My Favourite Story

It was August 4th2004. “I LOVE YOU Rishitha, I have been trying to tell you this, the day we entered college on August 4th 2003. In that pink chudithar you were looking like an angel. Your calm smile, the way you held your dad’s hand, all eyes were giving you their secret attention. Each of us was conscious that the other should not notice.

The moment you turned and asked me pen I was flying in the air. I decided at that moment that you could only be my better half. If I had asked you that moment, you would have told asked umpteen for which I would not have had any answer. But, now, I know I love you. Please…” said Vaibhav.

The class strength was 14, 8 boys and 6 girls.

“Err… I am sorry. I don’t even know your name. In which department are you in?” asked Rishitha.

Vaibhav was prepared with answers but not for such a question. He looked at her disappointed. Words were finding it difficult to make way out of his throat but finally he spat them out, “I am Vaibhav. I am doing my second year in ECE.” She is overacting her part.

“Vaibhav, I am sorry for it might seem awkward for the way I asked you, but, but do you know that I don’t have a good friend through whom I can make a good network of friends. And, I am sorry Vaibhav I decided that I will marry the one my parents want me to. It might seem funny but that is the way I am.”

He looked at her seriously, “Do you love me or not?”

“No.”

“Fine thanks for your err… reply. Bye”

“Vaibhav a sec, Would you, would you mind being my friend?”

“No.”

She felt as if she had been slapped on her face hard. She looked at him longingly. That night seemed to drag itself like the sorrow-stricken child who had lost her mother. She heard her teardrop hit her pillow before she even knew she was crying. The pain was unbearable. His words where still ringing in her ears like an echo. She pulled her pillow and put it over her ears and held it close with the hope that she will not hear him anymore.

She didn't know why she was crying, but she knew that if anybody spoke to her or looked at her too close the tears would fly out of her eyes and the sobs would fly out of her throat and she'd cry for a week. She could feel the tears brimming and sloshing in her like water in a glass that is unsteady and too full.

She got up from her bed and walked up to the mirror, “Vaibhav, will you never understand. It’s because I liked you that I asked pen to you, it was just that I wanted to show you that I knew very little about you that I asked you who you were. But, finally you said a “NO” for all my affection. I like you very much as a friend. I like you so much.” She sobbed till her eyes were dry.

She walked up to her shelf took her diary and wrote.


I am in a secret place, the land of tears, All I want is your friendship to waive of my fears.
There is no greater love than this,
There is no greater gift that I can miss.

If you decide to be my friend,
Even for a day.

I would walk all the way to where you are.
For I love you my friend, for who you are.

I know fire can burn, I know a knife can hurt. But today it is you who has shown me that a ‘NO’ can kill.



The page had tears and the letters were all smudged. She looked at them but she could clearly read them for each word in it was engraved in her heart, to hurt her.

She fell asleep with drops drying on her cheeks.

“Hi! Vaibhav, how are you. Have you finished your assignment that KKR Sir had given us?”

“Hi Tanu, yeah am done with it. Am a bit busy shall I catch you later? Bye.” Without waiting for an answer he walked away aimlessly.

Vaibhav sat near the window wanting to see her at least once, at least a second. She did not come. He looked around. Nobody seemed to be bothered about her.

He was surprised at the way people in the class looked at her absence.

Lunch bell rang.

He sat with his gang and without his own knowledge words slipped out of his mouth, “Hey Rishitha did not come today Na… What’s up guys?” Only when the words were out he realized that he was wrong.

All his friends looked at him in surprise. To keep up his ego he just kept up the same expression with real difficulty. None of them answered him. They changed the topic and finished their lunch and left for their classes.

His close friend Vinod said, “Vaibhav, Rishitha is a very good girl but unfortunately all the six guys in our class have asked her out and have got a ‘no’ for an answer from her too soon. So they all hate her. The guys hate her because she is not theirs and the girls hate her because they are jealous of her. Finally, it finishes off with the two of us. I don’t talk to girls and you have no idea of her. It leaves with her being all alone.”

Vaibhav’s blood became cold. He wondered, “A girl so pretty and so lovable is without a friend?”

That night he could not sleep. He still felt her voice lingering within him, deep inside him, from some corner of his heart.

“Vaibhav a sec, Would you, would you mind being my friend?”

He could not sleep that night. He felt sick and tired. He did not go to college for the next two days.

Rishitha felt an urge to see Vaibhav. She took the courage to meet him at his place. She wondered how he would react to her. She knocked the door and it was Vaibhav’s mother who opened the door. She introduced herself and walked in. Vaibhav came down the stairs looking at Rishitha.

He gave her a warm smile. They spoke for an hour and when the finished they were the best of friends.

He dropped her back home. For the next four years their friendship grew all the more with each passing day. Slowly people understood Rishitha and they became good friends, but, the best always remained Vaibhav for Rishitha.

It was time for Rishitha to get married. Everything went off fine and she was now Rishitha Vinod. Yes it was the same Vinod who never spoke to girls. It was an arranged marriage. Vaibhav was leaving to Australia on a project.

It was August 4th 2008. Vinod and Rishitha decided to surprise Vaibhav. They dropped at his place early that morning. But he had gone out for jogging.

Rishitha decided to cook for Vaibhav.

She was busy in the kitchen when Vinod disappeared into Vaibhav’s room.

After an hour he came out with tears in his eyes and a diary.

He went directly into the kitchen and thrust the diary into Rishitha’s hand and said,” Dear read it.”

Rishitha took the diary and flipped through the diary, there was only one page written. She read it.


I LOVED YOU...

I loved her with all my heart. I still love her with all my heart. She is the only one I love with all my heart. My love has met its end the day I gave birth to it. I am really lucky for I built the Tomb over my love for the one I love itself. She will always be very special.

Today when I look again into my heart I see that in truth I am weeping for that which has been my delight for a year.

No words can depict the pain and love I carry today. I can’t leave her the way she is now.

She needs SOMEONE, someone to be there all through her life.

To hold when she falls,
To give her a shoulder she wants to lean, She needs SOMEONE and that is a friend.

I shall kill my love. Kill my love for the one I LOVED. It might seem ridiculous but I can let my love alone in this world. Let her find the one she wants to share her world with. I shall be by her side till that very moment. I shall not suppress my feelings rather I shall kill it.


For me more than my being with her all through her life, I need to be with her when she most needs it. I shall be with her.

I shall pour out my love with thousand drops of tears. I shall pour it out till I am drained out of all love, But can we drain out the sea… THAT IS HOW MUCH I LOVE YOU. If a day comes that I should leave her… I wonder if she will ever miss me.

But I have decided…

FOR THE ONE I LOVE…I WILL BE A FRIEND FOR LIFE…

Rishitha I will be your friend for the rest of my life.



She dropped to the ground stunned. He had sacrificed his love for her… She felt tears wetting her cheeks. She ran into Vinod’s arms. He looked at her and said, “I know ma, you did not love him. But listen even if I was in his place I would not have loved you so much. I want one thing from you all though your life.” He paused for a second.

“I want you to be the best you can to him. I WANT YOU TO BE THE BEST FRIEND YOU CAN to him as long as you’re alive. I don’t want Vaibhav to know that we know all about his love. I don’t want to see him guilty. Just be as you are now… forever. Your worth all the pain he has taken for you’re the best a person can search in a friend. ”

She thought, “All this while I had held his hand, relied on him. But, not once I’ve felt him to be guilty. I could never have got a better friend had I searched the entire world.”

The door opened and it was Vaibhav. He looked at them surprised. He looked at her. That one look of his was enough for her to realize what a friend he was. She ran into his arms and said,” I OWE YOU MY LIFE... YOU’RE MY BEST FRIEND. I WILL MISS YOU”

He held her close to his heart, dropping a tear so that it might wash away her guilt. He thought, “Who said being a friend is not worth the pain?”

He left for Australia with a great relief and felt as if he had won the most prestigious award.

She wrote in her diary


VAIBHAV…I OWE YOU MY LIFE… YOU’RE THE BEST GIFT I EVER RECEIVED.