At 00.15 a.m., Vaish dropped four boxes of medium-sized pizza from Domino's Pizza, a box of garlic bread and a one-liter bottle of chilled Pepsi on the coffee table, just when Chanch stuffed the last piece of chocolate doughnut inside her mouth and licked the melted chocolate off her fingers. "What's wrong with all of you? Enough! You'll explode", Nash scolded, and took a sip of her Aloe Vera juice. "Damn, the pizza's smoking hot!", Chanch tossed a box of pizza open and took a deep breath in, sniffing in the aroma which still managed to breathe life into the hunger in me, even when I was stuffed and full. "Oh my God, this looks good", my voice literally melted, like the cheese on the hot pizza. "This combo is the latest one in store, and I swear, this is heaven on Earth", Vaish knelt down and held her iPhone right above the open box of pizza, attempting to capture a picture of it, while Nash simply watched the three of us struggle with and drool over food. "The three of you look like you haven't eaten in a decade", Nash judged, monotonously. "Well, we haven't eaten pizza in a decade", Vaish shrugged. "You and Chanch finished two large pizzas hardly two weeks ago, single-handedly", Nash reminded. "Two weeks, that is fourteen days multiplied by twenty-four hours...that's a huge number and a long, long time, babe", Chanch said, picking up a slice of pizza from the box. "Don't call me 'babe'", Nash shot a look of disgust at her. "Babe!", Chanch repeated, before taking a gigantic bite with her eyes shut. Vaish kept her iPhone aside and crawled towards the table, rubbing her hands together. "Four boxes, three people; possible much?", Vaish questioned, as she cautiously pulled out a slice for herself. "Challenge accepted!", I stated and joined the game, while Nash only managed to sigh.
She reached for her backpack and pulled her DSLR out, while the three of us ate like the next hour would mark the end of the world. "Hmm, wait, wait! Take it from a good angle. Make sure I'm looking good. I haven't posted anything on Facebook for over a month now", Vaish said, and froze, holding the pizza close to her mouth with a decent expression, while Nash captured her from two different angles. "Vaishi, stop posing for a fake candid and smile!", Nash ordered, and within nanoseconds, a smile, which stretched across seas and oceans, illuminated Vaish's face. "Perfect. This should go on your page!", Nash smiled in contentment, while studying the picture. "Don't forget to tag RajaRam", Chanch flatly said, Vaish kicked her, Nash burst out laughing loudly and I looked at the ongoing drama, blankly. "Hash-tag, pizza date with best-friends but missed you, Raju baby", Chanch teased and Nash laughed hard, so hard that she was almost breathless. "Dude, you'll die!", Vaish told Nash, who curled up into a ball on the floor and hysterically laughed, as though it was the funniest thing she had heard in months. "NASH, STOP!", Vaish yelled in annoyance, but Nash was in a world of her own, where she drowned in the sea of laughter. "She's not stopping tonight", Chanch sighed, shaking her head to the sides. It took five long minutes for Nash to recover from her laughing fit; she sat straight and held her chest, heavily breathing in and out with tears wetting her eyes. "I was imagining them together and I died", Nash said.
"Who's RajaRam, though? Sounds like an Uncle's name", I said, curiously, and Nash began laughing again, but it was a brief one. "He is an Uncle", Nash revealed between her laughs. "What are you saying?", I curiously asked in disbelief. "Nash, shut up!", Vaish aimed a piece of her pizza at Nash and threw it on her. "Raja Ram Uncle is Vaish's lover", Chanch said. "Okay, I'll tell you what happened!", Nash sat up straight, and clasped her hands together. "Nash, I hate you", Vaish nagged, burying her face on her palms. "There was a time when Vaish was a little more bored than usual, and she joined this Dating App on one of her college friend's insistence", Nash paused, and looked at Chanch with a grin. "She created an account, but did not dare to use it until she received a request from some Karan. The boy in the profile picture was so, so hot, I swear to God! Perfect jawline, masculine, beard and blue eyes!", Chanch described and I listened on keenly. "Part of this is our fault, as well, because when Vaish showed his profile to us, we encouraged her to take a step forward", Nash accepted. "I had a thing for that Karan at first sight and because these idiots told me to take it forward, I replied to Karan's message. His method of conduct and way of talking on social media melted me down, okay", Vaish said. "I think, a week after chatting with each other, he said that he wants to reveal something to her...", Nash began laughing, again, and Vaish went back to looking embarrassed. "He said he wants to send a picture of himself to Vaish, and when Vaish told him that he can, he sent a picture of his-true-self", Chanch vaguely revealed and stupidly smiled. "Apparently, that was a fake account which belonged to a thirty-eight year-old divorcee, whose name's Raja Ram and he's a University Professor", Chanch eventually said. "OH MY GOD!", I exclaimed, and I looked at Vaish with my jaw-dropped open. "Oh shit, that was bad!", I laughed hard on Vaish's face, holding my tummy. "You should have seen the way he looked, Dityaa; double chin, big belly, bald head and a bushy moustache", Nash added on, and I was breathless. "And...and...with the picture he sent, he typed a message, saying, 'Please accept me for who I am and marry me please. I love you and I will die for you'", Chanch said, moments later. "And I told him to please go die for me", Vaish told, flatly. "Oh God, I'll throw up!", I wrapped my arms around my tummy, and bent forward, resting my forehead on the coffee table. "Vaish cried for two whole days, trust me, and she kept cursing us for encouraging her to walk on the wrong path", Nash informed. "Aw, Vaish", I tilted my head to the side with a smile.
"You actually fell for it?", I questioned and sat back on the floor with my legs crossed. "He was fooling around to drive loneliness away from his life, and I just believed in his words, stupidly. This whole drama will always be a hilarious part of my crappy life, but it would always talk about a loner, who fell hard because someone approached her with love for a whole week. It might be a stupid thing to say, but it still does hurt because of the way I was played with and...the way I fell for it. I thought we stood a chance", Vaish chuckled, but she was on the verge of tears. "I was in need of love. I don't know what's this void in me...it's huge, and I can never love myself enough to fill the emptiness in me. It's this huge hole in my life that no one can fill, and it only gets bigger", Vaish was crying, Nash sobbed in silence and tears turned Chanch's eyes moist. "And I always wonder what's wrong with me...", Vaish's voice quivered. "Nothing", I whispered. "Then, why do people find comfort in betraying me?", Vaish questioned. "Because—b-b", Nash paused and took a sharp breath in, wiping the tears off her cheeks.
"Because you deserve better, Vaish; the ones who left your life were destined to leave you. If not today, they'll leave tomorrow and it's much better to let them go today than tomorrow, when you'll be immersed a little deeper in love with them; and you need to thank God for saving you from a heartbreak bigger than what you faced. I don't if I'm making sense, but I find comfort in believing that every situation we face could be worse than it is; this is not the worst, Vaish. Be thankful to God because you've been saved from facing the worst of worse situations, and trust me, it'll change your life. It is a simple equation you have to crack with God; love Him, and He'll love you back. Trust Him, and He'll keep your trust. Turn towards Him, and He'll keep you close. Maybe, you should quit seeking for love to fill the void in you from a world that's temporary. Bow before The Almighty; He has created the void, and only He has what it takes to fill it", Nash lectured, and Vaish listened, keenly. "And maybe, we're the ones God has sent your way, to fill the void in your life", I said, crawling towards Vaish and hugged her from the side. "And we're going to fill your heart will love until your hearts begs us to stop because it's getting obese", Chanch said and pounced over us. "In case that happens, my health drinks come to the rescue!", Nash exclaimed and joined the warm and squishy group hug.
The thirty seconds we spent huddling together were the thirty best seconds of my life, where everything around me was still and perfect. And that night marked the start of a beautiful friendship.
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Teen Fiction[COMPLETED]. When Dityaa moves to Mumbai with big dreams and a vision, things don't quite go her way. The struggle to survive in an unknown city is real. Living up to her expectations becomes a battle, coping with her worried mother becomes difficul...
