Talk Of The Town

If there was one advantage of being engaged that Ahmer enjoyed, it was that girls were finally leaving him alone now that he was no longer available. Now they were satisfied staring at him forlornly from afar while chatting to each other about what could have been. And guys rarely talked to him, intimidated by his height and quiet demeanor.

“Oi Prince, we need to talk.” Well, most guys were.

“I told you not to call me that in college,” Ahmer replied.

For the nth time in his life, Ahmer wondered if he had done the right thing by telling his friends about his secret identity as they cornered him in their college Anime Club Room. Sure, they had his back when he needed it, but they could also be a handful, like right now.

Saif Raza, a short and thin boy with fair skin and curly green hair, was staring him down. Shoaib Khan, a big-boned boy with wheatish skin and purple hair slicked back, was smiling at the whole thing. And Salman Saeed, a tall and muscular boy with spiky orange hair, was on the lookout, having locked the club room door.

“Explain yourself!” Saif demanded.

“What do you want me to explain?” Ahmer played dumb.

“This!” Saif showed him a video of the night before at the beach on his phone.

“I got into a fight with guys from Anti-West Squad… and won. That’s all.”

“That’s all? Bro, this was supposed to be your secret identity now,” Saif checked the phone for views, “4 million people on the net know about Prince, or should I say Pepper Spray Man?”

“Technically, it’s still a secret identity because no one knows Prince and Ahmer are the same, other than you guys,” Ahmer tried to placate Saif.

“You could have been exposed, you could have been injured or worse, dead. You should have run at the sight of danger. What made you pick a fight with seven fanatical thugs?”

“They were going to hurt my friend, so I couldn’t just stand aside.”

“Now that’s what I want to know,” Shoaib butted in, “Who’s the hottie?”

“Her name’s Roxy and before you ask, she’s just a friend.”

“Does your ‘friend' know about your fiancée?”

“No, she doesn’t even know my real identity.”

“I see Ahmer for Ruqsana and Prince for Roxy?”

“I told you we’re not like that!”

“Hey, I’m not judging. Polygamy with up to 4 wives is allowed after all. If you want a harem of pretty girls who love you, you have my full support.”

“Well, I don’t want a harem. Honestly, I don’t want to be married either.”

“Tsk, only you would complain about being engaged to the richest beauty in Aslanistan.”

“Can we get back to making Ahmer understand how irresponsible and dangerous what he did was?” Saif asked.

“There’s no point in badgering him for it. What has happened has happened,” Salman spoke. He turned to Ahmer and asked, “Do you regret what happened?”

“No.”

“Then that’s the end of it.”

“Okay but now that Prince has become a meme, he might need to change his disguise,” Shoaib pointed out.

“Yes,” Saif agreed, “Those maniacs have members even at our college, you can’t risk being caught.”

“I don’t think I can change my disguise,” Ahmer raised his hand to placate Saif, “I haven’t told Roxy about my secret identity yet. If I change my look, I’ll have to reveal why.”

“Do you want to tell her?” Salman asked.

“I don’t know, I’m a bit split. On one hand, we’ve been getting along so well, but on the other hand, it’s only been two days and she’ll eventually go back to Asadabad.”

They were interrupted when someone knocked on the door, “Anyone in there?”

“Looks like our juniors are here, let’s talk about this later,” Salman said before opening the door, letting the juniors enter.

“Why did you lock the door?” Alisha, one of the juniors, asked.

“We were just discussing the Pepper Spray Man,” Shoaib replied.

“Oh God, that was wild! I made a meme on him and it went viral,” Fahad, another junior, proudly showed an edited version of Prince’s video on his phone where he was pepper-spraying various well-known personalities, including his father. The comments were loving it.

“You do realize your account could be deleted for that?” Ahmer asked.

“I posted it on my backup account,” Fahad gave a thumbs up.

“I also made an edit,” Another junior named Faiz proudly displayed a clip of Roxy’s speech with Aslanistan’s national anthem playing in the background.

“Can you check mine?” Shazia from the first year requested shyly, showing an edit of his fight titled “If Fight Like a Girl was a boy.”

Ahmer sighed. When Roxy called him a living meme, he never imagined it would become true. Not only was his Prince persona now famous, but he had also been turned into various memes, ranging from dank to brain-rot. ‘Hopefully, this meme will die sooner rather than later.’

“Haha! Maybe we can make one with Pepper Spray Man spraying the Dean,” Shoaib suggested, “She certainly deserves it for cancelling the Youth Fest.”

“Oi! Oi! Do you want all of us to be expelled?” Saif asked.

“It’d be worth it to see the look on Mahira ma’am’s face,” Shoaib replied.

“Now, everyone,” Salman said, “Let’s not forget we have an episode to complete. It’s been a month since our last upload.”

“That’s right, UTube money ain’t gonna make itself,” Shoaib said, “Our club funds are running dry.”

“Did you all finish the keyframes?” Ahmer asked the juniors.

“Most of them, the keyframes for the last scene are still left,” Alisha replied.

“Alright, let’s start animating those scenes while some of us finish the last scene,” Salman delegated the tasks to everyone. Soon, everyone took out their sketchbooks, laptops and tablets to begin working on their tasks. For the next thirty minutes, the only sounds being made were the clicks of keys and the scratching of pencil and paper until-

“Ahmer! Ahmer!” A pink-haired girl called out at the door. Ahmer turned around to see Farha Qaiser, his cousin through his uncle. “Did you fill in the form?”

“Yeah, I’ve got it,” Ahmer took out a form and handed it to Farha.

“You know, if you worked on your campaign as much as you work on your cartoon, you might actually win the election.”

“You know, you can keep your opinions to yourself by keeping your mouth shut,” Shoaib retorted.

“Who asked you?” Farha scoffed, her red eyes glowing with anger.

“You just did!” Shoaib smirked, “Besides, why should Ahmer waste his time on something he doesn’t even want?”

“It’s better than making cartoons all day!”

“You mean better than sucking up to teachers and watching as they get rid of events and club funding in the name of focusing on academics?”

“If you’re so upset, why don’t you talk to Mahira ma’am about it?”

“I would except that’s supposed to be your job, Ms President!”

“Whoa! Calm down, you both. There’s no need for all this shouting,” Salman tried to pacify them.

“Bade abba is right,” Farha scoffed, “It’s you guys who are dragging Ahmer down.”

“Farha,” Ahmer said, “I love you, but I need you to leave us alone.”

Farha was taken aback, then her expression turned scornful, “Hn! Ruin your life for all I care.” She walked away from the club room, walking at a quick pace towards the Student Council Room. ‘Shoaib’s the one who started it. Why is Ahmer mad at me? Was I too harsh? No, I’m just trying to help him.’

She didn’t want to talk to anyone for now but Ammar had different plans as he waited for her outside the council room.

“Farha Aapa! Did bhaijaan finally join the election?” Ammar asked, Farha showed Ammar Ahmer’s form, “Perfect, now I can crush him in the elections.”

Farha shook her head, “Tsk! Only you would be excited about defeating someone who doesn’t even care whether he wins or loses. He’d most likely just resign if he won by some accident. You might get along with him for a change if you didn’t irritate him so much.”

“I just want to prove to Abbu that he doesn’t need Ahmer as long as he has me,” Ammar said.

“In that case, it’s not him you need to defeat, it’s me,” Farha smirked.

Ammar held his hand up, “May the best person.” Farha shook his hand.

Back in the Anime Club Room, everyone was looking at Ahmer, not expecting that outburst from him.

“You alright?” Salman asked Ahmer.

“Was I too harsh?” He asked Salman.

“Hn! I think you were too soft,” Shoaib shrugged, “She deserves a lot worse for calling anime cartoon.”

“Yeah, you were awesome!” Alisha agreed and other juniors nodded along.

“You didn’t have to provoke her like that,” Saif reprimanded Shoaib, “What if she tells Ammar about it and he tells President Suhail about it? He doesn’t like us already.”

“Exactly, Ahmer’s dad already thinks we’re too low even to be invited to his engagement party. Why should we appease them?” Shoaib retorted.

“Saif is right, we shouldn’t be causing unnecessary trouble for Ahmer,” Salman interjected.

“So you’re okay with them just forcing Ahmer to do what they want?”

“Guys!” Ahmer interrupted, “Let’s just focus on finishing our project.” Others nodded and went back to working on the episode… Or rather, most of them did while Ahmer attended a phone call, “I’ll be back.”

“Is it from bhabhi?” Shoaib asked.

“She’s not your bhabhi,” Ahmer retorted before going out of the class.

“Wait, really?”

“It’s nice that Ahmer is getting along with his fiancée,” Shazia commented.

“Yeah, fiancée,” Shoaib gritted his teeth for nearly giving Ahmer’s secret away.

Outside, Ahmer picked up Roxy’s call. “Asalamualaykum, Roxy, what’s up?”

“Wailaikum assalam, Did you see the news?” She asked from the other side.

“Oh yeah, it’s crazy, we’re memes now.”

“How will I go outside now?”

“I’m sure we’ll be fine. It was quite dark, so our faces weren’t very recognizable. For me, only those who know me have recognized me so far.”

“Same here, my brother gave me an earful for being dumb.”

“My friend did the same-” Ahmer noticed that his friends were staring at him through the window, with dumb smiles on their faces, “Can I call you later? I’m at the college right now.”

“Oh, do you have a class? Sorry for disturbing you.”

“No, just my club activity,” Ahmer gritted his teeth at his friends, once again wondering if he did the right thing by telling his friends about his double life all those years ago.

“Okay. I was thinking of hitting the Souq, will you be able to show me around?”

“Does 8:30 sound good to you?”

“Yeah, sounds nice.”

“Okay then, see you.”

“Allah Hafiz,” Roxy cut the call.

“Should we prepare for an elopement?” Shoaib teased Ahmer.

“I told you, she’s just a friend,” Ahmer gritted his teeth, but got back to work with a smile on his face.