Fist Bump

Chapter 17

One Year and a Few Months Later...

I pushed Sooraj out of the way and took hold of the TV remote and changed the channel from a sports channel to a news channel. I felt nervous.

"Hey, I was watching that," Sooraj complaining.

"Well, this is more important," I said.

"What? That?" He pointed at the TV. "Some dude getting convicted for murder?"

"Yeah. Now shut up." I listened to the news. A few months earlier Gauri's uncle was arrested from his office with the charges of conspiracy of murder and attempted murder. Apparently, they had managed to find evidence against him for Gauri's dad's murder as well. The guy was on trial all this while. The verdict was today. I increased the volume of the news. They said in the news that the guy gets 14 years in prison.

"Wait, what? 14?" I asked to the TV. "That's it? Ha..." I turned to Sooraj, "He killed his own brother. He tried to kill his niece. And 14... That's it?" I was furious.

"Well, I am not the judge," Sooraj said.

"Why are you so obsessed over this case anyway?" Dev asked flinging his arm around my shoulder. "Who is that guy?"

"Some asshole," I said, handing the TV remote to Sooraj. They had moved to another news story. "He tried to kill my girlfriend," I said.

"You don't have a girlfriend," Dev said.

"Yes. I have...." I said, sitting on the back of the couch. They had not told anything about Gauri on the news. Where she is, what she is doing...nothing. Why don't they tell that stuff on news??

"No. You don't..." Dev said. "Or are you talking about the imaginary girlfriend you are saying you claim to have since the start of college?"

The guys never accepted the fact that I have a girlfriend. They think I am lying.

"Just because she and I are not together right now, does not mean I don't have one. Okay? I have one. Her name is Gauri. She is awesome."

"So she is your ex-girlfriend," Dev said.

"Or he imagined the whole thing and she never existed," Sooraj said.

"She does exist, guys," I said. "That guy," I pointed at the TV, "is her uncle, who tried to kill her."

"What is this? A movie?" Dev laughed. "Veer, you should limit to believable level in bluffing."

"Yeah," Sooraj said. "That guy is like rich. Are you telling me that your girlfriend is a millionaire? Please bluff with a bit of modesty."

"The Gauri Rai Choudhari in the news IS my girlfriend. I can prove it to you." I said, taking out my phone and holding out the photo of her and me together, taken by Sameera didi on the day we dressed her up as a girl. I held it out to the guys.

"Photoshopped," Sooraj said.

"Or random girl. How can you prove that it's your girlfriend? It's not like you are kissing in the photo. And it's one photo. It's not even like you have any other photo of her."

I cursed and took another photo. It was a photo of Jai and me. Jai and I have countless photos together. But Jai as a girl is only that photo. I was apprehensive to show Jai as a guy photo to these guys. Besides, why should I even bother to prove to these guys? Sure they are my sort of friends in college. The closest guys in college. But it's not like they were my best friends. They were not even remotely close to what Jai was.