Neha
Legacy Name: Neha

The lonely train ride home.
Listening to sad songs but fighting back the tears.
Having to text instead of just turning around to talk.
Holding my own hand because it calms me.
Turning the ring around and around trying to remember.
Feeling the ebb of memories seeping away through the cracks.
Knowing that time will bring numbness and forgetting this.

I am going to tell you a story now. It's not a long story, and it's not finished yet. It's not filled with extraordinary people doing extraordinary things or heroes and heroines.
But I'm going to tell it anyway because I need somebody to know.

There once was a girl. She wasn't particularly pretty, smart or even nice. She wasn't special or anything like that. She had a lot of darkness inside of her though, for all sorts of reasons. 
Plenty of things were wrong with her. She underwent depression, had problems coping with reality and other nice things like that. She didn't really know what life was about - she thought she did but she didn't really. She also may or may not have been in love. In hindsight, it was hard to tell. What is love, after all? He may just been another way out for her to escape her mind.
But then the unthinkable happened, and she was left alone again. She mourned, she cried, and she dragged her feet on through life, swearing to never love another for as long as she lived.

There was a boy. 
Maybe to the world, he wasn't particularly special either. But the world is ignorant and shallow, obsessed only with the aspects of life and people that are the most unimportant.

A million other things could have happened and they might never have met, but they did. The headmistress of her new school unexpectedly allowed all the students to divide themselves into their own classes. At the very last minute, her new friend in that unfamiliar school tugged her along to join the throng of a different class - his class. If things had happened any other way, their paths would never have crossed. She would have lived her life and he would have lived his. Two parallel lines.
Separate.
Alone.

The first time she saw him, it was most definitely not love at first sight. She didn't believe in that, and besides she was still in mourning. She thought he was very attractive though - the best looking in the whole class. She thought that the girl next to him, presumably his girlfriend, was a very lucky girl indeed. Then she wandered away to sit with her friend and forgot all about him.

No one really knows what really happened next. As everyone knows, in the end high school is just a huge mish mash of colours and sounds anyway. But the next time he popped into her mind again, it was during a poetry recital in class. He wrote marvellously, she thought. Full of nice, pompous words that she approved of and proved his mastery of the English language - always an important feature in mate selection. Not that she was romantically interested in him or anything. Surprisingly, he hadn't written a poem dedicated to his supposed girlfriend even though the theme given was love poems. Interesting. So she asked around and found out that they were just friends after all. She was sceptical, but let it rest and forgot all about him again.

By normal high school hierarchy standards, she wasn't exactly Miss Popular. Understandable, since she was snarky and had a tendency to use copious amounts of sarcasm when feeling defensive. Nonetheless, she somehow attracted the attention of another boy who was probably sitting even lower than her on the ladder of social affluence. She wasn't even remotely attracted to him, but she was restless. She still spent her days and nights shuffling through a grey haze or numb grief and wondered every morning why she was still alive. She was lonely. So in a bout of foolishness, she encouraged this strange boy's attentions, intending to lead him to the edge of the cliff and push him off. Not very nice, but then she had never been a nice person.

It was around this time of awkward courting on the unlucky boy's part and even more awkward encouragements on hers, that the homeroom teacher decided it was time to shake things up a bit and switch everyone's seating positions. There was the expected amount of complaints and groans. Somehow, that attractive boy who spoke good English (and had quite a lot of artistic talent as she had found out, much to her envy) and his girlfriendfriend ended up seated right behind her. 
This is when she did something incredibly stupid.
She wasn't sure why, but his girlfriend friend intimidated her a bit. Maybe because kindred spirits of the dark variety tend to repulse each other. Who knows? And the boy himself made her quite tongue tied. He was so quiet, so taciturn, so good looking. In any case, she pleaded with the teacher to switch her own seat, using faulty eyesight as an excuse.
And that's how she ended up sitting at other the side of the classroom.
And that's how a whole a year was wasted between them.

Time passed. The awkward boy made an awkward confession of his affection for her, and she coldly turned it down as she'd always planned. She switched seats again to get further away from him. She made new friends, and forgot her old ones who had forgotten about her anyway. They were too busy having fun with the good looking boy and his friend. She regretted switching seats in the first place - they all looked so happy. By this time, she'd learned by the strange process of osmosis unique to high school gossip that he was effeminate and very quirky. Perhaps even gay. So that girl really was just his friend after all.

She still felt restless. One venue of entertainment had expired and she was casting around for another. Conversations with her new friend weren't going very smoothly either. They were both two extremely different sorts of people. So she thought hard about it and arrived at the conclusion that they would need something to talk about, to strengthen their girly bond. And what provides more conversation fodder than discussing a crush?

And that's how it happened, in the most unromantic way humanly possible. She faked infatuation for that possibly-gay-but-really-cute-and-seems-smart-as-well boy. She didn't openly go about approaching him of course. They'd never even had a proper conversation before. She just giggled about it a lot with her girl friends and stared at him dreamily. Then, because she was a silly little girl and had a perverse sense of humour, she started writing short anonymous love poems and leaving them in his locker. It was a great laugh at first and she really enjoyed playing this funny game. Her friends found it at once strange and hilarious.

Then all of a sudden, the rules changed. As she was writing the third love poem, she realised the uncomfortable truth.

She liked him.
She really, really liked him.

Cue confusion and plenty of shock. She hadn't expected this. Didn't want this. She'd sworn that she'd never love another, and would never let her heart wander. Now it was wandering. She thought about it again and decided in the end that if it was just infatuation, it was harmless. She decided that she'd just let it run its course because obviously there was no way that she'd actually ever fall for him. Innocent infatuation, that was it. Right. Of course.
Truth was, she couldn't have stopped what she felt for him even if she'd wanted to.

The next day, she slid up to his locker as usual, intending to slip the latest poem in. Then a voice behind her called her name and she spun around. It was that friend of his. 

Caught red-handed with the poem in her hand.

There was nothing more she could do. The game was up, and it was really embarrassing now that she knew what she felt was real. She'd always known that someday she'd get found out and then she'd laugh it off and let them in on the joke. But now that it was real...
She should have just pretended that it was a joke anyway, but for some reason, she didn't. There was no way she'd be able to face him once his friend told him about what she'd found out. It was just so embarrassingand weird. He'd think she was a twisted stalker waiting to jump out of dark corners and rape him or something. Besides, he was probably gay. So she turned and walked away from it all. Closed the chapter and retreated to the grey haze. She pushed him far away to the back of her mind and tried to get on with her life. She forgot all about him once more.
Almost.

Months flew by. A whole year passed without the two of them ever saying so much as 'How are you?' to each other. She slowly climbed out of the grey haze to reach something close to contentment, the pain of loss gradually scabbing over. She no longer thought about the fiasco of the previous year either. Sometimes, when they passed each other in the hall or when she heard his laughter she would pause for a moment in time, but she would shake her herself and move on again. Some small part of her still longed to know him, but she smothered those thoughts and left them no room to grow. It was the final year of high school, and soon everything would change as she graduated and left for new horizons.

And everything did change.

Three months into the new school year, she looked up from her work to witness him having a massive row with his friend. Hot words were exchanged and tears were shed. After the current lesson was over, they both stormed out of the classroom. She shrugged and went back to her work, not because she didn't care but because she assumed that they would make up again like all good friends are bound to do. But after the break was over, they returned to the classroom still radiating anger and pushed their desks away from each other. His friend went to huddle with some of her own cronies, while he sat alone in the corner. As these things tend to play out, his desk was on the same row as hers and by the next day their desks were joined with her friend between them. A new alliance was formed. 
At first, they didn't speak to each other. She, due to leftover embarrassment, and he perhaps just due to negligence. But it's only possible to avoid someone for so long when they're both finally travelling in the same social circles. They started spending more time together and gradually progressed beyond 'Hi'. Maybe they weren't the best of friends but at least they were friends. That was all she was looking for anyway. She'd put the past behind her and hoped that he'd done the same. They never brought up the topic of the previous year's madness.

Eventually, it was that time of year again when group projects were all the rage. They had to make a presentation with two other of their friends about a chosen location and what made it extraordinary. Unsurprisingly, the both of them ended up doing most of the work since the others begged the excuse of a poor command of English. And so it happened that they spent the night before the presentation staying up late chatting over IM about what needed to be done the next day. As the night drew on, the conversation slowly shifted away from work. To her amazement, that night he opened up his heart to her. He told her about his life, his sorrows, his tribulations. Until that day, their friendship had been shallow but pleasant at best. But that night, she finally saw him for who and what he was. He lifted the proverbial mask and let he take a glimpse of the soul beneath. God knows why he decided to do it. It was surreal. It was unbelievable. 

That was when she realised she'd never gotten over him in the first place.
She'd never truly forgotten.
Never really walked away.
She'd been keeping her distance all this time, but deep down she'd always been drawn to him like a moth to flame. Inexplicable. Irresistible. From the first time she'd laid eyes on him, there had been something there. Something intangible. 
Something real.

So she threw caution to the wind. She still loved the one before, but she could no more ignore this than the shore can ignore the tide. She persuaded her friend sitting in between the two of them to exchange places with her. All the better to get to know him, dear. From that day forth, they drew closer. She never told him of her feelings but left clues all over the place, hoping he'd get the hints. Her feelings grew day by day, but she never knew about his. Some days it seemed like he cared for her more than friends should; some days it seemed like he didn't care at all. As ambivalent as they come, she nearly gave up several times only to keep crawling back. She simply could not put him out of her mind. She didn't know what she was doing anymore, and truth be told she didn't really care. Where she'd once woken every morning with a heavy head, now she looked forward to every day when she'd get to talk to him again. It was more than just romantic interest. She genuinely liked him as a person. He was interesting and funny and deep. He understood. He saw the world the same way she did. He saw the invisible colours, heard the inaudible voices. She loved spending time with him. 

Neither of them acknowledged it, but they fit together perfectly.

Weeks grew into months. The wheel of life turned and a half a year went by. Finals were only another 2 months away and then they'd be graduating. She didn't know what would happen. She wanted to tell him how much she cared about him, how much he meant to her. But then what? Even if he felt the same way, what could they do? Would they forget about each other once they left for college? She thought that it was worth a try, at least. They were the best of friends now. They texted and called each other after school. He knew about her dreams and she knew about his. They kept each other's secrets. She didn't want to lose that. He was so special and she couldn't stand the thought of not seeing him again if she told him about the way she felt. Even so, she tried to. Several times, she almost worked up the courage to let him know. She always lost her nerve at the last minute and later berated herself for being such a coward.

Eventually, she chose the most cowardly way of confessing her feelings. 
She texted him. Told him there was something she wanted to tell him.
And then waited several hours while there was no reply.

She panicked. She fretted. Surely he must have known and felt disgusted, repulsed by her. It was over. She had to let go. 
Then when all hope was lost, he replied.

"Yeah I know what it is you're talking about, and the answer is no."


She hadn't known up til that point in time that the sound of a heart breaking could be heard. It sounded a lot like grief. His answer was so cold. So dismissive. Had she meant that little to him? She needed to know more.

"What do you mean 'no'? How do you even know what I'm talking about?"
"I don't know. Why not you tell me what you wanted to say and then I'll see if that's what I thought."
"Well, why not YOU tell me what you thought it was?"
"No no, just tell me. It'll be weird if I get it wrong."

Perhaps it had just been a case of mild misunderstanding after all. Nothing to it, she thought. Do or die, right? So she breathed deeply and took a leap of faith.

"Ok. Fine. Look, I'm just trying to tell you that I'm still freaking infatuated with you alright? I don't know if you've ever liked me. But if you're going to cut me, make it a clean cut please."

There. It was done. It was out in the open now, and there was no going back. Whatever happened from here on out would be beyond her control.

His reply was confused and hesitant. Turned out that all her previous assumptions were wrong - he'd never even suspected that she was still harboring feelings for him. He had no idea what he himself felt for her. He wasn't sure about anything, so he asked for time. He needed time to figure it out for himself.
She was frustrated, of course. She wasn't the world's most patient person, and matters of the heart are not to be trifled with. Nonetheless, she gave her assent to wait for him.

Except that it should be mentioned once again and stressed upon that she was an impatient person.

So by the end of the next day she'd pestered him into giving her a straight answer. Maybe he just said it to shut her up, or maybe he really did mean what he said, but he admitted that he did feel something for her too. He wanted to give it a shot. They both agreed that it was too close to finals to be starting a relationship and instead decided to just let things happen as they may.
Words cannot describe how happy she felt that day. There was doubt too, and guilt. She knew she was breaking her promise to the one before, and ultimately felt like she was betraying both boys since she couldn't love them both at once.
She was happy, but she was sad too.

Things just continued on from there, not much different from before. Only now, they were both aware of how each other felt and made the effort to lower down any remaining barriers. Less than a month later, they had their first kiss which then progressed to something a little...more. It may not have been the stuff of movies, but it was still a huge deal for both of them. It should perhaps be mentioned here that neither of them had been in a relationship before. Even her, despite having loved and lost before. This was all so new to her. New emotions, new sensations, at once exhilarating and terrifying.

Then a few days on, while his head was resting on her lap he looked up at her with a smile and asked her to be his girlfriend.
It was perfect.
The sun broke through the clouds. The birds started singing. The fireworks went on display.
It was. Just. So. Perfect.
She kissed her face and said yes. Yes, of course she would.

Originally coded by: dreamsky
Edited by: User not found: rael
Background by: imperion