Akhand Singh

It all started when David was 12 years old, year 2000 was rolling in and everything around was changing but yet roaming around with friends or without was his ideal way of living life. He would spend hours on the soccer ground then would sit with his little local gang consisted of all the children from the neighborhood. Being the eldest undoubtedly made him the leader of his gang and that’s how he would conduct small missions of fighting with others or putting crackers under someone’s vehicle and all the other little mischiefs. Being the leader and the most mischievous one he wasn’t actually the favorite of anyone except his own little gang who praised him like a big brother. Parents of other children would worry that he might have a bad influence on their kids, they would ask them to ignore him and not to be his accomplice but then that’s the beauty of a child’s mind, it hardly thinks of the profit and loss and stays connected through a sense of unity and a strong bond prevails.

On a most sunny day what would a kid most expect is be allowed to play, but it wasn’t that day for him. He was grounded for a recent complains received from his school.

The scene at his home a few hours ago:

“Did you hit someone?” dad shouts at him.

“No I didn’t” David speaks like he whispers.

“Don’t you dare lying, your class teacher just called” dad frowns.

He stays quiet, he knows what he has done but would the explanation satisfy his dad? “Probably not” he thinks and silence grabs his tongue. That was it the silence was the proof of being wrong for his dad and so he was grounded.

Sitting on his porch he was watching everybody playing and having fun, his little gang had already tried several times, but he won’t go, he knows the code. He had to stay away from going out of house otherwise he won’t just be grounded for next time. For hours he sat on the porch watching his friends play, jealous and frustrated he decided to come back to his room and sleep but then he just switch on the TV. Few minutes later somebody knocks on his door.

“Who’s there?” he shouts being irritated.

“It’s me Sushant”.

“I told you I am not allowed to go out today; I can’t play” he frowns.

“It’s important, open the door” Sushant says.

He walks up to the door and unhooks the lock, opens the door and stare at Sushant’s face.

“What is it? “He says.

“You’ve got to see this David” Sushant pulls him towards the porch. They stand on the porch and as Sushant points out, David notices a truck unloading on the building next to his. What he observes next was something that marks a different level of happiness on his face. While Sushant and other friends standing in front of the building were happy about the new neighbors, David had an other reason to be happy, he knew them and he knew her.

“Let’s go and check them out” David says.

“Alright let’s go” Sushant agrees.

They both climb down the stairs and the gang seems so happy to see their leader with them. David’s excitement is at its peak, he is shy for the very first time and he is confused. When Kiran sees David she recognizes him instantly and she smiles. David now gathers the courage and initiates the conversation with a simple “hi”, Kiran just smiles back.

“What does this mean” he thinks.

“Where is Vicky?” David asks. Vicky is Kiran’s younger brother, David met him one day while he was warming up on the ground before his soccer match, Vicky was roaming around with his dog, and when his dog saw David running it just couldn’t stop trying to bite him. David grew up in an environment where he had too many dogs in his house so he knew how to save himself and so Vicky’s dog responded nicely to him ever since. Vicky was definitely taken and amazed with this fact and so they became friend instantly, it was Vicky who that day took David to his place and introduced his sister to him as well.

“He is unpacking and helping mom” she said.

“Hi I am Sushant” the attention seeker breaks in and introduces himself. She replies with a ‘hi’ this time, that makes David jealous.

“Hey Vicky “David busted as he saw him coming out of the apartment.

Vicky seemed so happy and excited to see David.

“Mom is calling you “Vicky pointed to Kiran, after which she left.

“Do you need any help?” David asked.

Vicky nodded and so the sport of helping to move in begun for the gang.  When David went upstairs with Vicky, Kiran was setting up the furniture, her mom stood there guiding the other workers to keep the television properly.

“Watch it, be careful” she shouted, listening to this David’s courage was already hiding in his pants.

“Namaste aunty” he said, aunty replied nicely to this so that definitely gave him a little boost. But his eyes were sneaking on Kiran every time even when he talked to Vicky and was playing with his dog.

“David” Priya pulled him.

“What are you doing?” he busted.

“Aren’t you grounded?” she said.

“Oh my god, I forgot, dad is going to kill me. I am grounded forever now” he shouts and run towards his apartment.

When he reached his apartment door, the door was locked. “Dad is awake” he thought. “I am dead, shit, shit, shit” he curses himself. Suddenly a crazy idea comes to his mind and he decides to jump in through the porch. He climbs down the stairs and then tries to reach the boundary of his porch. “I am insane, what am I doing?” he thinks, but the fear of being caught by his dad that he went out even when he was grounded was propelling him to do this, to jump in through the porch. He finally got a grasp of the boundary and he tries to pull his legs up to the space between pillars. “I did it” he exclaims and his left leg slips, he looks down the height frightens him and so he moves quickly to jump in the porch. A sense of relief and joy touches him when he stands in the porch again; he did something he never thought he would be able to do. He feels like some super action hero. “Is dad awake?” he thinks, fear captures his heart again and so he goes in to check on his dad. “Lucky day” he smiles when he sees his dad sleeping.

“You were grounded and you went out?” Annie my younger sister asked.

“Don’t you dare tell this to dad” David pointed, and that’s how David survived being grounded.

Whole night David just dreamt about her and that was surely one of the best nights he ever had. He was excited to see her the next day. Things continued the same for a while, friendship of minutes turned to months and then years with time.

Present:

Just thinking about Kiran, David seems so happy now, his eyes have the same spark like the first time he saw her. There is an amazing happiness that his heart carries now. He almost comes to laughter when he remembers the first time he actually came close to say I love you, the three magical words to Kiran.

Past:

It was when he turned 14 and it was his birthday, the day he had decided to propose Kiran. All dressed up; the birthday boy was ready for celebrations. Everybody was supposed to come and they did but his eyes were searching only for her, his friends asked him to cut the cake but how could he? So he just went over hiding in his house until she came with Vicky. But how can he say it, he didn’t actually knew what to say. He sat next to her while they had dinner and even went to drop them to their apartment but never gathered the strength to utter those three words until he found the perfect moment. While they were on the way to Kiran’s apartment both Sushant and Vicky were accompanying them as well, but they always had a lot to talk about cricket and so David and Kiran always walked together at least David always made sure of it. Considering that Sushant and Vicky were talking with each other and were engrossed in their discussion, David gathered courage and whispered “I love you”, Kiran didn’t say anything and she kept walking. Noticing this David grabbed her hand and pulled her towards him.

“What are you doing?” She busted.

“Nothing”  he said, realizing that she didn’t listen to what he said, her face and eyes were the perfect answer, and so he lost the courage of confessing ever since.

As they grew, the feeling for Kiran in David’s heart changed. It became something he wasn’t able to express and understand. They would play together, but he would make sure they stay in opposite team while they play cricket. For some reason he thought that would bring them together plus he wouldn’t want Vicky to find out his feelings for Kiran. Nothing ever could change what he felt for her, not even when Vicky found out about it with the help of Sushant of course, not even when his first ever love letter was caught by his sister and when she told his dad about it, not even when Kiran got the idea for the very first time that it wasn’t just a friendship in David’s eyes.

Years passed and then came the time when Kiran and his family were moving out to a different city. He was heartbroken but even at that time when he tried so hard he couldn’t say his heart, he held the wrist band close to his heart that Kiran gave him before she left. What he felt for her might have been a mere attraction at that time, the adolescence might have played the trick but then with years the feeling grew up to be something else he never understood.

At age of 16 David was seriously having a hard time to grasp the concept of love. He heard about it, read about it in almost every book and the movies made him write some poems and songs as well but nothing was strong enough to teach him how to confess his feelings for Kiran.

For Introduction follow: 

Crush Like Love : Prologue

For Next Chapter follow: 

Crush Like Love: CH2 Teacher’s Daughter