The Proposal That Wasn’t (Chapter II)

-          “Kire, what happened? Bol kichu,” Samrat insisted.

-          “Dhur. Ki bolbo? Char na”, I seriously wanted to avoid this conversation now.

-          “Don’t be such a pussy man! Hypothetically o bola jae na naki? Say na, ki bolti ok, given the chance..” *ah, Samrat and his irritatingly repetitive use of the creepy wink emoji*

-          Don’t get me all started with all the feels and mush, okay. Er por mood swings gulo tokei samlate hobe.

-          R ke samlei tor mood swings, huh? Your “Mr. Crush”?

-          Not funny. But.. I wish he was there to handle my mood swings too, you know.

-          Aww. Ei to. This is a start. These are the real things that you should be saying to him.

-          Ha, so that I lose my license to talk to him forever, taina?

-          Sob somoy negative tae bhabis kano bolto? Remember the last time you complimented him on his shirt? He was cool with that right?

-          Yeah, because that was just about a shirt and this is my entire heart full of creepy, Bollywood romance filled stuffs we are talking about. There’s a jumbo difference, duffer. But you know, I would kill to have a voice right now. I just don’t wanna get stuck in “The blue shirt looked so good on you.” I wanna scream out and say, “That blue shirt you wore had me drooling for weeks and I would love to drool on you like that for a lifetime” .. Wait. Eww. That’s so PG 13.

-          Ha ha ha. See you’re talking. And don’t judge yourself, pagal. Love is supposed to sound PG 13 at times. But I’m sure that’s not the only thing you would put in your “Oh-so-very-hypothetical proposal”

-          Given the chance, puro ekta book publish kore ditam or jonno.  But that too will never be enough. No matter how much I say, there’ll always be so much unsaid. Uff, bhison nyeka hoe jacchi re.

-          Tao, ki bolti for starters?

-          Umm, that I have been acting weird since I started to acknowledge my feels for him, that I’ve never felt happier to be so weird. I wanna tell him that I hate losing control, but ever since he arrived in my life, all I think is to be reckless, to be stupid and just feel good about it. I feel like finally I am having a secret that I would guard with my life. The secret is him. Keu janbe na emon ekta bhalo laga. Kauke bujte dewa jabena erom ekta bhalobasha.

-          Bhalobasha? So you moved on from calling him “just a stupid crush”?

-          Yeah, I think for a while now. The word “crush” suffocated me, Janis toh. It made me remember all the past romantic encounters that never ended well and then I had to move on. I always hate the fact how intensely I fall for someone, and then when things don’t work out I never feel the same for them. I don’t want that to happen this time. I don’t want to fall out of love with him because it scares me to know that I can. I don’t want love to scare me anymore.

-          So, if he doesn’t reciprocate your feels, will you move on?

-          No. I think it’s my silence that will make me move on. I am tired of maintaining this face for so long. Because, baire thek I’m like the most calm, sorted, person you’ll ever know, but inside, guh, inside, I’m just a mess of so much noise and fury and love. I want to be over with this silence. I wanna get over with this fumbling, stuttering, acting stupid and just shout out loud to him and eventually the world.

-          And what will you shout out exactly????

-          That I feel so infected ever since I’ve fallen for him. It’s like he’s a disease without an antidote. That I love him more than I’ve ever loved anybody in my history of wacky crushes. That he’s the one with whom I want this to work out the most. That he’s the one I would risk changing my relationship status for, no matter how much that creeps me out. The one I would go on a world tour with. The one with him whom I wanna gorge on nasty street food, the one I wanna talk nonsense till 3:30 am and fall asleep without a warning. He’s the one I would drag with me on an aimless shopping spree or may be catch a Chinese film that we both can’t understand. He’s the one I would walk the extra mile for, save the extra slice of pizza for, leave the window seat for and go to awkward social gatherings for. He’s the one I would introduce to my dysfunctional family and feed every experimental dish that I would prepare. He’s the one with whom I don’t have to fake being miserable or pretend like I’ve got all the answers.  I want him together in this mess with me, because, because he’s my one for everything. And duh.. I should just stop typing.

-          Damn you woman, and you say you have nothing to say!! You’re telling this exact fucking beautiful shit to him. I’ll make sure you do.

-          No, frigging way. Don’t you dare do anything stupid. Bujli?

*******************