The Other Way Round

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This is an imaginary story about a girl who was in love with a man. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. 

Rupsa first saw Rahul on Facebook. While surfing randomly he came across his Profile. It was love at first sight for her. She liked all his pics and loved the way Rahul had posed in those photos. She found him to be very handsome. She just fell for the look in his eyes. There was a sort of princely arrogance in his pics and she got attracted to him. She went through each and every album in Rahul's Facebook profile. She also saved most of his pics in a folder in her laptop. She made his profile picture as her laptop wallpaper. She liked most of his pics, but also checked who else was liking his pics and commenting on them. The other women who also had liked his pics, she thought of them as competitors. She immediately started hating those women very much. She just fell truly, madly, deeply, hopelessly and helplessly in love with him. 

There was an age difference of fifteen years between them. But love knows no rhyme or reason. It just blossoms unknowingly. For a few days and nights Rupsa was a regular visitor at Rahul's Facebook page. She loved all his posts. Then one day she sent Rahul a friend request. He accepted it immediately. He was happy to receive a friend request from such a pretty young girl. He went through her pics and read her details. He messaged her and she replied. Here's how their conversation went :

Hi, thanks for sending me a friend request.

Hmmmm... You are welcome. 

So you are in St. Xavier's?

Yaa...

Thats my old College. I still miss it a lot. What are you studying there?

First year, English honours.

Wow, thats great. Is Professor Mukherjee still teaching there?

Yes.

He was my favourite English Professor. 

Yaa... He is very good.

Did you go to Xavotsav this year?

Yaa... I went. Were you there?

Yes. I was. I also went to Beyond Barriers. Loved Asha Bhosle's performance. 

Yes. She is really good. Do you still go to Xavotsav every year?

Yes.

Okay...

Anyways if you are using Whatsapp then please ping me at 98XXX-XXX68.

Sure. Wait. 

Rupsa immediately pinged Rahul on Whatsapp. From that day they started chatting daily on Whatsapp. Almost every morning Rupsa started sending him Good Morning messages. His days would end with Good Night messages from her. Rupsa would always initiate the chats. Rahul realized that she liked him very much. He has wooed so many girls in his life time and now for a change it was nice that a girl was finally trying to woo him. It was a boost to his self esteem.

Rupsa was very friendly and always had a positive approach to everything. She was always full of life. She was always full of energy. And she was always in a happy mood. There was never a dull moment in her life. Falling in love with Rahul made her even happier. Love is like a cocaine. Once you taste it, you are simply hooked onto it. No one knows for sure when and where a person will fall in love. It happens when you least expect it.  

Rahul and Rupsa started chatting on various subjects under the sun. Starting from Bengal elections to Navjot Singh Siddhu's commentary at the ongoing IPL, from Game of Thrones Season Six to Shah Rukh Khan's FAN, from the missing Kalboishakhis to Vivekananda Park's fuchkas, they chatted on all topics. Rupsa would always initiate the chats and ping him first. From day one Rahul realized that she was very much into him, therefore he never pinged her first, because he knew that she would do it. He knew that he has the upper-hand in this friendship. In any relationship, the one who cares the less, pulls all the strings. 

Rupsa was a huge fan of SRK. She was also a huge fan of the bangla band Fossils. And her most favourite TV series was How I Met Your Mother. Her most favourite character was Robin Scherbatsky. She wanted to be like her. Infact Rupsa wanted to be a news presenter after graduation. She just loved Robin. After college she would hang around with her friends at the Canteen and also at the Green Benches. She showed Rahul's pics to her friends. They all liked him. She was just too much in love with him. It could also be that she was in love with the idea of falling in love. Since childhood, movies have conditioned our brains into thinking that if you are not in love then your life is worthless. 

Rupsa was already thinking about a future with Rahul. She wanted to marry him after graduation and be the mother of his children. She wanted to grow old with him. She wanted to work after marriage. She knew that Rahul would let him work after their marriage. Whenever she thought about Rahul, she involuntarily smiled. She felt nice thinking about Rahul. His thoughts gave her a good feeling. Every night she used to write her diary. All the things that she wanted to tell Rahul during the day, but couldn't for various reasons, she used to write them down in her diary. She hoped that one day after her marriage with Rahul, she would read her diary to him. No one in the world has the right to read her diary, except Rahul. 

A few boys in Rupsa's class, plus some other boys from other departments developed soft corners for her in their hearts. But she treated them as brothers, which obviously gave them a lot of pain and agony. This pain and agony also turned some of the boys into budding poets. Rupsa also wrote a few poems about her love for Rahul. She loved writing poetry. But she never was confident enough to read her poems to Rahul. She doubted that he might not like them. She told Rahul the names of all the boys who had soft corners in their hearts for her. Rahul was not even bothered. The fact that Rahul was not even bothered about her admirers made her a bit angry. She wanted Rahul to be possessive about her. She wanted him to love her back passionately.   

Rahul loved pulling Rupsa's legs. In between their chats he would suddenly start talking about other girls and then Rupsa would take some extra time to reply back. He used to speak about his women colleagues in his office. It was evident that Rupsa didn't like talking about other girls. Rahul also felt a hint of jealousy in her replies. It amused him very much. It gave him a certain kick. She was obviously possessive about him. She didn't want to share him with any one else in this world.    

Anyways, after a few weeks of chatting on Facebook and Whatsapp, they finally decided to meet. They met one Saturday evening around 5 p.m. at Au Bon Pain at Park Street. This was Rahul's favourite hangout spot. Meeting at that place was Rahul's idea. She came wearing a tight top, tight jeans, her bag dangling from her shoulder and her hair hanging loose. She wore pink lip-stick and had kajal in her eyes. She was also wearing her big glasses. Rahul asked her to remove her glasses because he told her that her eyes were very beautiful and he wanted to stare directly into them. Rupsa blushed. She immediately removed her glasses. Rahul bought cold coffee for her, mango lassi for himself, chicken croissants, chocolate muffins and Nachos chips. They had a lovely adda. Rahul liked her a lot. But she was a bit childish and immature also. She was giggling at Rahul's silly jokes and was paying extra attention to whatever he was saying. It was quite evident in her eyes that she was savagely in love with him. Rahul enjoyed all the attention that she was giving him. 

Rupsa liked Rahul's vast knowledge on films, theatre, music, politics, poetry and literature. There was so much to learn from him. While talking with him, she felt that she knew too little about various things. She wanted to read all the books that Rahul had read, wanted to hear all the songs that he had heard, wanted to watch all the movies that he had seen over the years. Rahul had a great collection of foreign films at his house. He also had a huge collection of books, especially poetry books. He promised Rupsa that he would allow her to borrow his books and dvds. 

Rahul realized that she was too young for him. Plus she was very childish and immature too. If he had wanted then he could have easily taken advantage of her. Maybe ten years back he would have taken advantage of a similar situation. But nowadays he was too wise and mature for all these temporary hanky-pankies. Moreover he didn't want to break the sweet girl's heart. Rahul realized that she was indeed a good hearted girl and he didn't want to just play with her love. 

He initially thought that it would be fun to lie to her and tell her that he was actually gay. But then decided against that idea because he thought it would be too hollywood-filmy. Rahul also realized that it was not actually love. Rupsa was just infatuated with him. She was just having a massive crush on him. Thats it. Over time this too shall pass. She will be over it one day. Rahul decided to distance himself from her slowly. He didn't want to play with her heart and her feelings. He told her directly that he only liked her as a friend and anything else blossoming between them was not possible. She immediately told him that she also liked him only as a friend and had no romantic expectations from this friendship, but deep down in her heart she was hurt badly. Rahul could feel her pain in her eyes. They left Au Bon Pain around 7 p.m. and Rahul hailed a cab and went to drop her home. They continued with their adda inside the cab also. Rahul dropped her home and took the same cab and went to his house. 

That night there was no Good Night message from her...

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