Before 5th May, 2005

Life could not have been simpler: an average student in school, company of a few loyal friends, shadow of caring & loving family members and all the material possessions i could have asked for. 19 years of my life had passed without any complications and i was as happy as anyone could have been.

I never really had any substantial interaction with the opposite sex and was not aware of what it meant to be in a relationship. Little did I knew that the 3 years in Lucknow University, an educational hub, would change my life forever.

I met a lot of new people during my first few days in college; however, there were two distinct faces which lingered in my mind constantly. Bollywood has taught us that love at first sight is not an uncommon phenomenon, but I had my doubts about this teaching. However, till this day I am unable to infer what drew me closer to you and the more that i think about it the more i start believing in our Bollywood's age old formula.

Slowly, but surely, my reason for coming to the college changed from spending a good time with my friends to catching a glimpse of you, even if it was for a few seconds. Although the 'L' word never came into my mind, I knew that there was some force at work that was drawing me closer to you. Sitting and admiring you from far away became my favorite hobby. My one good friend, whom you now know very well, understood my condition and became my biggest support in this endeavor.

It was not until our final exams commenced that I realized how quickly the first year had passed and i had done nothing except admire you from a distance. I knew that if nothing concrete was done in the next few weeks I would have to wait for a long time, until the college reopened, to even catch a glimpse of you.

Time flies by, and so it did in this case. Our exams concluded and i could not muster the courage of going up to you and asking you for your phone number. Believe me, asking you for your phone number was all that I wanted to do under the circumstances. However, fate had something else planned for us and whatever happened on 5th May 2005 was as much a surprise for me as it probably was for you.