Page 201 - The World's Best Boyfriend

room. The house was dying. The walls were lined with bookshelves bent with
the weight of the textbooks. Big books with cracked spines and
incomprehensible symbols lay upturned everywhere. Minus the seepage on the

walls, the ruddy smell, it was exactly like Aranya had imagined. She had
imagined Raghuvir and her working together one day, half-filled blackboards
and half-empty coffee mugs surrounding them. Raghuvir clearly wasn’t

slacking. In fact he was on top of his game.
‘Why did you leave, Sir?’ asked Aranya.
‘I had to,’ Raghuvir answered.

‘Why?’
‘Mitra had wanted my head on a platter for a really long time. I gave him the
opportunity and he struck. We had a slight disagreement and I had to leave.’

‘What disagreement?’
‘He wanted to throw you out. So instead, I volunteered. And I had a few offers
lined up for me and I thought it’s best for me to take them up. I have been down

for far too long. It’s time to get on the horse again,’ said Raghuvir with a smile.
‘So you can come back if you want to?’
‘Technically I can, but I have things to do now. I have already accepted a job

offer in Bangalore. They are funding all my research. It’s a new start for me,’
answered Raghuvir.

‘You will never come back then?’ asked Aranya, her voice desperate.
‘No. Plus, I can’t assure them what happened that day won’t happen again.
This student–professor thing really brings you down in the research community,’
said Raghuvir, peering into some notes now and scribbling in the margins with a

pencil.
‘What?’

‘Four years is a long time to just like you and do nothing about it,’ said
Raghuvir.
The words hit Aranya like a bus. Raghuvir looked at her, nonchalant. Aranya
had tears in her eyes, God knew why, and she said, ‘That’s not funny. I didn’t

come here to be made fun of. That happens enough already.’ She got up to leave.
‘Sit down.’

Aranya listened.
‘It wasn’t supposed to be funny.’ Raghuvir flipped through his notes like they
weren’t having a conversation where he had admitted to liking her, which at best