Love is a special feeling. Of its various forms, involving most hormonal and heart matters is the one towards the opposite sex as in a "love-relationship".
A preliminary stage of this love is infatuation or attraction where you are obsessed with a person's charm or beauty and cannot think beyond him/her. I did have a few crushes and still carry fond memories of all my infatuations.
Ankita
She was a fair girl with a charming smile from the "B" section of my class in school. I wasn't quite a ladies' man and although a bright student, I couldn't muster up the courage to even look any girl in the eye and tell her that I'd really like to be friends with her, leave alone trying to talk to Ankita.
I didn't quite notice until my maths teacher Mr. Patkar brought it to our notice that she was a really cute girl. He asked kids to sing once in free-time and she took the center-stage and sang- "Neend churayi meri" from the movie album "Ishq" and I was just taken aback by her charming voice, confidence and attitude.
It wasn't a big deal for her though. She was very grounded and level-headed for a beautiful-unapproachable kind of persona; I say this as she did respond to my subliminal eye-contacts positively and talked to me whenever she met me.
We used to commute to school by the same wagon and I've lost count of how many times had she tried to thaw the ice of shyness between us and how many times had I re-constructed the ice-wall and drawn a line of uneasiness while starting talks with her. I am not embarrassed to say that she did play a major role in bringing me out of my hermit shell and making me feel comfortable with girls... the extremely beautiful ones that is. One of the moments that I still have with myself is when she sat beside me in the congested wagon and I felt like she was leaning over me... God! I can give my life to go back that beautiful moment again... it is an extraordinary memory, the ever-smiling princess sitting beside the mysterious loner. Her submissive yet authorative figure still remains in my memories fresh as dew-drops on fresh green grass.
I know there's a huge probability of my crush being a one-sided affair but, I still prefer to believe that she liked me too. We hadn't talked to each other much but I did realise that she was very comfortable talking to me.
Later on, I realised that she was the daughter of a leading politician of our area which instead of deterring me in my mission to marry her (laughing-out-loud), had me dreaming of having the rich politician as my father-in-law.
But, as time passed by, my shyness got the best of me, our chemistry faded and she too, like other typical Indian small-town girls grew mindful of not mixing up with boys. She changed, I didn't!
I still remember an incident (which by the way has no meaning in this context) when I was sitting alone with her in the tempo-wagon, one hot summer afternoon, returning from the school. Like other public transport vehicles, the wagon had a steel rod to hold on while it hopped its way through the pot-holes in the streets. Seeing her sitting alone, I started acting macho-macho and behaved like I neither cared nor needed to grab hold of the steel rod as the wagon started jittering on the pot-holes. All of a sudden, the lights went out and I grew a severe headache in my head in that tacky and sweaty afternoon. Yes, I had hit my head on the steel rod and I highly doubt that it went unnoticed by her. She acted like she didn't see it but couldn't hide that smile...
Richa
Another girl that stands out of my memory from approximately a hundred crushes is Richa. A perfect smile, short height and a superb confidence in her ways are things that I remember her for. I genuinely think that she liked me which is the biggest point of attraction as far as my thought rays go.
As a newbie in my new school, I was the subject of speculations among all the classmates of mine. My first face-to-face encounter with Richa was a great one- I knew her as a girl who eloquently delivered speeches in assembly and was quite bold and honest in her demeanours.
Once as the bell rang and students moved (ran) out of their classrooms, my hindi teacher (who I hated for his ignorance by the way), asked me to go after Richa and tell her that he's calling her. I waded through the crowd and told Richa to meet the teacher and went on with my stroll towards the school gate. She, after listening to whatever brief message the teacher wanted to convey, caught up with me and said Hi.
I looked around and made sure that the Hi was directed to me. She giggled and said- "Yes, I am talking to you." Her tone was friendly yet humorous... I, as someone who wasn't used to the words of greeting, returned her greeting in a quivering voice. I always thought that Hi, Hello, Good morning etc were so plastic and unuseful expressions but, that incident changed my view... a little. We chatted for a while, it was raining, she was smiling, I was... well.. happy.
It is not that I am a loser or thick-skulled who shivers in presence of girls, I just am never the one to break the ice first and leave my fun-side open only for very a few people.
Anyways, she went on her way, I walked towards my destination- the paths separated... but when I looked back, she was smiling and looking at me. My heartbeat raced faster, I smiled, she waved her hand and said "bye". I choked again. She patiently waited, I raised my hand too and whispered "bye" which I don't think reached her ears but made her giggle again... ah! perfect smile.
To be continued...
