The Tragedy of Silence

Chapter 1

Growing up as a teenager, Tania Mannan always felt awkward in her own skin. She was never comfortable with the way she looked, always feeling like the better part of her parents’ genes were passed down to her older sister and not her. It didn’t help that she had boyish qualities and wore no makeup, ever. Sure, she had a few flings here and there, but nothing that was ever serious. She didn’t think she was considered attractive to the opposite sex. Granted, she didn’t do anything to change that, but it was still an issue that she dealt with everyday.

When she got to college, however, things changed. Suddenly Tania was being noticed. Maybe it was her hair: thick, black and curly, extending beyond her shoulders. Or her skin, a dark, glistening brown. Whatever it was, she no longer had the problems she had as a teenager when it came to attracting men. Perhaps she had simply grown into herself a bit more and exuded a sense of beauty and confidence from within, rather than what she typically saw everyday in the mirror.

At the tender age of 22, Tania fell in love with a 26 year old Chicagoan named Jamal who was tall, slender and very beautiful to look at. He was of Jamaican descent but born and raised in Chicago. He was the kind of guy whose presence one could feel as soon as he walked into a room. He was classy, well educated, intelligent, well groomed and immaculately dressed at all times, even when he wore jeans. By today’s standards one wouldn’t hesitate to label him a metrosexual.

Tania met Jamal in 1993 through a mutual friend, but didn’t really start noticing him until later. That could’ve been because she had just gotten out of a 2 year relationship with a college sweetheart that left her heartbroken, a tad bitter and, some would say, pissed off.

In the fall of 1994 when Tania was 21, she and Jamal hung out with some friends after which they went back to her place to continue the drinking festivities. She had no feelings towards him at that time, nor did she even think that anything sexual was in the cards for that evening. But in their drunken stupor they ended up messing around and the evening ended rather awkwardly after things got really hot and heavy and Tania wanted to go all the way but Jamal didn’t. So he apologized and made a couple of excuses before he left.

The next morning Jamal showed up at Tania’s house to apologize again, and invited her to attend a university open house with him. She declined. Not so much because she was upset with him or even because she was feeling a tad rejected, but more so because it just didn’t appeal to her to spend her Saturday morning at a university open house. Not to mention, she really just didn’t care to spend anymore time with him after what had happened the night before.

After that, Tania didn’t see him for about a year, as neither of them bothered to keep in touch.

She was at a friend’s house in June 1995, when Tania saw Jamal again, fresh from a trip to Europe during his summer break. She didn’t really feel anything by way of attraction, but was happy to see him nonetheless. In retrospect she knew that they were both determined not to talk about the encounter that happened a year ago, and in the years that followed they never did. Instead, she asked him about his trip and whether or not he fell in love in Paris to which he replied “No, but I did fall in love in London” and proceeded to talk about his European adventures. Tania found herself attracted to his storytelling and his use of expressions and enthusiasm about traveling. She admired the fact that he spent his summers traveling to places outside of the States. Not many people she knew at the time did that.

Soon after, she started seeing him more often. She’d see him at parties or get-togethers with mutual friends where Jamal was always the life of the party, and quite the drinker. His parties would end when he was either passed out, or the alcohol ran out. There were even times when a friend would pick Tania up to go out somewhere and Jamal would be in the back seat of the car passed out, waiting to be dropped home, all before nightfall! He was quite the party animal back then, and despite the fact that Tania was unimpressed with his drinking habits, he definitely made up for his constant drunkenness with his charming personality. And the more she saw Jamal, the more she found herself smitten by him.

Of course, along with his charming personality came all the women. Tania vividly recalls an incident when a bunch of them, including Jamal, went to a party at the “B Side”, a club that opened and closed in the summer of 1995. It was a popular venue during its short-lived existence, on the second floor of a Belmont Avenue store right by the L stop and across the street from Berlin. Tania was dancing with her friend and at one point looked over and saw Jamal, dancing with a drink in one hand and a Sampoerna clove cigarette in the other. There had to be at least four women all around him dancing and grabbing his shirt or any other part of his body they could get their hands on. He was obviously having a great time and enjoying the attention, but Tania couldn’t help but feel a tad bit jealous and remembered thinking to herself that she probably didn’t have a chance in hell with this guy.

Later on that night, still partying at the B Side, Tania walked around the club, Long Island Iced Tea in hand, looking for her friends. She passed by a room behind the dance floor that was lit with candles and furnished with couches, coffee tables and ashtrays. Before she even entered the room to check out the scene, she caught a glimpse of Jamal from the corner of her eye, sitting on one of the plush red couches, heavily kissing a tall, built, black woman with shoulder length braids. She couldn’t really see the woman all that well but didn’t recognize her as anyone she knew. So she thought it best to just keep walking and pretended not to notice them. Tania was certainly upset by the vision of him with another woman, but in all honesty it didn’t really surprise her.

After the party ended at around 2am, the group decided to call it a night and Tania offered to give her friend Miguel a ride home since they lived close to each other. Jamal, who usually traveled with Tyrone, asked her for a ride as well, since Tyrone had apparently gotten lucky that night and was nowhere to be found. Of course she agreed and they all got in the car and headed to the South Side.

During the ride home as Tania sped down Michigan Avenue, Jamal started talking about his adventures that night and said that he ran into his ex-girlfriend and tried to go home with her, but that she rejected the idea. He sounded a little disappointed over it, but said that in the end it was probably the best thing for both of them. Perhaps his ex was the girl he was kissing on the couch, Tania thought to herself. Or it could’ve been any one of those women grabbing at his shirt while he was dancing. Regardless, Tania took some consolation in the fact that at the end of the day he got dissed.

She dropped Miguel off first, since he lived on 26th Street and Jamal lived on 71st. Miguel offered to ride with her to Jamal’s so that she’d have company on the way back, but Tania told him she’d be fine. They waited until Miguel got inside the building and Tania circled around the parking lot to turn right on Michigan Avenue. Just as they got close to 31st street near Tania’s house, she asked Jamal which way he thought would be the quickest to get to his place. He turned to look at her and said, “The quickest way would probably just be for me to spend the night at your place. If you don’t mind, that is.”

Of course Tania didn’t mind, because after all, he was already the object of her fantasies at that point. Despite all the girls, and despite his drunkenness, and for crying out loud despite even the fact that he was just making out with his ex-girlfriend less than two hours earlier, she couldn’t help but get excited at the prospect of him spending the night with her. And so he did.

Perhaps she was just a consolation prize after having been dissed by the ex, but Jamal made love to Tania passionately that night and well into the morning. He was gentle and careful and soft with her. And despite the fact that he was probably drunk, he treated her gently and fell asleep holding her. Tania would never forget how she felt that night, conflicted between her disappointment over the incident with his ex and the sheer joy of lying there in his arms, all within a span of only a few hours.

Over the course of the next several weeks, it was pretty much a big ball of confusion between Jamal and Tania, at least from Tania’s perspective. They were fucking, but not really in a relationship. Yet at the same time they were monogamous with each other. Or at least Tania was. Years later Tania would never know if he had cheated on her, although he never really gave her reason to think he did. At any rate, they’d call each other to hook up, not in the booty call sense, but to really go out and spend time together. He let her use his car to help get her driver’s license once while he waited in the lounge doing a crossword puzzle the entire time. Sometimes he’d go over to her house and they’d have a drink before heading out to either go to the movies or just drive over to the lake and relax with a bottle of Malibu rum, orange juice and two plastic cups. He was great company, and Tania always had a lot of fun when she was with him. The chemistry they shared was explosive and unreal, and the sex just too good to describe.

This went on for a few months and by September Tania was ready to talk about it. She called him up and asked if she could stop by his place to chat with him. He seemed a bit nervous, but agreed. She got to his place and met his mom who had a sweet sounding voice and was a seemingly gentle and pleasant person. He invited her into his room where she sat on his futon for a while as he spun some records for her, and then the phone rang. It was Art and he was wondering if Jamal wanted to come by to listen to some new records he bought. Jamal told him that Tania was there visiting but Art enthusiastically invited her to come along as well. So Tania drove to Art’s house, and after a brief stint there drove Jamal back home, fully realizing that they didn’t even get a chance to talk. As soon as she pulled into his driveway he said “So, I’m sorry we didn’t get a chance to talk, but we can talk now if you want to”. And so they did, right there in her car. She basically told him that she was developing strong feelings for him and that she liked him a lot and hoped that they could build upon their relationship. He became a bit fidgety at that point, playing with a blank cassette and its wrapper and said he felt the same way and that the feelings were mutual. Tania was relieved, to say the least and glad that she got a chance to get it off her chest. He leaned over and gave her the nicest, softest kiss and said he’d call her later.

Tania drove back home that night feeling pretty damn good about the conversation they had. She felt like she had finally expressed her feelings and that there would be no confusion about the status of what she would now call their relationship. She smiled the whole way back, up the elevator and into her apartment to tell her roommate Julia all about it, but as soon as she walked through the door, the phone rang. Julia answered it and handed the phone to Tania. "It's Jamal" she said. Of course Tania was elated.

“Hello?” she said.
“Hey…. it’s me”
“I know. Didn’t I just see you ten minutes ago?”
“Yeah.. (laughs) I just wanted to say that I’m glad you came by to talk to me tonight”
“Yeah, me too (smiling)!”
“So listen, I was just thinking, you know.. about what you said..”
“Yeah..?”
“Well, I figure that if there’s no script, then there’s nothing to flip, you know what I mean?”

Tania didn’t know exactly what he meant at the time, but said yes anyway because she figured that he was basically trying to say that they should just go with the flow and not try to follow some sort of pattern to build their relationship. And she was absolutely fine with that. Jamal was like that though, a bit cryptic, always using phrases that weren’t quite relevant but somehow applied very naturally to a situation he was trying to describe. And truth be told, Tania loved that about him.

There was very little confusion from that point on. Tania and Jamal were in full swing. They’d see each other often, and do things together all the time. They’d make plans to do things that were not ordinary, like drive out 30 miles to see a drive-in movie because Tania had never been to one before. Or go shopping for hard to find imported cds by Prince. One time they went to Navy Pier to ride the ferris wheel and while waiting in line to get on they noticed that the attendants were putting different groups of people into the same car. Tania mentioned to Jamal that she didn’t want to be stuck on the ride with a bunch of strangers, and he agreed. The next thing she knew he walked up to the attendant, slipped him some money and came back smiling. And so they managed to get a car all to themselves!

Tania never forgot the sexual tension she felt in that car way up high on the ferris wheel overlooking Lake Michigan in all its glory. The tension was so overwhelming that it left them both speechless the entire time, aside from the random comments about how gorgeous the view was. She wanted to kiss him and make love to him right there, high up in the sky, but instead she asked him what he said to the attendant to get them their our own private car. “Oh, I just told him that I was going to propose to you when we got to the top, so make sure you put one of your rings on your ring finger and come out with a huge smile!” he said. They both laughed, but Tania could feel herself burning up with desire inside at the sheer thought of what it would feel like if what he said were true. But of course it wasn’t.

They never ended up having sex on the ferris wheel that day. Tania had never been one to make the first move, really. She was too shy of a person to be so bold. But in retrospect she could punch herself for being so shy. After that day Tania realized how unapproachable she can be at times. Her shyness was often mistaken for disinterest and to this day it continues to throw people off.

On the ride home Jamal drove like a mad man. Tania wasn’t sure if it was the alcohol or not, but she didn’t say anything to him about it even though there were times when she truly feared an accident. And he just chatted away as if his driving wasn’t even an issue. It was during that ride home that he said something to her which she never forgot; he said “You’re so cute I wish I could put you in my pocket and take you home with me”. It was undoubtedly a compliment, and endearing at the time. But several months later, she heard him say that very same phrase to a close friend of hers.

Hands

Like most evenings on my way home from work, I sat on one of the stiff blue seats of the Red Line train headed north to Granville. I was engrossed in a book by one of my new favorite authors that I had recently gotten my hands on. As we approached the Chicago stop, I shifted my eyes away from my book and glanced out the window to see a crowd of faces eager to board the train, eager to get home after a long day of work. Amidst the crowd was a tall, dark-skinned woman who stood out by sheer virtue of her height. I gazed at her from the moment I saw her and my eyes followed her red winter coat as she boarded the train, standing just a few feet away from me.

The car was starting to get packed with passengers and once everyone was on board, she was no longer in plain view. So I continued reading, every so often becoming distracted by an urge to peek through the sea of winter coats that prevented me from catching another glimpse of her. To my left, the sound of a loud musical cell phone ring disrupted my reading and the rotund, middle-aged woman sitting next to me answered her phone and began chatting rather vociferously. Soon the entire train became privy to her dinner plans and her strict instructions to the caller on how to properly roast a chicken. “Make sure you start off at 450° for 15 to 20 minutes, and then drop it down to 375° for the remaining cooking time”, she said. “The skin will be nice and crispy that way”.

The sound of her voice was so deafeningly close to my ear that it was almost impossible to concentrate on my reading. A small sigh inadvertently slipped through my mouth as I closed the book and put it back into my bag. I leaned back to make myself comfortable for the remainder of the ride while trying my best to tune out the cell phone chatter. But I must have been pretty tired because soon after I closed my eyes, I drifted off to sleep.

I woke up to a sudden jerk of the train as it stopped at Belmont. When the train conductor announced that a Brown Line train was approaching on the outside track, an onslaught of people rushed out of the car to change trains. In doing so, the woman in the red winter coat appeared again, standing directly in front of me, holding onto the railing next to her. She struck me as having a beautiful, smooth complexion and dark eyes that suited the brown of her skin very nicely. She had on a long beige skirt down to her ankles and a hunter green ribbed turtle neck under her coat, and in her free hand she held a coffee cup. I found myself mesmerized by the way in which she held her cup, because for some reason, it seemed strikingly familiar. And then it hit me.. she reminded me of you.

She reminded me of the way you used to hold your cup when we sat on the couch while drinking tea. Your long, brown fingers embracing the cup in a way that left no space between them. Your short, well maintained nails were a testament to your godliness and were all the more beautiful because they were real and never subjected to a single coat of nail polish. The skin on your hands was so smooth that when they touched my face it felt like heaven, and when they brushed against my lips, they tasted like chocolate.

All of a sudden these pent up memories of you came rushing through my head. I thought of the way you would tilt your head to the side and raise your right eyebrow whenever I said something that you didn’t agree with. Like the time we debated for hours over gender roles in society and the death of chivalry. And the way you smiled, a full, beaming smile, whenever I opened a door for you or held out a chair for you. I thought of that last weekend that we spent together 7 years ago, when we barely even got out of bed. I remembered smelling you on the sheets for days after that, the sweet perfume that you used to wear. The perfume that you refused to let me buy you for your birthday when you ran out, because you preferred a hand-made thoughtful gift over one bought at a store. You were so thrilled when I made you a scrapbook that took me hours to put together, full of pictures of us and magazine clippings that represented you and times we shared, and four letter words. I wondered if you still had the scrapbook hidden somewhere in a closet or stored in a trunk. I wondered if you ever looked at it for old time’s sake.

The woman in the red coat exited the train at Berwyn, an all too familiar stop that we shared for so long until you left me. As she left, I felt a sudden emptiness, similar to the way I felt the day we said goodbye at the airport. I wasn’t sure what to do next. So I watched her as she walked down the platform towards the stairs until she was no longer in sight.

Maya

Although I only knew her for a short period of time, I felt as though the impact she had on my thoughts and later, a good chunk of my life, was well worth documenting. And long overdue. The time constraints that came about from the life that I led left me short of any to spare in order to properly engage myself long enough to even start, let alone finish the task. But I chose not to hesitate any longer, for the more I prolonged it, the less I thought about it. And quite possibly forgot. Not necessarily the memories, but the feelings that I had for Maya.

Maya was beautiful, simply put. She had a gorgeous brown complexion and pretty brown eyes that were often hidden by the glare from her small oval shaped glasses. And I would be mistaken to think that seeing the brightness of her smile was not somehow a factor that played a part in my attraction towards her. In retrospect I wish that I had noticed her before, when I first started frequenting the restaurant where she worked as a host. I think back and try to recall the first time I ever saw her, but I can’t, it’s all fuzzy. All I remember is the first time I ever noticed her. It was a strange feeling, something I had never encountered before. So far it had only been tall, dark and beautiful men that warranted a serious once-over. Not tall, dark and beautiful women.

It was the winter of early 1998 and I had recently gotten myself out of a relationship that rendered me exhausted. In transition I wanted to take some time off to lick my wounds, but I also felt it necessary to regroup and get certain affairs in order, so as not to feel like I was wasting any more precious time. Things began to change very quickly in my life, but mainly because I wanted them to. I was due for a priority check. There were two things that I needed most: a more challenging job and a new apartment in a more happening part of town. It wasn’t long before I was able to accomplish both, but it wasn’t easy. I ended up having to lick my wounds and regroup simultaneously, which needless to say, did a number on me. My emotions were out of whack and I felt no satisfaction with the goals I had achieved. Nonetheless it was merely a matter of time before things were back to normal. And before I knew it, winter was starting to slowly fade away.

It was time to get to know my new neighborhood. When it’s cold outside especially in a city like Chicago, the last thing you want to do is go out for a casual stroll. But as the weather began to improve I started going on walks through the park, or by the lake, past the zoo. My new neighborhood was prime and it simply couldn’t get any better than this. I started to feel comfortable in my new settings; there was a bar just down the street where I could shoot pool whenever I wanted and there was a great restaurant that I loved to go to just a few blocks west called Flattop Grill. It was at this restaurant that I happened to meet Maya.

I guess you could say that Flattop Grill is a Chinese restaurant, but not entirely. They didn’t have a menu, just a stir-fry bar. All you had to do was put everything you wanted in a bowl, and it would come back stir-fried. Frankly, I think the whole concept was invented specifically for me, the picky eater that I am. I’m not a vegetable person as much as I get lectures about it from my parents, so it was all about the noodles, chicken and shrimp, and maybe an occasional vegetable here and there, like peas or carrots or broccoli. It was all-you-can-eat for $10. Needless to say I couldn’t get enough of it. And the more I went, the more I craved my personal recipe creations.

For the most part, the crowd consisted of ‘trendy’ people although I never really paid attention to that particular aspect until it was pointed out to me. I would go to Flattop maybe once a week, sometimes more, depending on my cravings and my budget. Having spread the word to various friends and colleagues, I sometimes offered to accompany them there for dinner. Pretty soon I had become a regular. They knew me by name. All the people that worked there were very friendly, young and pretty. Not a bad combination. The bartender was kind of cute and I often found myself chatting with him while sitting at the bar smoking a cigarette. A few times he even gave me a drink on the house. The bartender, however, was the least of my concerns.

It must have been a Friday night if I remember correctly, because the place was packed. I met two of my friends after work and we decided to dine at Flattop. Once we got there we walked up to the front stand and put our names down for a table for four. As usual on a weekend night the wait was an hour, and our customary way to kill time was to sit at the bar and watch a Bulls game or whatever else was on the television set hoisted up against the wall behind the bar. As I took a step towards the bar, I noticed how ridiculously crowded it was and thought briefly about abandoning the idea and going somewhere else. However I was quickly distracted by a woman, the host of Flattop Grill, who brushed against me as she tried to get past the crowd of people gathered around her station. I looked over and noticed her dark brown dress, almost perfectly matching her skin. It was a full-length chiffon with light fall-colored leafy prints beautifully contrasting the brown of her dress, which draped down her body so smoothly, revealing every curve. She wasn’t model-thin, but was enticingly well proportioned! Nothing looked out of place on this 5’6” tall woman. She kept her hair short, twisted into little curls all over her head, tinted blonde, a color I never quite found to be flattering on dark skinned women until now. And to go along with this perfect image was the faint whiff of a sweet smelling scent that seemed to come directly from her cleavage. As soon as I realized that my eyes were drawn to her cleavage, I had to catch myself, and once I did, I could feel the chills already making their way down my spine.

Ever since that day, I was drawn to Maya in a way that I had never been drawn to a woman before. And to compare that with any feelings I've had for men would be like comparing the proverbial apples to oranges. This was very different. The first few times I went back to eat there after that particular night, I remained cool and was very discreet about my admiration towards her. Aside from the usual friendly greetings we exchanged, there wasn’t much room for conversation considering she was working and always seemed busy. I often found myself trying to catch a glimpse of her when she wasn’t looking. I began to notice how she stood at her station, her back facing me, her head tilted to the left, writing something with one hand and twisting her curls with the other. How silly of me to be watching her that way. But I couldn’t help it. I was attracted to her and although I was very much aware of the nature of my attraction, it was difficult to fully comprehend it. So in my quest to understand where all this was coming from, I found myself dining at Flattop on specific nights; nights when I knew that Maya would be working.

One night, however, as I sat to eat with a friend, I looked over by her station and was surprised to catch her looking directly at me. I often felt her looking at me before, but whenever I caught her eye it seemed as though she could be looking at anyone what with the light reflecting off her glasses. It was hard to tell, although truthfully speaking it was comforting to my ego to think that I was indeed the subject of her stares. But that night I was convinced of it because it happened several times, and whenever our eyes met, she would let out a gorgeous beaming smile and then look away. This continued for several days. At times I could feel her looking at me whenever I was at the food bar choosing the ingredients for my stir-fry. I could feel it, I didn’t even have to turn around and look. I just knew.

At that point, not only was I thinking about Maya constantly, but I actually became excited at the realization of the pure naturalness of the feelings that I had developed. Unfortunately, the thought of even attempting to relay my feelings to Maya seemed outrageous. I wasn’t prepared to “come out”. In fact, I didn’t even feel as though I was “coming out”. I was convinced that it was a once in a lifetime experience, but there was really nothing I could do about it without coming off to her as a lesbian, which I had never been. I wanted to get to know her and befriend her but I also had this intense desire to feel her, and kiss her. What was I to do? I had no clue as to what her sexual preferences were and that made it doubly hard to try to make something of it.

So eventually I decided to break out of the “shy” barrier I often find myself hiding behind. I felt like I couldn’t just sit around and wait for some type of fateful occurrence to rescue me from my inability to approach her with more than just a casual hello. In all honesty I wanted her to approach me. But that was highly unlikely, and I just couldn’t wait. I thought about her often and chided myself at the realization that I didn’t even know her name.

It was a Wednesday night about a month or so later when I finally decided that I would do something about this relentless crush I had. I ventured out to Flattop by myself. It was a relatively mild evening. not too cold, but the briskness of the remains of winter lingered in the April air. Once I got there, I took a deep breath, saw Maya, said hello, and made my way to the bar to eat. As I finished my meal, paid the bill and lit a cigarette, I decided to stick around until Maya’s shift ended at 10 o’clock, that way I might get a chance to talk to her for a little while. At around 9:55 Maya came over to the bar and told the bartender that she was going to the book store down the street but would be back to pick up her things. She looked at me and smiled and then headed towards the door seemingly in a hurry. I put out my cigarette and followed her out the door. As soon as I stepped out I noticed that it was raining pretty hard. I saw Maya standing a couple of yards ahead of me, holding an umbrella in one hand and fishing for something in her purse with the other.

“Hey, can I share that umbrella with you?” I said out loud. I don’t even know where that came from, there was certainly no forethought put into it. “Hey! Of course!” she said after turning around to recognize me. “Can you hold the umbrella for me while I dig for my cigarettes?” she asked. I took the umbrella, making sure it covered her fully so she didn’t get wet while I put my hood over my head. “What’s your name?” I asked. “Maya” she said. I told her my name to which she replied “Wow that’s a beautiful name, what’s the origin?” to which I replied, “Well, my sister named me when she was 3 years old, figuring it would rhyme (somewhat) with her own name, but it doesn't mean anything”. Then I added that I was from Bangladesh to which she mentioned something about never having met anyone from there.

So as we walked a few blocks, I told her that I lived down the street and she told me she lived on the West Side. I was nervous as hell, but somehow managed to keep the conversation flowing pretty smoothly. I asked her how she liked working at Flattop and she said she didn’t and that she was desperately seeking a career change. She quickly added that she’s leaving for Amsterdam in two months because her friend that lives out there has a job lined up for her. “I’ve done some nude modeling before and some other stuff here and there so I’m sure I’ll be okay”. Her response didn’t really hit me until later, after I said goodbye and turned the corner to head towards my apartment. I guess I was too caught up in the moment of just finally being able to have a full-length conversation with her to really realize the implications of her statement.

She's done nude modeling and is moving to Amsterdam in two months. Needless to say, all of a sudden there was a sense of urgency on my part to try to get to know her better. It was on the forefront of my thoughts. She’s leaving in two months, so I have to make a move soon if I want anything to happen. So one night, I think it was a Friday, I walked into Flattop determined to come out with her phone number or a coffee date or something. I stood by her station and chatted with her for a while on my way out after the usual meal and somehow mustered up the courage to say “Wow, so you’re leaving for Amsterdam in a few weeks! I feel like I didn’t really get a chance to get to know you. Is there any way we could meet up for coffee before you leave? Maybe I could give you my number and you can call me sometime”. It felt like those sentences took all the courage in the world for me to say, but I finally got it out, as awkward as it may have sounded at the time. She looked just a tad bit perplexed and said “Okay, what’s your number?” and she wrote it down. “I’ll give you a call,” she said as I turned around to leave, feeling pretty good about the event that had just transpired.

Well, she never called. And at that point I felt too embarrassed to go back to Flattop. Now I made sure I went on days that she wasn’t working so I wouldn’t have to face her and feel weird about the fact that she didn’t call me. I felt dissed and it felt awful. For the first time in my life, I made the first move, with a woman at that, and I was feeling a little rejected.

So eventually, May 16th came around, and the significance of that date was that during one of our conversations Maya mentioned that that was her last day of work at Flattop. I figured I had to go that night. I just had to. Otherwise I may never see her again and the thought of that was unbearable. I just had to see her one last time. So I conjured up some friends to go with me, so as not to make it obvious in any way. My friends Dave and Farah, an interracial married couple that lived in the neighborhood, knew the whole story. Dave was from Wisconsin and Farah a fellow Bangladeshi. They were the only ones who knew how I felt about Maya at the time, and thankfully they were happy to accompany me on this awkward occasion. By this time the weather had drastically improved. Tank tops and shorts were in full swing. As soon as I walked in, Maya looked at me and said “Wow, where have you been? I thought you had forsaken me or something!” to which I lied “No, I’ve just been really busy. How have you been?” She looked a little tired and wore a red and white checkered dress with short puffy sleeves, which frankly made her resemble a picnic table. The dress didn't flatter her at all. She also didn’t seem to be in a very good mood, so I thought it best to keep the conversation to a minimum and just admire her from a distance one last time.

Of course there was a wait for the table, it being a Saturday night, so my friends and I sat outside on the benches by the sidewalk. My friends kept telling me to go inside and make conversation with her but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. The rejection factor was still very much an issue. I didn’t want to embarrass myself any further, that just wasn’t my style. A few minutes later Maya came outside to my surprise, and sat right next to me, without really acknowledging my friends. She looked at me and reached out to touch my hair, claiming to remove a piece of fluff that was stuck in my curls. I felt that tingle down my spine again. I wanted her to run her fingers through my hair and tell me that she wasn’t leaving in two weeks and that she would love to go out with me and that she's dying to kiss me. But instead she said “Sorry I haven’t called you. Things have been ultra hectic for me. I just found out that I’m pregnant and I’m leaving in two weeks, so I’ve got a lot of decisions to make and it’s all really depressing”.

At first I was shocked but later that turned into feigned concern for her. In all honesty I felt like that was her way of saying look, I’m straight and I’m leaving so stop trying to hit on me. Selfishness reared its ugly head in me, but that was how I truly felt despite the fact that she was no doubt going through some heavy shit. Just then some customers walked into the restaurant, so she had to leave to attend to them.

I was heart broken. I didn’t know what to do or say or think anymore. All this time I spent thinking about her, waiting for her to call, hoping to be able to spend some quality time with her so that we could get to know each other, maybe even intimately. All hope was lost at that point and I really didn’t even want to be there anymore. I wanted to go home and crawl under the covers and wallow in my own self-pity. But of course that wasn’t going to happen. I sat through dinner, thoroughly distracted. My friends were great; they understood my silence and made the most of the evening. We smoked cigarettes at the bar after we finished dinner and I just stared blankly at the television screen, thinking, wondering why things had to be the way they were. Shortly thereafter Maya came up to the bar mumbling something about having run out of cigarettes. I fished a couple out of my pack and gave them to her. She seemed grateful and then somewhat awkwardly said “So, umm, I still have your number and I’ll try to use it. But I can’t make any promises” to which I stupidly replied “Please do” when I should’ve just said whatever, don’t worry about it, it’s too late. She leaned over and gave me a hug from behind and said “If I don’t see you, take care” and I said “yeah, you too, and good luck with everything”.

I never saw Maya again.

welcome...

welcome to my new spin-off blog "chotpoti".

here you will find some short and some not so short stories that i've written over the past several years.

some are autobiographical, some are fictional, some are just mumblings.

i'll try to update every so often, but truth be told, most of the stuff i'll be posting are old writings, as i haven't really had a lot of time to write stories lately.

i reserve the right to make changes to the stories as i see fit, be it names, locations or general descriptions.

i hope you enjoy them.. and feel free to leave feedback!