The Chocolate Boy

Chapter 2 - Cherry Blooms

The day had been a good day. For one, it was a half day at school and I was home early (along with Tuhina of course, though I didn't know where she was at this moment).

And secondly, I didn't have Nutrition the next day on my routine. I also did a very private dance (don't even breathe a word of this to Tuhina) to myself in my room for not having to sit through Nutri for one and a half hours. That's what my routine had. Double periods of Nutri everyday except tomorrow (I mean Tuesdays). But what it did have were the languages. And for the rest of the week, three hours of Ishan everyday!

Oh God! Save me! I promise I won't dance again!

Egoistic i***t!

Not you, God. I was talking about Ishan.

The door to my room was creaked open and I didn't need to turn around to know that Tuhina had come in and plopped down on my bed.

"I don't think you'll ever know how to knock." I didn't even look up from the sum I was trying to solve. She had been mean to me this morning and I'd make sure she paid back for it. There was no revenge worse than ignoring her presence. She hated not being the center of attention.

"Why should I? You shouldn't keep any secrets from me! I'm your twin."

"Nice excuse. But I might be doing something private, you know, like changing dresses and stuff - "

"Shut up! I know you bolt your door before doing that! Now stop giving me excuses to shout at you!"

At this, I turned. 

How could I have missed it? I smacked myself mentally. Judging from her tone, I should have known something was wrong with her.

"Oi? What is it?" I went to my bed and sat down beside her, draping an arm on her shoulders.

"Nothing," she said with teary eyes.

Yeah, right.

"Is it Chlorophyll again?"

"Don't call him that, Tuhin. He has a name," even her admonitions lacked their usual fervor.

"You'd been to his place?"

She nodded. Yes.

So that's where she was all this time after school.

"And you saw something? Or someone?" I guessed.

"I saw him holding hands and hugging that girl."

I swear my eyebrows went up on their own. They'd been involuntarily working for me now.

She noticed me. And my obvious oblivion to her boyfriend's detailed love life.

"Areh, that girl, I showed you her picture on f*******:, remember? I mean, really? Who does he think he is?"

Maybe she had. I never remembered. Nonetheless, I nodded.

"Just break up already." That might have come off as rude, but I knew my twin. She was not even remotely serious about the guy.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. I don't love him... I don't even like him that much... right? I only do that to get a chance to write love letters. Do you know I'm becoming a pro at it?" she wiped her eyes and beamed at me. "I just can't believe he fell out of my charm so quickly."

"Okay but you got all teary eyed just now because he was holding another girl's hands and hugging her. So that must be equivalent to you getting emotionally attached to him which is so not required to prove."

"I guess I was too much into the character. It happens when you are a great actor, you know," she winked and laughed. "But I love it when we speak the language of Maths."

"You want a tangent? Or a collision?"

"Now it's Physics included! To hell with your tangent. I need collision!"

We high-fived. That's our collision for you.

"Now that you ask me to find someone else, I think I've found the one that piqued my interest," she said with a stupid smirk plastered on her face that guys found appealing.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" I fixed her with a glare. Please let it not be the guy sitting beside me. I didn't need her to have any more excuses to hang around my seat everyday. "Don't you dare!" I warned.

"If you are thinking about how cute and handsome Ishan is, then yes," she remarked gleefully.

I couldn't have hated her more than I did right at that moment.

"What?" she nudged me.

"Don't even get me started on him," I grumbled.

"Did you already make a new enemy out of him?"

"Not really, but I don't like him a bit. He's a complete jerk. Calls himself cute and is egoistic about it."

"Better than cheating! At least that's what your dearest Chlorophyll does."

I snickered.

"What?"

"You actually called him Chlorophyll!"

"What's so funny about that? You always call him that!"

"Uh, but you defend him, don't you?"

"Don't be delusional. Told ya, I was too much into the character. I'm not the good, clichéd nerdy girlfriend either," a mischievous smirked played at her lips.

"Never be the clichéd good girl ever! After all you are the unclichéd brother's twin sister. Cliché doesn't look good on us!"

She narrowed her eyes. "That sentence you just uttered had too many 'cliché's!"

***

Afzal, a boy with thick glasses and jet black hair standing up in all directions, and Tuhina got chosen as the Prefects of our class. It was no wonder that she had already become the most popular kid in our class. 

As soon as the bell rang for the lunchbreak, Tuhina rushed to the front of the class as the teacher went out of the room. Afzal stood at the door, preventing anyone to get out of the class.

The commotion that it created, started to bother me. I turned to look out of the window.

"Hey guys, wait! Just sit down for a minute," Tuhina voice boomed across the classroom.

I heard the shuffling of several pairs of feet and the chaos seemed to quiet down a bit.

"Okay now, can I have your attention please?" she said with a bright smile.

Her social skills were really something else. No wonder she had become a popular kid in just a day.

"So as you guys know," she carried on, "Afzal and I have been selected as the Prefects of this section, and it is our duty to help the class 12 Prefects to organize various inter school competitions. So, for a start, we'd like to know what clubs you want to try out for. You can also put down any extra curricular activities other than what's mentioned in this sheet and we'll consider you for such events later in the year."

An excited murmur arose in the class.

"Dance. I wanna dance , Tuhina," a girl squealed from the front row.

"Hey buddy, don't forget me for football," another boy's voice came.

"Guys, calm down. Not like that. We are passing this paper around," she held it up for everyone to see. "Write your name in the left column and then fill up the other columns as you see fit. Got it?"

"Yes Ma'am," the same boy shouted again.

Why couldn't these idiots refrain from shouting and trying hard to seek her attention?

I sighed. That was her charm. Everyone around her sought her attention and validation.

"Okay, shouting and screaming isn't going to help you get into the team, Manish."

But... dammit! My sister knew all of our classmates and all I knew was the i***t sitting beside me.

No wonder she called me antisocial.

Nah, I'm not an antisocial. Those are criminals. I'm not a criminal!

Wait a second... why was it so quiet next to me?

The next seat was empty. Ishan wasn't there beside me.

ISHAN WASN'T THERE BESIDE ME! OH MY GOD! THANK YOU!

I got my lunchbox out and stared at its contents. A pair of rotis and a smaller box of Jhinge-Alu Posto.

This would've been a wonderful sight for me had it been cooked by Ma. But knowing the circumstances at home for the last few years, Benu Di, our help had cooked it. Her dishes, though edible and sometimes tasty, looked unappetizing to me.

I was pulled out of my train of thoughts as I saw Ishan enter the classroom with two boys trailing behind him.

But the frown on Ishan's face was so unlike him. Where did all the gloss and glamour go?

I mean, yeah, I'd known him for a day only but somehow I had taken him for a happy-go-lucky kid.

He came up to his seat and unzipped his bag. I turned my attention to the two boys who followed him with annoying smirks on their faces.

"Hi Tuhin," the one with the greasy styled back hair leered.

"Hi," I said in a monotonous voice. I might be complaining about my lack of friends every now and then, but I was in no mood to extend my social circle.

But wait, how did they know my name?

"I'm Shivam and he's Riyaaz," he said with a smug look on his face. Even spending a whole day with Ishan seemed tolerable than seeing Shivam's face for five minutes.

"We are old friends of Ishan, isn't it?" he said nudging Ishan's side with his elbow.

Ishan didn't look up from his bag.

That, ladies and  gentlemen, is what you call "odd".

I watched the trio from the corner of my eyes while pretending to be busy having my lunch. They kept on nagging Ishan about something that I failed to make out.

"Just get out of my sight," Ishan snarled.

"Suck it up, man," Shivam shoved him playfully. "We're going now but we'll come back later and have a little chitchat with our dearest Tuhin."

Ishan sat down with a thud beside me. His friends turned at me and said in a mock, singsong voice, "It was nice to meet you Tuhin."

"Can't say the same," I murmured.

"We're bound to become best friends, Tuhin!" Riyaaz called as they went away.

"I honestly doubt that."

Ishan stared back at me.

"What? I don't like your friends, is that a problem?"

"One, they are anything but my friends. Two, see that the feeling stays the same. Neither do I like them," he said, taking a bite of his sandwich.

"Feeling better today?"

"I guess so."

Of course, I got a solid three hours sleep last night. That's more than I could ask for.

"So, seeing that you are in a good mood, I'd like to ask you something."

"Shoot."

He cleared his throat.

"Are we friends?"

Ever so dramatic.

"Do I get a choice here?"

"Probably not," a cheerful smile crept up on his lips.

There it was. The warm, bubbly Ishan I'd met yesterday.

"So, yes, I guess," I shrugged.

"... this is just like a fairytale," I heard him gushing over something.

"What?"

"Nothing," he cleared his throat again.

"Look, what do I have to do here?" he pointed at a paper I recognized to be the sheet my sister had passed around.

"Weren't you there when Tuhina announced?"

He suddenly found interest in his half eaten sandwich.

"So much for being a friend," he mumbled.

"Oh, you weren't. Right, stop whining. You have to write down any extra-curricular activities you are interested in to represent the school."

He rolled his eyes at me and scribbled on the paper before passing it on to me.

"But how did you even get out?" I said as I wrote down my name. "The other Prefect guy was -" I paused as I saw the right hand column, the line just above mine.

Baking and cooking.

Impressive.

"Wow. You can cook and bake?" I asked him before realizing what a stupid question it was.

Of course he could.

"Yeah, I can," his cheeky grin returned.

I scribbled down mine and he looked over my shoulder to see it.

I could feel a pressure building up inside me. The walls seemed to close in around me. The growing, heavy weight on my chest didn't really help the situation.

"Move," my own voice sounded foreign to me.