It was a quintessential winter morning in Delhi, sunny, bright and cold. Beautifully cold, thought Ishita, hugging herself as she walked to her class. Ishita Iyer, a fifth year law student of the National Law School, Delhi.
"ISHITA! RUN! Mr. Anand won't let us in if we are even a minute late to the class!" Ishita's best friend and cousin Mihika yelled, which successfully made Ishita stop dreaming and start running! "Phew! We made it. I thought I'd be getting an attendance back for sure had I missed his boring, monotonous sick class again." Whispered Mihika to Ishita who tried to maintain a straight face. Mr. Anand was possibly the most boring person on this earth, there were times when Ishita wondered whether he did something more than just reading contracts related stuff or he just did that? God, how awful his life must be. And Ishita's next train of thought started, oblivious to her surroundings, she dreamt and dreamt and dreamt. She was a dreamer, she could pass a whole day just day dreaming, something which her friends never understood and would often get irritated at her ability to zone out almost everything but they loved her nonetheless. She was plump, round and cute, very cute. Also, she happened to be an amazing friend.
The bell rang, and the last class of the day got finally over. Ishita breathed a sigh of relief. Why do we have to put up with such awful teachers? She thought to herself. Ishita started walking towards their cafeteria for lunch when her another best friend, Simmi pulled her to the side and asked, "Weren't we supposed to go out for lunch?" Oh yes! The lunch! She smacked her forehead and said, "I forgot! Let's go? Oh and...ask others too?" Ishita added a little hesitantly. By others she meant her guy friends. Her close guy friends and no, she did not mean A guy friend. Nah uh! Not at all. Ishita shook her head to herself, earning an amused glance from both Mihika and Simmi! They had a crazy friend who talked to herself in her head. "What? Are we not calling them?" Ishita asked again, hoping against hope HE would come, after all they were going to the place he loved the most. Don't go there. Don't. Ishita reminded herself. It was dangerous to go into that territory.
"Hey! Let's go? Mihir and Bala will join us in a bit." The voice of her dreams spoke. It was Raman, her best friend. Oh how she hated this cliche of falling for one's best friend. Ugh. Disgusting. Get over it Ishita. Get over it. She reminded herself as she turned around to smile at Raman only to get a questioning look in return and she realized she had stopped walking altogether. Sigh. Why was he so goddamn good looking? Life is so unfair. She cursed him under her breath.
And the next moment she took a step and tripped over a small pot hole in the pavement, earning a roar of laughter from everyone. So, Okay. She was a klutz AND a dreamer. A little embarrassed but never to shy away from self depreciating humour, she laughed at herself too, along with her best friends.
"Mihika I think you can stop texting Mihir while sitting right in front of him" teased Bala as they were all sitting in a restaurant, waiting for their food. Mihir blushed and Mihika only looked too embarrassed.
"Shut up ya Bala! Mind you own business" she pouted prettily, earning a shout of laughter from everyone. "And Bala, if you don't stop pulling my and Mihir's leg, we are too well informed about you and Vandita, so..." Mihika trailed off, effectively shutting up Bala who looked equal parts shy and embarrassed, lighting up Mihika's eyes.
Oh how everyone loved to tease the innocent, cute Bala! Ishita smiled to herself and from the corner of her eye, noticed Raman.
He seemed happy and after so long, she thought to herself. He was one over achiever in life, wanted to do everything and anything and he did almost everything in college, which Ishita didn't understand. She was not a topper but she wasn't bad herself, but her extracurricular activities involved only painting now as she used to play but after gaining weight post her entrance results, she felt too conscious to play in front of everyone in the college. But she used to be good and she understood Raman's passion for football what she didn't understand was his drive to achieve everything at once and troubling himself in the process. He wouldn't sleep days at end stressing about some stupid competition, whereas Ishita never had a problem sleeping. She could drop off anytime, anywhere, she only needed to be told that she was free to sleep.
Coming back to Raman? He seemed happy after a long time, he was done with his memo submission of his moot and he looked stress free after almost a month. Sigh. She felt good too.
"GUYS! OH MY GOD! READ THIS" Mihir almost yelled at the top of his lungs, as he scrolled through his phone earning quite a few curious glances from the rest of the people sitting in the restaurant.
"What?" asked Raman and Bala in unison. "You and Ishita got accepted for the training programme that you two had applied for and Simmi, I, Mihika and Bala got accepted for the exchange programme we applied for!"
What? Ishita couldn't make sense of what was happening. Was it real? Her best friends got accepted to the same university for exchange programme as she and Raman? She didn't realize when Mihir circulated his phone to show everyone the results sent by the college admin, she could only think about one thing...
Raman and her. Alone. Together.
Okay, so others will be in the same university as them but not in the same programme.
Ishita knew nothing could ever, like EVER happen between the two of them cause of some 100 reasons which held true but she couldn't help but think about him, couldn't help but dream, about them.
To begin with, he was her best friend, she was his best friend, he confided in her the random-est weirdest craziest things, she did the same, he had come out of a 5 year long relationship with his high school girlfriend (Shagun) and he had major trust issues, he had a crush on someone else presently, also, once upon a time, he was Mihika's crush. Her very own best friend's crush and if that wasn't enough, Raman didn't find fat girls attractive, fat, average girls to be exact.
How will she survive this new closeness without revealing things to him? Without being stupid and blurting out the truth? So far away from home, working at the same place together, when majority of her friends will be busy doing their own work, she will be left alone to work with him.
With him.
And Ishita Iyer had never in her life dreaded something as much as she was dreading her best achievement of her college life.
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