Story 4: Wednesday.

Between the pen and paper lies a graveyard of thoughts. A medical school application, a cover letter to an entry level clerical job, an application to volunteer as a geriatric care-giver, a pledge to support Ethiopian AIDS orphans, a letter to mom, an apology, a letter professing his undying love for Meena - All had found a quiet death in the vast fields of molecular gaps between electrons and their nuclei.

Ajay rarely mourned his dead thoughts, except on gloomy days. Today is a gloomy day. Clouds hang like body bags, mourning the impending death of more thoughts. More good work, more potential, more, more, more would find itself in the vast expanses of the universe. That's the thing about thoughts, they rarely find their way back to the paper - they just disappear.

Ajay Ramaswamy had peaked when he was twelve. He loved to doodle constructively, wrote a book full of poetry and was actually in love with someone.

Today though was a gloomy Wednesday. Ajay had never given it much thought, but today he realized he ate less than his everyday quota when there was no one sitting across from him. It made him sad to hear himself chew on some leaves. Loneliness followed him even into his stomach through his food. He looked around him - young lovers - girl sleeps in boy's arm as his fingers lay entangled in her hair.

To sleep in the scent of a beautiful woman's hair, Ajay thought.

He had forgotten that feeling. He did not care to remember it. To him it had become just another one of his usuals - the feeling of appreciation that turned into loathing each time he saw someone unlike him. Their smiles turned into his despair, their happiness somehow found a way each time, to awaken his misery, making him lonelier.

And then she walked in. A woman with a cute nose, dark eyes, a mischievous smile on her shapely lips and hair that Ajay was sure he could play with all day. He had seen her before. Perhaps in another life, he thought. But he did not believe in reincarnations and Gods and fate. So what was this woman doing here ? And why here ? Of all the places in the big campus cafe, why on Ajay's table ? Of course, he did not question anything. He just pondered on how to break the ice.

Hi, she says while he broods over a thunderous way to begin a conversation.

Hi !, he replies

First Year ? she asks.

You'd be surprised..sixth.

Six years in this dungeon ?

Higher education calls for great sacrifices. I'm Ajay.

I'm Meena. Wait. Ajay ? Ajay Ramaswamy ?

His heart stopped, skipped and started pounding again. He felt blood rushing through his veins as a big smile crept up his mouth. Meena on the other hand was expecting a reply.

I knew it ! You looked familiar the moment you sat across from me ! How are you !

I'm good. My parents made the move four years ago..

Ajay didn't belive in luck, fate or God but suddenly found all three together sitting across from him chomping on an organic wrap.

What are you doing here ? First year ? Finishing up ! God ! I'm so glad to see you !

I'm happy to see you as well. I'm finishing up my Human Bio major, you know my parents. Med-school seems to be a divine calling for Indian parents.

Their conversation was interupted by the blinking green light of her Blackberry Something. She picks it up.

Hi Sweets ! she exclaims into the phone. She gets up the finish the rest of her conversation.

In an instant Ajay knew who she might have been speaking to. He knew he had lost the love of his life to Fate, to Time, to Misfortune. He gets up and walks away hoping to never see her again.

The only time he had cried over a girl was when he was twelve. That was when his parents decided to move out of the old country and into the new. Ajay cried a bucket of tears when Meena came to see him away. He cried a bucket of tears on the twenty-two hours it took to cross the Atlantic. Ajay cried a bucket of tears in the weeks forth because he missed her so much. Ajay never failed to include her in his dreams. In more ways than one she was his immunity from heartbreak. For as long as he had her as a constant in his life, noone could ever break his heart. For each time he walked away from a woman, he knew he could always hope for Meena to be yearning for him in a distant land.

On this gloomy Wednesday a heart was shattered by a hammer that'll never know about it. The mind of course, will never forget.