A Thousand Encounters

Chapter-42

It was sunny bright Wednesday. Town was certainly sighing in relief for the hump day. But there was a bunch of boys who had every reason to be more than excited for the following day. That hilly town hardly had anything for those cadets who barely got time to enjoy and when they were given a chance, they were going to celebrate it like there's no tomorrow. 

Manik sat on bench watching a busy street. He glanced at his watch and then at lively cafe across the road where young tourists were going crazy for God knew what. Dumping the empty box of dumplings in bin, Manik got up to kill the time in some other way. He was growing impatient. It was more than half an hour since Harshad had gone inside of that cafe to find a date. Manik was stuck with philanderer friend of his. He saw Harshad coming out with grin and he shook his head. He crossed the road dodging few bicycles. 

"This place is oozing hotness," Harshad exhaled the joy. 

"Dude, You have taken this date thing to another level," Manik marked his annoyance. 

A girl came outside and waved at Harshad. 

"She is hot, isn't she?" Harahd asked Manik while waving at that girl. 

Friend of that girl came out as well and glanced at boys. She whispered something into her friend's ear and both girls looked at Manik with a face Manik could never appreciate. Girls smiled at him and then asked them both to join. Manik scrunched his nose as if would die out of disgust if had to stay there any longer. 

"You all are ridiculous," Manik muttered and walked away. 

Harshad followed him laughing and held his shoulder to calm him down. 

"Relax, Gentleman," Harshad said slowing his friend down. 

"I don't wanna relax. Here I am worried how I am going to..." Manik started to rant about how he was going to ask Nandini properly but then he couldn't tell Harshad that he and Nandini were fine. 

"What?" Harshad asked clueless. 

"Nothing, it's just I have a lot to sort out, Bro," Manik covered up. 

"You know friend of my date was really interested in you. If you are okay, I can hook you up," Harshad tried to help only to get a growl from Manik. 

"How can you even say that?" Manik yelled in middle of mart only to attract attention of few passerby. 

"Why are you shouting?" Harshad was clueless.

"How can you even think about hooking me..." Manik slowed down realizing how he was shouting a bit too loud. 

"When you know..." Manik hinted towards his thing with Nandini. He gestured to Harshad through eyes to get it by himself. 

"When what?" Harshad was being dumb. 

"When you know...about...me and Nandini," Manik completed glaring him. 

"You mean standing under the lamppost every night and getting unique punishments," Harshad uttered and few girls who were standing by a shop laughed.

Apparently two handsome cadets in mart were center of attraction. 

"There is nothing like that," Manik chided. 

He would have thrown it in Harshad's face but then he couldn't risk someone jinxing it. Apart from that, he had no guts to explain what happened that night to Harshad. He just couldn't divulge the details, besides Nandini wasn't completely convinced yet. 

"You think first what you want and about what you are worried, okay?" Harshad had have enough. 

He walked ahead leaving a fuming Manik behind.