There was only one tender moment that Nikolai remembers having with a woman his whole life. Actually, it was really the most genuine moment he ever had with anybody outside his family, and it took him more than so many years to get over that simple small night which he has let his defences down, and nobody, except for Nikolai, knew.

Her name was Asher. She was a very slight girl who lived only with her sisters as her parents were overseas since she was twelve. She lived in a town far from where their school was, really, but due to tradition, she went to their high school and graduated there, the last in her family.

It was not love at first sight, Nikolai would claim, but in truth, Nikolai didn’t know it was love when he felt a small dip in the pit of his stomach when he saw Asher on the first day of classes with those white headphones on, a pink star in each of them. She wasn’t as gorgeous as some of the other girls, Nikolai noted, but there was something to her that stood out. And that was saying much as she was rather small, petite; with her long black hair covering much of her face. She had a very soft form of lips that would soon give troubles to his puberty stage; as if they weren’t really capable of a frown. At that time, she was mouthing the words to a song blasting on her headset, and Nikolai could make out the words:

“Did you realize, no one can see inside your view / Did you realize, for why this sight belongs to you”

It excited the hell out of him. A strange, delicate girl singing to Portishead! He was torn between approaching or giggling in his seat had the professor not asked them to settle down; but Asher was marked, that he knew.

There were a lot they shared together, in all the four years of high school. Outside the campus they would share smokes, swap LPs, and in their spare time, even make each other mix tapes of random bands that only them knew. MTV was common, and he always made a point to go to her house and watch TV with her, even slept over a couple of times. He learned that she was hard headed and rather strong with her personality; never backing down and always wanted to be treated as one of the boys in some ways; he got around to that by simply treating her as his best friend. But not once did Nikolai attempt to really court her. Asher was almost an idol, a perfect goddess for him; and though the fact that they virtually shared lives together and could not bear to be apart, he almost couldn’t imagine courting her in that sense; he still felt too boring and somehow…inadequate.

But there was an unspoken understanding between them, something unconfirmed but existing. And Nikolai was happy with that. It was Asher and him, and nothing else.

Until graduation came.

There was something in Asher’s eyes on the day that they were supposed to fit their togas. They were shifty, and Nikolai hated it; he couldn’t bear to see them troubled. Those eyes were very much adored, and it didn’t seem fitting that they were laced with worry; which was why he immediately knew something was wrong. I have something to tell you, Asher began, but they got cut off by the toga maker. They never got to talk that afternoon.

Nikolai knew. Somehow, he was born with this gut feeling of knowing when something was wrong, when someone wasn’t for him, when something was about to end. That night, he took his dad’s car out and went over to Asher’s, and they lay on the bed in silence watching an old film on. She was snuggled close, and although Asher hated being hugged, Nikolai pulled her close, and stayed close that way till the morning came. He kept kissing her temples every time, and he just wouldn’t let go—he hated it, he hated his all four years of not being able to do anything and he hated this imminent feeling of loss. And when he finally couldn’t help himself, after ensuring Asher was deep asleep, he cried on her temples.

The next day, she told him she was going to the US. She didn’t even attend the graduation rites anymore. And Nikolai had the worst face in the entire graduating batch.