Page 20 - Love Story of a Commando

‘Umm! I am actually very busy and I hardly use my phone.’ Now I
was sounding more like myself. You are not supposed to give your phone
number to just about anyone so quickly, let alone a stranger.
‘Don’t worry, I am not a stalker. It’s just that I owe you a cup of
coffee as a token of my gratitude and also, I will ping you my super hilarious
forwarded messages.’
‘Seriously? Could not you come up with something better?’ I smiled.
‘Actually, I have never tried that line before, so you see it’s just a
beginner’s skill. Grant me this please,’ he said, and smiled.
In the end, he dropped me back to my hostel in his gorgeous black
Chevrolet Cruze and said he would ping me soon.
How I wished time would have frozen right there! But life is never
meant to be simple. Is it?
In spite of waiting for his phone call for over a month I did not even
receive a message from him. I cursed myself for not taking his number. It
was a dead end. Soon, I forgot about him, not literally, but he was pushed to
the bottom compartments of my brain. It was easier to do so then because
my mind still controlled my heart. After all I had a life of my own and, in
fact, it was a pretty challenging one, as I was an engineering student who
was coping with her last semester.
The final placements were coming up. Placement season is the most
important time at any engineering college. Usually, students are placed by
the end of their third year, which leads to a carefree college life throughout
the last year. You feel invincible; cheerful, arrogant spirits are a commonly
found trait among fourth year students. Most seniors transform into ‘The
Great Khali’ while interacting with professors, juniors and sometimes even
with unknown people walking on the road.
Popular perception is that engineering colleges are magical places
where learning takes place but the truth is, they are actually beautiful places
where beer flows in amber currents, inviting faces are chased by prospective
suitors, snooty college sweethearts are considered property and generally
remain virgins, coffees are turned into essays, electric kettles are next to
God, nights are an exclusive time for leisure, mornings bring a plethora of
unwanted tasks like visiting classes, and professors are best ignored.
Basically college life is a Shangri-La rite of passage into adulthood
which involves rampant consumption of alcoholic beverages, flagrant and
promiscuous sexual behaviour and a general and fundamental disregard for
any form of responsibility by its inhabitants.
But life can be so tragic sometimes.
Due to global recession at the time, placements were postponed for
the fourth year which brutally clipped our invincible wings. There’s nothing
worse than not getting hired by a multinational company for an engineering