I sat in my seat and pretended not to notice the guy next to me. Yep, I completely ignored him.

Okay fine! I peeked at him through the corner of my eyes. He was good-looking. Short dark brown hair, good physique *grin*, and brown eyes that were staring at me. I let this go on for around five minutes. Him staring and me discreetly looking at him. Then, I got tired of the charade and so, I faced him and cocked one eyebrow. He reared back.

Man, was I that scary?

He cleared his throat nervously and looked away. I mentally sighed. I didn't want to be stuck on this flight without having someone to talk to. I knew I had forgotten something! I mentally slapped my head. How could I forget to bring a book? Books were my life! Oh my god! I was leaving my soul in Bangalore!!

Ok I'm being too melodramatic. I should talk to the guy.

I gave him the friendliest smile I could muster and I said, "Hey!"

He, however, looked at me in panic and said,"I have a girlfriend."

I suppressed my laughter and said,"I didn't ask you to marry me, bro. I just said 'hey'. An appropriate reply would be 'hi' or something similar." He looked at me and said,"Sorry, I get kinda nervous around people."I smiled,"yeah, got that."

Yep. Gonna be a boring-ass flight.

I turned away and looked out the window. We hadn't lifted off yet *sigh*. I wonder how it'll be when I reach. You know when you're excited as hell and you have this weird feeling in your stomach. Yeah, I had something like that going on at the moment. It was unnerving. It was my first time out. What if I get lost, end up being mugged and become homeless!!?? What if I got onto the wrong plane!?? What if the acknowledgement letter I got from the University turned out to be fake!!?? What would I do!!?? Shit, I should've let my father come along! 

NO. JUST NO. I earned my freedom. I wanted to be free and do what I want without looking around to see if there was anyone who could report back to my parents. I wanted my cell phone to be my private communication device. I wanted somewhere to keep secrets and I wanted to be me. No, this was a good idea.

My parents were chilled out people, but I just couldn't shake off the feeling that they were watching my every move. They gave me freedom, a lot more than other people. But I still felt restricted. I was going to live by my rules now.

Suddenly, the guy next to me cleared his throat and said,"I'm Ayan. You?"

To say I was surprised was an understatement. I looked at him in amusement, again cocking one eyebrow. He just grinned and shrugged. I smiled back and said,"Ana. I'm Ana." 

"First time out?", he asked. I nodded,"Was it that obvious?" He just smiled at that and I took it as a yes. "Scary and possessive girlfriend?", I asked. He blew a breath out and said,"you have no idea."

I nodded once, indicating that I could understand. "Which University?" was his next question. "Columbia", I said proudly. He looked surprised, "me too."

Same University!!?? YES! I hoped he'd stick with me, I wouldn't get lost that way and end up homeless. This was hopefully going to be the start of a beautiful friendship. At least I was going to make it one! As much as I didn't want to admit it, I needed help getting to the University and arranging everything. Yes, I know I'm too proud.

"Cool!", I said nonchalantly, "Which branch?" "Comp science", he replied. I grinned broadly, "dude! ditto!"

I could sense that this was a moment in our budding friendship.

Time passed pretty quickly after that. We shared college stories, spoke about his girlfriend, final year projects, his girlfriend, food, exams, America, whatever we knew about Columbia, his girlfriend and so on.

He was obsessed with his girlfriend.

Did I mind? Naaah.

No seriously. He was cute and all but nope.

I was a girl who immersed herself in books. No not academic books, I meant novels. I wasn't that big a nerd. Reading books made me float in this kind of limbo that was akin to heaven, if it existed. My heaven would have all the books in the world, if it didn't, I was going to smack God on the head repeatedly until I get all the books in the world.

I was the master of tantrums. No one, I mean, NO ONE could match my tantrums. What can I say? I was an only child and I was peppered with love. And my parents were the youngest of their brothers and sisters, both of them. A few of my cousins hated me *smug grin*. Yes, I have a lot of cousins, mainly because my parents have a lot of brothers and sisters. Yep, my grandparents were bizzzzaayyy people, if you get my meaning.

Anyway, thanks to my new companion who has a girlfriend, I endured the flight. Ok I got sick of listening to him talk about his girlfriend and asked him to shut up sometime ago but hey! I apologised! THE GUY IS OBSESSED! He'd walk on needles if she asked him to and I had a feeling she was capable of asking him to do just that. Sad, but who am I to judge.

We got off the flight and made our way through the airport. He was still silent. I felt bad about telling him to shut the hell up and so I said,"dude, seriously. I'm sorry." He just smiled and said,"No, it's not that. We need to get a bus or a cab. I'd say cab because both of us have a total of eight bags." I nodded.

And so we went. It was all pretty quick, we got into a cab in a matter of minutes and zoomed away to secure our future. Ok, I made it sound like we're a married couple. If I told that out loud, I have no doubt he'd open the door of the moving cab and jump out.

We got to the campus and got ushered to the dorms. Wow! its pretty systematic around here. If we were in India, we'd probably get yelled at for being so clueless.

I tuned to Ayan and said,"Thanks man." He nodded,"Thanks to you as well. Well then. See you around." I said the same,"See you around." We shook hands and went different ways.

Yes, we engineers shake hands. We're just expected to, its an unspoken but expected way to greet people or say goodbye. It was a kind of unspoken rule, I suppose.

Cue the drumroll.

I was, now, standing in front of my room. My room. I had my own room back home but this was different. I was bouncing slightly on my heel. Nervous as hell.

I took a deep breath and opened the door using the key they had given me. I let out the breath. This was ok. I could work with this. It had a small kichenette, two rooms with beds and tables, bathroom. All the essentials. I dropped my bags into one of the rooms. The other already had bags. Occupied, I suppose. My roomie was already here. I looked around, making my way through the small place which I was supposed to call mine for the next three years. This was pretty cool.

I stretched and called my parents. After a loooong conversation where I described everything from the campus to the colour of the room, they breathed a sigh of relief and allowed me to keep the phone. I obviously left out Ayan. If I told them about him, they'd fly down and drag me back to India by the ear.

I wondered who my roomie was. I'll meet her soon, anyway. How do I know its a girl? Her bedspread was pink. No self-respecting guy would use a pink bedspread. I'm not saying pink is a girly colour, because it definitely isn't. Look at me, I prefer blue. Or black *evil smirk*. I'm just stating that guys just don't use pink.

I should look around.

I left my bags in the room and began exploring. I went onto the previous floor, next floor, whereever I could, and looked around. I was walking back toward my room. MY room. I just had to *grins*. My head was turned 180 degrees (effect of being an engineer, don't judge) and I was walking forward, when suddenly I made contact with something hard ... and soft? At the same time?

My head snapped toward the object I had collided against and I saw ... A gray shirt. A shirt? I looked up. It was a guy, a tall one at that. I opened my mouth to apologise when my black irises made contact with green ones.

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Hey guys! Hope you liked it. Stay tuned for more ;-)

OOOOH green eyes :P

Enjoy, vote and comment, people :)

Picture of Ayan to the right!

- Mad_Hatter95