Periods, Pyaar And Patriarchy

Chapter Nineteen

Thursday morning found Vaibhav driving; this time actually to face the person he'd been avoiding more than he should've. He'd started off pretty early, early enough to not even give his mother time to force-feed him some breakfast under the pretext that he was far too skinny. At this point, Vaibhav was convinced that he could actually wear padding under his clothes to look bulkier and his mother would still find him skinny.

And while he was still a bit groggy with sleep, he found himself feeling fresher and fresher as he lowered down the window and allowed the cold morning air to hit him in the face. Within, no time; he felt much lighter- the air was doing him good. In the time he had been back home, he'd stuffed himself in the room and had probably given himself much more screentime than what he actually needed.

A brief consultation with an application that tracked his screen time had told him that he spent more than a whopping seven hours on Instagram alone. All that time on Instagram, while Shweta's message had still sat unread with a vivid red icon. No wonder his mental health was spiraling, his social media consumption was going to kill him sooner than swimming in crocodile-infested waters would.

He'd uninstalled the application early in the morning. There would be no spiraling, he'd been firm with himself about that. Maybe 'no spiraling' was a bit too ambitious, but he could always try. And looking around at nature for a change would do him good, instead of looking at his screen.

The endless number of reels on Instagram with montages of people changing into ten outfits in fifteen-second montages was a bit too much to take. And there would be the overwhelming amount of fake news that Vaibhav was slowly learning to swim through. There would be two extreme ends of the Indian political scenarios, tearing through each other- unaware that this seemed like a sick, psychological gladiator show.

Where the rich, the privileged, and the powerful sat quiet- and watched as common masses tore into each other; often breaking family ties of political ideologies.

Vaibhav was just glad to get away from all of that noise. It felt like too much to take at times and he didn't want to have to partake in it so much.

And having taken that decision, he felt much better. But that was, of course, more likely not because he'd uninstalled the application and more because he'd finally decided to face up on what had been chewing on him. He'd decided to face Shweta. Shweta had been pretty nonchalant about the meeting, but he knew her well enough to know that that was more likely her wanting him to think that she was nonchalant. He knew he owed her an explanation.

So, when he finally pulled up to the driveway of the café where they were supposed to meet, Vaibhav was glad that he was early. And he was gladder still that she was a bit late because that meant he had time to organize what it was that he wanted to tell her.

So, when Shweta finally arrived in the driveway; he was a bit nervous. He was sitting with his car door open when he saw her approaching the rear-view mirror. And because he was a bit nervous, he scrambled in an attempt to get up to receive her; thereby banging his head against the door frame of the car. True to her nature, Shweta burst out laughing before he even rubbed the spot on his head. He rolled his eyes at her, mildly annoyed; but relieved that the air between them would now be light.

"Good afternoon, how many fingers am I holding up?" Shweta laughed as she walked up to him. Vaibhav was tempted to make a corny line about fingers but he held himself back.

"That's not what a good afternoon looks like," Vaibhav grumbled falling back into the driver's seat, and Shweta laughed even further.

"Well, that's what mine looks like. But what does yours look like?" Shweta asked, her eyes still dancing with mirth.