Where are you…. going? Bhawana finished the question after a series of sneezes. I say I don’t believe in superstition, and fight with myself to think the same way. However, I don’t like when someone asks me where am I going when I am ready to walk out with hope for something positive. When the question is coupled… well not just coupled but compounded with multiple sneezes, my dislike for her disruptive question soared. I know she knows the answer, or at least has a solid or even accurate guess. I can read the answer I am expected to spell out reflecting right in her tired eyes, which seem to struggle to spark with disgust. I know the answer –if I say- will flare up another round of argument. We tend to feel the same (win/loss) when we argue on the matter in question. The topic of the argument switches between its face territory and our ego so often and so swiftly that we scramble regularly –during argument- to figure out what ‘re we arguing about. I already had decided not to answer her “where are you going” question. Therefore, I just picked up the car keys and headed out. I could hear her screaming, “I am sick too. How about me?” as I stepped out. Yeah, she has flu. But, Sweta? …. I wish she had the same. Just flu. I wish. I know Sweta since when she joined our school at class 4. I must be honest in saying that she was not one of the beautiful girls even in the class. Forget about the school. At 4th grade, what I mean by beauty is purely aesthetic and nothing beyond. Although definition of beauty pretty much remain the same but the definition of girls developed to be a dynamic one as we ventured out to higher grades. When we (a bunch of guys I used to hang out with then) reached the 8th grade, girls meant a welcomed confusion to us. Most of the time, we were dazed around them. Sweta rarely provoked any attention from any of us. She had all what we used to talk about all the time yet we stayed away from her. I should not flicker for truth. So, here it is. Whatever beauty she may have was overshadowed by one of her legs. She used to limp a bit on the right side. If we got nothing much exciting going on, we used to pick on her limping leg and pronounce an unwarranted name “Langadi” for her. I sink as I write the “L” word here, but the truth does not change to compliment my wish. It was raining that afternoon. I was on my bicycle racing toward Sweta’s neighborhood. Of course, not for her but for Sristi. Sristi was the one who used to pump all of our hearts in all sorts of variations in or outside of the class. Since the reward was priceless, the competition was tough. I was open to Anita, Sumi, and many others as well but Sristi was Sristi. I was just hoping to get there before evening could descend challenging the already fading visibility. I hoped to see her but hoped she would see me too. Even hoped our eyes meeting mid air on their way to hit us. The sky was getting darker with rapidly moving dark clouds. Roaring thunders were annoying me breaking up my chain of thoughts Sristi commanded. People were retreated to their homes. It was a secluded neighborhood dominated with big and fancy houses with compound walls. I had to pass Sweta’s house to reach Sristi’s. I neither wished to see Sweta, nor I wanted her to see me paddling through. So, I sped as I approached her house. Just then a yellow-top perhaps 1973 toyota Corolla taxi continued running in opposite direction splashing the mud water all over me. Humiliation? even that in front of a girl’s (I didn’t care for her but still…) house! I got furious, and yelled - looking at the distancing cab - all the curses I could come up with at the driver, who I doubt heard anything I screamed out. But then….just then…damn!.....