When I pass by the ugly streams and the glaring concrete,
It hides under the bridge waiting to catch the next train.
When my bathroom walls echo their early morning woes,
It drips down my shoulders and gushes out the drain.

I cannot for a moment catch a breath as it calls to me-
Under the blue waters, smelling like chlorine and making my teeth ache.

Tall trees and tiny buildings look pretty, like icing on a cake.
But it creeps into their shadows like a harsh summer, claiming them all.

We held hands, sighed collectively and asked each other, ‘Why?’
We gulped down the streams and hugged the rocks under the bridge.
On the way home she cried herself to sleep on my shoulders,
And I saw it behind her ears, hiding in plain sight.

It all started with a 1-hour conversation that I had with my best friend, one that involved telepathic cheers after clinking of imaginary glasses over fine, fine whisky. We both decided to move on in life, or start a life in my case and start online dating- again. She was new to it. I was not. Yes, yes, I have broken hearts online. And stomped on them by cruelly deleting the chats after long boring conversations.

This time though, this time I was serious. I wanted it. I wanted to feel alive. And of course, a relationship is the best way to start being alive. Dust off the cobwebs and get into the groove. Here comes the epic relationship — big, bad and bruising. And you will find it here, among the bright yellow cards on Bumble.

So off we went. We created brand new profiles — mine was chic and smooth, designated to trap all the innocent victims and drag them crawling and screaming, shivering in fright. What happened was totally out of character for me. I usually ignore profiles of people I know. But not this time.

Then I saw his profile.

I can give you a general idea about this person. Imagine a dude who never attends class, skips most or all of it to travel and do what not, hangs out with other cool dudes. And there was this one time during our college trip when I saw him sitting alone in the middle of a trekking zone and smoking. Being the close-minded basket case that I was at the time, I bristled up and thought, “This dude is full of shit.” I was full of shit. When I say shit, I mean the worst smelling shit of all human feces. But that is another story for another day.

So I swiped right. I did not think much of it. I had a feeling he did not remember me ( I was inconsequential in college) and would swipe left. The next day, I saw that I had one more ‘bee’ in my proverbial nest. He had swiped right.

Holy shit!

I freaked out. I found my old silly little teenage self roar inside me. She was erratic, browsing through his profile a million times to find one thing to start the conversation with. There was a butt-load of crap in his profile — the guy seemed to be quite eloquent and deep. The adult version of me stamped down her foot and sent him a message, after about 10 hours — something vague about the profile picture. You would think that the first question I would ask would be this — Do you know me? But no, I had to embrace my sneaky self.

Minutes turned into hours and hours into half a day, three-quarters of a day and finally — five minutes to complete twenty-four hours. Stupid Bumble. Why does it have a 24-hour rule anyway? To kill the hopes of idiots like me. That’s why.

So. Bad boy did not reply. How dare he not? And my inner teenage-good-girl was in despair. She took up refuge under her best friends opinion. I showed my friend his profile.

“Isn’t this sexy?”

“Meh. He probably copied it from somewhere to trap eloquence-loving girls like you.” Like the spider capturing its prey.

I see.

I was thrown and dunked in my own pool party.

The designated bad boy from my old college ghosted me. was originally published in House of an over-thinker on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

How it all began.

When I think of gaming, the first image that comes to me, is of me and my brother playing the ‘Harry Potter and Chamber of Secrets’ game, around what feels like fifty years ago.

This could be an involuntarily altered figment of my childhood memory. But I do remember my brother climbing our gate and running over to his senior’s house to get the application copied onto a floppy disk/DVD.(who knows) Although I do not remember the installation process, (all those mudane details never managed to catch my interest) I can still feel my fingers pressing the up key for floating Harry to move forward. Discovering the way to tackle all the challenges, though tedious never stopped us. It is my brother however, who discovered how to move forward in every single challenge. I copied him, like the smart girl I am. The best part is when Harry climbs up some cave like the one in ‘The Dark Knight Rises’. Only the right combination of keys would get little Harry from one ledge to the other. Often he would be left clinging on to one ledge with just a hand to support his entire body. Little Harry never disappointed, he’d climb onto the ledge with the use of his strong back and triceps. I used to stare at him in awe, wondering if I would ever be able to pull myself up like the little pro.

People who have never played the game would be wondering. What in the everwonderful world is she talking about. You are right. I completely missed the point. The most wonderful part of the game was when Harry lost balance, trying to jump through the ledges on the wall. He then falls down the cave into darkness and the scar shaped life symbol that was completely covered in green turns colorless. And we hear a pathetic scream, echoing through the speakers, and we’d yell too… AHhhhhhhhh, like a bunch of silly cats crying for no reason. This too is a tradition started by my brother. I am just following in his footsteps.

When we were young, we were forbidden from doing a lot of things. Things normal pre-teenage kids take for granted. And just like any normal kid, whatever was forbidden to us, seemed all the more juicy and delicious. Playing games, unnecessarily talking to each other, watching movies without parental supervision etc etc. As soon as father leaves for work, both of us will take seats in front of the computer. Sometimes in a reclining chair. Sometimes in a white plastic chair, that is more apt for playing games. And one of us would make Harry collect all the flavoured beans that floated around. It did give a strange satisfaction, hearing the sound of beans being collected. The game developers sure knew their way around a child’s heart. Some days I wished I could actually be Harry and eat all those stupid beans we made him collect. He never ate them anyway. Idiot.

And Aragog!! How can I forget him. The best and the worst challenge. We got Harry killed many many times, trying to figure out how to murder Aragog and his swarm of spider-kids. Aragog would scream in a gravelly voice. “Kill him, my children, kill him myyyyyyy childrennnnnnn” Like as if one time is not enough. Thousands of dog-sized spiders would crawl up towards my little Harry. The trick was simple though. To run around simultaneously pressing up and left keys and clicking the mouse at the dumb creatures. Harry would yell either Rectusempra or Ridiculous. I am not sure which one. Could be entirely different though. After we discovered the trick, Aragog was pretty easy to conquer. And then Ron enters car in tow, which leads us to think why the hell he shows up after the dumb spider gets killed. Harry sure could have used another wand.

When it is time for father to return, we would switch off the fan and light of the “Computer Room” as it was called. And still is. The hottest room in the entire planet. An apt place for a PC. The curtains closed, so the light from monitor is not reflected on the windows. And pin drop silence, even from little Harry as the speaker system will be off. We were so accustomed to the sound father’s scooter that we’d recognise it from a 200m distance uphill. We’d pull the plug of the PC directly from the source because there is hardly any time for even closing the application let alone 10 minutes of booting before shutdown. Back then there was something called UPS that handled battery when the power was off. This device would start screaming if we forgot to switch it off before pulling the plug. It made a sound similar to modern day fire alarms, and you can guess what happens next.

But this happened only when the UPS crossed its prime, when it could no longer fulfill it’s purpose of life. But father still kept it, he could not bear to part with most things. I am pretty sure, the UPS is still in some corner of the house enjoying the company of the same PC it served and some floppy disks.

But that is besides the point. We still managed to keep most of our illegit activities under the hood from our parents. A talent that I have possibly carried well into adulthood. Something my brother unlike me, decided to discard at a very young age. Well, good for him.

Going back to the story, me and brother would run for the door. At least one of us would. The other runs to the room and hides behind his/her respective desk’s. And pretend to be a good kid. We were, actually.

That was my first introduction to the world of Harry Potter.