'Love at first sight'? That's so passé.
‘Hate at first sight’ is more of a reality.
We sometimes meet people
whom we dislike at once, for no obvious reason. The intolerable presence of the
person kills us till we are compelled to be in his/her vicinity.
As our
annoyance soars, we may begin to fabricate plans to bully, abstain or even kill
him/her for no apparent reason.
However, studies indicate that
hatred arises with a definite reason, in the subconscious mind. It is said that
when we hate someone, we think more and consequently, our analysis turns out
with better clarity.
***
Short Story - The Hatred.
He wore a red shirt. Not
the kind of red that gives out a pleasant sense of positive energy or power. It
was the kind of red that jars the senses and hurts the eyes.
I wanted to look away, but
couldn’t. He must have seen me watching him. Or maybe I noticed him ogling at
me, with neither a sense of hesitation nor shame, for such a long time. His shirt
had pale white buttons on it. Strange though as it may seem, I have no
recollection of anything else about his attire. Was he wearing blue jeans or
black, or even yellow? I didn’t notice.
All I remember is the
extreme reaction I had when I set my eyes on his thin face. I wrinkled my nose
in distaste and almost looked away. Almost. Because as I mentioned earlier, I
couldn’t look away.
His light brown eyes, bored
into mine with no sense of inhibition, whatsoever. A smile played across his
slightly parted, thin lips. The expression on his face seemed to beckon to me
and say, ‘Hey, let’s talk.’
I couldn’t fathom what it
was about him that made me want to…slap him. Yes, all I wanted to do was slap
that smirk right off his face.
He wasn’t good-looking, oh
no! Well, he wasn’t ugly either. Perhaps some girls would find that French
beard (or whatever that tuft of hair on the chin is referred to) attractive. It
just made me want to wring his neck.
‘Joel! Oye Joel!’
Someone called out to him
from a few feet behind me. He waved at that someone, shifting his eyes for just
a second to acknowledge whoever it was, and got back ogling at me. He ran his
left hand across his hair, in a manner that suggested that he clearly thought
of it as a cool gesture. But all it did was, bring my attention to his ugly
hair. That mop of curls on his egg-shaped oily head was downright disgusting.
Don’t get me wrong! I have
nothing against curly hair. On the contrary, I think curly haired guys are rather cute. Well, some guys, at least. Not this one, though.
I finally tore my eyes
away from his lanky frame and picked up my backpack from the floor where I’d
placed it earlier. I returned to the classroom with a frown that earned several
surprised stares from my new classmates.
Who was that asshole? Joel.
Alright, who was that asshole called Joel? I settled down, as usual, in the
last bench, to enjoy my favourite English class. The first month of college had
seemed pleasant and enjoyable, until then. Not anymore, though. The ‘red-shirt
fellow’ had ruined the day for me.
***
Three days later, I was
rushing to the Zoology lab for the practical session. I pondered why the zoo
prats were strategically scheduled right after the lunch hour, on Thursday
afternoons. I wondered what poor animal was due to get mutilated that day under
our inexperienced instruments. I shuddered when I thought of the gory black
leeches we’d had to deal with two weeks ago. One of the guys with a weak
stomach had thrown up his Biryani-lunch all over his specimen, when the blood
had begun to ooze out of the chosen predatory worm of the wild. That was one
‘Yikes’ moment all of us would remember for a lifetime.
I chuckled when I recalled
the incident with Kamal that had left us in splits the previous week, when we had
dissected wild frogs. Kamal was the undisputed hunk of our class, with the
six-pack abs and musculature that had half of the girls in our section swooning
in adoration. The adoration had received a severe beating, however, when he had
shot out of his seat with a terrified yelp, when the gigantic black pond amphibian,
sedated with chloroform, was placed in the steel tray in front of him. He turned
out to be the only student that day, who’d been unable to even touch the unconscious
specimen, let alone gorge out the huge yellow eyes off the creature, to locate
the optic nerve.
I was still trying to bite
back my smile, when I stopped short at the landing of the stairs that led to
the third floor. My friends, Varsha and Rashmi were talking to him. Him, that
disgusting red-shirt fellow! Well, he was wearing an ugly green shirt today. I
love green, mind you, but then it was a disgrace to the beautiful colour, when
it was worn by someone like him.
‘Yuk!’ I thought. ‘What’s
gotten into these females today? Why on earth would they even look at, let
alone talk to a guy like that!’
I fumed inwardly when I
saw Varsha laugh at something he said. She saw me then, and waved to me.
Oh no! I panicked. I had
to get away before he spotted me. But, it was too late. He’d seen me too. He
smirked then, in obvious enjoyment of his display of winning humor that seemed
to charm my friends. I had a vivid vision of digging my dissection knife onto
his face, plucking his eyes away from the sockets with my forceps and finally
gorging them out savagely with my scalpel, like I had done to that poor dumb
frog, last week.
And before I could turn
away and make my escape, he waved to me and called out ‘Hiiiii Roma!’
I could have killed Varsha
then! How could she have told this horrid fellow my name? How dare he use it so
flippantly, calling out to me as if we were…friends?! My name, my beautiful
name, coming from him sounded absolutely degrading!
I seethed in disgust and
turned on my heel, the zoo prats forgotten. I heard Varsha’s high pitched voice
and Rashmi’s low pitched one, crying out to me frantically. I ignored the
receding sound of my name being called and hurried down two flights of stairs,
blindly heading for the library, my only place of solace in the whole building.
***
‘But, he is a nice guy!
What the hell is wrong with you? How can you hate someone you don’t even know?
You haven’t even met him properly, nor have you even spoken to him…and he likes
you so much!’ Varsha’s face held a mixture of utter confusion and controlled
anger.
Varsha and Rashmi had
searched far and wide, all over the college and finally found me seated in the
far corner of the canteen, sipping cold coffee.
‘Don’t you dare talk about him to me!’ I
yelled. ‘I hate that asshole and I’ll kill you if you ever tell him anything
about me again!’
I saw her recoil in shock
and regretted my outburst. Why was I overreacting so much? After all, she was
my friend and meant no harm. I tried to hold back sudden tears that threatened
to escape my lids and attempted a flimsy apology with a ‘Sorry…it’s not your
fault…’
Varsha, the sweetheart
that she was, tried to console me at once.
‘What’s wrong with what I
did, yaar? I didn’t tell him anything
personal about you, ok? Relax…’ she tried to soothe me. ‘Tell me, why do you
hate him so much? There is no reason for you to overreact like this…’
I didn’t reply. I silently wiped away the tears that had
begun to flow down my cheeks with the back of my hand.
‘I’ve known Joel from the
past four years, yaar. He was my senior in National Public School...’ Rashmi chimed in, as if to corroborate
Varsha’s statement about the extremity of my behavior.
‘I don’t know! I just hate
such guys!’ I finally erupted, my anger resurfacing at the disdainful
expression on Rashmi’s face.
‘Such guys, matlab? He is a decent guy from a good
family!’
‘Decent, my foot! Decent
guys don’t behave this way!’
‘What way? You are so
irrational, Roma!’ Rashmi gave me a look of disbelieving disgust.
‘Oh, go to hell!’ I stormed
out of the canteen, without a backward glance.
***
Late that night, I lay
awake tossing in bed, as the events of the day played over and over in my mind
like a rewinding videotape. I knew I had to apologize to both my friends. But
then, I’d have to tell them the reason for my anger in the first place, the
reason behind my ‘irrational’ hatred of a complete stranger.
So, why did I hate him?
I finally allowed my mind
to dwell on what I’d been avoiding to analyze until then. What was it about him
that made my blood boil when I looked at him?
His eyes, I realized. His
eyes had the expression that made me cringe with revulsion. It was the kind of
expression that made girls want to adjust their veils over their breasts, to
shield them from gawking eyeballs. It was the kind of expression that made
women feel insecure in a crowd. It was the kind of expression that made women
feel exposed, even when covered from head to toe.
I knew the exact reason
for the intense hatred, that Joel evoked from every cell of my being, which
made me want to murder him the minute I sighted him.
I might’ve been able to
ignore the loud, gross clothes he fancied wearing. I’d be able to overlook all
that oil in his hair that gave him the personality of a slimy creep. I’d even
be able to forgive the cocky impudence in his demeanor, at his assumption that
a convent-educated girl like me would actually give two hoots about a scoundrel
like him.
But, few girls would
forget or forgive an unfamiliar, unknown person, who had neither a sense of
self-control nor the decency, to keep the blatant lust from showing in his
eyes. Yes, it was the unconcealed lust in Joel’s eyes that made me flinch away from
him in abhorrence. Joel, the boy, had the eyes of a predator.
I felt no guilt or coyness
whatsoever, when I decided to tell my friends why I hate Joel. I knew then, that I would hate him for the
rest of my life.
I turned off the bed lamp
on the table next to my cot and turned over to retire for the night, my heart lighter
from a burden removed, and my mind in relative tranquility.
*** *** ***
