14.08.2002 | 12:31 a.m
sometimes the silent ones talk louder than imaginable.

Kanika and I are sitting at Coffee Day , talking about our trip to Dubai. She's stirring her cold coffee and ice-cream and I'm fidgeting with my cell phone. The couple on the adjacent table keeps looking over at us and we keep looking back at them. Neither of our intentions are bad. It's just what happens in places like these.

"I can't believe 4 months passed so quickly. God, I feel like you've been here forever...I can't explain it.."

"I know exactly what you mean. Although....this has been the longest 4 months of my entire life..." I laugh and wave off the smoke drifting towards me from some other table. It's a little past 10:30 p.m and we have nothing else to do. We contemplate going to Bandstand for a while just to watch the sea but it's too late and the promenade will be full of couples at this hour. Kanika keeps stirring the coffee with the pink straw to delay its death. Almost instinctively, I turn to my right and see three boys entering the gates. I vaguely know one of them; the other was in Jai Hind, I'm pretty sure. The boy I know, Samarth, was in Jai Hind too. But I know him from a French class Kanika and I took when we were 15. Kanika's social circle intersects with his, and she knows him through all the parties she attends. I tell her he's here and she says "oh,cool" and we continue our wordless conversation. But then, a voice booms behind us and a hand falls on each of our shoulders.

"Hi girls!" He sits on one of the two spare chairs on our table and kisses our cheeks one at a time. Kanika and I look at each other slyly with partially amused, partially surprised smiles. He's talking incessantly about some party he met Kanika at, the theme of which was "Pimps and Ho's". He asks me if I was there too and I shake my head to indicate I wasn't. He tells us he wore an afro wig, a flashy vinyl shirt with buttons undone and thick gold chains. I ask him if the pimps were supposed to be from the 70s and he doesn't get it. "Nevermind." I say and look down at the time on my cell phone to hide my smile. He proceeds to tell us that one of his male friends dressed up as a whore, wearing a stuffed bra, mini skirt and fish net stockings. He points at the guy waiting at the counter for his order and tells us that's the guy. I mentally dress him in the attire described and I start laughing. "I bet he was gorgeous." I say. The other two walk back from the counter inside with a burger each and sit on the table too. Introductions and smile pass all around and I can feel my body inside going cold.

"Hey, you were in Jai Hind,right? Friends with Vivek and them?" one of them says before taking a huge bite of his burger. I validate him and wait for him to slurp in the gherkin so that he can respond. He says he knew he'd seen me somewhere. The other guy sits silently just looking abstractedly ahead of him. I catch his eye and smile.

"I'm sorry, I didn't get your name....um, how do you spell it?" he asks,apologetically.

"Aurina. A-U-R-I-NA..."

"Pretty.."

"Thanks..." I begin to ask him if he lives on Pali Hill, but Samarth distracts me and asks me how Jai Hind is. I tell him I have no idea; I study in London and he looks at me and says "Oh nice! I'm studying in Carnegie Melon right now." I'm impressed and I tell him so. We exchange a few stories about studying abroad and suddenly he asks me to smile and takes a picture with his state-of-art cell phone. I groan and everyone laughs. Reluctantly, I look at the image on the screen and there I am. Slight smile looking downwards, my nose ring glistening. "Not so bad eh?" he says and everyone agrees with him.

So here I am. On a table with four others, three of whom are virtual strangers. One of them is endearingly boisterous and talking boyishly about sex. The other one is narrating a story about phones falling into toilets and the third sits in silence, either listening intently, or day dreaming. Kanika sits with her arms crossed, her pretty eyes dancing with delight. As for me, I'm glad I don't live in Bombay anymore. I just wish I'd known the quiet boy when I did.

deja vu? | jamais vu?