It was my 18th birthday. And she was my back up plan. You know, in case plans don’t follow through with Jamshed and the others. Ironically, they did not. So I called her.

“Hey! Jo?”

“Hey birthday girl! How’s it going?”

“What are you doing tonight?”

“I’m heading home right now, I’m thinking of catching up with Sasha and Urvashi later tonight”

“Well, I just wanted to know if you wanted to go out and get some dinner?”

“Sure birthday girl, Independence Café?”

“Cool!”

“Cool! I’ll see you there in twenty”

She got me a neon eyebrow ring, for my newly acquired piercing, it had a little picture of Blossom, my favorite Power Puff girl.

Over salmon and steak, I discovered that college was going well for her and she was seeing someone new. He looked like Harry Potter and talked like Jon Stewart and would never miss an opportunity to make her feel loved. Her father was now the head chef in Chinese Room, and had just appeared in the high society “Upper Crust” food magazine. Her car had been in the shop for two weeks and she was currently getting around in buses and trains. She discovered that she preferred using public transport and that she barely misses it. She was looking for a job, something in the Public Relations field. That’s where her real interest lay.

“Intersting….” I nodded along.

“Et tu Aditi?”

I’m nervous about leaving the country and I’m nervous about this huge responsibility I will have to take on. i.e. of myself. I was finding myself increasingly addicted to the newly lauched Mountain Dew and finding myself using the current Mountain Dew mantra “Do the dew” far too often. I wanted to write, but I was cowardly and lazy. I was thinking of buying a laptop, it had to be a great one at a not great cost and I was scouring the market. And since I did have my car with me, I would give her a ride home that night. I had just been fitted with new contact lenses and don’t I look awesome without glasses?

We stepped out Independence Café a satisfying meal and conversation later.
As we crossed the road I turned into my purse to get my keys. And I remember hearing the horns blaring and turning to my left and being blinded by the headlights. What in real time must have been about three seconds, turned into thirty minutes for me. I knew I was falling; I had been pushed out of the path of the speeding car. I may have momentarily passed out, I know I did. I came to, still lying on the street, with Jo anxiously over me.

“You idiot, what were you thinking?”

I blinked and sat up.

“Come on, now move slowly, move slowly, don’t rush. Does anything hurt?”

Shooing aside the crowd of curious on lookers that had gathered around us, she walked me to the car.From my purse she took out the keys and I sat in the car for two minutes and gathered myself. No, nothing hurt. I was going to be fine.

On the drive home I said very little. I was not tired or hurt; just dazed. She saw that.
“Way to go Mittal, wanted to kill yourself on your birthday?”

Despite myself, I cracked her smile.

“Thank you”

“Don’t mention in kiddo”

And I realized that I really didn’t need to mention it. She was Jo, one of my best friends, but also the one person I took most for granted. She sat in the driver’s seat after literally saving my life and asked me “not to mention it” when I thanked her. With no questions asked about why she had not been invited to do something special on my birthday, she let go of her plans to spend time with me. But these were unsaid things.

When she parked outside my house, I apologized about not being able to drop her home as promised.

“Shut up” she said good naturedly.

And I did.