Allie

He doesn't remember the date she sent him a friend request but he remembers they were talking about notebooks and Coldplay on a thread. He liked the t-shirt she had on in her dp and so he accepted. It was a t-shirt showing a dabbing panda. He found it funny. She was  funny, he now thinks in retrospection.

She told him texts irritated her, but she always replied to his texts. She called him too, now and then. Slowly a friendship developed . But they hadn't met yet. She was in Delhi, he was in Kolkata. She loved Kolkata. She'd heard all the stories about the City of Joy from her grandmother. She pinged him once and told him she would come and it was his responsibility to show her the city and the street food. He readily agreed, and is now waiting for her to come.

She is short and sweet, cute and intelligent, thoughtful and kind. When he feels low, he sends her a text. He always gets a reply. In the day and age of broken marriages, breakups after the third date and other such crap, it's rare to find something concrete and worth holding on to. People are fake. They say something, mean something else and do something else. But not her.

One day, she'll come. Hopefully it's during the Pujas. That way he can show her the city in all its splendour. Maybe he'll give her a hug. He doesn't know.

And so he waits. And while he is waiting he writes about her.

The Bilge Master