CHAPTER - 1
1912 was just born. All six of the gang were, like usual, sitting by the town’s post office’s compound wall, neatly dressed, and waiting for the ladies to come out of the neighbouring tailoring class. And Andy in particular, was certainly the most nervous amongst them six. He had decided that he was going to talk to her that day. And for this one meeting, he had written, rewritten and practiced a baker’s dozen times, what he was going to say to her. But the moment she came out with her friends, the moment he saw her, he went blank. Lucille and her friends walked past the gang and as Andy had hoped, Lucille was walking in the extreme left, farthest from him. He walked up to her from behind and called her. She turned …show more content…
After a lot of calculation, he chose the Andy-Lucy Circle outside the college gate. Through knowledge passed on through generations, he knew that this circle was, and had been the hotspot for proposals. Approvals of genuine lovelorn advances and rejections of youthful guts by assumed mature decision-making, this circle had seen them all, year in and year out. Philip felt a bit uncomfortable, with no idea why he was imagining generations of couples, watching him from above – how he was going to fare with his proposal today. “Okay. Chill matey. You can do it.” He said to himself. He walked up to the circle and positioned himself near it, just as he had rehearsed. Then she came, Laurie, along with her group of friends. She walked past him. But he wasn’t facing her. He was facing the other side in fact. He was looking at a small decorated stone, in the centre of the circle; he had never noticed it before. “THIS CIRCLE IS NAMED AFTER ANDY AND LUCILLE WHO...OH BOLLOCKS!!” Laurie was gone. The fact that he had screwed it up, by reading about some Andy and Lucille, slowly sank into him. It was a disaster. A catastrophe. The month-away December 2012 End of the World theory suddenly seemed true. At least to …show more content…
That’s how Philip consoled himself. Exactly since that disastrous day, Laurie was going out with Ronnie. Ronnie was the university’s football team captain. He played as a defender. And, he was big. Very, big. His father owned the local meat butchery factory, and also had a pending criminal case for murder against his name. Now, what Philip didn’t know back then, was that Ronnie had asked Laurie out just the day before Philip was going to. So it was easy for Philip to work out that had he proposed to Laurie, and Ronnie learnt of that, well, that would’ve pretty much been the end of him for all he knew. So Philip generously decided to move on with his life. On graduating, he joined Google as an intern. Along with Victor and Brad. Right from day one, Victor went hyper – “Okay. Task One. Get into Google. Mission complete. Task Two. One Asian with long black hair, one blonde Spaniard and one African Puma with silky chocolate brown curls”. “Yea. Right.” Brad cut him short “Have you even reached base two before? And FYI, falling on a 40 year old Indian lecturer, and acting as if it was by accident, doesn’t count.” “Oh please. Like as if you had great carnal experiences with Julie. You hardly dated her for what two weeks?” “Three.” “Alright three, before she dumped you for a junior.” “Hey, he wasn’t a junior alright. He had flunked a year in high school.” Philip had to intervene – “Guys guys. Let’s just play it cool alright. Act like naturals,