Some dogs never change!

Friday evening, in the veranda Shady with a bottle of Kingfisher beer on the bonnet of the car was busy washing it. Nithin watched him over from the porch sipping his favourite Barcardi rum. A car just screeched and stopped in front of the gate. A man came running out of the car and started hitting Nithin and put him on the floor and said “Hey, Asshole how can you miss my engagement” Shady laughed and continued washing his car. “Karthik, I was worried that your girl might decide not to get engaged if I was around” Nithin replied and all of them sat together laughing and started partying in honour of Karthik’s engagement.

“We are going to a resort in Coorg tomorrow and there is no way you are going to miss that, I will be here in morning at 4, let’s leave by 5. Already spoke to Praful, one of you have to pick him up” Karthik said.

Nithin and Shady exchanged looks and knew there was no way they could miss it tomorrow, as soon as Karthik left Nithin said “How can I come? Am screwed tomorrow”

“Everything will be fine, Chill!” Shady replied

Hoping that everything would be fine they went off to bed, early in the morning Nithin woke up at 3 to leave and escape. But Karthik was already in front of the gate with his newly engaged girl in the car. Karthik came up to the house and was happy to see Nithin open the door thinking that he was excited and ready to go with him. Nithin without a choice said “I will go pick up Praful, why don’t you and your girl hangout in the living room till then?” and went into the garage drove away in Shady’s car. Shady came down, even before Karthik could introduce Mana to Shady, he was surprised to see that they were already hugging and wishing each other. “Sorry could not speak to you properly during the engagement ceremony, not at all in touch after college? What is up with you?” She said. “We have all been in touch with each other and you are the one who disappeared” Shady replied. Karthik cut across by saying “you guys know each other from college? Bloody hell none of you told me! So you know Shady, Praful and my best buddy Nithin already? How cool is that!” Upon hearing this Mana and Shady exchanged looks and Mana asked “so you stay with Nani?” and smirked.

Meanwhile Nithin picked up Praful, stopped midway asked Praful to drive and picked up some booze from the boot and said “So you met Karthik’s girl?” Praful replied yes and started driving without any further comments. Nithin called up Karthik and said that they will meet them on the highway.

Nithin picked up his phone and started calling somebody and said "Hey, morning! Wake up and get ready am coming to pick you up in 10 minutes, pack up for 2 days, cold weather" and hung up even without even waiting for a reply and kept directing Praful to drive without telling him the destination. Asked him to stop in front of a house, got off the car went into the house. After sometime came out with some luggage in one hand and dragging a girl out in the other, Praful's jaw dropped but didn't comment. He put the luggage in the boot pulled out another bottle of beer, without even offering others started drinking. He jumped into the car and introduced Praful to her and then Neha to him. Praful was lost and had no idea what the hell was happening.

Karthik, Shady and Mana were already at the coffee day on the highway waiting for these people to catch up. Karthik was surprised to see a new girl in the car, Nithin got down from the car and finished up the beer. "Some dogs never change" Mana murmured under her breath and pretended as though she was not even around. Nithin introduced Neha to every one as his childhood friend and winked at Mana. Neha blankly smiled at everyone and pulled Nithin aside and said "You dragged me here, if Anuj finds out am with you he is going to kill us both" "Chill, I will take care of him" replied Nithin and avoided her furious looks and got back into the gang.

They continued their journey towards the resort, Karthik was very curious about Neha, wondering if Nithin had hid anything about her he asked Shady “By any chance do you think is Neha, Nithin’s girlfriend?” Mana quickly responded saying “Anuj is Nithin’s neighbour and have grown up together, Neha is Anuj’s sister. Karthik don’t think too much, you still have a lot of stuff to figure out. You should really be insane to find out everything about a crazy guy like Nani, I mean Nithin.” All that Shady could do was smile awkwardly and continue driving. “How come you know so much about him and still neither of you behaves as though you guys have ever met before?” Karthik asked. Mana's silence made Karthik more curious but understood that it was not right to force things out of her and closed his eyes to catch some sleep.

By the time Mana woke up, they had already reached the resort and the guys were busy transferring the luggage from the car to the cottages. Nithin was busy talking to a watchman, anyone who knew him would have figured that he would be inquiring where he could get booze in case his almost inexhaustible stock of booze ever exhausted. Mana got down from the car and walked straight towards Nithin, who noticed her coming and sent the watchman away by giving him couple of smokes. She reached him and held him by his ear and said “You dog, how much do you drink these days? Can’t you control a little?”

“Sweet heart this has been my only companion ever you since you left me” he jokingly replied.

“Why did you miss our engagement?” she asked

“Was scared that you will leave my best friend and run towards me” he smirked.

“How come you don’t change? You never grew up, you still have not quit cracking silly jokes” she smiled

“LOL, I was not joking”

“Ah, yeah right, Nani no one knows you better than me, you can never really miss anybody. That is your strength and weakness; you love any person who is with you at that moment. We might not be in touch but you are the best friend I ever had and I am sure nobody can ever understand you better than me.” She turned a little serious with a drop of tear rolling down her cheek. Nithin noticed that and also that Karthik was heading towards them. He said “I am not sure what you know me as but Karthik knows me as a guy who is always hitting on every girl he meets and he is headed our way. So, I suggest we start walking towards our cottages”

“Oye Karthik, better take your girl away from me, she is tempting me to kidnap her and runaway. Don’t tell me I didn’t warn you” he said to Karthik.

“I have got her with great difficulty, there is no way am going to let you do that” Karthik replied and all three of them joined the others for lunch. Karthik’s curiosity had not decreased but did not know whom to talk about all this.

In the evening, they were taken to the top of the hill and were given with a camp with a sleeping bag for each, some firewood and of course some booze. The cold weather and beautiful sunset on top of the hills, there was no better place for holiday than this. Praful got busy and started clicking away photos, as soon as Neha saw Praful with a camera, he had become her new best friend. After appreciating his photography skills she convinced him to click photos of her for profile picture. Karthik and Shady picked up a bottle of beer, Nithin who was tired of the city liquor had managed to get some local toddy and in reserve was some homemade wine. Karthik did not know if Mana liked drinking, but half-heartedly offered some beer which she refused. Nithin said “Try this, it is homemade wine, it is just like fruit juice” and handed over a mineral water bottle in bad shape filled with some rose coloured drink which was obviously not a pleasing look. Karthik said “Nice, let me try some” and finished more than quarter of the bottle in one gulp and passed it to on Shady and all of them forced Mana to try who took a very small sip and spat it out.

After couple of bottles of beer, Karthik could not resist, he took Shady aside and asked him “Were Nithin and Mana in a relationship in college?”

Shady replied “The regular misconception! They were best friends. Such good friends that all the guys wished we had someone like her and every girl wished she had a friend like him.”

“Oh, but why were they not in touch?”

“People thought that they were in a relationship, this spoilt a lot of her relationships in her extended family, without her knowledge, her mother and sister explained this to him and he made himself look bad and fought with her for a silly reason and stopped speaking to each other. He is a good actor, he made it look like it is his ego”

“Oh, does she know that now?”

“No, and by the way you are lucky to get a girl like her and you should be thankful to Nithin”

“Thanks man and I didn’t get the point of me being thankful to Nithin”

“She had at one point decided not to get married and was about to join an ashram after a girl from her neighbourhood killed herself after a domestic dispute”

“Holy shit! Let us go back to them” and walked towards Mana and Nithin who were staring into the open sky without uttering a word. Karthik pulled Nithin hugged him and drank up the left over toddy and passed out. Shady helped him into the sleeping bag and came back. Nithin took out a fresh bottle of toddy and passed it to Shady, by now Neha and Praful had finished their photography session. Praful shared the toddy with Shady and Nithin passed another bottle of homemade wine to Neha who drank a little and went off to sleep. Nithin signalled something to Shady, he got up and took Praful away wishing the two good night disappeared into their respective sleeping bags.

Now that he was alone with Mana, he wanted to pour his heart out, even before he could utter a word she asked him to pass the bottle of wine. Filled with surprise, he passed her the Neha’s half-finished bottle of wine. She gulped most of it at once and moved closer to him and asked “Are you sure that they will all be asleep now?”

He turned back looked at the camp and nodded

“Why did you enter my life? And why did you leave me all of a sudden?”

Even before he could think of replying he felt hard slap on his face, even before he could recover from that he got couple more and felt her head rest on his shoulders.

“My best friend was not around when I needed him the most. I missed you, a lot. Did you ever not understand that I am not as strong as you are?” she said

“I did, that is why did not come for your engagement and give you a shock”

“Ah, once you left me I realised why people always mistook us to be lovers. I realised I was deeply in love with you” she said

“Now stop cracking silly jokes, that is my job” he joked with tears in his eyes

She was pissed that he had not taken her seriously even now and got up with anger to show him how serious she was and noticed how hard he had been crying. He picked up a new bottle of toddy and gulped more than half at once.

“I thought that I had understood you the most, now I realise how wrong I was to imagine that” she said and sat on his lap, snatching the bottle of toddy and finished the rest. Even before he could speak anything she landed a kiss on his fore head. “I drank for the first time in my life for this, I wish I had done it 4 years back” She landed another but this time on his cheek. He was breathing hard, pushed her away and said “Get back to your senses, you are getting married to my best friend. I am really happy to see 2 of my best friends get married, don’t spoil that. I don’t want to stay away from your wedding as well” got up and started walking away, stopped mid-way and said “I loved you from the very moment I saw you, even before we became friends and I do miss people, my silly jokes are what keeps me alive”.

She got up and said “Some dogs never change, they will continue to be loyal whatever happens” and walked into the camp.