It All Started With Amnesia

Chapter Twelve || I might have the hots for Keith ||

Arjun on the other hand was going out with Kiara. Apparently, he had reservations and the whole works for her. All this I heard during an excruciating meeting last evening at my place. The whole lot had come, except Samir. He had to babysit his cousin.

I am getting tired of my feelings towards both sisters. On one hand I feel the attraction between Alyssa and me, and on the other hand, I get the feeling of something else entirely when I’m near Kiara.

If I could only figure out what.

I walk towards the living room to have breakfast where I notice Ma has kept it ready for me and left a note saying she’s left for work already. Oh well, single breakfast it is.

When I reach the station after walking extremely slowly, I find Elita and Ben waiting for me at our usual meeting spot, just outside the station.

“Hey James,” Elita says, and Ben says, “Morning” in a groggy, grumpy voice. Nope, he’s not a morning person.

After making idle chitchat, where Elita asks me if I’ve brought my selection of songs and I reply in the affirmative, we board the train that is twenty minutes late as usual.

I swear, the day Mumbai’s local trains turn up on time scores of people will miss their trains. We all are so used to turning up at nine thirty for a nine fifteen train.

We make it to college with ample amount of time to spare. At the canteen, we separate, Ben goes off towards class for an early lecture while Elita and I walk towards the room we practice in.

“Hi, wow, you’re early James. What woke you up?” Alyssa says, half in shock and half sarcastically as I’m on time today.

“Har de Har. Very funny, Alyssa. Where’s Alan?” I say in a fake - disgruntled tone, but with a small smile creeping up my lips.

“Oh, he’s gone to get the final form of the songs. The Contingent Leader shall be sending it today. And, guess what. The venue of the competition is Johnson,” Alyssa says, while removing the covers of the instruments.

“Great. The Johnson’s will have home field advantage again.” Elita grumbles while she dumps her bag on the floor the way I do and walks towards her instrument.

“So, have you got your songs?” Alyssa asks, looking at Elita and me expectantly.

I never noticed how much she talks. Kiara doesn’t talk as much. I shake my head; I have got to get a grip.

“Yes. Let’s wait for Alan and then we can discuss and chose the final set.” Elita says and promptly both of them whip their phones out and start swiping.

I take out my new phone as well. Ma and I got it yesterday when we’d been to some huge hypermarket. It’s a touchscreen. I’ve been going on my Facebook account and telling people my new number and getting them to inbox me theirs. Although, that wasn’t as easy as it sounds either. My password wasn’t written down anywhere, and I had to go through email and everything. At least I had written my email id’s password in a book.

Alan arrives after sometime, and by then I’ve figured out how to take photos in proper lighting on this phone. I had been taking photos of Alyssa and Elita in their natural poses before they caught on and tried to grab my phone to delete the pictures.

What is with girls and their need to pose?

“Okay,” we start off with Alan initiating the discussion for once, “we all say what we’ve selected and put all songs to a vote. All ties shall be disqualified, and the other songs shall be chosen. That fair?”

We nod, and Elita goes first.

“My selection includes Paradise by Coldplay, Dream On by Aerosmith and Numb by Linkin Park.”