Page 30 - Love Story of a Commando

We were all from North Indian states, except Swami, who was from
Kerala. Nidhi was an IITian from Kharagpur, Dipti belonged to Lovely
Professional University Punjab, Gaurav was from NIT Jamshedpur and I
was from Delhi College of Engineering.
After the lunch break, the instructors asked us to form small groups
of four to five people; we would work in teams. Nidhi, Dipti, Gaurav, Swami
and I quickly formed a team. At the end of the work day, all of us except
Swami, who was allocated another place, came back to the apartment.
Gaurav was asked to share a room with us girls. It was a bit awkward for a
small-town boy like him. We assured him that we would suppress our lust
and longing for him as much as possible and try our best not to attack his
honour. Then we ended up laughing hysterically for at least half an hour
while Gaurav went back to his room shyly.
It was a good start.
We spent the rest of the day wandering the streets of our new
neighbourhood, which was characterized by towering apartment blocks and
bustling markets with tiny dusty shops jammed together in rows.
We found a small restaurant with a long menu comprising vegetarian
and non-vegetarian dishes. We decided to go dutch and placed a sumptuous
order for paneer butter masala, butter naan, chicken do pyaza, rice and daal,
which we hogged mercilessly and then hopped to a little grocery shop
nearby and bought a few provisions to keep us going. Three packets of
bread, a fat chunk of butter, jam, chocolates, rice, daal, toiletries including
Harpic and Tide detergent powder and other regular stuff to keep a house
full of working people functioning.
By the time we got back to our flat, we were tired and fell into our
beds like dead people.
The next day, survival pushed us to a whole new level of
multitasking; Dipti was smearing butter over half burnt toasts while Gaurav
was waiting outside our single bathroom for Nidhi to come out, I explained
to my mom why I could not take her call last night while struggling with my
stubborn hair which was refusing to transform into a perfect ponytail. But
eventually we made it out of our little flat successfully and hopped into a
taxi.
While I grabbed the window seat, Gaurav and Nidhi were explaining
to their parents that the challenges of the new job was why they hadn’t been
taking calls from home. Dipti, being the smartest one, spent the entire
twenty-minute ride napping.
Work life is stressful. Or at least, not as exciting as I thought it would
be. Damn, all those Hollywood movies where the damsel meets her warrior
in a corporate suit and their love life starts with a bang.