Chapter XLIII
Inordinate: The Lunch Box Journal

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He checked the time. He barely slept for an hour and there were already 3 missed calls from an unknown number. As he was checking the phone, it rang again and he picked it up instead of ignoring and going back to sleep.

“Hi, Aryan. Likhita here!”
“Oh hi”, checking what time it was & mentally calculating the time he had slept so far knowing very well that he was going to hear an earful about something.
“Why Aryan, why? You knew how much I want Akhil. Why are you doing this? How long we know each other? And you know about me and Akhil”
What the hell is happening?, Aryan spoke to himself in his mind.
“She (Srestha) has no self-respect at all. Even after unfriending why is she contacting him.”
“Look, I had no idea what had happened between the three of yo…!”
“Why are you being a connector? Why?”
“Like I said, I had no idea what was going on between the three of you. If I knew anything…”
“Why did you bring her? She has spoiled everything in the last month.”
“And today also.”
“If I knew anything, I myself wouldn’t have come to the Airport. I was just accompanying her since she also wanted to go to the Airport.”
“Why is she talking to Akhil even after knowing there is no future with him.”

She went on for a little longer amidst sobs and all this while Aryan was still reeling and getting to terms with what was happening again. He had barely slept and all this was just messing up with his mind. All he wanted was to have a little sleep and all he was getting was headache. And after ranting for a while, Likhita kept the phone down. Aryan had a new headache now and the result was that he won’t be sleeping anymore. After all this, Aryan felt that a  few too many lines were crossed by the once-friend Likhita and somehow he got himself in the middle of the triangle, getting blamed by two people in the triangle. He didn’t want any of that. He was happy being a silent spectator but now this new found rope around his neck from three corners was a bit too much for him to handle. If only he wasn’t a teetotaler, he would have hit the bar, but then again he was a drinker for sure. So, he went to the only place he could – Starbucks.

While Aryan had lost that ounce of respect that he had until then for Likhita, he was wondering what kind of a person was Akhil all along, making promises he couldn’t keep, not being completely honest with the people he was involved with, letting that one girl control him and whatnot. It’s one thing to have feelings for someone and a completely different thing to have feelings for more than one and keeping everyone at arm’s length and not letting go of anyone. It’s inhumane to play around with people’s emotions, but if only he knew that. Meanwhile, Likhita was taking a step down from her moral ground and trying to stomp a little lower by messaging Srestha about her discomfort and to give her peace of mind to her, to warn her, scold her and whatnot all to achieve one thing – to make her miserable because she was miserable and to make her back off of Akhil. She was taking every ounce of frustration on her. What was worse is that she was miserable and making others feel miserable at the same time. She had the same thing to tell Srestha as well which was told to Aryan over the call, about how she(Srestha) didn’t have any self-respect, why she was contacting Akhil even after him telling not to talk, unfriending her on Facebook and ruining the previous few months of her and his. She went to tell how close was Akhil before he met her and how he shared everything with her. Apparently, Akhil was sharing everything with Likhita. By everything, he shared everything, those personal chats among them and whatnot, almost everything. The news broke a part of Srestha. How could Akhil do that? She kept asking herself, something that is so personal and private was no longer private and it was not acceptable at all for someone to break the confidence in which some things were shard. She felt vulnerable,  used and mostly cheated upon. This was a case of clear breach of trust which she was unable to come to terms with. And there she was listening to Likhita’s boastful rant about the two of them while she was drowning herself in the misery of the broken trust. While she responded to the best of her ability and as far as she could try to justify herself and Akhil, it didn’t seem to end anytime soon. But the news of the broken trust was what bothered her more now.

The next day Srestha met Aryan in the office cab. She was taking the cab for a few days since her head wasn’t straight and she had way too much to think about. It was then he came to light of a lot of things that had happened and was completely unaware of that. The exact series of events that had happened and that Aryan was completely unaware of, from the beginning to previous night’s Likhita’s intensive messages. And what topped all of them was one judgmental comment of Akhil was just out of proportion.

(To be Continued …)

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The Lunch Box Journal

ak, mmxviii