Love at First Swipe ✓

Stay Away.

Five days since I started skipping work- I've been sitting at home all day, researching, working on the article. Twenty-three links, nothing that has direct evidence, forty-eight notes hanging all over my wall, three sub-theories, eleven suspected members. My brain is too small to figure it out, my heart can't be used here although I wish I could.

Arjun tried to talk to me but I kept ignoring his calls with a message, "I'm busy". The first two days, I expected him to come and check on me. Hope. I realised by day three that I'm not Tara Shetty, for him to care enough. He'd even care about killing an animal to eat meat, forgetting that it's a law of nature, the great cycle of life, but he doesn't seem to remember that I, a whole human, Trisha Mehra could possibly be dying on the inside.

Talking to myself just makes me realise how pathetic I'd sound if I said these out loud. How dramatic! people would say. But Trisha is dramatic. I've always been. I'm working on a whole article just for that. But do I want to? Am I capable of pulling this off? I don't know. I don't even know what I'm trying to prove.

My phone buzzes again and I'm ready to click on ignore, but I see the name. Payal. I answer it.

"So, you think this will work?", she asks.

Yeah, I'm still helping Payal despite making a deal with Karan. Why? Because I still think with my heart.
I decided to use my brain and see how I can make a win-win situation. So I decided to both publish the article as well as help Payal. I know that it isn't the best idea, but again, it could be worth the risk.

I definitely didn't think of all this at first, I wanted to really ditch Payal for those credentials. But my brain seemed to try and work during my lonely time.

"Yes, it will and I'm with you", I reassure Payal, "go ahead and file your complaint".

Is Payal my friend? I don't know. She could be. But again, I don't want hope. On days like these, I think of my mom.  I think of how she managed to be lonely. But again, all I think is- isn't it the loneliness that killed her?

I wish I could scream and tell everyone around me that this is not okay, it is not okay for me to keep wavering back and forth, to care about everything too much or too little, that my past doesn't have to affect me each time and make me do things I don't want to do. But the voice never comes out. So I do the only thing I'm capable of doing. I sit alone and blame myself for falling in love with Arjun, I blame myself for loving Ayesha, I blame myself for being me. I only want to push people away.

The doorbell rings interrupting my thoughts. I think of who it could be. I wish it would be Arjun but again, I don't want it to be Arjun. I want to stay as far as possible from him. I open the door, to see Arjun standing at the door. My heart skips a beat looking at him, like I want to jump over him, hug him, kiss him and tell him that I've fallen in love with him. But I don't. I give him a smile but I realise that it comes out as a sad half-smile.

"Are you okay?", he asks me and I just nod. I move out of the way so that he can get in.
He walks in and I close the door behind him.

"I've missed you", he says pulling me into a hug and I barely hug him back. He pulls back, scanning my face, cupping my cheeks in between his arms and looks at me, waiting for me to give him an eye-contact.

"You have to tell me what's going on in that head of yours", he taps on my forehead.

"I've just been busy with the whole article".

He scans around the room, sees the notes stuck up against the wall and gives an understanding nod.

"Can you call it a day? We could order some food, watch a movie, spend some time together".