Under the Mistletoe

"Hi, good morning,” I shouldn't be so excited, but I am. I like him no I love him.

“Hm,” he says.

“You look stressed, is everything alright?”

“The exams are around the corner I want to score well. I want to secure a place in the college I want.”

I take his hands and rub my fingers over his knuckles. I know he loves it when I do it for him.

“Aryaman you work hard, you practice and you revise. So no one is going to stop you from entering your dream college, Ok?”

He smiles, which melts my heart.

 Yes, I'm in love with him.

I sit next to him he's cute and hot at the same time. I take out my lunch box I'm hungry as hell.

I have the usual salad and a cube of cheese. I'm on a diet because, in a fashionable sense, I'm fat. I'm about to dig in but, Aryaman swipes the box towards him, in seconds he munched my food down his throat.

“You know my routine, first I measure and eat my things according to their calorific value. My diet is very light, which you ate right away.”

“I'm hungry and I wanted to eat,” he says.

“This is the only thing I have for my lunch, you know I can't eat anything apart from this.”

“See, I did not recommend a diet to you so, it's none of my business. By the way, how will it help, you won't look beautiful just by losing some pounds?”

I froze, my ears couldn't believe that Aryaman spoke so harshly with me. I was angry, on top I have to stay hungry for 4 hours straight.

I was throwing things in my basket. My empty stomach was making my brain go foggy. He knew that I was on a strict diet not to become beautiful but to cure my PCOS. He knew it, but I think the exam is stressing him out.

I reach the billing counter. The queue is big and my stomach is short on patience.

“Will someone show remorse to a girl whos been hungry for the past 6 hours"? I grunt out.

People throw glances at me, and the guy at the counter gawks. This day couldn’t get any worse.

“Well, you can take my place. I don’t have many items.”

 I nod and go ahead in the line, turn, and thank him.

Dev was a below-average student, a class clown, and a daydreamer. He was not interested in studies nor in the competitive exam that he was enrolled for. He was a wannabe influencer and photographer. I never talked with him cause the topper group never interacted with other people and most of the time I was busy pleasing someone else.

“Total amount 550 rupees,” the counter guy said.

“I dig my hand into the coat pocket but, to my dismay, I find out that I forgot my wallet, drops of sweat form over my forehead.

“You know the rules mam,” he puts down my basket, my hunger is turning into despair and my craving into tears.

“Here take it,” Dev hands the amount to the guy behind the counter and smiles at me.

We are out of the store, with my mouth stuffed with wafers. My stomach was dancing with salts, and my taste buds were intoxicated with spices.

“Thank you very much,” and a piece of wafer flies out of my mouth on his sweater.

We both giggle at the same time. His eyes have sparkle which I never noticed.

“Well I like your haircut,’’ he says.

“How did you notice? I thought it didn’t make a difference.”

“Sometimes you need to have a perspective to admire the beauty.”

I feel a sudden rush of blood blooms up my cheek.

Wait! It’s the line from my blog. I cough, I think the wafer got stuck into my esophagus.

He takes out his water bottle from his backpack and hands me over. I jug down the water in seconds sudden anxiety takes over me.

“How do you know this line?’’ my throat was getting parched.

“I'm an investigative director, give me some credit for it. I noticed the things you liked and the characters you loved from your Instagram post. Linking everything I found your secret story blog, which I regularly follow with a fake name.”

I was dazzled, I was perplexed.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” I ask.

“Because your thoughts were preoccupied with the things that did not require your attention,” a line from one of my stories. I could sense that he was hinting towards Aryaman.

“Thank you for reading my stories. I would love your feedback on it.” I felt a slight tinge in my heart.

“Of course, can I tell you something?” I see slight fear in his eyes.

“Yes, you can.”

“He doesn’t value you nor your friendship respects your feelings. I would punch his face if I was you, for his reaction in this morning.”I see his wrist ball up with his knuckles pointing out.

“It's okay, I think I found my perspective.” I give him an assuring smile. He smiles at me, and I regret not noticing him sooner.

I make a decision, that to be friends with Dev, I sit with him in class, we solve physics problems with each other, we are making notes together, we are studying together late at night on skype. So you must be wondering about Aryaman. Nowadays, he seems to a lot pissed of because with the constant touch-up of happiness from Devs friendship I have become stress-free. With my stress gone, now I'm scoring better, I'm ranking number one in the class test with Dev in the top five. He was no longer a below-average student, nor he was the lazy mellow that he used to be. Aryaman had his temper flying now, I used to see him glaring and gawking at us. A strange rage had occupied his mind, sometimes he would send me mean texts, sometimes he would cross his limits. I distanced myself from him and began to focus on my studies more.

The exams were coming near and the pressure was building up, Dev was always there for me during my panic attacks or when I was feeling low. With him, I realized the true meaning of friendship and maybe I even understood the meaning of love. I couldn’t think I would live without him for a second and thinking about this made me more stressed.

“Hey, did you solve the organic chemistry problems?’ I ask Dev. We were supposed to solve worksheets, and I think he wasn’t serious about it.

“No, I thought to take a break today.”

“Did you even discuss it with me?” I ask him by shooting invisible arrows from my eyes.

“Y…oo..u are so serious about studies, so I thought maybe I should keep you away from my plans.”

“Now I'm not included in your plans too.”

“It's just for a day sugar, I thought you would be pissed about my idea. You are so serious about your studies."

When he called me “SUGAR” my cheeks caramelized and my lips trembled. I couldn't stop the tears that were forming in my eyes. Words were stuck on my tongue and were afraid to come out. I breathed deeply and relaxed my shoulders, I asked.

“What if we get different colleges after the exam?”

He stares at me for a few seconds like a Lab puppy.

“Let's go,” he packs my bag and takes my hand and locked his fingers with mine, and whispered in my ear.

“It’s a surprise.”

He brought me to St Mary's church. The church was famous for its Christmas celebrations and carols. The whole church was decorated with Christmas trees and lights. It was beautiful, we went inside, there was a group of girls who were practicing carol with a nun.

We sat in the third row paying attention to them for a few seconds, and strange silence knocks the space between us. He took my palm and kissed my knuckles.

“Do you know why I brought you here?” he asked.

I had no sense to answer him with words, so I shook my head.

“Because you can't lie in the church nor hide your feelings. And you wouldn’t dare to slap me here.”

“Why I would do that?”

His lips quivered, and the finger which was wrapped around mine went numb. He laughed a little and then turned his face towards me.

“I think I'm in love with you.” and this time my fingers became numb.

“ I love you. I love you from the first day of class, I loved the haircut you did, I love your pink ruffle top, I love your blogs, your posts, your drawing. I love it when you bite your lip when you realize that you made a mistake in your problem. I love the way you eat, with your eyes dancing in ecstasy, I love when you make those slurping sounds while drinking strawberry shakes. I love the warmth of your hands and the waves of your hair. I just cannot imagine a day living without you, every time you are near I want to catch your hand and don’t want you to go. I want you to be my girlfriend.”

His face is blank, his eyes stream with tears and his hands tremble. I cup his face in my hands and stare into his honey brown eyes, and say.

“I love you more.”

His eyes shine and shout, “What?”

“Yes I love you Dev, not from the first day, but I realized that I was so wrong to not notice you. I can't bear someone else being your girlfriend.”

“So, is that a yes?” his voice echoes in the church and the choir stops its practice, I nod.

He squeals in happiness, and the nun gives him a death glare. We run from there and come to the back yard of the church. We are laughing like maniacs.

He grabs my wrist and pulls me towards him.

“Am I a distraction to you, to your goals?”

I reply, “no, actually.” I fix his mopped hair which was falling on his brows.

“As Antonella is to Messie and Melinda to Bill Gates. You are my strength, my hope, and my love. I wouldn’t be afraid ever in my life if I knew that you were standing beside me. You are my supersonic engine, my medium to my dreams and goals.”

He laughs and stares into my eyes, he glides his thumb on my cheek and says.

“I promise to work hard and never disappoint you. I will put effort into my exams and ensure that we both get admitted to the same college. I won't ever let you down.”

I smile with a strange tinge on my cheek. He seems to copy me by blushing hard, a sudden but strange warmth rushes on our fingertips. A strange emotion has surrounded us. Something cold lands on my cheek, when I move my eye to search for its source, I see small flakes of snow falling. We both giggle and catch the cold snowflakes with our warm palms.

He pushes away my wavy brown hair from my ears and whispers with a warm breath.

“Did you see what's above our heads?”

I lift my chin to observe what he mentioned. Mistletoe, my cheeks turn into every shade of red that I ever knew.

“Do you like traditions?” he asks in a soft voice.

“No, but I am willing to learn from you,” my answer makes him smile, and his eyes sparkle.

We lean in and kiss with tenderness and soft cusps. Amid snow, jingles, and carols, we embark on a new journey.