Dedicated to midnightskies-

*Starring Parth Samthaan as Manik Malhotra and Niti Taylor as Nandini Murthy.*

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Nandini blabbered some incoherent words as she snuggled deep inside her cozy blanket, to find warmth. With her eyebrows knotted in confusion, she continued murmuring, totally oblivion to her surrounding and the continuous ringing of her phone.
As the non-stop ringing started getting louder, her inner self screamed to throw that phone outside immediately, but instead, she plopped the phone on the bed and pressed the green button.

“Hmm…”, her drowsy self grunted.

“Hello, Nandu?”

Hearing the voice, she opened her eyes to look at the watch, which made her drowsy state fly away that instant. She immediately sat on the bed and hurried to the washroom, along with the phone.

“Nandini, you there? Hello—”, the voice reverberated in the washroom through the mobile.

“Yes, yes, Manik! I am here. What’s up?” Nandini bit her tongue in embarrassment as she continued searching for a pair of casuals in her wardrobe. She could feel Manik’s confusion and frustration seeping inside her though the phone screen.

“Where were you since past 15 minutes I was calling you? And after you pick up my call, all you say is ‘What’s up’! Seriously Nandini?”

“I was in college, receiving an award from our principal, for the best student of the year”, she pouted as the dream remained incomplete.

“What? When did our college start? And—” He sure was confused but he was quick to guess it too. “Nandini Murthy!! If you really want to achieve it, then stop sleeping till late and dreaming. Weren’t we supposed to meet now?” Manik was frustrated as he combed his hair with his hand.

“Yeah Manik, I know. Let me get ready ASAP and we will meet in 30 minutes.”

“15 minutes Nandu!”

“No, no, 30! Please pleaseee pleaseeee?” she pleaded.

“Fine!” Manik huffed. “But do remember to have your breakfast, okay?”

“Sure. See ya!” She rushed to the washroom without any delay.

After dressing up and having her favorite strawberry oats, she opened her laptop and was about to start a YouTube video, when an incoming video call disturbed her. She glanced at the watch to see that still five minutes were remaining from Manik’s scheduled time.

“What happened mam? You don’t seem quite happy seeing me”, the complaint came from the other end of video call after it received a small glare from the receiver.

“You are early by whole 5 minutes Mister. I told you to wait 30 minutes na.”

Manik chuckled. “It is you who is late by 25 minutes from our earlier scheduled time Nandu, so you don’t get to complain now. Moreover–“, his tone became serious but there was still a little smile on his face. “– I couldn’t wait to see you!”

Nandini smiled. “Same! I was dying to meet you. At least not physically, but I am glad we could meet virtually during this lockdown phase.”

“Seeing you forget our meeting, and complaining about me calling you 5 minutes early, I very well can predict how much you were dying,” Manik spoke ironically, while rolling his eyes.

Immediately Nandini jumped in, “That is not true. I was so excited that I couldn’t even sleep early and then dozed off in morning and now I wanted to…”

“Okay okay, I understood Mam. I was just teasing you. Look at you. You are flushing now,” he laughed lightly to which Nandini flushed more profusely. “Have some water and then we will start with Web development, okay? Did you watch what I asked you to see?”

“Actually I wanted more 5 minutes for that only. Didn’t get time to watch it yaar. Sorry,” she spoke cutely.

“You would watch whole 10 hours video in just few minutes? How fast! And don’t make cute faces. They won’t work on me,” he said closing his eyes tightly knowing that they were definitely affecting him.

And Nandini knew Manik’s weakness well too. After all, they were best friends for more than 4 years. Everything related to Nandini, whether it’d be her cute pleas or wild cries, her innocent tantrums or silent tears, did weird things in his heart and were always very close to him.

“Manik! Look at me naaa. Oh my god! You have grown beard. Uhh huu, dikhao na ache se (show me properly),” stiffing in a naughty smile, she again called him sweetly. She missed teasing him the way she used to do in college and right now, she was in full mood to compensate the passed time.

His hand immediately went to his cheeks, but all it touched was the sharp jaw bone and hard skin without any peck of hair. It was then he remembered, that he shaved it in advance, before calling Nandini. Whereas, Nandini was having high time controlling her laughter.

“I got you!” She shouted with excitement.

“I will see you in college madam,” he said it, but more to himself.

Mentally rolling his eyes, he immediately switched off his camera and shared the same web development video on screen. “Let’s watch it together. I will explain to you at time intervals. And if there remains any doubts, then ask me, okay?”

She was surprised. “Why did you switch off your camera?”

Obviously, a small tease can’t ruin his mood, she knew that. But what she didn’t knew was, that he was becoming more self conscious around her. He wanted to see her laugh, blush, feel annoyed, scrunch her eyes with confusion, and smile, but without making it obvious to her.

“Shall we start?” He asked without paying any heed.

“Yes, Monster Manik,” she tries to tease but without commenting, he started with his tutoring session.

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After completing one hour of that video, along with explanation and solving Nandini’s vast number of questions, Manik called it off for the day. “I think Nandini, now you should have your lunch.”

“At least switch on your camera now, please,” Nandini pouted. “Please, please, please?”

“Why do you want to see Monster Manik?”

“I want to see my cute Monster Manik, naa. Switch on your camera right now!” She demanded, to which Manik gladly gave in after she called him “her’s”. “I missed you and your teachings,” she said to him genuinely as soon as she saw his face on screen again.

He was speechless. Her words were so straight-forward and yet unexpected that they plucked different beats in his heart which sounded rhythmic yet strange to his own self. During the years of friendship, they were in same batch of same boarding school, and it was the usual routine of Manik to teach her computer related subjects which she reverted by clearing his conceptual parts of other theory subjects. They were never apart to really miss each other until this period, so those words were never exchanged between them until today, either.

Seeing a speechless Manik, Nandini continued, “When will we meet?”

“Super soon!” He answered. “Until then, how about our daily classes?” He chuckled thinking about her horrified response, but her expressions were exact opposite.

“DEFINITELY!” This separation definitely did different things in her to make her sound so excited about her ‘not so liked subject – computer’, but Manik really liked this change.

“Okay. So, see you soon sweetheart,” he winked. “Bye!”

“Bye Manik!”

Closing the laptop, Nandini took deep breaths. ‘He has called you sweetheart for umpteenth times in these 4 years, Nandu, but just as a friend. Stop blushing!' She reprimanded to herself but her crazy heart didn't find his casual laugh in the end. He was sincere this time, as he called her 'sweetheart', which was creating unknown emotions in her.

Things were yet to fire up, but this meet definitely ignited things between them. And probably this meet, 'the special meet' would be forever etched in their hearts too, giving rise to different questions that were yet to get their answers.

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After long, I am here on a very special occasion.

Happy BIRTHDAY BUDDY midnightskies-
Well, this 'special meet' is just to tell you that it was a very veryyy special and memorable day, I met you!
I hope you like my small surprise jaaneman! I love you❤