by Atul Todi
Khushi could not believe him; he was going to make her work on the fields and get her perfectly manicured nails dirty. She thought that he was testing her, and she was not going to back off. She had come all the way to that deserted vineyard for something very special, and she was going to get what she wanted.
Going to a barren area that had been prepared for planting new grapevines, Abhay held out some vine cuttings that had to be put into the wet soil. Watching the other farmers planting the woody stems into the soil at equal distance, she followed the simple steps. First she had to scoop out some soil, push the plant inside and then cover it back up. It was quite simple; she quickly got a hang of it.
While watching her work diligently, Abhay told her that those stems were taken from other vines, and new plants would grow from it. Later they had to come back and build trenches that would support the vines and also water the plant to help them grow.
Getting her pretty fingers dirty in the soil, she started digging and placing the sapling inside the soil and covering it back up. For a city-girl, having grown up in San Francisco, this was a very different experience. Thinking about how that dead-looking stem would blossom into a beautiful plant some day, with juicy grapes hanging from its branches, Khushi felt happy. It felt like giving life to something, and she couldn't help talking to herself about how she might want to become a winemaker one-day.
Abhay watched her from a distance and was glad to have her around. She was stubborn and arrogant at times, but she was like a little angel who amused him. He didn't know what brought her to him, but was glad she found him. She reminded him of a dear old friend from college, someone he really missed during all his years at the vineyard.
It was a tiring day, but Khushi had fun playing in the muddy soil. Later that evening, Abhay took her to his secluded lake to relax and feed the fish. Sitting by the lake, they watched the sunset together. While Khushi munched on some grapes she had picked during the day, Abhay sipped on a new wine blend he had made a few days back.
Looking at the reflection of the receding sun in the orange lake, he finally opened up to Khushi and let go of all his inhibition.
It was a special moment. Living a lonely life, he never imagined it would happen.
He told her that it was the month of March, a few days before spring break: a week in the middle of the semester when college was off. Exams were around the corner at Purdue University, and everyone was in study mode. Some sat at cafes or the library in groups while others locked themselves in their rooms, studying for the mid-term exams. Everyone looked serious and stressed; it was a major nerd time across campus.
In contrast, the weather was way too cheerful. Winter was over; the bare trees had turned green again. Flowers, in colours of white, yellow and purple, were blooming all over campus. The warm air, after months of harsh winter, was just too romantic to be stuck with books.
Driving around campus, he had seen her walking to classes before. Even in the middle of winter, while most people looked like polar bears, wrapped up in furry clothes, she wore heels, short skirts, sexy leather jackets and her trademark Prada glasses. Extremely attractive, she was the talk of the town, especially during the dull and gloomy winter evenings on campus.
She was the only colourful thing to look at in the white winter canvas.
Even that evening, she looked gorgeous like a Hollywood star. Abhay remembered her straight brown hair, tucked neatly over her left shoulder; her short yellow skirt and black heels, complementing her shiny toned legs. She was a born fashionista, turning heads wherever she went.
She knew she was good looking, and she loved showing off. And like all other nerdy college students, he just couldn't get enough of her.
Khushi could hardly hold back her curiosity, her imagination of a girl Bugsy would fall for, was completely different. Interrupting him, she asked if that girl was the one he was in love with.
Replying to her, he said, "Well I did not believe in love back then; it was all just a stupid game. A sort of infatuation you see, just like a kid wanting a candy and enjoying it until he finds something else that interests him more. But, I guess you are too young to understand this."
Immediately she fought back and said, "I just look young, you know that. I am very smart, and if it makes you feel any better, I have already dated and broken-up with a boy in my school."
"Oh wow! And where was your mom when you were doing all this?" Abhay was surprised.
"Everyone my age is doing it; it is quite accepted these days. You have just been here in the wilderness too long. Anyways, who was this girl? Tell me."
"Precious, that was her name. Part Latino, part German, she was like this diva every boy wanted to be with. Hot from head to toe, she did complete justice to her name."
Abhay repeated her name again, remembering his college days.
He remembered that it was a Friday night, a weekend before the exam week was to start. He and his friends were planning to hit the bars to get drunk; it just seemed more fun than the other weekends. All the bars ran special offers on drinks that night and the overdose of studying for exams made people more excited.
While Khushi looked comfortable with his college story, Abhay felt uncomfortable telling a teenager about his college days. However, he warned Khushi not to take any inspiration from his past. He was telling her the story as it was, and asked her to bear with him if some things seemed strange and confusing.
Continuing his story, he told Khushi that he and his friends were all dressed up for the night and headed to the bars. They were already tipsy from the pre-gaming they did back at his apartment and on their way he realised that he had forgotten his wallet back in the apartment. So he asked his friends to carry on and told them that he would catch them at Harrys, their usual drinking joint on campus.
Driving back to his apartment with Jolly, he saw Precious walking to the library with her roommate. They parked their car and followed the girls around the corner, through the dark back alleys. It was kind of creepy, following two girls at night, but it was exciting at the same time.
Precious had an excellent fashion sense that made everyone notice her. With her dirty amber-blond hair, pouty red lips, perfect figure and sharp greenish-blue eyes, she was too hard to resist. He was no different; he wanted to know more about her and get close to her.
She was a high-society girl who only mingled with other snobbish rich boys like her. Always driving around in fast cars, she had a thing for speed and bad boys. Being arrogant, Precious had already rejected a few of Abhay’s friends, and he knew that she was too full of herself. He knew that he did not stand a chance with Precious, but Jolly had challenged him to get a kiss out of her, and he never said no to a challenge.
Khushi asked: "She seems completely out of your league, please tell me that you did not embarrass yourself."
Khushi could be mean if she wanted, but Abhay had gotten comfortable with her snarky comments.
Justifying himself, Abhay replied: "In those days, I did not look like this: I did not have this beard or this paunch. I played tennis, went rock-climbing, and had a sexy six pack abs."
He stressed on his fitness and Khushi pretended to be amused.
Seeing the little girl mock him, he tried harder: "I was a charmer; women loved my sense of humor. I could impress anyone, trust me."
"You are so modest. I can now see the Bugsy in all those narcissist books of yours."
Abhay laughed, but continued to justify himself to a little girl, who clearly did not believe him.
"Trust me, I was different back then; actually, I was quite full of myself and proud. I believed that I could have had anything I wanted. But now I am just a shadow of my old self, nothing like what I used to be."
"I think I like you better like this; you still look mean and arrogant, but there is kindness in your eyes now." Khushi gave Abhay her cute smile, as if to reassure him that she still liked him.
"But, why were you after Precious? She does not sound fun; nothi
ng like a girl Bugsy would go for. She is so different from the girl you always write about."
"It is very tough to explain. When you grow up and go to college, you would understand. With all those stupid boys running after you, you would know what I mean Khushi. However, moving forward with my story, Precious was like this puzzle that every guy wanted to solve, and I was no different. Curiosity at that age becomes attraction, and attraction becomes infatuation. And I was very infatuated with her, blinded by her outer appearance."
"So you were after Precious because she was hot and sexy. Is that what all men want in a girl?"
"No Khushi, not at all. Some boys are just stupid, especially at that age, but sooner or later they all realise that they want a girl who is fun to be with. Anyways, if you are done interrupting my story, can I continue?"
"Yes, yes!" She went back to taking notes in her notebook, and he continued his story.
They followed Precious and her roommate to the library, pretending to be looking for some books for an exam.
Unlike Precious, her roommate was strikingly different. Wearing an oversized hoodie and sweatpants on that warm night, a big school bag on her shoulders, hair tied like a big beehive on top of her head and hiding behind her nerdy glasses, she was definitely not Abhay's type. But he knew that the nerdy girl and Precious lived together, they were flatmates.
Abhay had already found out that the nerdy girl was helping Precious get through college by tutoring her for all the exams. Enrolled in the medical program, Precious could not have made it through second year of med-school without some major help. While he did not know too much about her, but he was sure that the nerdy girl was his best chance to get close to Precious.
To become friends with the nerdy girl, was a strategic move.
That evening, Precious and her roommate sat quietly on a round table, studying for a biology exam. Abhay and Jolly hid between the bookshelves, keeping an eye on them. From afar, it looked like Miss Nerdy was tutoring Precious by explaining some important concepts and marking out chapters for her to focus on.
Making a conscious effort to study, Precious looked cute. Abhay could not help admire her: Rocking on her chair, biting the pen and pouring over a handful of papers. But as expected, she soon got busy with texting and playing with her perfectly curled hair.
Miss Nerdy, on the other hand, poured over her thick books and piles of notes. All the commotion in the library did not disturb her; she flipped through her book, took notes and stayed focused on the task at hand.
Jolly, confused about Abhay's plan, was too drunk to focus. He started flirting with another girl who was looking for a book in the library shelves. Abhay waited for an opportunity to go talk to the girls.
After a few minutes of patience, he finally got his chance. Some of Precious's friends came over and took her away. Abhay sneaked up on her roommate, hoping to become friends and get some dirt on Precious.
He had still not seen her face until then; it was hidden behind her hoodie, large glasses, and long jet-black hair. Standing behind her, looking over her shoulder, he said, "Hey, you are studying the human anatomy, that's so cool. I always wanted to know how many bones we have?"
Looking back at him, she said, "Excuse me, who are you?"
She was not amused by his stupid question, so he immediately got to the point.
"You look like a smart girl and I hope you can help a fellow nerd. I have this big sociology exam on Monday and I really need this one book. But I have never used the library computer system before. Can you please help me find the book?" He handed her the book reference number, hoping she would not say no.
He felt stupid, but he pretended that it was normal, and he genuinely needed help.
Sitting down on the chair where Precious was sitting earlier, waiting for Miss Nerdy to respond, he glanced over the stuff Precious had left behind on the table. Looking for some clues, hints that might come handy at a later point.
Not looking back at him, she told him to go to the librarian and ask for help; she said that she was no library expert and excused herself. Immediately, cutting her off, he told her that the librarian was not in her office, and the front-desk people were jerks; they were not helping him. They were too busy with other people, so he came to her because she looked smart and helpful.
While she tried to make an excuse to get rid of him, he finally got to see her face. She looked up, turned her head towards him and pushed her messy hair away from her face. Big round eyes, a little mole next to her chin, a small nose ring and no makeup: Miss Nerdy looked nothing like Abhay had imagined. The dusky skin tone of her roundish face, made her facial features look more striking.
With dark circles around her eyes, it looked like she had not slept for months. Looking like a zombie, the serious look on her face made her look scary.
While Abhay found her strangely cute, she did not look too approachable. But he had no option.
That evening Abhay got lucky, the nerdy girl turned out to be an Indian. It was sheer destiny and instinctively he told her, "Hey, you are an Indian too. Right?"
Automatically his ‘desi' (people from the Indian subcontinent) accent broke out, expecting her to be a ‘FOB' (fresh-off-the-boat) from India, just like him. But she replied back with a thick American accent, "So?"
Her emphasis on ‘so' made it seem like he had offended her. She stared back at him; her dilated pupils judged his intentions. He wanted to tell her that he was not hitting on her; he genuinely needed her help.
Covering up for his mistake, he resorted back to his normal accent and said, "If you don't help me who would, ‘Mera Desh Mahan'. Please help me! Please!"
Just like her ‘so', he emphasized on his ‘please'.
He felt stupid for having said that, but it worked. Even though she knew he was drunk, she pretended to have not noticed and agreed to help. She thought that he genuinely needed the book and was not fooling around. However, the problem was that the book did not exist in the library; Abhay had just made up the reference number.
Walking around the library, searching bookshelf-to-bookshelf, picking up random books, he tried becoming friends with her. Walking fast, she tried to stay a step ahead of Abhay. She did not feel comfortable with him staring at her and judging her for how she looked during exam week.
Abhay tiptoed behind her, trying to keep pace with her. Least interested in talking to him, she ignored him and answered with ‘ya' and ‘na'. Even when he asked her name, she told him that it was none of his business.
Tired, nervous and clumsy, she dropped the books she was helping him carry and even hit her leg on the side of a wooden desk. She almost tripped over and fell on her face, but somehow balanced by holding on to the side of the table.
That night she was a wreck and it seemed like she was prone to hurting herself. Abhay on the other hand just could not help cracking up, seeing how out of place she was.
Still, knowing that she was his only chance to get close to Precious, he tried hard to be nice to her. So getting into action, he immediately helped her back up and walked her to her seat. Sitting down on the floor, he massaged her hurting leg in the middle of the whole library.
Shocked by his outrageous gesture, she tried to stop him and pleaded him to let go of her leg. Being persistent, he carried on. Soon enough he insisted that if she told him her name, he would stop and leave her alone.
She eventually smiled and said, "Its Tia! Now please leave. You have already wasted too much of my time".
Tia, the nerdy girl, was pretending to be arrogant and aloof, as if she didn't like the attention she was getting. Deep inside she could not believe what had happened that evening. Abhay was quite a decent looking guy; she remembered seeing him around campus.
Adjusting her big round glasses, she peered back into her biology books that were sitting in front of her. Ignoring him and his distracting antics to get her attention, she focused on the complicated diagrams of the human brain that she was studying.
Exams
were at hand and she could not afford to be distracted.
Taking a moment, Abhay ruminated that evening when he first met Tia. Khushi quietly admired the glimmer of smile that Tia’s memories brought to his face.
He told Khushi that Tia was a very special person and he just didn't know it back then. She looked like any other Chardonnay selling at a wine shop; he had no clue what grapes she was made of. It was only when he got to know her that he realised that even a whiff of hers was enough to completely intoxicate all senses.
She was different in a very pleasant way.
"So you immediately fell in love with Tia after your first meeting?" Khushi could hardly control her curiosity.
"Not at all; I didn't think she was my type and at that time I was too infatuated with her roommate. But becoming friends with her seemed like a good idea to get closer to Precious. Yes my intentions were wrong, but completely harmless.”