sketches...

J did not intend show an iota of her annoyance when she carelessly, but softly, threw her bag on the Costa coffee table. Too bad she almost knocked a half full cup of coffee. She calmed herself a little, sat on the posture- betraying wooden chair, and took slow deep breaths. The cool wind playing and messing with her hair seemed to mock her helplessness, and how she wasn't able to control her emotions, let alone her life. An image of them both flashed before her eyes.
She had nothing against them. And she no longer had anything for him. She was sure. More like..She wanted to be sure... why she feels the way she does... she couldn't understand. She tried to smile her way through it, day in, day out. Often, to stop herself from snapping, she just had to walk away. This was less rude than the fluent sarcastic remarks that she was impulsed to spit often. God was playing games with her. And He was enjoying, no doubt.
Life wasn't fair. Period.
From the surface, she was happy, content, free spirited, and the happy- go- lucky- kind. A graduate, satisfying career, a group of great friends, family that has supported her throughout...
Things wer going fine; atleast she let herself believe that everything was okay. She knew it wasn't, but somethings are best ignored. Putting certain things at the farthest screen of your mind and paying no heed to how prominent it actually is... Yup, she'd gotten used to it.
Things wer going fine, until he had come. Z had come bak in her life. After 5 years when they last met. After those 2 delightful highschool years during which they shared bond, that they falsly labelled "friendship". They both liked each other back then, but too scared to admit it, for the fear of losing the little they had of each other.
College separated them. They promised to keep in touch, as everyone does. The distance between calls grew very long too soon. At a time when her friends wer in a relationship, and went bonkins over what to wear for the date every saturday, J spent time helping her friends with their dress and makeup, reading, learning a new language... and everything possible to get Z out of her mind.
Trusting her instincts, J wrote to Z several months after school about her feelings for him. She let him know that things have now changed, but she just thought he deserved to know how "likeable" he was (hehe). He replied that all time long he had liked her too, but kept quiet for the same reason as she. He said he was happy she moved on, as he had too. He now had a girlfriend.That did it.
She stopped learning chinese. She visited the library less often. She got to know people. She began havin a regular college life. She hung around, tried smoking, tried boozing, puked after it, laughed over it...
She got into a relationship. A good friend from the "popular" gang asked her out. She thought she was interested. She wanted to forget the past, anyway. What better chance could she get? But life never seemed to play fair with her. No matter how perfect and special R treated J, she couldnt stop herself from comparing R and Z. The harder she tried to stop, the worse it got. She hated herself for that. He never understood why she never got comfortable with him. They both seemed to be perfect. But the chemistry between them... too imperfect. Something that neither of them wanted to admit. God had other plans for them. After college they both decided to end the relationship on the grounds of "long distance relationship wouldnt work". Ahh! excuses. R went on abroad to do his masters. J got a decent job through campus recruitment.
Several months, J remained single. She concentrated on her job. She felt guilty that things did not work out with R. He was a girl's guy. Perfect boyfriend material. But he wasn't Z...
With time, Z became a distant thought. But he was still in her thoughts. She wud think about him...Over a cup of coffee, while gazing at the kids in the park, flipping through the seemingly ancient autograph book... his smile, his charm, his goofiness... everything about him brought a smile to her face...
J got a glimpse of his familiar but not- so- familiar face a month ago this day at the cafe close to her double room flat. She walked into the cafe with her roommate as she did everyday. She ordered for the regular latte n ciabatta and made herself comfortable to listen to the latest in her roommate's life. As she listened to her roomie's trash about the new cute coworker, her eyes darted towards the table across hers. She saw him. She almost choked over her tuna sandwich. Z whom she hadn't seen in over 5 years. Z whom she hadnt spoken to since ages. Should she walk over and say a hi? should she wait n see if he recognizes her? would he remember her? should she bother? she cudnt help noticing that he was sitting with a rather attractive female.
she trusted her instincts, as always. She pressed the pause button on her roommate, excused herself, and walked over to his table.
" sorry to interrupt.. you look lyk sumone i kno... are you zaki??"
"um.. yea... that wud be me..." he said without paying much attention
"zak yousuf??"
"i.. yea... m sorry..but... i don't seem to remember you, mam"
She just looked at him. Gawked at him. the time taken for his words to hit her eardrums and the signals to reach her brain seemed eternal....

He beamed within himself. She finally came upto him. He had been watching her and waiting for this moment since a couple of days. He noticed she still loved coffee, n enjoyed tuna sandwiches just like years before. She now wore eyeglasses that made her look more mature. The disappearance of braces seemed to have brought alot of change. She had turned all lady like, but her clumsiness undoubtedly remained the same.
Back in college Zak's relationship was a disaster. She had sed that she loved him, but he felt more that she was obsessed with him. She just wanted him to want her. He understood what being in love really meant only after that one mistake. He needed J back. He wanted to know about Jen's whereabouts. It seemed to take forever to trace her, esp without letting her know, but he was ready to spend the rest of his life for that if he had to. Zak managed to catch Riz, and learnt how distant Jen remained to Riz inspite of how much he genuinely adored her.
Zak was sure that Jen still wanted to be with him, but he wasnt confident about it either. Zak made no sense to himself often, one of the very disturbing but assuring signs of love. She deserved the best, and he'd die to give her that. He knew he had a chance now. He might not get lucky again.
He found out everything he needed to know about her. Her college life, her career, how life treated her... He came to know that she frequented this cafe. He made arrangements to be able to come here as often as she does. He did not want to make the first move. A guy's mind works weird ways. He waited. She finally spotted him... n came up to him. He could play around with her for a while, it wouldn't hurt... he did not expect her to get as heartbroken as she did.
"i.. yea...sorry... but... i don't seem to remember you, mam"
He half expected (hoped rather) that she would just untidy his hair n cal him jackass as she used.
But these words did not change her expression. She had the same look as she did while having her coffee every evening, no.. maybe a feeble smile broke out. She seemed to have given up her animated and comical way of expressions. She learnt to control the way her feelings displayed on her neat face. He began to wonder if he was playing it all well. Would she have changed even on the inside? Would Jen still be the same simple natured, uncomplicated, the not overly feminine kind as he had last seen her?
" my name's jennifer peters... we went to the same school actually... same batch.."
"o.. jennifer... nice to meet you.. m sorry... u look familiar.. your name unfortunately slipped off my mind..."
"ahh mr. zaki i dont blame you.. its been quite a good number of years, anyway nice meeting you too...i'll catch u later then"
She was about to turn around and step towards her table.
OOOPS! Now THAT, he did not expect. He had to think fast.
" Ms Jennifer..."
".. Jen.."
"...Jen.. meet my partner in business and crime, Huma.."
Jen and Zak made an eye contact for a fleeting moment that explored the universe, took them back through a time machine, and let them peek into the future. However, they both hid their momentary time travel...
She shuk hands with Huma. A very brief, and fairly formal conversation between the three of them followed. He now worked 2 streets away from wher she lived. He learnt to like coffee which disgusted him as a teenager . He seemed pretty pleased with his life. She learnt the woman he was with was a colleague. Jen n Zak exchanged numbers.The next few days wer magical for them both. They called each other and caught up on their lives, not their feelings though. He now seemed to be reeli interested in Ms Attractive Colleague whom he couldn't stop talking about. Ofcourse, She had no hopes of being anything more than "gud friends". Good friends... thats what they were, yet again. This time they both were supposed to have left their past behind them. At one point, When they did talk about the bygone days, they laughed over the "childish infatuation". Using those words however seemed an offense to themselves, and felt lyk a stab of a few hundred knives.
They met a few times. And few grew to many. But they both knew their lives could never be woven together again. It seemed a little too late. Was it really?
Jen was half happy to have him back in her life. Slowly, they returned to being comfortable to opening themselves up to each other. He told her how much he disliked his work, and secretly hoped for a career in music that became his passion in college. She told him how much she secretly hoped that she would get a new roommate or wished to live alone, but was under parental pressure (?, :P) not to live alone and had to stay with a family friend's daughter who wasn't all that friendly. Everything was almost same as before...
Almost.
Huma somehow seemed like an interruption. A wall. A partition. A national border overwhich a cold war prevailed. Before she even realised, she began wondering what he saw in her. Zak kept hinting her tht he had something special coming up. And he said that she'd want to help him out in it...
The days that followed safter he told her about the surprise she felt restless. She had forced herself to believe that she had fallen out of love. She dint want to accept to herself, sumthin that did not even have a chance of working out.
The show was getting over. He had led her to believe that he was going to propose to Huma, and he needed to talk about it to her, and wanted her to help. He had prepared everything well. But as the saying goes, he hopes for the best, but prepared for the best. He asked her to come to Costa. Where he did it wouldn't matter to her, whether it be atop a mountain, underwater, or Costa. The point was, he was going to do it.l He was finally going to tell it to her.
He found her sitting at a table, staring into nothingness, seeming to have lost herself in wonderful fantasies, or was it disturbing nightmares? He sat opposite to her.
Zak took the seat opposite to hers; and she did not like him sitting in a way that would allow him to read her emotional tantrums going through her mind.
" Huma isn't here yet i gues..." she sed not meeting his eye
"I never said she's gonna come"
" what? but u sed u... no.. wait... u don;t epect me to talk to HER about YOU, do u? cuz i reeli don;t know her well and i can't...."
"All i want you to do is..." he handed her an envelope that he removed from his jacket.
With a doubtful look, she tuk the envelope from him, opened it, and removed the paper to see wht it contained. Her heart was in her mouth. Over the paper, Zak saw her eyes narrowing, and glaring back at him.
"Its a blank sheet of paper" she said tryin to sound calm, but too bad, she sounded mad anyway.
"Oh wrong envelope, sorry" He handed her another one from wher the first one came, with his characteristic goofy grin.
She snatched it from him, ignored his smile, and opened it a little too harshly, expecting it to be a continuation of the prank... she removed a paper in which was written..
"If you love something set it free. If it comes back to you, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was...
.. i already lost you once. I may have been your friend at one time, but ur foolishness did not influence me enough to lose you again..."
Shocked, she got up from her chair

He stood up and gave his charming smile, and looked into her eyes. She felt his intense gaze and knew instantly that he'd played with her heart for a good 40 days...

Mixed feelings of anger, annoyance and lots of other inexplicable good and bad emotions overwhelmed her. She couldn't decide whether or not she shud pour the leftover coffee on his hair.

Zak probably sensed this and quickly hugged her. Now, she obviously had no time to think.

DUH she hugged him back.