The breeze was chilly and the sun was set. The fairy lights hanging in the balcony since last Diwali were still swaying and cello tape used to stick them had not given yet. The weed was almost crushed and getting rolled into a joint.
The phone kept ringing but I was staring at it, waiting for it to stop, smoked a joint I had rolled and the ringing vanished with the smoke of the joint and so did the anxiety of the call.
The girl next door had started her evening routine of taking a walk back and forth her terrace, wearing headphones, probably just taking her stroll. All the guys gathered around the windows to admire her walk. The Netflix anime playing on TV had no audience left.
We boys grouped on top of each other to get a glimpse of her from the window. She had probably noticed us noticing her but she continued walking. Occasionally flipping her hair when she drew closer to the our side of the terrace. Knowing all well that she was being watched, she didn’t care and neither did we. Making sure to not be deliberate in this game, we gathered a few chairs and started removing the fairy lights from Diwali. It was a one person, five minutes job, it took four guys and twenty minutes that day to get those lights down.
She went back inside after a while and so did the excitement in the guys, the anime had it’s audience again. My phone rang again, the same number, I picked it up and said ‘hello’, almost hesitant, but not enough to show.
‘Are we on for tonight?’, she asked, ‘Yes babe’ I said. ‘I called you half hour ago why didn’t you pick up?’ I wanted to reply with the complete truth but I went with ‘I was busy’. She didn’t complain, I didn’t bother.
Just saying 