Pehla Nasha: '11 years later, she met my fiance'

It may all seem a little funny now and may mean nothing to you beyond a fond memory, but it's fun reminiscing all about your first love!

With Valentine's Day coming up, we invited readers to share stories of their first loves with us. Here is Get Ahead reader Naveen's sweet and innocent love story!

We were of those kinds who never bothered about girls and laughed on guys who dashed behind girls, be it the lucky ones in love or not so lucky, for us they were all losers and did not have anything better to do. The only thing one should love was based on two choices; cricket or football! We loved both and lived to play; we absolutely had no time trying to impress girls.

After a long hard session of cricket, I and my friend went to watch Judwaa, we had taken the premium seats which cost Rs 11 and it gave the view of the entire theatre which was empty as it was a 2 pm show. Few minutes into the movie and my friend saw someone, so he asked me if I can go and call them over here so we can enjoy the movie together, he said they were his friends. With no questions asked and not knowing what I was doing I just went 10 rows ahead and said "Hey guys, Dom is asking if you guys would like to sit with us for the movie". And then there was bright light and I could see who I was talking to. She was an angel who swept me off my feet and raised my heartbeat to a level it never had been!

I was stuck in her eyes and I felt lifeless for those few seconds and then she said "No we are ok" and that voice brought me back to life. I went back to my seats and she waved to my friend. How I wished that she sat along with us! I was in a hypnotised state and did not ask or say anything to my friend.

After the movie, we all met outside the theatre and she smiled, of course not at me but at my friend. That was the first time I saw her in daylight and how I was wrong, she was no angel she was a goddess! She walked like a princess and smiled as if she was one of the contestants in the beauty pageant. My friend then introduced each one of us, it was comforting to know that now she knows me and I know her name.

They took a bus to home, they -- she and her friends -- whom I had not noticed till now, five of them!  My friend and I took our cycles and headed back home. On the way I asked him who she was and how he knows her? She was a classmate of one of our cricket team member from class VIII and they had met during a cultural event which for some dumb reason I had missed! We were in Class X A.

I went back home and all I could remember was her face, those eyes, her voice and everything kept playing back, again and again, in slow motion. I wanted to go back to school and find out more about her. I got up early, got ready, got on my red hero ranger cycle and headed to school. As I parked and turned, there she was entering the school gate!

That moment I knew, God was real and now I had all the more faith in him. I wasted some more time around the cycle so that she would come closer and notice me. As she came closer, I looked at the ground and up. She had a big smile on her face and she waved her hand and said "Hi, How are you". Not knowing what to I say smiled and nodded to say yes, she kept that beautiful smile on her face and we walked together for 40 steps and then we had to part ways to go to our respective class rooms. I said 'Bye', she smiled and nodded, maybe she was making fun of my earlier reaction.

I hated myself for not saying anything to her or asking her how she was and if she liked the movie. So many questions ran in my head and then there were so many things I could have said to her! 

Time went by and I kept getting more desperate to see her; meet her every day and soon each one of my team members knew the 'in and out' of my fondness for this girl. At times they helped me in different ways so I could get to talk to her and at times they made me feel like a loser as that is what we used do to others in 'Love'.

One day I was watching WWF and the phone rang, mom said it was for me, no one used to call me; rather no one cared to call me. Mom said it was some girl. I was already tensed as who has called, is it the class teacher who wants to complain about us bunking classes? I picked up the phone and said 'Hello" and someone replied ''Hi'. God, it was a girl! Some girl had called me; well no girl has ever called me before. I asked 'who is this'  and she said 'guess who this is'.

There was a big pause, then she asked again: 'Can't you Guesssssss?' and now I could make out who it was, my heart went pumping and I said 'Priyanka?' She said 'Yes'. I said "'ho gave you this number?'

She said 'I can find out, you know'. I knew some friend had leaked the info and how much I wanted to thank him for doing that. After that we often talked on the phone and shared a lot; we had come much closer by then. She always complained that I was a good talker on the phone and not in person, when I always kept quiet.

By now I knew a lot about her and knew that she was in love with someone, someone named 'Saurav Ganguly', till then I used to like him but since then I started hating him, she loved cricket and she loved to come and watch us play, she would cheer me and friend would tease me instead. Back then there was a scheme where if you collect 12 caps of a cold drink then you get a mini bat autographed by 'Saurav Ganguly'.

I was good on pocket money and savings, so I took the team for a cold drinks party and everyone was happy, not knowing my motives. We often used to hang out at Shetty's canteen and he was a good friend. On request, Shetty quickly managed to get the autographed bat for me which was of course my first Valentine's Day gift for someone.

I gave it to her a day earlier as it was way embarrassing to give it on February 14 with everyone watching. She was happy and all smiles, she said you gave this to me? Why? I told her I had two and I wanted her to have one. I also told her that it was a gift for tomorrow. She smiled, turned and left for the day, the other day she gave chocolates to everyone and I did not feel that it was something special for me, maybe she was too shy.

I had a poor handwriting, so I took help of a friend to write my scrapbook questions. A scrapbook for a single person where you ask them few questions and they reply, the real motive of such book is to find out what they like and how they feel about you, which cannot be expressed face to face. One of the questions was 'Do you like me?' and generally we replied 'Yes! I like you as a friend' to avoid confusions, I was expecting something more from her, expecting her to write something which will encourage me to say those three words.

Three days went by, she did not return the scrapbook, I called her up and she said that her class tests were going and she could not find the time to finish all the questions and she will give it in two days time.

That day she kept looking for me to handover the completed scrapbook, but our team was at another school to play school level cricket match, I met her around 1:30 pm at the bus stop where she handed over the scrapbook, smiled and said, nice questions. I liked them.

I took the book and headed home but I could not wait to read the scrapbook so I stopped near a tree and started reading one by one, all of them filled me with cheer and with high hopes as I was waiting for the magical 27th question which would change everything between us and Yes! it did.

Question 27: 'Do you like me?'. With a black pen she wrote 'No, I don't like you'. Under that she made a smiley face and wrote 'just kidding, I like you as a friend'.

Question 28: 'If you don't like me who do you like' with red pen she wrote 'your friend Dom'. That's it! The sky was spinning... no the earth did... no wait everything was spinning. The heartbeat again rose to a level it never did, but this was way different than I had always felt for her. That day I knew that there is no difference between loving and losing something, you have the same emotion, but the emotion makes you feel so different.

Priyanka never got to be with Dom as he already had few girlfriends and was quite popular. He also knew that I liked Priyanka and he was never interested in her. After Class X Dom went to college and I stayed back in school (CBSE) to complete my Class XII or maybe coz I never wanted to lose sight of her and thought things will change.

It was never the same between us after the scrapbook episode but she was worth every bit of it and maybe more. After 11 years I happened to meet her in a shopping mall, I could recognise her but maybe she did not recognise me. I was hesitant, but gathering all my courage I asked her if she is Priyanka, She said 'Yes. I introduced myself to her but she could not find me in her memory, then I told her a bit more and she did remember me.

I introduced her to my fiancee that day and she smiled the way she always did.