MISS PEOPLE
I have narrated this story over a number of times in the last few years, and I am sure I will tell it again a few times too. It is the first time that I am writing it down, though, in its entirety, the way that I usually go about telling the story of drummer guy.
All of this began in undergrad when I was in Architecture school and I used to be friends with two girls, one of whom was a good singer, and thus had some connections to the music people around us. Well, it was during the festival at school, a lot of people were performing, and he was playing the drums for them. The first time I ever saw him was in a classroom or something, but the one that I remember with dramatic clarity is when I saw him in the lift. He was wearing his white shirt, wide open, abs and shit. I was absolutely thrown, I was infatuated with him from the moment I saw him, of course. It was very dramatic, of course, I don’t know how exactly but I swear to god there was a slight breeze in the hallway, the shirt moved against his skin, just so. We went down in the lift together and I honestly absolutely wanted to die, to disintegrate, become one with the cold steel panels that made up the interiors of that box. I turned around and made chat, I think I wished him good luck and that was that.
When I first met Ted, I had zero, absolutely zero self-esteem. I used to dress like an idiot – in retrospect only, of course, I didn’t think myself beautiful or even fun to be around. I was so lost then, just coming off of the train wreck that was my academic downfall. I was really doing horrible in terms of mental health. I was depressed and horribly self-pitying. It never occurred to me that someone so cool, so good looking would give me even half a thought. I got him on my socials, and that was cool too.
I had asked my friend then, to help me get a chat going, and she realised then that she had a crush on him too then, and she decided to get a chat going for herself, which pissed me the fuck off. That was around the time when I began to hang out with Rachel – a story for another day.
We danced around each other like this, well, at least I danced around him, I think he was with someone back then. But anyways, I did what we usually do, try and look cool on my Instagram stories to get him to talk to me. It was a long courtship. It was my birthday in twenty eighteen or twenty seventeen, we had moved too, in this period, from Dahisar to our new house in Kandivali, and I think it was twenty sixteen actually, but I’ll only be certain if I go back into archived pictures. I don’t have any will to do that. Well, it was my birthday then, I had already previously tried to converse with him, nothing concrete, just random failed attempts, and that is why I believe he replied when I post something for my birthday then. We realised that we lived not even two minutes away. Another movie like moment. The guy I had the most absolute biggest crush on lived right across the street from me. I can look into Teds window from my own balcony, in fact we have also waved at each other from our own homes. So, we decided to meet that evening, seeing as we lived right next to each other. That was the first time we ever hung out properly. Thinking about it makes me want to weep.
There is only three people I have known in life with whom I have been able to spend endless amounts of time without feeling the need to leave, without being bored or drained of energy. Ted is one of them.
We walked around the area that day, just chatting. I was shitting bricks. I had just begun to use make up during this time, and I would usually put some on to go see him. This is insane to me honestly, firstly because I have since never touched makeup again, and also I have since lied a lot about not having used makeup in life before. It felt nice, to feel like I looked good when I really didn’t have high regards of myself. We walked around and talked for hours, it felt incredible. It is hard for me to hold conversations with people, especially one on one, always has been and always will be, but with Ted, we hit it off from the jump, we talked so much, we talked about so many things.
It was nice to have a friend, if we take the early days at face value. I was happy that we were forming a friendship. I didn’t let myself dream of anything more, back then, I didn’t want to break my own heart. To be fair it wasn’t like Ted gave me any hints, and also, to be fair we have come to know since that I am very fucking shit at picking up hints. I thought I was so far out of his league, so far out, I refused to even consider the possibility of anything otherwise.
We developed a friendship that I will cherish until the day I die.
We would walk around a lot, and it was so nice. We would go to this burger place, and I would get fries. We would go to McDonalds too, the one that was near my college, and we would go to run errands, and we would go to a taprri near link road, and in Dahisar. I used to half my fires then, it was so fun to eat it like that, and we used to talk a lot, and it was nice to be able to talk about things with him, about life, about our past, about our families and about music, about architecture. Time would move around us, but we held our own, anchored there, in the middle of everything, and it always felt like that, like everything slowed down because of the gravity that we created by existing in the same moment together. It felt like we existed in a place outside of ourselves together. We also talked a lot about music. He told me about drums and about jazz. He wanted to play jazz. It was so beautiful to listen to him talk about music, to listen to someone so passionate, so in love with that they wanted to do. We would talk about practicing a lot too, and about the future. Ted seemed to love music, and it made me feel inspired. He always talked about it. It was a habit, finger drumming, only unique to him. I loved to catch his fingers go off in these moments of translucent love. His hands were just perfect. They would find any surface to drum on, tabletops, the side of cups, the seat of a bike or scooter we were standing besides, the steering wheels of his car. How lovely to watch passion translated to reality like this, the fingers always looking for something that was hidden from me. It's so funny to me that I have actually never seen him play drums live.
I remember we were coming back from somewhere this one time, and i was on the back of his scooter, and we had one headphone each, and the night was quiet, it was pretty late. He had his own music going, and it was warm, so the breeze felt really nice. My fingers were gripped around the little piece in the back, I didn’t dare touch him. When we were on the main road, after the circle, he always dropped me off on the back gate, and so we were going up the road, and the music hit a very good riff, I have no fucking clue about what song was playing or even about the music, but I remember the feeling, the music swelling around us, and the roar of the vehicle and the low and speeding street lamps like little anchors in the darkness. The last bit of that road goes upwards, and the music somehow swelled perfectly with the incline and I am sure Ted slowed down to accommodate for the moment and it felt like the whoa entire world had held its breath, stopped everything, everything for just a fraction of a second, to observe. It was so romantic.
Ted was also one of those people who are so shitty at communication. I also believe he was a very emotionally unavailable person back then. I could hardly ever get a hold of him. He was also busy with all of his music stuff, he was in school, too, back then. When we met, it was a completely different story. We walked out the universe, into our own little one, and I had his full attention, always.
I remember most of him in dim lights and silhouettes, I remember most of him in smiles and the jaw, the streetlights making his softer, eyes brighter.
He would drop me off at the back gate, always, and we would hug goodbye sometimes, and it was so awkward, I would go back home and go to sleep all dazed, wake up all dazed.
All of this began in undergrad when I was in Architecture school and I used to be friends with two girls, one of whom was a good singer, and thus had some connections to the music people around us. Well, it was during the festival at school, a lot of people were performing, and he was playing the drums for them. The first time I ever saw him was in a classroom or something, but the one that I remember with dramatic clarity is when I saw him in the lift. He was wearing his white shirt, wide open, abs and shit. I was absolutely thrown, I was infatuated with him from the moment I saw him, of course. It was very dramatic, of course, I don’t know how exactly but I swear to god there was a slight breeze in the hallway, the shirt moved against his skin, just so. We went down in the lift together and I honestly absolutely wanted to die, to disintegrate, become one with the cold steel panels that made up the interiors of that box. I turned around and made chat, I think I wished him good luck and that was that.
When I first met Ted, I had zero, absolutely zero self-esteem. I used to dress like an idiot – in retrospect only, of course, I didn’t think myself beautiful or even fun to be around. I was so lost then, just coming off of the train wreck that was my academic downfall. I was really doing horrible in terms of mental health. I was depressed and horribly self-pitying. It never occurred to me that someone so cool, so good looking would give me even half a thought. I got him on my socials, and that was cool too.
I had asked my friend then, to help me get a chat going, and she realised then that she had a crush on him too then, and she decided to get a chat going for herself, which pissed me the fuck off. That was around the time when I began to hang out with Rachel – a story for another day.
We danced around each other like this, well, at least I danced around him, I think he was with someone back then. But anyways, I did what we usually do, try and look cool on my Instagram stories to get him to talk to me. It was a long courtship. It was my birthday in twenty eighteen or twenty seventeen, we had moved too, in this period, from Dahisar to our new house in Kandivali, and I think it was twenty sixteen actually, but I’ll only be certain if I go back into archived pictures. I don’t have any will to do that. Well, it was my birthday then, I had already previously tried to converse with him, nothing concrete, just random failed attempts, and that is why I believe he replied when I post something for my birthday then. We realised that we lived not even two minutes away. Another movie like moment. The guy I had the most absolute biggest crush on lived right across the street from me. I can look into Teds window from my own balcony, in fact we have also waved at each other from our own homes. So, we decided to meet that evening, seeing as we lived right next to each other. That was the first time we ever hung out properly. Thinking about it makes me want to weep.
There is only three people I have known in life with whom I have been able to spend endless amounts of time without feeling the need to leave, without being bored or drained of energy. Ted is one of them.
We walked around the area that day, just chatting. I was shitting bricks. I had just begun to use make up during this time, and I would usually put some on to go see him. This is insane to me honestly, firstly because I have since never touched makeup again, and also I have since lied a lot about not having used makeup in life before. It felt nice, to feel like I looked good when I really didn’t have high regards of myself. We walked around and talked for hours, it felt incredible. It is hard for me to hold conversations with people, especially one on one, always has been and always will be, but with Ted, we hit it off from the jump, we talked so much, we talked about so many things.
It was nice to have a friend, if we take the early days at face value. I was happy that we were forming a friendship. I didn’t let myself dream of anything more, back then, I didn’t want to break my own heart. To be fair it wasn’t like Ted gave me any hints, and also, to be fair we have come to know since that I am very fucking shit at picking up hints. I thought I was so far out of his league, so far out, I refused to even consider the possibility of anything otherwise.
We developed a friendship that I will cherish until the day I die.
We would walk around a lot, and it was so nice. We would go to this burger place, and I would get fries. We would go to McDonalds too, the one that was near my college, and we would go to run errands, and we would go to a taprri near link road, and in Dahisar. I used to half my fires then, it was so fun to eat it like that, and we used to talk a lot, and it was nice to be able to talk about things with him, about life, about our past, about our families and about music, about architecture. Time would move around us, but we held our own, anchored there, in the middle of everything, and it always felt like that, like everything slowed down because of the gravity that we created by existing in the same moment together. It felt like we existed in a place outside of ourselves together. We also talked a lot about music. He told me about drums and about jazz. He wanted to play jazz. It was so beautiful to listen to him talk about music, to listen to someone so passionate, so in love with that they wanted to do. We would talk about practicing a lot too, and about the future. Ted seemed to love music, and it made me feel inspired. He always talked about it. It was a habit, finger drumming, only unique to him. I loved to catch his fingers go off in these moments of translucent love. His hands were just perfect. They would find any surface to drum on, tabletops, the side of cups, the seat of a bike or scooter we were standing besides, the steering wheels of his car. How lovely to watch passion translated to reality like this, the fingers always looking for something that was hidden from me. It's so funny to me that I have actually never seen him play drums live.
I remember we were coming back from somewhere this one time, and i was on the back of his scooter, and we had one headphone each, and the night was quiet, it was pretty late. He had his own music going, and it was warm, so the breeze felt really nice. My fingers were gripped around the little piece in the back, I didn’t dare touch him. When we were on the main road, after the circle, he always dropped me off on the back gate, and so we were going up the road, and the music hit a very good riff, I have no fucking clue about what song was playing or even about the music, but I remember the feeling, the music swelling around us, and the roar of the vehicle and the low and speeding street lamps like little anchors in the darkness. The last bit of that road goes upwards, and the music somehow swelled perfectly with the incline and I am sure Ted slowed down to accommodate for the moment and it felt like the whoa entire world had held its breath, stopped everything, everything for just a fraction of a second, to observe. It was so romantic.
Ted was also one of those people who are so shitty at communication. I also believe he was a very emotionally unavailable person back then. I could hardly ever get a hold of him. He was also busy with all of his music stuff, he was in school, too, back then. When we met, it was a completely different story. We walked out the universe, into our own little one, and I had his full attention, always.
I remember most of him in dim lights and silhouettes, I remember most of him in smiles and the jaw, the streetlights making his softer, eyes brighter.
He would drop me off at the back gate, always, and we would hug goodbye sometimes, and it was so awkward, I would go back home and go to sleep all dazed, wake up all dazed.
I went over to his house once, and he made me tea.
His house had tinted windows,
big
ones. I remember how hot it was. His bedroom looked over the back of Lokhandwala, an it had a few plants there. His drumkit took up most of the space in the room and he explained how he slept. I sat near the window, I was wearing the cobalt blue shirt I used to love wearing. He showed me a weird purple light he had, and we talked about that too. I felt absolutely privileged to be there.
We used to also smoke a bunch of pot in the stairwell of my building. The pot was dude, I believe, I had got it off of some kid, and I had a lot of it, I am sure some of it was still underneath my bed when I left for London. At one point I was afraid that I had become his pot connect, but that was just stupid. Nothing really diluted the lucidity of the moments I spent with Ted, I never felt the effect of the pot because I was so entranced with being there with this person, so entranced with our conversation, his presence, with spending time with him. We talked on the phone a lot too. He started to call me when we couldn’t meet in person. He called me when he was eating food at home and hanging out with his mom, and when he was too tired after practice to go outside but still wanted to talk. He called me late in the night usually, and we would talk for hours on the phone. The amount of fucking sleep I have lost on this guy, it’s ridiculous. We would end up falling asleep on the phone, and I would dream about how his voice deepened, just so, gradually, when he got sleepier, so heavy with exhaustion, so low and soft.
The biggest hint that he threw me was when I was in London. I text him to wish him for the new year, I told him that I wished him to have all the love in the world, and he wrote back, saying he had all the love in the world, but I was in London. I think that was the moment when everything got real. It was the first time he had just outright indicated that he had feelings for me. I had got him a jazz CD from Camden Market. The problem with Ted and I was that we were big pussies. On the night before I was leaving to go to Auroville for the first time, I was supposed to meet him, and he had been busy all day and was exhausted so he told me to call him in a while if he didn’t reply to my text, because he was going to take a nap and then come see me. I never called. I left. I made excuses for myself, saying that I wanted him to get his rest, when I actually stayed up all night waiting for him to wake up and text me back, when I was actually fucking dying to see him. I was too much of a pussy. I didn’t call.
I was in the car, going from the airport to Auroville, and we were texting then. Another moment of my life I will never forget. It was like in the movies. We wanted to say something, and we ended up saying something else. It was one of those moments of lucid quality. Both of us knew what the other one wanted to say. The impression of the weight that those two lines of text held in my heart is hard to explain.
We talked on the phone so much when I first moved to Auroville. We would talk through the night and fall asleep at the end of it. I remember this one time, we were on the phone for hours, and the sun came up and I went out for a walk and only when I came back and had to get ready to go to work did we finally stop talking. It was so surreal. To realise that distance hadn’t changed our relationship at all. My heart would explode every time I saw his name on my phone. It always felt like he was right beside me, whenever we talked, I could see him.
Everything changed then. I began to date Kane. That was one of the times when he expressed his emotions. That shit really made me reflect on my life. It wasn’t easy to realise that the one person that I was in love with and had been for so long now actually felt something for me too. I had never allowed myself to think about the possibility of this. It had only been half a year at this point since I had known Ted, but it felt like I had never not known him. It was my own issues with self-esteem that made me blind to a lot of things between us. It was also a lack of detrimental awareness or the balls to address things head on. We always spoke in code, or always said the thing just shy of whatever it was that we wanted to say.
Before going to Auroville, I was in London for a bit. That was near Christmas and new year's. Ted got him phone stollen then, and it was difficult to communicate with him, but we did talk from time to time. He even called me once. I missed him so much then, being next to him, his physical self. I thought about him all the time. It is even in one of my pictures on social from that time, my folly, I was mistaken enough to believe that he was thinking about someone else. I was proven wrong on the night of new year's. It was another one of those moments in my life that seemed to anchor itself in my bones and thus also anchor my bones into a new stream of reality.
It must have hurt him, I realised this much later, I had – yes, I have since practiced very hard to change this aspect of my personality - a tendency to cause a lot of hurt with my naivety.
When I met him again it was like I had never left. It was like we were the only two people in the world, and that we could just exist like that forever, on the stairs in my building, and it felt like my chest had been so tight, and then it wasn’t when I saw him again. We talked about our feelings then, frankly, for the first time. And it was what it was. I remember so distinctly my feelings from then. I was so elated and so entrapped, simultaneously. I was fighting the urge to touch him, maybe hold his hand, to kiss him, it was so hard. I was determined to not ruin the relationship that I was in, and I wanted to so badly. He was right fucking there. The heat from his skin was palpable on mine. I remember thinking that I was so in love, but not with the person I was supposed to be this much in love with. We went to eat or something after, probably. I think that I regret it, not doing something then, not really sure though. I love the drama of it more. Would it be the same? This whole story. It is so sweet the way it is, and it trips me up sometimes, if I would have done something then, reached out, things would be so completely different. It makes me afraid.
My heart held so much conflict at that point in my life. Here was a man, so close, right there, someone I could share everything with, someone I could talk to for hours no end, someone who made me happy, someone who inspired me, made me feel it too, someone so beautiful, someone I considered to be my closest friend, a person who in all sense of things just absolutely perfect for me. I wanted Ted so badly. I was spending so much time with him anyways. I had moments of distinguished clarity when I would pick my phone up to end things with Keith, so that I could be with Ted. Multiple moments.
We were parked in front of the back gate, and we spent hours in his car. He talked about jazz, and I listened to him. I wanted so bad to hold his hands in mine. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything so bad in my life. I wanted to put my fingers through his, to feel the give of his skin, to feel the warmth of it. I wanted so fucking bad to just do it, just lean in and fuck everything up, to ensue some kind of chaos, some kind of ruin that would come surely, just for the solace of having his hand in mine. I remember all the finger drumming. We were really getting into jazz and drumming then. I remember coming back home like I was on a peak. It was just to beautiful, to hear him talk, and about music too, about drumming. There was another night like this, we actually literally stood around talk for hours that night, just outside of the back gate. He was stood leaning against his car and I shuffled around on my two feet in front of him. The streetlights seemed to be pulsing around us, made him look like he was a divinity. I don’t know what we had been doing before, maybe I had just met him there, or maybe we had gone to get something to eat or have a juice or a tea, but we ended up there. I remember stepping in closer to him, trying to see how far I could go, how close. I loved the sound of his laughter. It was another time when I really wanted to reach out and pull his hand into mine. It would have been so easy, so soft, in the deep of the night, just our voices echoing around us, everyone asleep, just the two of us. The
We used to also smoke a bunch of pot in the stairwell of my building. The pot was dude, I believe, I had got it off of some kid, and I had a lot of it, I am sure some of it was still underneath my bed when I left for London. At one point I was afraid that I had become his pot connect, but that was just stupid. Nothing really diluted the lucidity of the moments I spent with Ted, I never felt the effect of the pot because I was so entranced with being there with this person, so entranced with our conversation, his presence, with spending time with him. We talked on the phone a lot too. He started to call me when we couldn’t meet in person. He called me when he was eating food at home and hanging out with his mom, and when he was too tired after practice to go outside but still wanted to talk. He called me late in the night usually, and we would talk for hours on the phone. The amount of fucking sleep I have lost on this guy, it’s ridiculous. We would end up falling asleep on the phone, and I would dream about how his voice deepened, just so, gradually, when he got sleepier, so heavy with exhaustion, so low and soft.
The biggest hint that he threw me was when I was in London. I text him to wish him for the new year, I told him that I wished him to have all the love in the world, and he wrote back, saying he had all the love in the world, but I was in London. I think that was the moment when everything got real. It was the first time he had just outright indicated that he had feelings for me. I had got him a jazz CD from Camden Market. The problem with Ted and I was that we were big pussies. On the night before I was leaving to go to Auroville for the first time, I was supposed to meet him, and he had been busy all day and was exhausted so he told me to call him in a while if he didn’t reply to my text, because he was going to take a nap and then come see me. I never called. I left. I made excuses for myself, saying that I wanted him to get his rest, when I actually stayed up all night waiting for him to wake up and text me back, when I was actually fucking dying to see him. I was too much of a pussy. I didn’t call.
I was in the car, going from the airport to Auroville, and we were texting then. Another moment of my life I will never forget. It was like in the movies. We wanted to say something, and we ended up saying something else. It was one of those moments of lucid quality. Both of us knew what the other one wanted to say. The impression of the weight that those two lines of text held in my heart is hard to explain.
We talked on the phone so much when I first moved to Auroville. We would talk through the night and fall asleep at the end of it. I remember this one time, we were on the phone for hours, and the sun came up and I went out for a walk and only when I came back and had to get ready to go to work did we finally stop talking. It was so surreal. To realise that distance hadn’t changed our relationship at all. My heart would explode every time I saw his name on my phone. It always felt like he was right beside me, whenever we talked, I could see him.
Everything changed then. I began to date Kane. That was one of the times when he expressed his emotions. That shit really made me reflect on my life. It wasn’t easy to realise that the one person that I was in love with and had been for so long now actually felt something for me too. I had never allowed myself to think about the possibility of this. It had only been half a year at this point since I had known Ted, but it felt like I had never not known him. It was my own issues with self-esteem that made me blind to a lot of things between us. It was also a lack of detrimental awareness or the balls to address things head on. We always spoke in code, or always said the thing just shy of whatever it was that we wanted to say.
Before going to Auroville, I was in London for a bit. That was near Christmas and new year's. Ted got him phone stollen then, and it was difficult to communicate with him, but we did talk from time to time. He even called me once. I missed him so much then, being next to him, his physical self. I thought about him all the time. It is even in one of my pictures on social from that time, my folly, I was mistaken enough to believe that he was thinking about someone else. I was proven wrong on the night of new year's. It was another one of those moments in my life that seemed to anchor itself in my bones and thus also anchor my bones into a new stream of reality.
It must have hurt him, I realised this much later, I had – yes, I have since practiced very hard to change this aspect of my personality - a tendency to cause a lot of hurt with my naivety.
When I met him again it was like I had never left. It was like we were the only two people in the world, and that we could just exist like that forever, on the stairs in my building, and it felt like my chest had been so tight, and then it wasn’t when I saw him again. We talked about our feelings then, frankly, for the first time. And it was what it was. I remember so distinctly my feelings from then. I was so elated and so entrapped, simultaneously. I was fighting the urge to touch him, maybe hold his hand, to kiss him, it was so hard. I was determined to not ruin the relationship that I was in, and I wanted to so badly. He was right fucking there. The heat from his skin was palpable on mine. I remember thinking that I was so in love, but not with the person I was supposed to be this much in love with. We went to eat or something after, probably. I think that I regret it, not doing something then, not really sure though. I love the drama of it more. Would it be the same? This whole story. It is so sweet the way it is, and it trips me up sometimes, if I would have done something then, reached out, things would be so completely different. It makes me afraid.
My heart held so much conflict at that point in my life. Here was a man, so close, right there, someone I could share everything with, someone I could talk to for hours no end, someone who made me happy, someone who inspired me, made me feel it too, someone so beautiful, someone I considered to be my closest friend, a person who in all sense of things just absolutely perfect for me. I wanted Ted so badly. I was spending so much time with him anyways. I had moments of distinguished clarity when I would pick my phone up to end things with Keith, so that I could be with Ted. Multiple moments.
We were parked in front of the back gate, and we spent hours in his car. He talked about jazz, and I listened to him. I wanted so bad to hold his hands in mine. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything so bad in my life. I wanted to put my fingers through his, to feel the give of his skin, to feel the warmth of it. I wanted so fucking bad to just do it, just lean in and fuck everything up, to ensue some kind of chaos, some kind of ruin that would come surely, just for the solace of having his hand in mine. I remember all the finger drumming. We were really getting into jazz and drumming then. I remember coming back home like I was on a peak. It was just to beautiful, to hear him talk, and about music too, about drumming. There was another night like this, we actually literally stood around talk for hours that night, just outside of the back gate. He was stood leaning against his car and I shuffled around on my two feet in front of him. The streetlights seemed to be pulsing around us, made him look like he was a divinity. I don’t know what we had been doing before, maybe I had just met him there, or maybe we had gone to get something to eat or have a juice or a tea, but we ended up there. I remember stepping in closer to him, trying to see how far I could go, how close. I loved the sound of his laughter. It was another time when I really wanted to reach out and pull his hand into mine. It would have been so easy, so soft, in the deep of the night, just our voices echoing around us, everyone asleep, just the two of us. The
world was so empty of everything except for us andit felt just perfect.
It
would have been amazingly easy, to just reach out. Would it be so easy? I’ve held people’s
hands for less, since, I wish I would have done it then, just to know the sensation, just to go about life knowing rather than wondering. We must have stood there for hours, and it felt like it had been a few minutes. It felt like an eternity.
When I ended up wearing a sari on the school traditional day, we hang out for hours after class. He came around to see me and we walked over to sit down and eat somewhere a couple of lanes over. I felt so fucking happy. I was so confident in myself by then, I was so much more open, so much more honest. The sun was hot on my skin, and even then, it felt like it was just the two of us, smack in the middle of the afternoon with a city going about it’s business in full swing, it still felt like it was just the two of us. So reassuring. We talked for hours, and we went somewhere too, in a rickshaw, to get a print or something, and we had to share one on the way back. We sat squished up in the back of the rickshaw and my heart wouldn’t stop pounding. What is it about proximity that is so endearing? It felt so safe, to be anywhere near him, and the feeling only intensified the closer we were. Life felt so simple that afternoon, so full. I got to hang out with my best friend, and it made me so happy. I was in love with this man and it that afternoon that I realised the different layers to this love, the different currents of it.
That is the thing I miss the most, now that we don’t talk anymore. I miss a friend. That was the best winter, summer, whatever, even when it was covid, we would talk on phone. Since then, we have only interacted a handful of times.
We spoke from dusk to dawn on the day that Keith broke up with me. It really fascinates me too, to recall this. We spoke all through the fucking night. I cried a bit over the hours, and that was fine. He made me so happy that night, I laughed, and it was like nothing bad had really happened. It was a very heavy night in some ways, we would have ended up together then. I wanted for us to end up together then. Not in a rebound way, but in a way of ah this make so much more sense or like ah I am glad that is over, and I can finally be here now. Well, I was really fucking happy. It was a bit amazing. Everything had seemed completely distorted that night, even the sound of his voice. If it wasn’t covid, I would have probably had enough balls to hold his hand. I can’t imagine anyone else helping me through that night but him, always him. Even years later, whenever I would find myself in a situation or state of mind when I really needed somewhere safe it was always him. I said something that pissed him off that night, and then we didn’t speak for about a year and some. We spoke about this, and I honestly don’t understand what I said to make him angry, and then we spoke about it again and by then I didn’t even remember the shape of his eyes, which made me sad. I don’t know what I said, I must have been trying to protect him. I didn’t want anything between us be a reaction to my breakup, and that is one thing I remember thinking, one think I remember forcing myself to adhere to.
When we spoke again about a year and a half later, I was back in Auroville. Oh my fucking god, my life was so complicated then. That was when he was dating someone. I missed him so much, that was the first thought I had when I heard his voice on the phone. It had been so, so fucking hard to not talk to him. During that time in Auroville I would get so lonely sometimes, overwhelmed, I would miss home a lot and for me home only meant Mumbai which in turn only meant Ted. I would miss him so much and I would try, a lot, to reach out and talk to him. I’d text a lot. I was very impulsive back then, and horribly reckless, but everything stupid I did seem to have no consequences, so I did a lot of wild and obnoxious things. It worked, it did, and that made me so sad, our conversation brought into light the parts of me that I had been missing, the parts of me that I had left with him.
Life just goes on, and more time passed by, and I came back to Mumbai. I tried a lot to see him, but I was just talking into the void. It was very difficult for me to understand why. I really wanted to see him, to talk to, I was literally right there, at home, across the street. I wanted to go back to our walks, to talking into the night, to being able to be in the presence of a man I still considered my best friend, the love of my life. I was back home for a few months, I think we spoke from time to time, a couple of texts here and there, and I kept begging to see him. I wrote one of my best poems then, for him, one of my most favourite piece of work, eighty two, for reference. It broke my heart then, it really did, to not be able to fall back into being around someone I had missed so much, someone who meant the world to me. The thing about me is that I never understand unfair situations, and it makes me so angry. And I was pretty angry at him then, I think now too. It’s so silly, one sided anger, so completely unreciprocated. It’s such a waste of my time really, but then what else is the purpose of my existence other than this, to fight for everything I worship. Sometimes I am very stubborn, and then I was too, it was about a couple of days before I was going to leave, for good, for a long time, and I was so extremely desperate.
The last time I spoke to him, it was one of the most honest conversations we’ve had. It was about two years ago. I was in the student accommodation back then. I never realised before that the sound of a persons voice could carry so much – memory, longing, love, delight, heartbreak and quiet, so much. It was one of the most honest conversations we’ve had. I remember looking outside the window, the very small one in my room, into the rain, and feeling this incredibly cold wave of strangeness washing over me. It was not his building I was looking at, not the green government land that sprawls out in front of my balcony or the building in the back, still under construction, the smell of upturned, wet earth, not anything that could match the sound of his voice. I remember feeling so much disassociation, that was one of the few times I have ever felt distance like that, in my bones. We spoke endlessly, for hours. It was like I had never left, like we hadn’t not been talking for the past what, year, for a long time. We spoke about this too, back then, about how surreal it was to belong in someone's life like that, so completely but then not also. I remember my words from back then, when we first began to be friends, we had created this bubble for ourselves, our own world, and somehow this place, ‘bubble’, existed in space and time independent of everything around it, independent of even us, and we stepped out of it a long time ago, but since, every time the two of us have crossed paths again, we seemed to have stepped right back into it, as easy as taking a breath. Being around each other just came naturally to us. This bubble will exist, I reckon, until the both of us cease to exist, or maybe beyond us in this realm and into another one, and we might just slide back into it some day, somehow. I told him that I loved him. It was easy to say this time. That was the last time we spoke.
He was so kind to me then, in that conversation. I get jaded when it comes to everything that has ever transpired between Ted and I, and sometimes I tend to gloss over the different facts of the relationship between us. It was this kindness that allowed me to grow, allowed me to start to become something that I could recognise. Being around Ted, I grew a lot, I did. From back then, I remember this feeling of trying to become someone that he would admire or love, and then I became someone I admired and loved, so, so, so much. I realised myself. Love can do that sometimes, make you. Were we really in love with each other or just the idea of the other person? I wonder about that too sometimes. I am a different person now, not as rash and volatile as I used to be. I have learned a lot about boundaries and consequences, I have also learned to stop being so adamant. It’s very immature, really. If it was a few years ago, I might have taken more measures to try and contact him, which honestly, a bit weird, not gonna lie. But I might have, I had back then. I miss my friend, so dearly.
Sometimes it’s nice to miss people, and leave it at that.
When I ended up wearing a sari on the school traditional day, we hang out for hours after class. He came around to see me and we walked over to sit down and eat somewhere a couple of lanes over. I felt so fucking happy. I was so confident in myself by then, I was so much more open, so much more honest. The sun was hot on my skin, and even then, it felt like it was just the two of us, smack in the middle of the afternoon with a city going about it’s business in full swing, it still felt like it was just the two of us. So reassuring. We talked for hours, and we went somewhere too, in a rickshaw, to get a print or something, and we had to share one on the way back. We sat squished up in the back of the rickshaw and my heart wouldn’t stop pounding. What is it about proximity that is so endearing? It felt so safe, to be anywhere near him, and the feeling only intensified the closer we were. Life felt so simple that afternoon, so full. I got to hang out with my best friend, and it made me so happy. I was in love with this man and it that afternoon that I realised the different layers to this love, the different currents of it.
That is the thing I miss the most, now that we don’t talk anymore. I miss a friend. That was the best winter, summer, whatever, even when it was covid, we would talk on phone. Since then, we have only interacted a handful of times.
We spoke from dusk to dawn on the day that Keith broke up with me. It really fascinates me too, to recall this. We spoke all through the fucking night. I cried a bit over the hours, and that was fine. He made me so happy that night, I laughed, and it was like nothing bad had really happened. It was a very heavy night in some ways, we would have ended up together then. I wanted for us to end up together then. Not in a rebound way, but in a way of ah this make so much more sense or like ah I am glad that is over, and I can finally be here now. Well, I was really fucking happy. It was a bit amazing. Everything had seemed completely distorted that night, even the sound of his voice. If it wasn’t covid, I would have probably had enough balls to hold his hand. I can’t imagine anyone else helping me through that night but him, always him. Even years later, whenever I would find myself in a situation or state of mind when I really needed somewhere safe it was always him. I said something that pissed him off that night, and then we didn’t speak for about a year and some. We spoke about this, and I honestly don’t understand what I said to make him angry, and then we spoke about it again and by then I didn’t even remember the shape of his eyes, which made me sad. I don’t know what I said, I must have been trying to protect him. I didn’t want anything between us be a reaction to my breakup, and that is one thing I remember thinking, one think I remember forcing myself to adhere to.
When we spoke again about a year and a half later, I was back in Auroville. Oh my fucking god, my life was so complicated then. That was when he was dating someone. I missed him so much, that was the first thought I had when I heard his voice on the phone. It had been so, so fucking hard to not talk to him. During that time in Auroville I would get so lonely sometimes, overwhelmed, I would miss home a lot and for me home only meant Mumbai which in turn only meant Ted. I would miss him so much and I would try, a lot, to reach out and talk to him. I’d text a lot. I was very impulsive back then, and horribly reckless, but everything stupid I did seem to have no consequences, so I did a lot of wild and obnoxious things. It worked, it did, and that made me so sad, our conversation brought into light the parts of me that I had been missing, the parts of me that I had left with him.
Life just goes on, and more time passed by, and I came back to Mumbai. I tried a lot to see him, but I was just talking into the void. It was very difficult for me to understand why. I really wanted to see him, to talk to, I was literally right there, at home, across the street. I wanted to go back to our walks, to talking into the night, to being able to be in the presence of a man I still considered my best friend, the love of my life. I was back home for a few months, I think we spoke from time to time, a couple of texts here and there, and I kept begging to see him. I wrote one of my best poems then, for him, one of my most favourite piece of work, eighty two, for reference. It broke my heart then, it really did, to not be able to fall back into being around someone I had missed so much, someone who meant the world to me. The thing about me is that I never understand unfair situations, and it makes me so angry. And I was pretty angry at him then, I think now too. It’s so silly, one sided anger, so completely unreciprocated. It’s such a waste of my time really, but then what else is the purpose of my existence other than this, to fight for everything I worship. Sometimes I am very stubborn, and then I was too, it was about a couple of days before I was going to leave, for good, for a long time, and I was so extremely desperate.
The last time I spoke to him, it was one of the most honest conversations we’ve had. It was about two years ago. I was in the student accommodation back then. I never realised before that the sound of a persons voice could carry so much – memory, longing, love, delight, heartbreak and quiet, so much. It was one of the most honest conversations we’ve had. I remember looking outside the window, the very small one in my room, into the rain, and feeling this incredibly cold wave of strangeness washing over me. It was not his building I was looking at, not the green government land that sprawls out in front of my balcony or the building in the back, still under construction, the smell of upturned, wet earth, not anything that could match the sound of his voice. I remember feeling so much disassociation, that was one of the few times I have ever felt distance like that, in my bones. We spoke endlessly, for hours. It was like I had never left, like we hadn’t not been talking for the past what, year, for a long time. We spoke about this too, back then, about how surreal it was to belong in someone's life like that, so completely but then not also. I remember my words from back then, when we first began to be friends, we had created this bubble for ourselves, our own world, and somehow this place, ‘bubble’, existed in space and time independent of everything around it, independent of even us, and we stepped out of it a long time ago, but since, every time the two of us have crossed paths again, we seemed to have stepped right back into it, as easy as taking a breath. Being around each other just came naturally to us. This bubble will exist, I reckon, until the both of us cease to exist, or maybe beyond us in this realm and into another one, and we might just slide back into it some day, somehow. I told him that I loved him. It was easy to say this time. That was the last time we spoke.
He was so kind to me then, in that conversation. I get jaded when it comes to everything that has ever transpired between Ted and I, and sometimes I tend to gloss over the different facts of the relationship between us. It was this kindness that allowed me to grow, allowed me to start to become something that I could recognise. Being around Ted, I grew a lot, I did. From back then, I remember this feeling of trying to become someone that he would admire or love, and then I became someone I admired and loved, so, so, so much. I realised myself. Love can do that sometimes, make you. Were we really in love with each other or just the idea of the other person? I wonder about that too sometimes. I am a different person now, not as rash and volatile as I used to be. I have learned a lot about boundaries and consequences, I have also learned to stop being so adamant. It’s very immature, really. If it was a few years ago, I might have taken more measures to try and contact him, which honestly, a bit weird, not gonna lie. But I might have, I had back then. I miss my friend, so dearly.
Sometimes it’s nice to miss people, and leave it at that.