Vicissitudes of Life - II

There was another guy in college RJ. He too was deeply interested in me. I, of course, knew from the start that I couldn't go beyond friendship with him. But I made the mistake of discussing with him my relationship with R. RJ always criticised R for his wavering nature. I couldnt read between the lines. I didnt realize that he was trying to create a wedge between R and me. I fell prey to his intentions and like a dumb moron, accepted his proposal for me. But I felt RJ's love was very genuine.

When R came to know abt this, he was shaken. He reasoned out with me and told that he loved me a lot, that he really couldnt survive without me. I dunno whether it was bcoz of his words or a realization deep within, but I was suddenly brought back to reality, to my senses. I was brutally hit by the guilt of what I had done. Albeit, it was too late to mend the damage, bcoz I'd done something which couldnt be undone. I had toyed with someone's life, though it was entirely unintentional. True, R had wronged me, but that didn't give me the right to do the same with someone else. I apologised over and over again to both R and RJ, and pleaded with RJ to leave me alone. RJ tried his best to convince me to come to him but never succeeded. I'll never forgive him for certain things, but I feel I gave him the liberty to do those things.

R, ostensibly, pardoned me for the RJ episode & I was profoundly grateful to him. I discovered later that he used it as a weapon to hurt me at almost every available opportunity. Much as I wanted to wipe out RJ's bitter memory, R wouldnt let me do that.

But by this time, I'd resigned myself to fate. I decided to go ahead with R no matter how he treated me. I started believing that just as my mother longs for true love from her husband, I would yearn for it too; just as she doesn't have any happiness left in life, I wouldn't have too; just as she's surviving and not living, I would too. But it wasn't easy. My eyes were too used to seeing Cinderella dreams. It was tough to tell them that they shouldn't dream any further and those they had dreamt so far would never see the light of the day. It was a sort of compromise I'd made with life.

All this while, Ji had just been my classmate in college. He knew abt R's presence in my life. Then came the excursion arranged by our college - the excursion entrusted with the task of changing our lives forever. That trip virtually wiped out all distance between the two of us. We shared the darkest secrets of our life and each was equally taken aback. None of it was planned. The rest of the group had a blast and we being of the calmer genre, gelled well together. The result was a newfound friendship, I started respecting him tremendously. Period. I still never thought of him as anything beyond a very good friend...

[the rest will soon follow...]