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“When being together is more important than what you do, you are with a friend.” – Connie McMartin

I’ve been friends with S for the last 11 years now. Now that’s a bloody long time to know someone, isn’t it? We had begun our acquaintance with peals of laughter on the University staircase, if you’d believe. Both of us are infamous for our laughters, which can easily be compared with flight take-offs. They start with a giggle in unison and end up after reaching a crescendo that has offended a mighty lot of people then and now. But we wouldn’t be us if we had actually cared about that!

After hanging out in University campus for almost three years, we had to part ways. While I flew off for academics, S continued hers in Calcutta. It’s been mostly social media and very occasional meetings for the next few years. We’d plan in advance and meet for a movie and lunch, blabbering away the happenings in our lives, mostly love lives. We had created the record of chatting hours at bus stops before heading for our homes, respectively. There seems to be a throttled river of words that comes to life and rushes along whenever we see each other.

When I came back and settled in India post marriage, S got married too and moved to the US. We’d surely miss our rendezvous but were happy for each other at the same time. After moving quite a few cities, we landed in Pune and began another new chapter. As luck would have it, S and her husband decided to be back to the pavilion and  coincidentally they gatecrashed in Pune too! Bereft of any friends there, I was over the moon that I’d be seeing S again. Now there’s something different meeting your age old friend after she’s married. I don’t know what the difference was, but both of us being married, added a few more topics to our adda. Fortunately my husband M and her husband A became great friends too. It was a clique nobody could beat. We went to their place every other weekend and spent them with glorious food and never-ending chats. The best part is, M and A would cook while S and me would carry on our gossips and forgotten tales sitting in their verandah.

Those weekends still remain the best ones we have spent in Pune as they were in august and like-minded company. When you are with the right friends and people you like, the togetherness is beyond horizon and cherished for the rest of your life. While they have moved to Mumbai now, we are in Calcutta. Both of us miss those evenings with mugs of masala chai and spicy pakodas. I guess we still hope to live in the same city again sometime or the other so that we can meet at least once a while and rejuvenate our togetherness.

This post is written as a part of #together campaign by Housing. #lookup