time.
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"And where exactly where you, Purvi? You know you're supposed to call," her father put down the newspaper that had covered his head as soon as he heard the door make the gentlest noise. She cursed herself and bit her tongue.
"Ummm... I was getting tutoring for math... like I always do," Purvi lied through her teeth. She bit her bottom lip before trying to make her way towards the stairs.
"Tutoring should have ended 20 minutes ago," he said in a stern voice while standing up. He turned around only to be facing her back. She let out a deep sigh and turned around; a bit taken back once she noticed her mother joining her father.
"Yeah... that's because I met up with my boyfriend afterwards," Purvi blurted out after feeling as though if she didn't speak up now, then she wouldn't be worthy enough to be Arjun's girlfriend. He's the type of guy that would stand up for his rights and it inspired her to do the same, especially since that was much needed to deal with the people in her life.
"Well, honey, if you just told us that you were going to be out with Onir..." her mother started, but Purvi was quick to cut her off.
"I'm not with Onir," she admitted quietly while looking at the ground. However, she thought of Arjun and once again, her confidence was boosted. "We broke up. I'm dating Arjun... you guys don't know him, but he's a good guy." After Purvi spoke, the living room was silent for a good few moments.
"Why'd you break up with Onir? He was a good guy too," her father asked in a rather startling tone.
"No, dad. He wasn't a good guy," Purvi revealed through gritted teeth. She didn't even notice when her hands began to curl up into fists by her side. "Arjun's the good guy, trust me." With that being said, she turned on her heel and went straight to her room, not bothering to stay and answer anymore questions from her parents.
She shut the door behind her and locked it before going over to her closet where she had carefully stowed away Arjun's leather jacket. Purvi ran her hand along the jacket gently, studying the discrete embroidery of symbols and abbreviations that she wasn't aware of. "Arjun IS the good guy," she said to herself, before hugging the jacket tightly against her.
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