Chasing Shadows - Chapter 6-Pg118, NOTE-Pg120 - Page 22

Originally posted by: ..Jojo..

@Bold: Because you.were.bored. :D :P

"Do I really have to ask?" Muskaan gritted her teeth. She had been sitting there on Riddhima's bed, staring at Riddhima's face which looked like it would erupt in flames any moment, while she tossed around her unpacked boxes in her bursary room, swearing every two minutes. And to think she was excited about moving into her Uni! But Muskaan was tired of her hauling about - she still hadn't uttered a word. Finally giving up, she had decided to ask her best friend the matter.

"That complete jackass of a person is back in my life!" Riddhima growled, in a low whisper. Muskaan's eyes widened.

"Yeah, you kind-a told me about that jackass, but does that jackass have a name and a convict, or do you just enjoy snapping at random people?" Muskaan joked. But Riddhima was in no mood of course.

"Oh shut up!" Riddhima snapped. "That jackass is named Armaan Mallik, and contrary to the meaning of his name, he is not at all desired here!" Riddhima said bitterly. Muskaan raised her eyebrows in an 'Uh-huh, I see' sort of way, and that way Riddhima's cue to continue.

"We were together in high school…Something I repent now!" Riddhima sighed. "But before I continue, there's something you need to know about me!" Saying so, Riddhima pulled out her phone, and once again held it up for Muskaan to see - the same picture she had shown Armaan a while ago. But unlike Armaan's wide eyes, Muskaan's lips curved into a smile.

"Who is this dork?" Muskaan laughed.

"Me." Riddhima said in a monotone. Muskaan's laughter came to an abrupt halt.

"That. Is. You." Muskaan stated it.

Riddhima began counting backwards in her head - "3…2…" She murmured to herself. And sure enough, just as she whispered a "…1…" to no one in particular, Muskaan's guffaws filled her room.

"Done?" Riddhima asked her with her sweetest smile, while Muskaan nodded, catching her breath. "Yes, that dork in the picture is me. A me I had forgotten until today." Riddhima smiled sardonically.

"Tell me more!" Muskaan's eyes twinkled. Her best friend's past which she was completely in the shadows about - this had to be huge. Riddhima wasn't normally one who would hide things from her. And although a bit upset at not having known this side of her, she knew Riddhima had a valid reason for it.

"At 13, I stepped foot into high school, as this girl over here. I had been home-schooled previously, because of…" Riddhima's voice trailed off into a whisper.

"Because of?" Muskaan asked curiously.

"…because of my heart problems. I had a hole in my heart." Riddhima sighed. Muskaan's gasps had been expected by her, but she smiled when she felt her best friend pull her into a tight hug. "Uh, I don't have one now, you know, so you can stop choking me!" Riddhima pretended to cough, while Muskaan just pulled out and glared at her.

"You got a transplant?" She whispered to her.

"Yea..I'm forever indebted to the person who gave it to me though..I wouldn't have been here otherwise.." Riddhima replied back, thoughtfully. "It was a woman's heart. She had apparently died in an accident. I was on top of the donor's list, and I finally had a heart. And a chance at a new life."

But there was something else in Muskaan's eyes - hurt at not having known so much about her supposed best friend.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you! It just didn't seem important! And honestly I was cured when I was about 10, but Mum was still apprehensive about letting me out of her sight. But she eventually gave in when Dad made her see reason. And so, there I was - stick thin, face flushed and filled with acne, and alien high numbers for glasses - all a result of the medication I had been put through for the past 13 years!" Riddhima shrugged.

But even her nonchalance couldn't hide her nostalgia. It felt like she was talking about a long lost sister, a long lost twin, someone who was an important part of her life but had vanished into thin air. It seemed like she had escaped into a faraway parallel world, traded an entire lifetime just by trading a heart.

"You looked cute!" Muskaan muttered, in an attempt to be nice to her once troubled best friend. But if Riddhima's face hadn't looked so convincing, she would have never believed all that she was telling her. Because the Riddhima she was today was far from the ugly duckling she was being portrayed as. Her deep hazel brown eyes, normally highlighted with a thin layer of kohl - a breakthrough to her heart within, her smile, which caused a small dimple in her left cheek and which would lighten up a room, and heck, she knew the number of guys Riddhima had had after her. But according to Riddhima, she was looking for someone who would call her beautiful and not "smokin' hot".

"Uh, Muskaan, I know I'm breathtakingly beautiful, but I am straight!" Riddhima caught Muskaan eyeing her up and down, and although she knew why, she couldn't stand the incredulous glances Muskaan was throwing at her.

"Shut up! I just can't believe this is you!" Muskaan sighed, looking down at Riddhima's phone which still showed her 13-year-old-self.

"Me neither! Seems like another lifetime!" Riddhima smiled softly.

"Maybe you're her evil twin!" Muskaan shrugged. Riddhima frowned.

"Even if she is my twin, how do you know I'm the evil one?" Riddhima asked curiously.

"Look at her. Does she look anywhere close to sinister?" Muskaan asked with a smirk while Riddhima giggled. "And knowing you, I will bet anything - you are definitely the evil one!" Muskaan laughed.

"Point!" Riddhima smiled. "So anyway, getting back to my awesome Ugly Duckling fairy-tale, I stepped into high school, with apprehension and excitement in every nerve of my body. And the first person I met while over there was…." Riddhima clenched her teeth as she went back to her first day in school. "Armaan Mallik." She said in an undertone. She suddenly got up, and opening one of her boxes, she fished inside until she reached a long, wide book, with the heading 'Norwick High School - Batch of 2004-2005'.

"The desire of every girl's heart, the object of every boy's envy, the apple of every teacher's eye…" Riddhima said loudly, while she mercilessly whipped through the pages. "Meet Armaan Mallik!" Riddhima smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes, and shoved her book on the bed, while Muskaan eagerly peeped inside. "I met him first in the Science Lab, which was my first class of that fateful day. He was my lab partner." Riddhima huffed.

"He's so cute!" Muskaan sighed deeply, only to make Riddhima scowl.

"Shut up! He's not cute at all!" Riddhima said annoyed.

"You're right. The Armaan Mallik I saw today was spiking hot!" Muskaan grinned up at her, only to be thumped in the head by a pillow. "Fine I'll zip it. Continue your fairy tale please!" She added with a smile.

"He was sports captain, and later went on to become the student body president! Needless to say, he was the most popular kid in school - the jock who everyone wanted to be with. Along with Ethan Mendler of course. I still remember the rivalry between the two. It used to be at the peak of hostility. But while I saw Ethan strive to be the best, I never saw Armaan even give anything a try. I think he was just a natural at everything he did. Sports, academia, dance, singing, circus clown, you name it and he had it all. He was one of those perfect people who you would think never exist except in fairy tales. Maybe for girls around him he was a desired fairy tale. I never knew if he really had those gorgeous shade of blue eyes or were they lenses, but I never failed to see that bout of mischief in them. They were always up to something. And oh, he was always up to something. He and his jock-gang were the biggest pranksters on campus!" Riddhima laughed. From the stink-bombs in the classrooms, to the tomatoes in the evil Vice-Principal's cabin, he was the culprit behind all of it.

"And you were head over heels smitten by him, weren't you?" Muskaan teased, as she noticed the high in Riddhima's voice when she talked about him. She had noticed the tinge of red in her cheek apples, but she wasn't sure if it was because she was angry or because she was blushing. Probably the former, Muskaan thought. She had been witness to Riddhima's red hot anger on several occasions, but never once had she seen Riddhima blush. Now that she thought about it, she had never seen Riddhima even talk like this about any guy - her dates never made it to a second dinner or luncheon. And as far as she had known Riddhima, she had never been so deeply affected by any guy either - in a positive or a negative way. She had always laughed when Riddhima called herself the female version of a Playboy, but now that she noticed it, Riddhima probably was one. But she also knew Riddhima didn't trust anyone easily, and hence she had never given her heart to anyone. And Muskaan didn't have the heart to term her as a merciless bitch, because she knew Riddhima was way more than that - she knew her best friend inside out. And 6 years were enough to let her know that Riddhima was a gem of a person. So she was curious - she knew this certain Armaan Mallik was the reason behind Riddhima's lack of trust in people.

"Yes." Riddhima replied coldly. When she turned, Muskaan was shocked to see the steel coldness in her eyes. She would have been spooked if she hadn't seen the unshed tears behind those gorgeous hazel orbs.

"I was." Riddhima smiled her normal warm smile when she saw the shock pasted on Muskaan's face. "I was smitten by him. It was the first encounter I had had with someone my age, of the opposite sex, and let's face it, he was heavenly gorgeous." Riddhima sighed, plopping herself next to Muskaan. "It was a wonderful feeling though. I was a pre-teen, who had just gotten her first crush, and believe it or not, from the moment I saw him for the first time in the Science Lab, like any normal teenager, I wove dreams too. And yes, I loved him for another reason - he made me feel normal. 13 years of being caged with just a handful of people around me, who jumped when I as much as coughed. Falling for him made me realize that I wasn't abnormal, that I had normal human feelings too, normal girl feelings, just like I had read in books." Riddhima gave Muskaan a small smile, while Muskaan returned it.

"So yes, I was smitten by him. But with those dreams, I knew I had no hopes of being noticed by him. Heck, he was my lab partner for the rest of the semester, and I bet he didn't even know my name! He just came, did his thing, while I sat there, barely concentrating on acids and alkalis, and then he left, without as much as sparing me a glance. For him, I was just an idle by-stander sitting next to him. He never even once thought that since we were partners we should carry out the experiments together. But he would just come, sit, pass me a smile, and then get to work. That smile would make my day, and I wouldn't care about not being able to perform the tasks. I wouldn't even care when people would rag me right after, in the hallways, point and laugh at me when I walked, throw paper-balls at me. Who cared? He had smiled at me!" Riddhima said in mock enthusiasm.

"So anyway, for the next few months, I lived by just staring at him across hallways, in homeroom, during gym, and during math class. He was definitely a charmer, and so I never felt the need to fall out of love with him." Riddhima sighed.

"So, what happened? Why did you start hating him?" Muskaan noticed the biggest loophole in the story and voiced her doubts.

"Let's zoom to year 9 shall we?" Riddhima sighed heavily. Restlessness getting better of her, she began pacing around her room once again…She needed to move around. The trip down memory lane was suffocating her…It was only going to get worse now…

"Year 9, now more in love with him than ever, I started being noticed!" Riddhima said in a breath. "The feeling of liberation, the feeling of freedom after long years of medication and overwhelming protection, I began to live…Finally…Thanks to my over active brain cells, which loved scoring in exams, I got the tag of the official nerd. The geeky dork. And just like that, I didn't know when, I didn't know how, along with being noticed for my excellence, I began to be noticed by the queen bees as well. Queen bee actually. Monique De'Latour, the hottie of our school started giving me unwanted attention. And one day, to my utter dismay, my personal diary, which I would carry with me wherever I went, got into her hands. You can assume what happened next!" Riddhima rolled her eyes. Although she hadn't bothered rewinding back to her past, now that she was finally recalling all of it, it seemed like it happened just yesterday. The diary, the naive 14 year old, who was madly in love with the hottest guy in school, the annual prom - every girl's dream, and then…

"Call it my naivety, my innocence or sheer daftness, I fell for Monique's false words of getting me noticed by my 'Prince Charming'. Actually, on the contrary, she left no stone unturned in getting me noticed by him. She did keep her promise…" Riddhima's voice trailed off into a whisper, as a lump formed in her throat. It still pricked her to think about that night - that night which changed everything.

"I remember how excited I was. Mum was tensed about sending me, everyone knows what happens on Prom Nights! But I was adamant on going. Sometimes I wish I would've just listened to her. But, as they say, don't regret anything. And so, dressed in best ways possible, I made it to Prom…" Riddhima drew in a breath. Now came the tough part. "I stepped in, and the blinding disco lights, the dresses swivelling about here and there, and the harsh scent of people's mixed perfumes made me choke. But that only added to my excitement. I kept roaming about, looking for him, trying to see where he was. And then I saw him - his arms tightly wrapped around that bitch Monique's match stick waist, her stilettos making her a little shorter to him, and right in front of my eyes, I saw them kiss. It wasn't even a kiss, they were stuck to each other as if she were glue and he paper, and he was just devouring her as if he was going to swallow her entire fac-"

"I got it! Don't need the visual effects!" Muskaan yelped and sat up, her hands raised in surrender. But Riddhima was too lost to laugh at her exaggerated expressions. Riddhima clenched her fists tight. She was almost there again.

"Before I could as much as register what was happening in front of me, and before I had the chance to just run out of there and never look back, I heard my name on the loud speakers. And when I turned to the stage, I saw Monique, her nasty evil smile making her look like Satan's daughter, holding my book. And she read out everything - from my heart problems, to my love for Armaan. Everything." Riddhima choked, angry tears spilling out. She felt this sudden burst of humiliation and anger and hatred erupt in the deepest corner of her heart, it was almost as if she were reliving the entire night all over again.

She heard Muskaan let out an angry swear and came out of her trance. Sighing, she continued. "I turned to leave, but saw Armaan's friends looking down at me, smirking from ear to ear, not letting me escape. And from between them, I saw Armaan emerge. I almost smiled when I saw his straight, expressionless face, and I thought he would speak up. Those smiles he gave me had to account for friendship if nothing else. But when I saw that huge grin spread across his face, all my hopes came crumbling down. He started laughing along with the others, pointing at me as if I had just landed from a UFO, and then he was the one who blocked my way when I tried to walk away." She felt her throat go dry. Closing her eyes, Riddhima took deep breaths, trying hard to calm herself down - she thought of her parents.

She smiled when she felt her heart's pace slow down a little. Gathering all the strength she could muster, she forced herself to continue. "And then, while I cried of hurt, humiliation, heartbreak, broken dreams, Armaan caught my diary in his hand and began reading from where Monique had stopped. From my midnight dreams about him, to my fantasies, to my wishes, to my hopes to finding a fairy tale. Everything was unleashed in the worst ways possible. All I did was watch and stare at my heart coming crumbling down, everything I thought him to be shattering right in front of my eyes. He was no knight in shining armor. He was pretty much the opposite. It hurts the most when you see the person for what he really is after having pictured him as your reason for existence in this world. And it hurt me a lot. I don't know what hurt me more actually - the way I was humiliated by him, or the person I thought Armaan was. Either way, I had had enough. But Armaan hadn't." She finished in a breath, and she was surprised at how blank her voice sounded. Having got no reaction from Muskaan in a while, she turned to see her pretty white face fuming in flames of red. She smiled when she tried to bring out words. Riddhima knew she was trying to curse him, and she also knew her anger wasn't letting her do so.

"Its okay. I know he's a bas****." She said sympathetically. Muskaan just gave her a vague smile. "Armaan then went on to describe why a guy like him would never fall for a girl like me. In explicit detail. He made it very clear that, I quote, 'Ugly, abnormal, diseased and pimple-filled girls like me, would never be able to get a guy like him to love me. Pimple-town.' And that's where I achieved the tag to die for. Pimple-town." Riddhima gritted her teeth. She could kill Armaan if he was standing in front of her.

"I could kill that dude if he was standing in front of me." She heard Muskaan say and burst out laughing. "What? I'm serious!" She said indignantly.

"I know why we're best friends now!" Riddhima grinned and pulled her into a bear hug.

"How are you so normal about all of this?" She pulled out and asked her as if she were committing a crime. Riddhima shrugged nonchalantly. Thanks to Muskaan's anger, her's had subsided greatly.

"It doesn't matter. I had forgotten everything anyway. Forgotten the prom, and forgotten the incredible year that followed. Year 10:I had my locker filled with 'Pimple-town' scribbled sheets, not to mention the eons of tissue paper they wasted, because they thought I should 'try cleaning my face sometimes'." She rolled her eyes. Having gotten through the worse, Riddhima knew she was okay now. But Muskaan evidently wasn't. "And it was all Armaan. Every part of it. Even the ragging, the pranks before the prom, all him. Those smiles he passed me during lab, were all smirks. I tried confronting him, telling him to back off. But he replied back saying no dorky girl could embarrass him and get away with it. I was an embarrassment." Riddhima shrugged. She couldn't believe how much that one line of his had made her cry. But she was past all that now.

"Aww…" Muskaan felt rotten seeing her best friend so torn as she thought, and walking to her, she pulled her into a tight hug. "I know why you didn't tell me now." Muskaan smiled at her warmly. Riddhima nodded. "Does he know its you then?" Muskaan asked as Riddhima got back to her unpacking.

"Yes. I told him." Riddhima replied back casually. "At least he'll stay out of my way now." She chortled. "He better." She finished. She was glad Muskaan hadn't been too darn sympathetic. But then again, Muskaan knew how much Riddhima hated pity. Muskaan knew Riddhima never wanted sympathy, and that was one thing Muskaan loved about her.

"Can I ask something?" Muskaan asked, frowning.

"Hmm?" Riddhima replied back.

"How did you change so much. You still haven't told me that part of the story." Muskaan said quietly.

"Doesn't everyone change once out of high school?" Riddhima asked, chuckling.

"Whatever happened to your notion of no change, no exchange?" Muskaan smirked. Riddhima sighed.

"That policy still applies." Riddhima muttered.

"How? You changed so much because of what Armaan did to you. And weren't you the one who would defend your policy oh-so-much when I would try and please Rahul?" Muskaan asked. She knew she had hit jackpot this time. They had always argued on this policy of Riddhima - 'No Change, No Exchange', according to which, a person should never change himself for another, in exchange of something that he thinks is worthwhile. But Muskaan had never agreed. According to her, change was natural, and you always tended to change when you meet people. Riddhima had then argued on how she meant changing for someone else, and not natural changes that happen as you grow older and gel with the people in this world.

"I didn't change because of Armaan, Muski. I changed because of me." Riddhima snapped. Muskaan raised her eyebrows. "Honestly, after what Armaan did to me, I just wanted to prove him wrong, let myself know that whatever he made me feel about myself wasn't all there was to me. And I succeeded. There's a big difference between changing for someone and for oneself. I did the latter. Yes, Armaan may have initiated the whole thing, instigated my ego, but it was me who decided that it was time to change. Not because of all that had happened. But again, to let myself know that I was as normal as the second person." Riddhima finished. She knew every word she had said was true. Her childhood had always made her feel out of place, and so she grasped every opportunity she could get to prove to her alter-self, that no, she was as normal and in place as a person could be. But at the same time, Riddhima had always been careful to stand out, to let her presence be shown and felt. And, much to her pleasure, she had succeeded in every aim, in every target she had set for herself after high school had finished.

"I am what I am, because of me. And besides, normally people change for others by compromising on certain things. I've compromised on none. I changed things about myself, which I didn't like. I frankly never liked the way I looked. So I changed myself. For me. Not for anyone else. For me. And I did so once I had enough confidence and strength to, which I admit, I got from what happened with Armaan." Riddhima continued. "I made myself what I wanted to since always, the love and affection of people that I strived for, for so long, I gained all of that, I earned the respect which I wished for, and moreover, I always wished for someone to care for me the way I do for them - and look, I have my parents, you, and countless other friends as well. I got all I wanted. For me." Riddhima finished. She smiled widely by the end of it, and looking at it, Muskaan smiled as well, but she knew Riddhima too well to reply to any of that.

Muskaan knew there was an unexplainable void in Riddhima's eyes, her hazel brown eyes screamed it out loud, and this wasn't something she had noticed for the first time. She had seen this on countless occasions. Only now did she know the reason behind this void. And she hoped that this head-strong, independent girl that she had for a best friend would find her knight in shining armor soon. She deserved him.

tis is not fair yaar...continue soon plsss...😒

Originally posted by: Castle-Beckett

Posting the next installment in a few! Stay tuned! =)