This time, the guys...

The girls were beautiful as they were. The guys, well let's just say they were nice!

"Okay, you want to know about the guys? We never had this friendship, but rather alliance all the way. The partners in crime that I made in a matter of 120 hours. The bond that existed for ages. How do you put it in words?”

The glass left with just the last sip of the whisky that he stirred in his glass, like he was stirring the thoughts in his brain. The cigar now nearly stubbed out, he fiddled with the lens of his glasses.

"A bunch of bonkerheads... That’s what everyone was.

“Dude, how are your lips so pink? Alaska had asked in that husky, but buzzing tone of hers.

Jay had replied with ‘That’s gay’… in a tone even more buzzed.

And an argument emanated thus there on. There was something off about her”

He had taken life with a dash of salt, always. It seemed he had had a life worth living.

“So, Jay… one of your close friends?” I said.

The sun had reached the horizon now, the sky gray more than usual, but his thoughts captivated me, the image of all these friends he had made, was bewitching.

“Well, when high, the declaration was I’m his brother… oh that lad cladded in white looking like a fuck that day couldn’t hold his drink. One who could was Jacob. That guy could drink. He was the brother one would wish for. The guy ready to help, with his eyes, some way or the other fixated upon Rhea in every pic, he was fun to be around.”

“Rhea? The typical Delhi girl?” I asked, and he retorted;

“She was every bit as beautiful, dancing her way like a dainty flower. A book can be misjudged by its cover. She was more than the pretty face, she was indeed, a lady worth the name.”

“Anyway, about the guys, we were just… guys. Rahul’s bike was the ride, to ride the town. Be it close or far, he had learnt pretty soon, with any of us around, he was the pillion on his own bike. Jay and Rahul were brilliant debaters with alcohol down their system. It went up a notch with the amul boy Prakash joining in. With the wits of a stand-up comic, and the looks of a decent kid, he was lethal with his jokes. He did try to grow a beard on his face, that drinking aficionado, but to no avail.”

“These were my friends. Lost some of them on the way, some of them stuck by. Life goes on is all I’d say.”

He took the last sip. The glass seemed empty, finished, like his stories. But I could tell he had lot more than it seemed.

*All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.