Dear Diary,
Today, I want to take the lid off of the secret which till now was buried in my heart.
This is all about my best friend; I also had one like everybody. We met each other in a school function and felt the connect. Steadily, we started to converse with each other; started to share endless weird and absurd thoughts to each other and in the long run we began to understand and handle each other. I still remember that unforgetful promise made by me. We became very good friends, like the best of pals and she requested to me one day, “Priyanshi, you need to promise me one thing; wherever the destiny takes us, whether we are together or at different places, we will stay connected forever”. Listening to this, with tears in my eyes and a promising smile on my face I replied, “Pinky promise. We will forever stay in touch and connected.
After this promise, we spent some time together and then I came back home. I was feeling unusual and so to comfort myself, I began to watch a movie. My ears felt alert to a particular dialogue, “……..promises are made to be broken”. On hearing this I was suddenly taken aback; I had just made a promise which I intended to oblige to for all my life! But then I thought movies are just surreal; so I drifted from believing that vexatious dialogue. And so I decided to move on.
We kept growing together; we started to approach our higher classes. Our friendship started getting condemnations from our teachers who restricted us from being together all the time; even our companionship was reported to our parents as complaints who began to reprimand us. Our parents refused to hear our explanations before the complaints sent by the school. It was difficult to swallow that they trusted the school more than their own children. Everyone ordered both of us to stay away from each other in order to focus on our career.
Due to all the pressure which we were not able to withstand, we decided to part ways and ended up. The separation was a bitter pill to swallow for me and I was badly shaken up.
Since then then till today morning, a cumulative span of six years, we had not had seen each other.
But, I got a golden chance to see her again today evening in the reunion part organized by my school. I had high hopes of meeting my bestie there; all my other friends were their including my crush but the only face which wasn’t visible was of my ex-best-friend.
I thought for a while, “Probably she will come in some time. Will she be happy to see me? Will she still value our friendship? Does she miss me?” I allowed myself fifteen minutes and kept my hopes of meeting her high. Luckily I had my ‘Graff Diamonds Hallucination’ watch which helped me to keep a track of time. After 10 minutes were passed, I was into an enormous worry. I started to annoy the members of organizing committee by repeatedly asking if each alumni of the school was sent the invitation; the reply was always positive.
When I again glanced at my watch, three and a half minutes were already passed. I was slowly getting depressed about her coming. And then, when only sixty seconds were left I strongly believed that she would not come. I almost turned when my eyes caught a familiar face coming in. A lady wearing business formals came across. She had long and silky hair with a hint of attractive fragrance. Her forehead was wide followed with her absolute shaped eyebrows. Eyes were deep set with intense black pupil. And a broad nose with slight freckles on them which contrasted with her lips.
That lady looked very much similar to my ex-best-friend. To clear this confusion I went up to one of my friends and asked, “Do you know who is she? Her name?” The friend reverted, “Are you out of your mind?! She is yours beloved best friend.”
I was ecstatic and moved towards her. I received a cold reaction from her and this shocked me. I felt this was her way to show her annoyance on our separation and did not mind much. On receiving a strange reaction from her on my another attempt, I realized that I was a forgotten past for her.
I was vexed by her attitude and hence decided to ignore her too. I sipped in an ice cold glass of champagne and ate my most liked type of food at the restaurant in the party. Suddenly I heard a squeaky noise of tik tok of heels coming towards me. I looked at my back and found my ex-best-friend coming towards me. She came close to me. I expected a tight hug of reunion, instead she tightly slapped me and said, “EXCUSE ME, did you ever try to approach me?! You never had the time to contact me also? Were you such busy in your huge business of culinary?” Zapt by her slap and words I replied curtly, “Seriously? Did you have the time to do all these things?! You also didn’t try, even once to meet me!
A sudden silence enveloped us which was disturbed by first our sudden sobs and then abrupt laughter. Forgetting everything, we both hugged each other…………
PRIYANSHI DHARIWAL