Rono spoke...

when i used to read the words 'with a heavy heart' i never really got it. but on ocassion, i have had to do things which made me sad, and a strange, continual heaviness in the pith of my stomach accompanied such doings. i guess that comes close enough. this post was one of those times...

it's that time again. it keeps coming every now and then, and it hurts like hell. one of those times when you have to bid farewell to a close friend. but what if you had never really given a thought to ever saying goodbye. you knew it would happen sooner or later, you just never thought about it. and all of a sudden you realise that the light will turn green, the whistle will blow and the train will take rono away for good. another one.. gone.

first it was the babu. i'll never forget that evening when he chose to lose control. babu was more than my senior. he was one of the people i could always count on to be there whenever i wanted him. there was a whole stretch when i was hanging only with babu in college. him n me, all the time, everyday. over endless cups of chai and smokes, breaking our heads creating connection quizzes, or lyrics to our rap songs (hehehehe), or bitching about the world, or me taking his case. whatever it was, it made life worth living. i couldn't imagine college life without him, and if it weren't for the guys, i'd probably have just crouched into a shell after the babu left. but whether anybody liked it or not, he left. and as the train pulled away, a part of me left with it.

then came (or went) the freak. the reason for such a big change in the lives of most of us. truly, if i hadn't met the freak, none of us would probably have really met at all. it all started with the freak n i. his drunken goodbye in his farewell party remains vivid in my memory. "Da, don't let Ehsaas die..." (followed by an unnecessarily wet one on one cheek, followed by an even more unnecessarily hard slap on the other. clarification: i'm referring to the cheeks on my face.). for once, someone saw me off, so to speak. the freak and jeetu came to see us off at the station as we were leaving for kashmir. i faked a loud teary goodbye on the platform.. hehe, it was funny, i was loudly howling on the freak's chest, and from the corner of my eye i could tell that everyone was staring at us!! one of our friends even came to us, crying herself, and tried to console me!!!! hehehehe... but the tears did come.. the next morning on the train, early on when everyone was sleeping, and no one was around. Oh, the tears did come...

and then jeetu. it's strange, i can't really remember when he left. it's like he went home after his exams, and just didn't come back. our universal 'phone laga' guy would now have to be called and spoked to when he had the time. one of his many lovely statements: "saalon, tum log har wakt kehte the 'jeetu, phone laga'. ab bhenchod main phone ka dukaan hi khol baitha!!!" after babu, jeetu's the one rarely seen nowadays.

and now, it's rono's turn to wave goodbye. goddammit!!! if babu finds it so difficult to come here from delhi, how much fuckin harder will it be to see rono again. he's off to bongland!!! and though he says he's thinking of trying out working in bombay in a couple of years, i doubt he'll be able to just pack up and leave home like that on impulse. the 7 have dwindled to 4, and the 4th one if gone in 3 days!!!!! sam, mayukhda n i remain...

the pain is slowly sinking in. as i come to realise that those people who have been my life in the past 5 years are slowly but surely fading away, i feel a lonliness that i had forgotten years back. i know they're there, they'll always be there. but we all know it's not the same. the question is, will it ever be the same again? will we ever be who we are now? will rono be the same insane fuck when i next see him? will i be whatever i am to him when he next sees me?

I guess another one of jeetu's gems would have to suffice here. he sms-ed this one to me when i was leaving pune, after i sent a senti msg to a bunch of people:

"Dude, are you gonna die? bitch, i agree life's changed a lil. but has it affected you so badly? chill man. we're where we were, just that we aren't together. all da best"