Casement

It was the first day of the course. I was one of those few enthusiastic students who came to class before the lecturer. Students came in one after another and occupied the empty seats first. Slowly, when all the empty seats were occupied, people randomly sat beside anyone without too much choice. I was indulged in an unconscious and childish thought about who would sit by me.

"This one, looks brilliant," I thought and kept looking at the girl who entered the room, but she occupied the first available chair and shook hands with the girl next to her. I let her go off my sight and looked at the one that followed, "Ok, this one is fine too," I approved. He came in at the speed of light and found a place next to the person sitting in front of me.

Then another one entered. At once, everyone turned towards the entrance. He was tall, dark and fat. I felt bad for him, for I thought, he was aesthetically challenged. In addition to a strict diet in this life, it looked like, he needed another lifetime of diet, to treat his obesity. Who cared about his obesity treatment anyway? All that I cared about was getting a better neighbour for the day! He walked towards me with heavy steps. "Oh, no, Oh, no... Why is it that I always get what I don’t want?" I breathed a sigh of regret.

"May I?" he asked in a voice that was totally unrelated to his physique. "Oh sure!" I said, removing my bag off the chair. "Thanks. I’m Kaushik..." he added, extending his hand. "Mira..." I said with a smile camouflaging my disinterest. My palm felt tiny in his gigantic one. I sat there in utter silence developing a stratedy to evade any conversation.

The lecturer soon entered the room. He started with a round of his personal introduction and then asked each one of us to walk to the podium and introduce ourselves. Besides our names and academic details, he wanted each one to state our long term goal and objective behind joining the course. Siddharth, Mohan, Deepthi, Santosh and Neha finished with the obviously expected answer for the objective - doing CA. Their goals differed from becoming capable of managing their family business to working for MNCs. It was his turn now and he went to the podium. I noticed that his rear took ten seconds to follow him making the total waiting time more than the average. "I am Kaushik. I graduated from..." he went on... I gave no particular attention to the details. I looked at his face and noticed that his obesity gave him a forty-something look, while he must not have been more than 25, even if I assume that he failed four times during graduation. "My goal in life..." he started with uncertainty in the tone, followed by a brief moment of silence. "When I was a kid, I wanted to become a fighter pilot. I insisted that everyone called me Mr. Fighter Pilot," he said. I grew attentive and looked with an expectation of what he was going to say. "I've often put myself in trouble with my teachers for not responding to them when they address me with my first name. I was so passionate about becoming a fighter pilot. But, as I grew up, I changed my goal because I outgrew the cockpit and ended up here, working towards being a Chartered Accountant", he said, spreading his infectiously genuine smile to everyone in the room.

It was my turn next and walked to the podium while he approached his chair. This time, when I took a closer look at him, I found spontaneity, sense of humour, lightheartedness and the promise of a friend hidden beneath the layers of fat in his 130+ kgs of personality.

We have been friends for over five years now and thenceforth, I hold him responsible for every dissatisfactory book I read, because, he taught me that it is iniquitous to judge a book by its cover.