THREE

DEPARTURE

All the break I was wondering and waiting for the college to reopen so I could see her and once talk to her and get over with, once and for all.
Finally it was the chilliest of the January’s day when the college reopened. All jacketed up and shivering. I went to the college. The first day would usually be a brief one, as we would run back for boozing. After all we were back. Hae. But none of those things interested me this time. I was there to see her. But couldn’t find her.
Next day I went college half an hour earlier and stood infront of the building to see her. But she wasn’t there to be found. All her friends passed by into the class but she wasn’t there. This happened for a week. And enough is enough I asked one of her friends about her. The answer I got from her shook me from inside.  
“She left college”. “She ain’t coming back”  
      These words were like an arrow piercing right through my heart, ripping it right away from its ribs.
I just couldn’t believe it. No one knew why. The only thing she knew is she would never come back.
      I cursed myself for being such a loser, a f**k. One little effort could have changed my life, and now I would be cursing my life all along. Thinking I had, but lost it.
I was very disappointed. But everyday, I would look for her thinking she might come today, tomorrow….  
 
As of 20 days passed by.
 
One day as I was sitting on the hallway with my friends in the very same place I met her for the first time.I saw her then. She was with a friend I hadn’t seen before, a guy and an auntie (probably mother, I guessed). I was so happy to see her. By that time my friends knew something fishy was going around.
      …. As she walked passed by me she gave me one of the most sarcastic of smile, as if shouting, “you couldn’t and I’m going.”
She was running to and forth with her friend into various departments, as if signing up for the final clearance certificate. Then I followed her upstairs into the ME dept.
I went inside the library and stayed there. I said to myself, “If she comes in here as well and signs that paper, then definitely she’s leaving. After one of the longest and excrutiating moments of my life, she actually entered and did the improbable. She kept the books in the rack along with her friend. She stared at me like usual. But this time I left bad and empty. As she was leaving the room, she turned and looked back at me as if bidding me “goodbye……”  
I felt as if the whole world had collapsed upon me……….. I wanted to shout and scream in agony, but I was in library. I couldn’t.  
I didn’t follow her. I thought I couldn’t see her go away. I was feeling weak and hopeless. Could I’ve done something to stop her or reverse the outcome… But now all that was in vain. She was leaving and I couldn’t do anything about it.
I went to class thinking about her. But she was nowhere to be seen. She was gone.