Here I begin...

From today, you would get a regular dose about my days in Cotton College. I’m not a writer, so please stick to the content only, don’t care much about style and language. And remember not everything what I write here is true. I would add fiction to spice up the story.

There are some people who you either like or don’t like at all. You cannot be indifferent to their existence.

Bhaskar Bora was one of them.

He sat beside me in the dining hall on the very first day of my hostel life and immediately started conversation. I usually take five to six encounters to go beyond the ‘Hellos’ and ‘How are yous’. So he almost sneaked into my comfort zone.

“Hi Kaushik, great to have food with a rank-holder,” he grinned.

Now, that was torture. I was not sure if that was a praise or joke. Besides, I hated this new identity of mine. I admit I got rank and I desperately wanted it as it could help me to wipe out a stigma thrust on me.

Unfortunately it became a baggage.

I seriously hate the image of a bookworm as I was never one. But, a rank-holder is supposed to be one, who also embodies certain other traits. For instance, he would not talk of girls, forget about sex.

And sex used to be my pet theme.

The moment someone realized I was a rank-holder, they would stare at me as if I was in the museum. Then the grilling session: How many hours did you study? What did you do during leisure? Can you suggest me some good books?

How do I tell the moron that I used to watch porn and flipped through Debonair?

“Can you ignore that I got rank and accept me as a normal human being who loves sex a lot?”

Bhaskar was surely not ready for this, but the twinkle in his eyes said he laid his hands on gold mines.

“Wow! We seem to be on the same wave-length. Let’s meet post lunch in the TV room.”

Now, what’s this wave-length? And how could he judge my wave-length by some words uttered almost in disgust. But Bhaskar was too magnetic to be ignored.

The only edge I had over Bhaskar was my rank in the examination. I scored exactly 30 marks more than him. But that’s all. There were many other fields where I scored zero and he got distinction. He was a good guitarist, knew martial arts, wrote wonderful poems, sang very well and to top it all was a great orator. Thank God that he was four inches shorter to me. I did not loose all the girls to him.

I became his friend instantly little realizing that he needed me to build brand Bhaskar. But I was not fool either.

So, the friendship ended with me ditching him and Bhaskar almost getting me killed.