To love somebody

Submitted into Contest #4 in response to: Write a story based on the song title: "To Love Somebody" ... view prompt

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General

Xavier is a travel photographer. He visits his high school and is overcome by memories. So, a reunion is arranged through their school WhatsApp group. At the reunion, his friends catch up with him. They hesitantly mentions that Katherine (Xavier's childhood sweetheart) is coming from Singapore. Xavier gets uncomfortable and walks away to be alone. The story shifts to Xavier's 10th grade where he and Katherine belong to the same class. Since the earliest days of childhood, Xavier and Katherine have been friends. Katherine is a talented singer. Xavier develops a love for Katherine and she reciprocates. Once their board exams are over, they have a moment with each other where Katherine asks him not to forget her until they meet again after the holidays.

Back to the present, Katherine arrives at the reunion and searches for Xavier. When a guy points xavier's location to her, Katherine walks towards him. She reminisces the first day of 11th grade when she eagerly awaits Xavier's arrival to the classroom, but he doesn't show up. She finds that Xavier has left the school because his father had financial difficulties and his family relocated to Chennai overnight. Katherine is inconsolable and pines for Xavier until she completes school.


At present, Xavier and Katherine finally meet and find it uncomfortable to interact with each other, but gradually get along. Their friends talk about Katherine's married life in Singapore and disclose that Xavier is still single and has not moved on. After the reunion party, both go 

out on a drive. Katherine reveals how she could not forget Xavier and would have traded anything just to have met him once back then. She narrates how circumstances forced her to get married to someone else. Then, Xavier asks Katherine if she really does not remember the day he came to her college to meet her. Xavier says that he waited in front of Katherine's college to meet her and passed on a message through a student. Surprisingly, Katherine refused to meet Xavier and forbade him to contact her again. He returned sadly and never tried to meet her since then. Katherine is devastated listening to this and reveals that she never saw them at her college and thought it was her stalker who was troubling her. Xavier tells that except for the mistake of assuming that she hated him, he knew everything about her life. He also tells about seeing her from afar at her wedding. Katherine is heartbroken because she felt his presence and expected him to come for her until the last minute. Both feel sad about their misfortune and finally come to terms with everything that happened in their lives. Katherine expresses her desire to spend the final few hours with Xavier before she catches the flight back home.


They go out into the city and then to a restaurant and catch up on more memories. There, they meet Xavier's photography students who assume Katherine is his wife and request her to share their story. Katherine obliges and narrates an improvised version of the time when Xavier tried to meet Katherine at her college. She tells about how they finally met and made up and have been together ever since and got married. Xavier feels awkward but tries his best to play along. The students leave and Xavier and Katherine get wet in the rain. So he asks her to visit his apartment to freshen up.


At his apartment, Katherine is visibly upset that Xavier does not have a love life and requests him to move on and get married and have a family. She finally sings Xavier's favorite song for him, a song that she had purposefully avoided singing in school in spite of his repeated requests. Xavier shows Katherine a collection of their old memories like love poems, dried flowers and their school uniforms. They realize that time is running out and go back to Katherine's hotel to get ready for her flight in a few hours. Katherine is sad knowing that she will leave Chennai and Xavier very soon. At the airport, Xavier escorts her till the boarding gate and they bid a teary farewell. Katherine then gets into the flight and leaves.

Back at his home, Xavier finds Katherine's clothes that he had put to dry the previous night. He folds them neatly, puts them along with his treasured collection of school memories and shuts the suitcase.

             Living together isn't the main motto of love and to love somebody.Before falling in love with somebody learn how to sacrifice things for them.




August 28, 2019 15:53

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