I am not a romantic. I used to think I was a psychopath once. As my seventeen-year old self came to know about the existence of sociopaths, I figured that is the community where I would belong. Emotions and love were never meant for me, or at least I thought so. But I think every human mind is a romantic kept in the dark shackles of the hidden deep. (Not psychopaths, perhaps. I'm not sure.) If you rip out your chest and you see a heart pumping uncountably fast because well, you're losing blood, maybe your psychological self can reveal to you that the need to be loved is somewhere lying there suppressed surrounded by the eeriness of a scary black hole of fear, ego, embarrassment, disappointment and a dose of that early heartbreak you had which you are probably trying to go all Clementine upon. The understatement? Humans want to be loved. Cared for. Looked out for. Prioritized. (Again, not very sure about psychopaths) It took my psychological self several unrecognizable heartbreaks and twenty five years of taking in oxygen and throwing out that same formula of carbon dioxide to realise that I deserve to be loved too.
The ultimate beach fantasy for any couple in love would be to have sex. I know that in movies, they show the guy and the girl on beaches with the bluest waters, dancing in sync (without any kind of practice) to tunes that seem to come out of nowhere, their voices suddenly turning all Arijit Singh and some uncared for female singer's. Come on you know very well that they're going to have sex later.
Jessie and I took a dream holiday to Goa as part of our romantic adventures, and yes, I had every plan to have sex with her. And we did. But like every other human, I also wanted to love her. And like every other narcissist, I wanted her to love me. Give my painfully chiselled body and helplessly tamed mind the attention they deserve.
My earliest fantasies about a relationship all somehow culminated into a situation where I would proclaim my love for her against the backdrop of the receding line of endless horizon and the sun all set to dip into the thirsty sea, ready to spit out vapours. Never did I ever imagine in my life that my heart would get broken on the same beach, as easy, as gradual as the setting sun.
Jessie walked up to me. She wasn't in her usual t-shirt and shorts attire. White dress, an orchid behind her ear. Her boyish hair fluffed up by the breeze, almost as if it was parting her hair impatiently to kiss her head. I wanted to kiss her head. But I had something else to do before that. The real reason why I brought her to her favourite beach despite me being a mountain person. I wanted this to be special for her. We've been together for 6 months now. And she has been patient throughout about my failure at expressing emotions through words, and maybe at times actions. I was going to make up for that today. I know she loves me. I know she does. There are no butterflies or moths involved here. I just know it. And today is the day I would let her know that I feel the same. My knees were trembling. But still, no butterflies. Just nervousness. Was I anticipating a rejection even though my heart was sure of her commitment?
I didn't waste much time. I told her what I had in my mind. The same statement that I kept thinking over and over again every day like Sisyphus dragging the rock up the mountain. I said it all in one breath. As I inhaled to calm my tightened lungs, I looked at her face. I wasn't so sure if I should continue, because I had imagined her face to have the biggest smile when I played this scenario a hundred times in my head. And that was missing. I wasn't so sure if I should continue.
They say when love happens, you can hear violins in the background. When heartbreak happens, you hear a sad piano whirling all around you. And your mind wants you to distract yourself from the impending disaster and focus on the music. The tune. It makes you remember things. To cushion the blow. The black hole, the heartbreaks, the general perplexity of life-- all form a protective wall to catch hold of your falling heart, perhaps even the tears.
I smiled. I tried everything I could to not cry in front of her. As she kept listing out reasons why we would not work out, I was laughing at my heart to have been so dumb not to sense the signals. There were many. I couldn't coherently think about them then. But I know there were many. My brain started to make sense of every time she said she was busy, when she refused to kiss me in front of people that day and I thought that was because she was shy-- my mind properly fed with regular doses of the bollywood-romance took all the right signals in every wrong way possible. It was my fault.
One of my beach fantasies had come true. Sure, we did make love. I'm not so sure about that, but have sex we definitely did. As I held her hand for possibly the last time, the theme song of Shinchan was playing in my head. That was what we were watching before she'd left to change. It was funny. The entire scenario was funny. I could already imagine going to the travel bureau and booking a separate flight ticket for myself, controlling my tears through the flight, calling up my best friend, crying about this (perhaps even feeling stupid) over 3 bottles of Old Monk and then throwing my guts up in his toilet. That's what I have always done. Kunal has handled me, my romantic self, my stupid self and my drunk self.
As I played all this in my head, Jessie came forward to hug me. I held her hair, short as always. I had once asked her to grow it out. She'd said that she liked it this way. The breeze stopped as I hugged her tight and parted her hair. She gave me a peck on the cheek-- the "I'm never gonna see you again lol" kind of peck. I closed my eyes, held her scent for five seconds and let go. She walked away, the waves calmly ruffling her feet and then returning, only to lustily tickle her feet again. A part of my brain was wondering what was with the wind and the sea that day. My gaze was focussed upon her footsteps-- her feet sinking into the brown sand, forming a hole in the shape of her flat feet she always used to hate. As she kept on walking, and not turning back like I had expected her to, her footsteps faded, one by one, until they completely merged with the sand and vanished. Her retreating figure turned into a thin line as my stagnant feet sank into the sand, deep, almost as if it was sinking in a whirlpool of confusion, unable to believe that the last five minutes actually happened. My feet kept sinking into sand, until my ankles were completely buried into the ground. Buried, that's funny.
The waves kept hitting the shore, teasing it playfully as the beach guards called out to me, reminding me that the tides were dangerous at this hour. For ten seconds, I imagined myself sinking into the sea, dying, my picture appearing on the newspaper and Jessie crying over my untimely death. I laughed, walked to the pub, ordered shots and went to my room with another girl who had also had her heart broken that day. Beach fantasies do indeed come true, in one way or the other.
The ultimate beach fantasy for any couple in love would be to have sex. I know that in movies, they show the guy and the girl on beaches with the bluest waters, dancing in sync (without any kind of practice) to tunes that seem to come out of nowhere, their voices suddenly turning all Arijit Singh and some uncared for female singer's. Come on you know very well that they're going to have sex later.
Jessie and I took a dream holiday to Goa as part of our romantic adventures, and yes, I had every plan to have sex with her. And we did. But like every other human, I also wanted to love her. And like every other narcissist, I wanted her to love me. Give my painfully chiselled body and helplessly tamed mind the attention they deserve.
My earliest fantasies about a relationship all somehow culminated into a situation where I would proclaim my love for her against the backdrop of the receding line of endless horizon and the sun all set to dip into the thirsty sea, ready to spit out vapours. Never did I ever imagine in my life that my heart would get broken on the same beach, as easy, as gradual as the setting sun.
Jessie walked up to me. She wasn't in her usual t-shirt and shorts attire. White dress, an orchid behind her ear. Her boyish hair fluffed up by the breeze, almost as if it was parting her hair impatiently to kiss her head. I wanted to kiss her head. But I had something else to do before that. The real reason why I brought her to her favourite beach despite me being a mountain person. I wanted this to be special for her. We've been together for 6 months now. And she has been patient throughout about my failure at expressing emotions through words, and maybe at times actions. I was going to make up for that today. I know she loves me. I know she does. There are no butterflies or moths involved here. I just know it. And today is the day I would let her know that I feel the same. My knees were trembling. But still, no butterflies. Just nervousness. Was I anticipating a rejection even though my heart was sure of her commitment?
I didn't waste much time. I told her what I had in my mind. The same statement that I kept thinking over and over again every day like Sisyphus dragging the rock up the mountain. I said it all in one breath. As I inhaled to calm my tightened lungs, I looked at her face. I wasn't so sure if I should continue, because I had imagined her face to have the biggest smile when I played this scenario a hundred times in my head. And that was missing. I wasn't so sure if I should continue.
They say when love happens, you can hear violins in the background. When heartbreak happens, you hear a sad piano whirling all around you. And your mind wants you to distract yourself from the impending disaster and focus on the music. The tune. It makes you remember things. To cushion the blow. The black hole, the heartbreaks, the general perplexity of life-- all form a protective wall to catch hold of your falling heart, perhaps even the tears.
I smiled. I tried everything I could to not cry in front of her. As she kept listing out reasons why we would not work out, I was laughing at my heart to have been so dumb not to sense the signals. There were many. I couldn't coherently think about them then. But I know there were many. My brain started to make sense of every time she said she was busy, when she refused to kiss me in front of people that day and I thought that was because she was shy-- my mind properly fed with regular doses of the bollywood-romance took all the right signals in every wrong way possible. It was my fault.
One of my beach fantasies had come true. Sure, we did make love. I'm not so sure about that, but have sex we definitely did. As I held her hand for possibly the last time, the theme song of Shinchan was playing in my head. That was what we were watching before she'd left to change. It was funny. The entire scenario was funny. I could already imagine going to the travel bureau and booking a separate flight ticket for myself, controlling my tears through the flight, calling up my best friend, crying about this (perhaps even feeling stupid) over 3 bottles of Old Monk and then throwing my guts up in his toilet. That's what I have always done. Kunal has handled me, my romantic self, my stupid self and my drunk self.
As I played all this in my head, Jessie came forward to hug me. I held her hair, short as always. I had once asked her to grow it out. She'd said that she liked it this way. The breeze stopped as I hugged her tight and parted her hair. She gave me a peck on the cheek-- the "I'm never gonna see you again lol" kind of peck. I closed my eyes, held her scent for five seconds and let go. She walked away, the waves calmly ruffling her feet and then returning, only to lustily tickle her feet again. A part of my brain was wondering what was with the wind and the sea that day. My gaze was focussed upon her footsteps-- her feet sinking into the brown sand, forming a hole in the shape of her flat feet she always used to hate. As she kept on walking, and not turning back like I had expected her to, her footsteps faded, one by one, until they completely merged with the sand and vanished. Her retreating figure turned into a thin line as my stagnant feet sank into the sand, deep, almost as if it was sinking in a whirlpool of confusion, unable to believe that the last five minutes actually happened. My feet kept sinking into sand, until my ankles were completely buried into the ground. Buried, that's funny.
The waves kept hitting the shore, teasing it playfully as the beach guards called out to me, reminding me that the tides were dangerous at this hour. For ten seconds, I imagined myself sinking into the sea, dying, my picture appearing on the newspaper and Jessie crying over my untimely death. I laughed, walked to the pub, ordered shots and went to my room with another girl who had also had her heart broken that day. Beach fantasies do indeed come true, in one way or the other.
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