I was staring at my photo on the computer screen. ‘Indha moonjikku idhellam kekkudha’ was the only thought running through my mind. I felt butterflies in my stomach. To ease the tension down I closed my eyes and put my head down on the desk.
I was planning to ask her out. I was thinking about that and thats when i heard the ping. I lifted my head and looked at the screen. Her name was there on the right bottom corner of my screen. “I am coming to Chennai for the weekend” it read. I smiled. The Leader of their group, a common friend, had already told me this but I decided to act surprised. But the next message did really surprise me. “Will you be able to come out for lunch on Saturday afternoon?” I was dumbstruck. I did follow Varenya’s advise but I never thought I would be able to achieve so much progress in just 15 days.
Just a fortnight ago I had sent her a facebook message. Yes. I had decided to talk to her after four and a half years of sight adichifying and e-sight adichifying (mainly gaping at her fotos for hours together on facebook or if I was fortunate enough, a photo that was not available to the public sent by one of the common friends). I had asked for her Gtalk ID. Facebook is very risky as it is open to general public. Even an update that I had added her as my friend would be enough for some Naradhars to start their work. Gtalk was a safer option. No one would know even if she rejected the request. Eventually she did add me which actually surprised me. I thought she might not really like this idea of me talking with her because she knew I liked her and she still added me knowing that I was going to flirt with her from day one. This made me wonder if she also liked me.
The first set of exchanges did not go very well. I did most of the talking. If only someone had counted the number of characters I had typed i think it would have been more than 99% of the chat log. And most of her replies were hmmms and ohs. But I was happy that she put some ‘lols’ for some of my well tried comedies. Not sure if she really laughed. Still better than nothing. I waited for her to ping the next time as I did not want to show her that I was desperate. She pinged the very next day. By then I had taken some online classes on ‘how to correct girls’ by Dicky. So this time I was prepared and I knew how I had to approach her. That’s how our friendship started.
Saturday afternoon came. She wanted to go to The Park. Ashok Nagar park ah nu kekkanum nu thonichu. Control pannikittu ok sonnen. I was to meet her in front of the hotel. She was there by the time I reached and needless to say she looked gorgeous. Angels in white dresses started dancing around me for an Ilayaraja song the moment I saw her. Even Premji would have taken more time to get those angels there. After all it was the first time I was actually meeting her in person.
We walked to the Hotel from there. It was a pleasant walk. (Chennai veyyil afternoon 12 o clock but love la irundha ellame pleasant thaan). We reached there and both of us were silent for a long time. Chatting over the net definitely is easier I thought. You can take your time to think about the mokkaiest replies to impress her or worst case send the chat log and get help from someone else. But talking in person is completely different. No time to think, no one else near to help. Keeping all that in mind, I decided to open up a conversation to break the silence. “I love you. Will you be my girlfriend?” I had completed the sentence even before I realised. She was shocked. So was I. That was not what I wanted to tell her. But her expression changed back to normal so i did not take back what i said. She said she needed some time to think about it although I felt she had already made up her mind what her answer was going to be. The next word we spoke was after the lunch and it was ‘Goodbye”. It gave me a bad feeling.
I called her that night and we decided to meet up at the beach the next day morning. She was going back that night and I hoped she would give her reply before that. I was waiting opposite Barista for her. There she was. Walking towards me in a beautiful red salwar.(Same ilayaraja song) I saw a smile on her face when she reached me. I tried hard to smile back at her. But I couldn’t. My only thoughts were about her reply. I was not able to see her in the eye so I turned around and waited for her to talk. I felt an arm on my shoulder. I did not turn back.
“Excuse me” the voice said. Excuse me ah? “Hello.” said the voice again. I turned back and she was not there. Just when my eyes started scanning for her I realized that I was not at the beach. I was sitting in an AC hall in front of computer that had my photo and some other details about me on it. I saw the lady who had actually called me. “Keep your ID proof on the table” she barked. Eh? She muttered something under the breath which sounded like “Idhellam enga uruppada pogudhu. CAT ezhuda vandhirukkara lakshanatha paaru”. I felt the same but for a different reason. Appo naan innum avan kitta pesa kuda illa. Ada
