Find-a-date-to-save-the-job

Oh gosh! Oh gosh! Oh gosh!

He is the most gorgeous man I have ever met in my life. It’s only ten minutes since I came back from our coffee date and I am already missing being with him. Earlier this evening when I walked in the café, I spotted him in the sofa reading TOI by the huge picturesque window which was exhibiting the beautiful scene of a tiny garden of café Basilico.

“Hey!” I chirped as I set in the vacant sofa chair.

“Hey sweetheart! It’s nice to see you!” he beamed a beautiful smile and for the first time I noticed that when he smiles his green eyes twinkle. He was looking heart-shattering in bottle green shirt which was the exact shade of his eyes and rugged denim. For a second I was blinded by his smile and failed to realize that I was holding his gaze longer than I ever should, ever and when I realized I quickly looked away at the garden outside the window.

“How are you?” I brought myself to speak after that tiny embarrassed second.

“That you can tell better” He winked. What? Was he flirting with me? I guess yes. But why I was blushing?

“You look good” I said.

“Thank you. Well even you are looking …..mm……tensed?” He narrowed his eyes as if he was trying to read my mind, my thoughts. Oh Gosh!

Shit! This whole mission of find-a-date-to-save-the-job was definitely taking the toll on me. ‘Relax. You are fine. You will get him’ I chanted to myself, for some hundred times.

“I wanna ask you something. Would you be honest?” He looked directly into my eyes and I could feel his eyes boring in to my soul.

“errr…..yeah! Go ahead.” I said gingerly.

“Why are we here?” His gaze were holding mine tighter than ever.

“For coffee” I said mustering my casual tone.

“Only for coffee? I mean I thought you didn’t like me much!” He said and I swear the crease on his forehead made him more vulnerable. Ok. I hadn’t thought about this part. Of course I didn’t like him that much. I mean I like him but it’s different from like like.

“Umm…. Actually I found you pretty interesting and since I don’t have many friends in this city, I thought how much it could harm to make a new friend” I lied graciously.

“Ok. Great” he shifted in his chair but his gaze were still fixed on me. He was smiling but I was sure that he didn’t buy any of my words.

After telling him how and why I landed up in this city and listening to his side of story, how he has to visit different countries every now and then because of the nature of his job and how tiring and boring it could gets sometimes we called for a check. I reached in my bag for my share but he said “I will get it!”. This was the first time in my life when a guy had paid for my coffee. Yayyyyyyyyyyy!!

As we left the café, he walked to the parking and offered me a lift in his ROVER but I politely turned down the offer because I wasn’t sure how safe it would be to take a lift from a barely acquainted but fairly good looking guy. I waited for another five minutes, there were no taxis in the sight and when I gave up and decided to walk few miles, miraculously a shining black and yellow taxi appeared to be waiting on the other side of the road , so I rushed and jumped in it before driver could even blink. Suddenly my phone vibrated in my hand. It was message from Vikrant:

                           Dinner? Saturday?

Yeppppppiiiiiiiiiii…. I am so proud of myself because my first date is such a huge success!

 Signing off:

Ecstatic girl in the beautiful big city!!

What to wear?

Right after the office I and Priya rushed back to my flat at 30 km/ph speed. As I turned the keys in the lock Priya flung opened the door with the hard kick and we marched up to my closet leaving our purses in the doorway.

“I can’t believe that you didn’t even think about what-to-wear-on-date cloths!” Priya shirked and pulled open my closet doors.

“I was so…..so…err….whatever! I am sure I will have something to wear. Something decent. Just don’t shout on me and help me to dig out some dress” I said almost pleading.

"You should better have something decent coz you are going to Café Basilico not Barista. Remember that” she shot me a stern look. She was right; I just couldn’t get away with plain jeans-T-shirt combo or some Kaftan look. I definitely needed something nice if not to look smashing then at least to look reasonably good to take this date to the second, third, fourth…. date. Today if I failed to cash this chance, cash him then I promise I would board the train back to Shimla no matter what Priya or my parents would say.

“You really don’t socialize. Do you? Your wardrobe is telling everything about your super glamorous life” Priya said sarcastically while examining my blue superman t-shirt.

“You. You are my social life. When I am not socializing with me, I socialize with you and our social events required us to wear Pyjamas and ganjis not cocktail dresses and sequined jackets. Do you get that?” I snapped. It was getting too much. I seriously didn’t have anything happening to wear other then my staple wear. When I am writing this blog I seriously think that, Am I really becoming Bridget Jones day by day? Will I really die alone in my old not-raw-silk-but-cotton-pyjamas with a pile of rom-com dvds in one corner of the house, pile of Mills and Boons in the another corner and jars of nutella and rappers of strawberry yogurt bars scattered all over the place and no one would really notice that I am gone until my apartment start exuding vom-stinky smell? Oh gosh! My imagination is going terrible with every passing second.

After digging for good forty minutes we finally came to the conclusion that I seriously have nothing to wear but denims. So Priya decided to do something marvelously creative to my denims so they won’t look simple or just plain. She reached for the paper cutter in her purse which she always keeps as safety weapon in her beg and started scribing and tearing my jeans at different places and after ten minutes I was the proud owner of almost rugged & torn denim which surprisingly I liked more than I thought I would. I quickly pulled down the plain white t-shirt and tied my pink MANGO scarf around my waist instead of belt. Putting on my only and only and only Jimmy Choos, I hit the road and hailed the cab for Café Basilico. As the driver pulled over the taxi outside the café somehow I knew I was gonna nailed it.

 Signing off:

Poised girl in the big city!!

Would it work?

“What will you do without me?” sitting on the floor in the Priya’s living room I grab fist-full of popcorns from the huge plastic tub and thrust them in my mouth, all at once.

“Shut up! You can’t be serious. You can’t go back” Priya snap and pass me the sixth cup of coffee in last two hours.

“Priya. No one is gonna date me. No one ever did. AND trust me when I will tell that bitch that I can’t do this she would kick me out of the office and then I won’t have any job to earn my income and no money to pay my rent so eventually I will have to go back home. You can’t change the truth darling” I sob.

“Oh come on! That’s bullshit. We will find someone, just keep the spirit up” Priya says while turning the pages of Vogue bridal issue. She is not taking me seriously. She always does that. I mean why she can’t understand that I am the most un-datable girl ever born on the earth. Is it that difficult to understand?   

“How? Where? When?” I screech.

“ummmm……actually I have someone in my mind who would be apt for this job” she states and looks up at me with her big mischievous eyes.

“Really?? Whooooooo???” I ask curiously.

“Vikrant!” she retort.

“Vikrant? Oh please!”

“What was that?” she asks visibly taken aback by my reaction.

“I mean I barely know him and he is not here as well. How will I date him?  Do you expect me to walk to him and beg him to date me for the sake of my job?” I asked haughtily.

“Wow! That’s not a bad idea” she grins. “But how about calling him and fixing up a casual coffee meeting as soon as he returns from Goa?”

“Would it work?” I ask dubiously, narrowing my eyes to read her face.

“It should.” She says. She hauls the phone out of her jeans pocket “let’s call him” and speed dialed his number.

“You have his number?” I ask with not-very-impressed look.

“What do you think who am I darling?” she winks at me and thrust the phone in my hand. He picks up the phone on the third ring and from his voice I can tell that he was sleeping. I mean it was 11:30 P.M and I expect him to be in some hip party not in his bed alone or with someone. Dmanit!

We talk for some half-an-hour but not about anything particular or important and all I gatherer is that he is back in the city. It take me hell lot of guts and efforts to ask him out for a coffee and not sounds desperate both at the same time and much to my surprise he agrees to meet me at Café Basilico tomorrow after the office.

Ohmygod! I wish everything goes the way I want and I pray god to give me enough attitude just for a day so that I can drive him crazy after me, not on me.

 Signing off:

Girl on mission in the big city!!