Summer

One summer many summers ago. Was spent walking between rows of gulmohar. And feline infested jungles. Or so we believed. Slept in sweaty dorms. With half a dozen stranger women. Dozed off till midnight by the sea with brackish water and no waves. Licked ice cream on our way back. Our slippers went missing. Walked bare-feet again. Between rows of gulmohar. Kicking amuck heaps of yellow petals. Stacked together by sweepers. Who would surprise us between wee hours and dawn. If we were woken up by a random incessant nightmare. Staring down from the top floor window grille of a near ancient girls' hostel. In whose bathrooms we sat and wept. When we PMS-ed. Or smoked. And the gardens on whose grass we lay. Biting off the ends of grilled cheese sandwiches. Soiled with ketchup. Right in the mid of May. Haggling with public transport, for the last rupee. Which wasn't hard earned then. We knit stories. Sans climaxes. For we couldn't see the end. The end, right then. Assumed that that Summer would go on forever. 

Somehow, the aftertaste of infinite freedom hasn't dwindled off my tongue yet. Even though many more summers have been by.