First of all, I didn’t know there was going to be a part 2. Frankly, I didn’t believe that the friendship would last at all. Cause for one I didn’t know the reason it ended. For two, that’s how I have been all my life.
Chuck!
So right after me getting back in the group came Fatema’s birthday. I was damn excited cause like I had already attended it 1000s of times in my head when I’d imagine what it would be like to celebrate her birthday and that being said I had already bought her the birthday gift.
It was a set of 4 mini glass bottles that had a mini rolled up message card in it. It looked cuter than I can describe. I wrote quotes on each one of them that were our conversations and I left one of them blank to signify the days and chats to come in future. I am philosophical and boring like that.
I even wrote her a very formal invitation cause I know she liked that kinda stuff. The birthday went well except the fact that my friend circle made it darn uncomfortable for Fatema and her school friends. Fiza and Mayuri were with us that day. They are Fatema’s best friends from school. But thanks to Harshada, they felt like outsiders. How much ever I tried to ease them in, Sadiya’s and Harshada’s silence made things awkward.
Me and Harshada went to drop the trio at the station. so Fatema being a nice person that she is, thanked me and Harshada for a decent birthday party. I got down with Harshada while they took off. I had fun and I was happy. It was all my efforts with Sadiya and Harshada constantly complaining about the things neither of them did. But because they weren’t such a pain in the ass during the party Harshada decided to ruin the after party.
“I don’t wanna spoil your mood..”
‘Don’t. I am happy.”
“Sun na. Fiza said to Fatema that “Stay away from Aditi.”‘
“That was a joke.”
“She was serious dude.”
And thank you very much that was all I thought about until I picked up the phone and rang Fatema up. I told her what it was.. and she cut me off in between and she was dead pissed. Believe me, if she could she would have got into her phone and came out of mine to shout about how much of a pathetic mess can Harshada create with her IMMATURITY and bitching habit. (You’ll get to know the importance of the CAPSLOCK later.)
Well water under the bridge.
It was Alegria Time. It is the college fest. And all of us being 1st years were damn excited. Now you gotta know some basic dynamics of our group.
I, Aditi, lives 45kms away from the college. Am allowed to go out with friends preferably by my Papa and can stay the night if I wish.
Fatema, lives 15mins away from the college, can go out with friends, can’t stay the night preferably by her father. (whose damn handsome btw.)
Harshada(not that we care), lives like 5 mins from college but she takes 25 mins to go home, rest same as me.
Sadiya, lives 10mins from college, can go out with female friends only in daytime. Is allowed nothing, not even a cellphone by her whole family.
Deep, lives about 45mins away from the college, is allowed everything when she lies conveniently rest just as me.
You gotta know this because that’s how we planned for Alegria.
I had to go to Sadiya’s place to change as Fatema and Harshada has some issues and Deep wasn’t attending Alegria cause she had her reasons.
Now Fatema asked me to install Snapchat so that it would be more fun. I did. But Harshada kept spamming my feed. I honestly was new to the app and by mistake rather than muting hr I accidentally blocked her. She again created a mess and I just really blocked her this time from all of social media. She being her like a baby ran to Fatema who was just being nice and I got ignored as Fatema didn’t want Harshada to feel left out.
This was important to share cause, one it sows that I really don’t give a fuck when someone gets on my nerve.Second, Fatema cares about everyone in the group and takes decision she knows might upset someone or the else in the group. Third, I learned that I can bear with stupidity for the greater good.
For everyone else, we buried the hatchet. But for me, I knew Harshada was just a classmate to me and I limited my involvement in the matters that concerned her.
Apart from that we were a fun group now. Me being back didn’t seem that awkward after all. We were the students who balanced attendance and fun almost perfectly. The teachers loved us. We loved each other but we still had to learn to respect each others choices.
Believe me, we aren’t even halfway there yet. But enough for the boring parts. Let’ get to the fun.
I was afraid of Maths my entire life. But fascinatingly enough I always got along with the teachers. So all of my friends and Harshada, developed a theory that me and my math professor (female) had an affair.
I could’ve gotten offended but no. I joined the joke. And I loved it. Our girl gang seriously needed a naughty angle. And thus I included Fatema in it.
Like we shared a meme on our WhatsApp group “Pin Drop Nonsense”, which had a baby girl clicking the photo of her mum. I said that’s definitely Fatema. And from there we took it till a point we had to stop. We are really good at fantasizing. God help our husbands. And please make us meet them faster.
So yeah we were getting along with the daily dose of tiffs, jokes and love. But the point where I felt that maybe it time to put the past behind myself and just be good friends with Fatema was when she told us that her parents are going to Karbala for a week and she has to stay alone with her younger brother and grandma.
I out of genuine concern called her the day her parents left and we stayed up talking for the better part of an hour. We didn’t like talk college or bitch but just talking casually which was rare when it came to us. She talked about the significance of going to Karbala in Islam and I being the curious listener just kept asking doubts and replenishing my understanding of her religion. Now that’s not something I’d do for anyone. But you should really listen to Fatema speak about about something or someone she truly loves. The way she speaks of Islam makes you embrace it with all the peace and tranquility.
That’s when I realized that there is so much more to this person than I ever thought. She was not just some arrogant bossy lady I liked. But it was this amazingly smart, pure and beautiful soul I fell in love with.
The past may not be there but it is the reason for your present to exist. And that’s why I kept the love or any other soft corner to myself. It was going well and I didn’t want to jinx it.
For a long period of time none of us had been out. We decided to bunk a few lectures and go out for lunch. Me and Fatema took charge of deciding the location, the budget and everything else cause we were good planners. I had my aunt at my place and I could not attend college for a bit. Me and Fatema had already decided and fixed some of the restaurants and gave others choices they could pick from. Deep and Harshada were okay with everything but Sadiya had this typical habit of not going to the places which were owned by her distant relatives. Believe me, it left us with only one restaurant.
The plan was on and we were all really excited. I was in the middle of my dinner with my family plus the guests when I got a call from Fatema. It was odd timing but I have never rejected her calls.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Listen.”
“Yeah. 2 Seconds.”
“I really want to know what do you do in these 2 seconds. Please. Just tell me and end my curiosity.”
“Gulp down a piece of paneer.”
“Oh wow. Aye shut up bro. Listen do not tease or mention Harshada’s weight or anything and please don’t use the word “Elephant” in any context at least for 2 days from now.”
“Okay. But what the hell happened?”
“Aye, Sadiya sent her that video of the baby elephant bathing. And she also teased her a lot on chat. Harshada got offended. I’ll forward you the screenshots.”
“Okay done. See you day after then.”
“Yeah. Bubye.”
“Bye.”
Now, once again, dynamics.
Out of the five of us Harshada and Sadiya weighed the most. But as Sadiya wore the traditional hijab Harshada looked a bit plumper than her as she wore westerns.
I, at that time, weighed below these two and above the rest. I had the shortest height in the group so even I looked plump.
Fatema and Deep weighed almost the same but Fatema looked healthier than Deep and was also a bit taller.
This wasn’t mentioned as we body shamed each other but in an Indian academic institution if you don’t tease each other and call each other by names I don’t think you count as friends.
What Sadiya did was completely normal in our group but Harshada took it in a very out of the box way and got offended.
Sadiya did apologize to her a lot. More than me and Fatema thought was important as it was routine for each of us to tease the other person. So due to this mindset me and Fatema decided that we ought to teach Harshada a lesson in teasing and friendship in our group.
We opened the chat window of Pin Drop Nonsense where Harshada had asked us how many lectures were there today because she was absent. And there goes the chat.
When Harshada asked us to show maturity Fatema got pissed. And she had her reason. Harshada was the one who was acting like a baby and this wasn’t enough.
The next day when she attended college she didn’t sit with any of us but went and sat behind us. We were aware of the fact that she was offended but we had paramount egos and this time even I thought it was jsutified. During the break we went to the Canteen which by the way served the most inedible food ever but wasn’t that bad. Harshada cornered Sadiya and complained that me and Fatem shouldn’t have called her off like that on group chat and we owed her an apology. Standing applause everyone please.
We were chill. We assusmed that this would end in a bit. She would be back and thus we slept like babies that night.
8.30am 13th March 2019
My phone rang ambushed by the caller. I was a bit lazy but when I saw the caller ID I jumped immediately and picked it up.
“Enough is enough. That bitch. What does she think of herself? Some iron lady or something. Bloody asshole.”
“Good morning to you to.”
“Shut your good morning wishing ass up and listen. That bitch blocked me on WhatsApp and Instagram.”
“What? Really?”
“No. I am kidding.”
“Okay wait.”
I browsed through my phone and opened the respective apps. Yeah, it was official. She had blocked me too.
“She has blocked me too. She even left the group.”
“What the hell does she think of herself. Who the hell is she to block me. She’s got it from me now.”
“Calm down Fatema. You are the one who said she immature. She’s just proving it back. Relax.”
“Screw calm this is the limit. Bloody six standard wali harkatein.”
“Screw her. Come on now. Let’s meet in college.”
“Okay. Bye.”
“Yeah.”
This was the same person who blocked for a reason I don’t even know. And I forgave her cause she mattered to me more than some blocked app. But Harshada took a fight she didn’t know will end up in a way none of us imagined.
Fatema comfortably just shunned her out.
Cold treatment. No talk. No attention.
I was used to the routine as I had experienced it. But Harshada still complained about it to Sadiya and after a while even Sadiya shunned her out. And just like that we had turned to a group of 4.
We did go to the hotel we found after such a menace. But none of us were really happy about it. I was kinda off both physically and emotionally.
We were a fun group and it was supposed to be like that for the next 2 years to come. We had our differences but we were adjusting and tuning in just fine. I didn’t like the idea of the group getting small. Only if I knew at that time, it would just keep getting worse.
But the doom does wait.
Fortunately, unfortunately me and Fatema became great friends after Harshda left. Me and her used to talk all the time. Cause Sadiya wasn’t allowed to have a phone and Deep really keeps to herself when we leave to home from college.
And by all the time I also mean about all the little and small things. We had gelled up really well. And time flew at it’s own sweet pace. Soon enough we were faced with another obstacle.
Semester 2 External Examinations.
All of us didn’t even turn the pages of our textbook the whole semesters but during exams all of us are on high alert. We don’t do anything except study like reckless nerds.
Fatema and I, discussed over 2 hours what to study and what not to study. We used to decide and skip the parts we didn’t want to study. And it went really well. Also it would be a bit of buffer time and take the stress of.
One night, before the Law paper, I got really tensed as the portion was more than what I could bear with in an all night’er so I gave up on studying it altogether. I went walking and posted a snap. I got a prompt reply.
It was quite comforting to have a friend who can tell when I am lying. And this one above was on the moments where I felt that maybe after all the mess that both of us created for ourselves Fatema and I did become good friends after all.
Exams ended and all of us were really happy the way they went. And with that ended our first year. After all the fights and laughter, there we were four friends who didn’t want to let go each other for 2 months of being apart.
Under The Tree fiction 