Ek Chhoti Si Love Story !

Yes, a love story. To spice things up, I would go a step ahead and call it a 'passionate' love story. And most importantly, it's my story… an ever-continuing and undying tale of a relationship that had its' fair share of highs and lows. If you will, call it a Ross-and-Rachel story because it had the definitive we-were-on-a-break moments as well. And much as I would have wanted the entity on the other side of this romantic equation to be an earth- shatteringly beautiful damsel, it isn't. It couldn't. For that matter, it isn't even a look-once-puke-thrice-irretrievably-mirror-cracking kinda beauty. And the worst part is that I am not a misogynist and neither do I have any weird inclinations. In fact, I am as straight as the proverbial ramrod. By the bye, also spilling my cup of woes is the fact that I am in an age where crushes, infatuations and other such conjured-up hypothetical dalliances can play gilli-danda with your hormones. And this hormonal upsurge has caught up with me on quite a number of occasions but I would, for the sake of my general well-being and to avoid scandalizing any of my friends, spare the details. So, I have had those moments when the appearance of a certain someone made my heart skip a beat or when I fell in love with a pimpled face…when all I had wanted to do was to keep looking at that ethereally beautiful visage without caring to registering a thing…when the sprightly wiggle of a ponytail put me in a trance… when an hourglass figure made me lose touch with time…when the gentle shimmies of a delicate, supine body taking down notes in class set every conceivable bit of my existence aflutter….when indeed, I was jolted out of my reverie as I espied my object-of-attraction staring back at me catching me in flagrante and forcing me to jerk my head towards the teacher with a flourish desperately hoping that she had not noticed me but knowing pretty darn well that nothing could extenuate my deed as in that fraction of a second our eyes had met….when mornings were spent staring narcissistically into a mirror at a moronic weak-chinned face to see if everything was in order. But be that as it may, I could never pucker up enough courage to breach the threshold of this deeply ingrained fear. It wasn't like I did not try but even before I could hit my stride, the inner demons would pour scorn on my innocent desires by hollering: dude, it aint gonna happen… not in a million years… jejune flight of fancy mate… bin it.. bin it pronto!!!... So I stewed in my own lovelorn feelings and wrote longish diary posts bemoaning the might-have-beens.

So, girls are out of the picture. And I am straight. Who, then essays the role of my beloved in this saga? Okie then, without further ado, I declare that it is but an innocuous little sport. A game that is--- and I would be stating the obvious when I say this---my favorite, one that has provided me innumerable hours of unparalleled ecstasy, a game that I learnt from scratch heuristically like an autodidact, a game that goes by the name of Table Tennis. I love it and it loves me. Simple and peaceful, you think. Not so. As I practice, everything seems fine. My shots land in the right areas and life seems good. But come competition, it refuses to get lovey-dovey with me. I don't understand its hesitance in accepting me publicly. It just blows me off brusquely and all my skills shamelessly go for a walk ignoring my pathos-evoking pleas to come back. And then bereft of the company of my dukh-sukh ka companion, the moment the all important match begins, diffidence creeps in. Inevitably. I develop cold feet, my vision blurs and my right hand mysteriously gets paralyzed with my feet sticking intransigently to the ground. Errors start coming out of the woodwork and literally so. To compound my miseries, I fail to return even amateurish serves and my trademark shot eagerly French kisses the net as if it were Jolie's irresistible luscious lips. I lose. Again and again. Confidence crippling and debilitating defeats scar my memory. But oblivious to my pain and suffering, it doesn't proffer a reassuring hand. Fugging prude, I say. And so, we part ways. We go on a break. I ignore it for days on end. Impulsive urges to get back at the TT table pay a visit but I send them back whence they had come. And then, on one of these days, I give in. I take out my racquet from the case and the ticklish smell of glue assails my nose. I feel the rubber and a frisson of nervous energy bubbles through my body. The old flame starts roaring again and I bury the hatchet. The feeling of being in love comes screaming back to me. And then, another episode of our lives takes shape and we move on hoping to live happily ever after. Now, you can go puke in the nearest paper bag……