a tWiSt In A tAle

I have somehow always believed in fairy tales and have always dreamt that someday something like a fairy tale would happen to me. A loud unclear announcement was enough to wake me up from my disturbed sleep- thanks to bedbugs. What followed was morning ablutions, drill and PT, followed by heavy breakfast and the completion of my hitherto incomplete sleep, in academic classes. I then had lunch and played basketball in games period. The day was as normal as any other but things were soon to turn around. just as it happens in fairy tales (When a boy then. So I calmly said” OK! So how this wasn't the correct word to use right After games, I took bath and while dressing up, I heard the Squadron Cadet Captain thought, (now I've had it) that I must have committed some 'grave mistake'. I rushed to his cabin. He said “Hey you, your girl friend is on the phone, she has called the telephone No of my Squadron to anyone not even to my family, how the hell did she get hold of it! And since when did I have a girlfriend? Riddled with many similar questions, I thought here is the beginning of my fairy tale. I picked up the receiver and said “Hello”. From the other side, a girl with a soft voice replied “Hi this is Shalini”. I mistook her for a friend from my hometown and with a feeling of pleasant surprise in my voice replied “Hi, how are you and how have you been doing?” She replied, “I am fine”. I queried “How did you get this number and where are you calling from? At this she said “that's a long story. I am in Pune, How is NDA?” The voice wasn't familiar and yet with excitement, I continued, “NDA is great, just as I told you when I was home, why don't you come to see NDA this coming Sunday, if you are in Pune?” She replied “I think you have mistaken me. I am Shalini Patil” This girl was right! I didn't know any one with that name, I asked “May I know whom do you want to speak to?” At this, there was a spate of questions, “Isn't that you Yashvardhan? Don't you recognize me, isn't this Alpha Squadron?” Whew, who is she? I thought.hat is my name, but who's this girl? I stuttered, “Ya it is Yashvardhan here, B…..b…..but I am sorry. I didn't recognize you”. Conscious of being the wrong person, I looked around the room and noticed that my senior was staring at me all through this episode. Receiving a call on this number was not my privilege. I was a bit worried, but all the worry vanished into thin air when, after a brief pause, this girl continued “I m Shalini Patil, daughter of Col Patil. I was your neighbour at Roorkee”. “Wow!” was the word that spurted out of my mouth instantaneously, but soon I realized that are you and where are you?” she told that she was studying at Symbiosis and wanted to see NDA. I asked for her number, but I did not have a pen or paper to write on. But meets a girl, magic occurs, beautiful mountains appear in the background, you hear violins playing and everything falls into place, the same would happen here and so I waved my hand in air and to my surprise, magic really happened) pop came a pen and paper into my hand. In a flash, I emerged from my reverie and saw that it was my senior who had done me this favour. I seemed as though my senior was more interested in the phone number than me, but I let things to be the way they were. I noted down her number and enquired if she would come alone or with someone else( she had a twin ,a complete look-alike) and she said that both of them would come. My heart stopped a beat when I kept the phone down and rushed out of my senior's cabin, suspecting that he would snatch the piece of paper.By the time I reached my cabin, the Study period had started and so there was no time to gloat over this grand success. For cadets at NDA, girls are mythical characters. It's like children asking each other, “Do you believe in ghosts?” Similarly, cadets here ask, “Do you believe in girls?” And trust me, the answer is always in negative, so you can imagine my state. I kept quiet about the phone call and did not tell any of my course mates about it, because I didn't rule out the possibility of a prank being played on me. Anyway, on Saturday evening, I got their names entered in the guest list. Finally, Sunday morning arrived. Handling one girl wasn't easy but now it was double trouble for me. I gathered all my guts and called the number they had given me and it was decided that they would arrive at Alpha Squadron. At 10 O'clock sharp, I glued myself to my cabin window, looking out, waiting for my guests to come and recollecting good old memories of how I used to wait with my friends every evening in front of my house before going for basketball, for these girls to pass by. They arrived at 11.30. Both the girls were strikingly similar to each other and I could tell between them only by their different dresses. We first went to the ante room, then to Nescafe and than to Cafeteria. At the cafeteria, I bought a cold drink and a burger for each of us. Like a typical NDA cadet, my concentration shifted from newly made friends to the eats in hands, and my small burger was finished in one go. I controlled my burp keeping in mind that the girls were sitting near by. Girls! Oops!! I shifted my concentration to the correct place. I could make out that these girls hadn't moved a single bit and that their burgers and cold drinks were completely untouched. My instincts were directing me to jump and grab their burgers and finish them off before these girls could realize this, but then I did not give into my wild urges. I asked politely as to why they hadn't started and Shubha (the twin sister) replied that they needed straws to have cold drinks. Though slightly embarrassing, it was a lesson learnt, immediately. I realized the need to be extra cautious when with someone not acquainted with NDA's rules of eating. They started drinking, correction, sipping their cold drinks, once I brought them straws. Their style of eating burger was no less strange to me. They would first break it/tear it (or whatever) and have such a small part with which even a bird would feel dissatisfied. It was pleasant meeting them, better chatting with them but the best part was that I had learnt a bit about how to behave with people who weren't from NDA. After this, they came a few more times to NDA. We met on my “liberty”, a couple of times, as well. On one fine when I had been sanctioned “liberty”, it was decided that we would meet at E-Square, a famous multiplex in the city. Again burgers and cold drinks were ordered (by now, I knew how to go about such things). With that special scent that I had put on, I had the confidence of revealing to Shalini that I was in love with her. Shubha went to fetch the snacks from the counter, while I poured out my feelings to Shalini. My heart stopped beating when she reciprocated positively. The fairy tale would have ended ideally with the proverbial, “AND THEY LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER” but this wasn't to happen. In the theatre, I wanted to sit beside Shalini. But things went wrong when Shubha sat in the middle and Shalini had to sit next to her. Completely unaware of this and thinking that it was Shalini, I watched the entire movie holding Shubha's hand with the latter not resisting this at all confirming ,as I thought her acceptance of me. The movie over, I saw Shubha excitedly whispering into Shalini's ears. Shalini's smiling face turned into a frown as she too shared something with Shubha. And then nemesis took over. I managed to reach the Academy, just before the time for liberty got over. I told my course mates that the torn shirt, broken tooth and black eye I had acquired was the result of a fall from the moving Auto that I had rented for returning to NDA. My belief in fairy tales has not been erased despite this rendezvous and I still dream that someday something like a fairy tale will be part of my life.