CHEEK TO CHEEK
Vengrai Parthasarathy
The story I am about to tell opens on a gold-framed mirror in an apartment.
Arjun stared at the mirror for one full minute, He could not believe what he saw. It was not there the previous day. The pink dot. He got up on his toes for a closer look. Yeah, it was there now .A pimple. He ran his finger tentatively over it. A slight bump, acne or pustule, doctors call it. He did not like what he saw, not one bit. God, why now? The mardi gras dance event was coming up in a few days. Arjun was a lucky guy. Blessed with the good looks of his mother and his father’s ruggedness he was a hunk of a lad. Special attention came to him unsought. At the top of the list of girls who gave him the glad eye was Ashwini, the chocolate-complexioned’ svelte beauty of the college..
Arjun had no trouble getting Ashwini to be his partner at the gala dance event. It was a privilege to be paired with Ashwini..‘How is it that he always gets the best of everything’, his friends would mumble. But then Arjun was Arjun., .athlete.debater.and a sort of Romeo.
.And now this blessed pink spot at the most inconvenient time. Arjun sat wondering what to do. He saw no point in moping.. .But beset by worry he was.. Being a pragmatic chap, he analyzed the situation mentally. There was no escaping the fact that the red pimple just cannot be wished away After going through the pros and cons of every alternative he said to himself.’ I just can’t afford to sit on my rump waiting for some sort of divine miracle.
Arjun then took out his Vespa and went straight to the Colony Pharmacy . Wash your face twice or thrice with a mild soap and apply this water-based gel before going to bed. It will be okay in a week or ten days. It has Benzyl Peroxide , and it’s not rich like lanolin. All adolescents go through this phase, son ;don’t worry… See me again after a week’ Muttering to himself ‘this guy belongs to the last century. I want an instant remedy, man’ ;he wended his way back home.
Pimple still there.
The next two days went by slowly. .His friend Gopal dropped in. .‘Squeeze it out, man.’ What a friend” There was no way Arjun would attempt any such fool-hardy thing and make it redder and septic. He started ruminating. Main question on his mind was: ’What would Ashwini’s reaction be? Will she cool off? Many thoughts criss-crossed his mind.
One more day to go but the pimple wouldn’t go..
After what seemed like a century, the great day came. With diminished enthusiasm Arjun got dressed up. And went to the quadrangle in the University quadrangle. Usually gregarious, this day Arjun was not in a mood for company. He sought out a quiet spot hoping that it would soon get dark.
As he sat there ruminating, some thing came over Arjun.. He braced himself. ‘What the hell.. I am what I am. Why fret about a tiny pimple of all things. I have the rest of me, haven’t I’, he said to himself and started moving in the direction of the other boys. Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks seeing all heads turned towards the entrance. She (there was only one ‘she’ in his mind) emerged like a vision, like a Cinderella stepping out of a golden coach. Arjun held his breath. His unfaltering gaze was on Ashwini and it remained there. She was in a gorgeous blue dress and headed straight to him with a fetching smile .’ My, how breath-taking she is’, thought Arjun
And when he saw her at closer quarters he was flummoxed.. Everything about her was gorgeous. Her dress. Her smile.. Her elegant style of moving