A Thing called Broken Friendship

I look into my slam book. One of the first entries read- “The girl I met on the stairs…

And there I float away to another time, two years back. It was my first day. My first day in my fifth school in ten years of school life. I’d gone through this rigmarole four times before but why- WHY did it have to be so difficult each & every time? With jellybean legs I walked up the stairs, walked to the room that was to be my class for the next  one year. And there occurs the most delightful co-incidence, I meet a girl uncommonly pretty with stringy hair also walking up to the same place. We meet, we smile, we talk. She’s a newcomer yes but she already knows a bunch of girls and yes (much to my disappointment) they are in her class.

“….You looked like a complete tension pandi (tamil slang) walked up to me and said “do you know where 11G is?” I was quite happy I had company to walk  with up to my class. And since then, I’ve never got rid of that company..”

Yes we became friends. Very thick ones at that. We talked about nothing but laughed about everything. We got into trouble, we got sent out, never did our homeworks, flunked every now & then, hated the same things- Physics & Math. We spent hours on the phone, talking about nothing in particular, laughing, giggling, moaning, hating & loving. Life was- ah- idyllic.

“…there are just so many unforgettable fun moments we had with you. We guys bring out the worst possible childishness in each other. Pushing each other off the benches, scribbling in each other’s books, you trying your singing skills in the chemistry period and earning us both bad names from the teacher…”

We had tons of fun. Loads of it in fact, it was a happy uncomplicated friendship. We hardly had anything in common yet we could relate. More than a best friend she soon became my sister and thus proclaimed my facebook  page. As 1 year passed, our all important 12^th grade arrived bang into our lives in all its grim seriousness. But 12^th too passed and it was more of the same, almost, and I was happy. What more could I ask for? I remained in all my stubborn non serious glory, refusing to study the subjects that bothered me. I had a choice though she didn’t. She climbed up the ladder, scoring higher & eventually migrating to the ‘toppers section’. But all this while we remained best friends just like sisters as we told everybody around. Boards came and went and then came our Farewell. It was a bright sunny day. We sashayed around in our saris got bored and people watched, in our trademark style we rolled around laughing, yelled, clapped, screamed and behaved in a manner highly unbecoming of soon to be college girls. The scorching march sun shined its way through the tree leaves. In the crazy heat we smiled and beamed into the cameras and all the while knowing we would hold each other during whatever adversary came our way. Who gives a shit about results? And so school came to an end and there were no tears. We won’t be together for college but so what? We had facebook & we had mobile phones

When you are fresh out of school, in your opinion nothing can get you down or unhappy except for the disgusting thing called marks, in your opinion every friendship forged will stand the test of time, in your opinion every person who meant the world to you probably thinks the same about you. And like many a fresh faced school graduate, I believed the same. But as it happens, even the best things come to an end. I went away from home, away from a place that was the hub of all social activity thanks to which we couldn’t hang around. Anxious to kick start vacation we made plans over the phone swearing to go through with it. Perhaps I should have noticed the gaps between the calls, the way it increased over time. Maybe I should have noticed that I enjoyed her company but did not crave it. She went out with her other friends, I didn’t mind. She went out with other people whom in my opinion she hadn’t spent even a quarter of her time with in school. I still am special I told myself . But as time flew and as results came and went, temper began to fray on my end. What about the plans we’d made? What about the movies we were supposed to watch?

In the 3 months we spent away from each other we’d inevitably grown apart. She had a boyfriend now, that took her time, trips to her native place, that took her time, Applying for colleges, that took her time. The hi’s on text had come to an end, we both had issues with our ‘phone balance’, we both -in short- had time for everything but were too busy for each other. Love, life, passage of time, college, everything we thought wouldn’t come between us did end up interfering and by the time any of us realised the damage it had created, we had drifted apart. Too far for anyone or anything to bring us back.

“…its quite weird to think within few months we  will be sitting beside someone else and sharing lunches and laughing and calling them our close friends. We just have to console ourselves by talking philosophy-This is life..”

Well so that was life. Was our friendship never meant to be? It came to an end the same way that it began. The fire started fast and burnt bright but in the end there just wasn’t enough fuel. Maybe there wasn’t enough time for us to establish it on firmer grounds or maybe I just wasn’t understanding enough. There are plenty of ifs and buts but that’s how it is for everyone right? Life isn’t black and white, there is no right or wrong, all you could do is make your decisions based on your instinctive assumptions. And that was what I did.

“..Hope you get good friends who make your life beautiful. All the best, for everything. I’ll surely miss you, with your wide smile waiting to greet me everyday.

I love you, my sister…”

And so her entry came to an end. Below was her sign dated 22.11.2011. We met for the last time 3 months back. We did the usual..ate ice creams, talked and gossiped and yes we laughed. Little did we know it would be the last time we met. In a way that must have been a farewell to our 2 year long relationship. It didn’t deserve a drama, it didn’t deserve a fight, it died what I know is a clean death. Just the way I prefer it to be. As winter fast approaches I think back to those days of summer and the light that filtered through the leaves and above all the moments we’d spent together.

Adios my friend.