The Pessimist

Chapter ONE: Mundane World

A/N: Cover credit goes to my friend Indrogupto. Hope you guys have a great time reading!

***

"Why do you even care?", the second girl interrupts, smacking her lips together, might possibly after putting a good deal of juicy lip gloss upon her 'so delicate' lips.

"It's not like she's stolen your boyfriend or anything!", she reasons. "Nor did she's got tickets from Sienna's night concert from Connaught's Place on this Saturday night, which my friend here already got her hands on!"

And with that she squeals to cheer her friend up, whose mood is already spoiled for whatsoever reason, and maybe that's me.

"So, drop that poker face already and just...ignore her!"

I think, I really like her reasoning.

"But you saw it right? She put on those damn gloves before handing over the fundraising's cash! What.... what does she think she is!", the first girl barks, countering her friend's well put reasoning. "I knew, she was weird; but looks like, she's totally sick!"

Wow, she is literally acting like I dumped her.

"Geez, Saloni, dude! Drop it now, okay? And to be honest, I don't like her at all, and I doubt, anyone in our department would disagree. Seriously, like...her looks really creep me out!", she states with a sigh of sheer disgust.

Okay, I take my words back. What's wrong with having blue hairs? And how does it have anything to do with me being creepy?

Last time I checked, I have clearly been avoiding any direct contact, whether tactile or conversational, with all of them, for the last one month, since I got into St. Joseph's College, the central academic hub of North Delhi.

"And let's not talk about those black stone-cold eyes, just like a dead corpse!"

"No, no, no, no! Say zombie, please!"

"A very hideous zombie, indeed!"

A string of loud giggles reverberates around the packed four walls of the ladies' room, and also giving me the cue to get out of the cubicle wherein I've been putting myself, probably surreptitiously, which I maybe shouldn't. I mean eavesdropping.

But what else can I do? These silly mundane events are something that amuse me to no end, and never fail to get me going.

Does that make me a masochist? No, perhaps a psycho? I'm not really sure.

Getting up and turning the flush down, with the gurgling sound of water in the pan, and the cluttering of opening the ply door bolt of the tiny cubicle as the background chords for my dramatic emergence, as well as setting the climax, I finally divulge my presence to the now utterly bemused girls, and decide to ignore their shocked annoyance targeting towards me.

Rinsing my hands properly in the adjacent yellowish sink, I exit the restroom, leaving two unconscionable girls behind.

Well, that is just me, and how my life has been for the last one month in this school, and since all the previous years in high school. During the first few years, I had been morose and a bit lonely, but now these things hardly get to me. And...I guess, I like how things are for me now, and probably that is the best thing to do for my sake and others as well.

"Isn't she the blue creep from Zoology department?" I hear someone whispering, while eyeing me with askance.

Geez, that's what I call creepy!

"Shh! Keep it down! I've heard, if once she hears you talking ill on her back, you'll be doomed for life, and bad things will never leave you alone. That's what happened with the sophomore guy from the Economics department," the other girl explains to the first girl.

"You kidding me, girl?", the first girl shrugs off.

Well, I'm a little curious now. After all, it's the initiation of rumors in my first ever college.

I had a few in high school. Quite a few, I must add, and all were equally hilarious and entertaining.

I walk past them, and hide behind the turn of the long-winded corridor, right at the mouth of the steep stairs.

"He got caught hand-in-hand while making fun of her bluehead, and she just stared down at him for a minute, and then left without saying another word. Since then on, he's been on poor form in both academics and sports, as if bad luck itself got stuck on his back, and inseparably," she ends her exposition with a seemingly ominous sigh.

Wait, that's a bit add-on to what I had got in high school, but still....so novel.

"Damnit, Kiara! You should've told me first thing first!", the first girl complains squeamishly.

"Sorry, girl! But watch out from now, cause that's the curse she bears."

Let me do a little redress here. That's not the curse I disseminate. The curse I actually bear is something more dangerous, more darker, or maybe something similar to those only found in the pages of children's banal fantasy storybooks. But the thing is, it won't do any harm to anyone but myself, or maybe it used to.

Retrofitting my composure and putting my guards back on, I glide down the stairs mutely, with my hands inside the pockets of my jeans.

As I come down on the next floor, I watch a group of guys coming from the opposite way, probably to climb down the next flight of stairs, while talking convivially as one of them walks backwards, maybe trying to explain something to the others.

For the split of the second, my eyes land on the banana peel placed portentously right at the onset of the steep stairs. Calculating the probability of the possible outcomes, the disastrous accidental one seems to be more deducible. Seeing that ridiculously back-walking guy, having no minimum sense of awareness, stepping right on the peel, just as I predicted, I rush to him, and so without a second deliberation, and forgetting all about putting my gloves on, I grab tightly onto his right arm up to his elbow with all I've got inside, preventing his imminent fall down the stairs.

I start rapidly gasping for air, as I mutely watch the person, I hold onto reciprocating the same action as mine. I guess, this might have shocked him well and the others as well, as the shock of the moment is evident on each of their faces.

But then on started my downfall.

Next what I see, are a warm smile, a splendent face with mustache yet familiar, suited in a three piece and tailed coat, black eyes as if those of the one being lovestruck, the same face but two different souls, in moments blood splattered onto that bright face as tears quietly fall down his cheeks, and it feels like he is enduring watching someone he loves dying.

I flinch as I let go of the hand under the spur of the moment. Loud gasps besiege my surrounding almost immediately, taking me back to my senses, and as soon as I realize that I am letting him fall, I grasp on his shirt with the other hand, and instinctively other one joins as well, pulling him closer to me.

For the brief of the moment, our eyes collide with multiple friction, our breaths get conflated, and like the one past incident, I felt that same spark inside me. The same face, but two souls. I throw him aside repulsively.

People start to gather around him. I guess, news of accidents runs faster than the ocean currents.

I clasp tightly onto my chest, trying to stop the erratic pounding right beneath there, as I step down the stairs in a short hasty pace.

"Hey, wait!" I hear someone calling out, and that's probably for me.

But I don't bother.

Because....that is all for the curse I bear: the curse to see one's past life.

***
A/N: Sorry guys, it got deleted before.
Next update will be on upcoming Monday. So, stay tuned until then.

Vote. Comment. Share.

Xoxo,
Sal