7 Women in my life

I tried to write this from a guy's perspective. It looks as though it's only a love story. But if you take a closer look, it's much more than just a "Love Story". Hope you have a good time reading it.

Jane:    I first saw Jane when I walked into the class as a new admission in 4^th standard maybe…I took glance of her…she was different…she had this straight long hair; while every girl in the class made ponies she left it over her shoulders. Her sweet and innocent smile…and those dreamy eyes! Jane was absolutely pretty…as a child she made me happy…I was happily ready to share my lunch with her, I was okay with even giving my marble collection to no one but her, In fact I was ready to share almost anything when it came to her…I liked having her around…I loved it when she wore that red dress she once wore in her 10^th birthday party. She looked cute in it. I couldn’t see her crying…I didn’t feel good inside when she did. I felt like comforting her but then I wouldn’t. Jane and I never really spoke much. Two years…two long years of unspoken words….and sadly, after those unfortunate two  years, she left the school and I felt lonely…sad..Betrayed..Angry..Lonely.
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Marion: Marion came to my life when I was a teenager. In my early teens,  when I used to be popular and Marion, a diva of the whole class. What drove me towards her was; my friends…yes my friends…they always would mock around about what good couple we made and how I should go and propose her. She was an all-rounder; good in almost everything and she was very graceful. She also had those beautiful dimples that added to her beauty. She was undoubtedly  the prettiest girl in my class; every guy craved for her attention and I was the lucky one to win it. She brought me tons of gifts and love letters …..I wrote her name in my wrist and said I would love her forever. I remember the first kiss we had…Awkward, sweet, memorable! Aah! The “first love” thing….it was all about those silly love songs which I sang for her and then, she blushed. I thought I was in love but now I know I wasn’t. We had to separate when we left for high school.

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Rebecca: High school….same stream…same class. Rebecca was an attractive girl. A little tom boyish by nature. Her slender body,her beautiful rose-petal like lips made her appear more lady like. She was different than me…So different. They say, opposites attract and it did…I was inclined to her bold attitude and her confident personality while she took interest in mine. We soon became good friends and then things turned different. “What’s wrong with your hair?” she used to say running her soft hands through my hair..”Change your hairstyle please, it doesn’t suit you”. She didn’t like my hairstyle for some reasons but I wouldn’t change it because I wanted her to touch my hair more often. Her little grey eyes were so unique, every time I looked at her I would never miss looking into them. I said I loved her and she said she loved me too..we shared notes, studied for exams together, came for classes together, left classes together, went on movies together…everything together! We talked for wee hours on the phone…she would always be present in every thing I witnessed…my friends complained about how I started missing catching up with them after I found Rebecca but I couldn’t help it…I almost started falling in love or maybe I was already in love with her… but she broke my heart. She ditched me for a guy named Steve, who she once called her childhood friend..all I knew was I was heart broken and she left me over some guy. She never really loved me…”Its not you, it’s me” I remember how she said that after deciding to call it quits. But, it was not her…it was not me either…it was both of us.                                                  
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Neena: Neena was my ex-girlfriend, Marion’s high school friend. I remember She had short hair…she was good looking, tall, and that perfect nose! I don’t know what but something about her nose was so appealing..we met in an art class which I joined later of my interest. She too was an excellent artist. We grew fond of each other very quickly due to our common interests in abstract art and common favorites like favorite artists or favorite soccer players and also with the common thought  of resisting love…but maybe she forgot that later…and fell for me…I lied…I wanted to keep it casual…she believed …she was serious. Neena, was a very sensitive girl, she would end up in tears if I ever said something to her. She cared a lot about me; you could say she showered all her love and care that nearly scared me. She called me after every hour to check on me if I was doing fine or not. She was totally into this while I was not…her love her care was too much for me to take! I knew she would never leave me heartbroken like Rebecca but still, she wasn’t right for me. I had to return her love back cause I knew I didn’t deserve it …so, I had to break her heart.

“Is it Marion?”

“No”

“Rebecca?”

“No”

“Then…why?” she asked in tears

“I’m sorry Neena, it’s not you, it’s me”.

She never spoke to me again but she taught me the difference between “someone you love” and “someone who loves you”. I will always be guilty of hurting Neena in my life.

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Scarlett:   While I was attending university Scarlett was a junior to me. She was a hardcore party animal!  A typical rich spoilt brat; she was stubborn and arrogant in attitude and also a girl who never took love relationships seriously. She had a casual approach to everything! She changed her boyfriends like she changed her clothes…every guy lasted around 2 months or so…she was a gorgeous lady with long curly hair, a dusky complexion and a curvaceous body..Any guy could fall for her looks. She was simply attractive. Except for her aesthetics, I really admired her realistic character..she was what she was and always proud of that regardless of what people talked about her .

“You’re hot”, I remember how she said this when we first met at a friend’s party while taking tequila shots.

“You too”, I flirted back. And that’s how it all started. Scarlett and I had nothing but a fling.

She once said to me how she seeks perfection in every guy she dates…and how she never found someone to match up to her expectations.

“I don’t want only men to take a woman as a material…we can do that too.”

Maybe someone or something in her life had caused deception of some sort; for her to turn surprisingly negative about love and men. I wanted her to know not all men are the same..But later I decided for someone else to do that for her.

Scarlett was in my life for a very short period. After I graduated from college, we decided to end our casual affair and stay in touch.
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Alyson:  Alyson came as a rescuer in my life…as a life jacket to someone drowning in a deep ocean of troubles.  She was my colleague first then a friend and a girlfriend. When I started working, I met this beautiful girl of fair complexion, long hair with bangs, sweet looks and a smile that reminded me of Jane… she wasn’t skinny, slightly chubbier and had a great personality. She was everyone’s favorite at work…and everyone seemed to trust her with almost anything. I recall the time when, I was facing a lot of issues with my job and dealing with stress. Nothing was working as per my plans and everything seemed messier but with Alyson, it turned simple. She was always there to constantly encourage me and as my pillar of strength, she stood besides me. I loved her and her little quirks…I loved it when she could solve world’s biggest problems but often would worry about little things like “what to eat for lunch?” or “which color nail paint to choose from”?

Alyson and I were somewhat different from each other, where she was outgoing and sorted I was never a people’s person and always confused when it came to making important decisions. She completed me…a soul mate she was….I realized love; when I met her.

We did have problems; Alyson disliked my need of solace and detachment from the people’s world….while I disliked her need of spending too much time with her friends.  We had this difference but always worked it out.

 She was my only girlfriend whom I introduced to my friends. They liked her.They knew I was going for real this time. It was one day before New Year ’s Eve when one of my friends decided to organize a huge party- cum -get together and invited me and Alyson too. Alyson couldn’t attend it as she left for a short family vacation so I decided to go there by myself. And this is what that changed everything…a twist in my and Alyson’s story.

At the new year’s eve party, one of my old friends introduced me to a girl…who looked like someone I knew very well ..someone familiar…someone from my past…it was…

Jane: “Do you recognize her?” My friend asked. “C’mon make a guess”.

I was trying to regain the consciousness of the moment after suddenly time traveling in thoughts and reaching those childhood years.

Her sweet innocent smile much sweeter than before, her dreamy eyes, dreamier than ever ….her long hair…comparatively shorter…and by co-incidence she wore the red dress. She hadn’t changed a bit, I thought.

“It’s Jane”, he said and I came back from a whirlpool of mixed thoughts.

“Hi Arthur”, she said.

“Hi Jane”

“It’s been a long time”, I said looking at her beautiful eyes that I just couldn’t resist.

“Yes, long..long time”. She smiled back and took a sip of the wine. “You guys carry on”, I’ll be back “, my friend left.

I talked to Jane after nearly 15 years maybe…after waiting so much….only to realize how much I wanted to see her and how happy I can feel seeing someone. She gave me nostalgic and euphoric sensations.

“So Jane..what do you do these days?” I asked her out of curiosity.

“Oh, a lot of things…I am an archaeologist by profession but I am a part time writer and also a ballet dancer.”

“Wow, that’s cool”.

“What do you do?” she asked me.

“Umm…well nothing much..I am just a computer freak”.

She smiled that smile…oh how beautiful she looked that evening.

We talked about a bunch of old things…reminiscing the past…the good old days of childhood.

That party without Alyson, could have turned out to be seriously boring for me but it didn't...in fact it changed my life forever. I realized that Jane was never gone from my life; she was always there. Since the time she left the school to that New Year’s Eve day she’d been present throughout. We studied different high schools in the same locality, just 10 minutes away…under same university and we later also found out that Jane’s ballet classes was just opposite to my workplace. I was stunned. So was she. It was strange that we crossed paths but never really knew of each other’s presence and never really met.

“Destiny”, we both concluded, like every destiny believers do.

At the end of the party, we exchanged numbers and that’s how it started shaping. After that night, on New Year’s Day, I felt like a new person. I don’t know what it was …but after meeting Jane something had definitely changed.

 Alyson came back from her vacation and she knew I was different. She knew that I wasn't the same Arthur she knew.

“I met this old friend of mine…she’s an archaeologist…she has invited us to watch her ballet dance performance, would you like to go ally?” I asked Alyson

“Yes..I’d love to see her”, Alyson replied in a rather suspicious way.

I and Alyson together went to see Jane’s ballet. As it begun, I could just see no one but Jane…The room was filled with her and only her I forgot Alyson was there with me…I forgot about any one else’s presence. It was just her. She was graceful the whole time.”She’s so talented…and beautiful…” I kept thinking.  As the dance ended, Alyson asked me to introduce her to Jane.

Jane came to see me after the end of the performance; she looked a bit disappointed to find Alyson there with me. I could tell that from her face. I didn’t tell her about Alyson the time we met. I couldn’t say her that I had someone in my life already and I couldn’t lie Alyson either and go to see Jane’s performance all by myself.

“Hi, Alyson..i am Arthur’s girlfriend”, Alyson said.

“Oh, I’m Jane”. She looked confused.

“You were very good today”, I tried to change the direction of the whole awkward situation.

“Thank you”, she said smiling.

We talked for a while then we had to leave to attend Alyson’s dad’s birthday which I just wanted to avoid. But I had to go because I couldn’t turn down Alyson.

Her dad was turning 61 and there was a big bash going on…I was standing there in a corner, away from the crowd, with a glass of wine, thinking about Jane. ‘What must she be thinking of me’…’I must have told her about Alyson that day’. Surrounded my several thoughts, I decided to give her a call. I asked her to see me the next day, she reluctantly accepted and I waited for that day to happen.

We met the next day. She was carrying a diary with her that looked really interesting, I wanted to see what’s inside but except I started talking about Alyson. I told her everything.

“She is pretty”, Jane said. “You guys look good together”.

Jane was hilarious. She knew how to make someone laugh. She was a girl with an easy go attitude. That made it better with her. I confessed to her about how much I wanted to talk to her when I was in school but never really had the guts.

“Why? Was I that scary back then?” She humorously asked. I also shared to her about my past relationships.

“I’ve had six major relationships so far..1..2 less or more”. I told her. “Some had pretty eyes, some had pretty nose, some could sing while some could cook so well”, I said emphasizing on my experiences with women.

“Only six?” She remarked sarcastically.

“But I’m not a Casanova”. I wanted her to trust me.

“Everyone does no one really accepts”.

She also talked about her few failed relationships and how she said, “Life is not a fairy-tale, where a prince will come to your castle to take you away with him and you live happily ever after”. “You are definitely going to meet and love few villains before you finally make it to the prince.” She was so good with the words, I thought.

Jane was just like me…she didn’t like it in the crowd, she loved serene places. “It sometimes becomes suffocating between the people”. “We need time to ourselves too and we forget that”, she used to say. Jane and I both shared love for Italian food and reggae music. I told her about my love for art, and how recently my life felt uninspired without my passion being followed in years and how I kept my canvas dusted and rusted. She insisted me to start painting again. And I finally did…it felt like my life only had grey and white colors before her entrance and how colorful it had finally started to become.With her the time just seemed to fly..And I wished to hold it for once.

I once found Jane’s same interesting diary, one day after we had lunch together..where she had left it unknowingly. I wanted not to read it but then I had to, it was like a journal….where she wrote her biggest fears, her biggest dreams and aspirations…it was merely, a reflection of her. I fell in love with that human being. I felt like I understand her more than she does  and she; she could read my mind.

I fell in love with my childhood…my muse. I fell in love with Jane. She was that part I could never share it with anyone else. It felt like I was destined to be with her. Alyson had given me so much but it was never the same with her….she was always with me even in the worse of times, but it was never the same with her..she was an amazing person but it was never the same with her. Maybe she was better than Jane in a lot of ways but it was never the same with her. And with Jane, it was different. It was beautiful.

 I found out how in every girl, I kept searching her…I wanted to find Jane in everyone I met and in the course of finding her, I ended up making mistakes…breaking hearts…broke my own heart…but at last, the point I needed to reach was Jane herself. And that I only realized after meeting her.

Alyson knew about it. She was a smart woman…she knew I was falling out of love with her..and so was she.

“It is her, isn’t it?” Alyson asked me.

“Yes”.

“Good luck, I will miss you”, she said.  I held Alyson’s hands for the last time and then let her go forever. Of course I would miss her. But this had to happen. I confessed my love for Jane. We both knew what we feel for each other. We always did. Since the time I saw her for the first time, yes, since that day we both knew that sparks flew between us. We know there was something. We just knew it, that we were in each other’s plans.

And now Jane continues to be my friend in this journey called life. She is the last woman I ever fell and will fall in love with because I am sure of one thing that it’s never going to be the same with anyone else. Ever!

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