Momos

Kritvik Bhatt

“Yeah, and so, when we were about to go to the studio, he asked me if…”

Kirishima was sitting on stage, narrating a story or some stuff to the other guy. Her voice was being blasted by the speakers on both sides of the stage, for some reason. The audience sat silently, listening to each and every word she was saying.

“A-And then… Ahahaha.”

Maybe she just cracked a joke, and many people around laughed for a moment too.

“And then, when she was just about to say it, he…” She was narrating with a smile on her face.

The guy on the right side of the stage too was grinning as he glared at her narrating.

I had my arms folded in front of my chest, for some reason, as I stared toward the stage with my drowsy narrowed eyes.

On my right was Sana, who was smiling as she glared at her saying stuff.

“Why am I even here…?” I thought. “Maybe, I shouldn’t have come here after all…” I closed my eyes and shook my head. “No, man. I just thought I’d not talk about this stuff.” I turned my head downward, opening my eyes a little. “I’m now here, and that’s that. Now, I’ll regret it later.” I turned my head leftward, for some reason, looking aimlessly some distance away. “But, if I were with my friends at Faridabad, I’d surely have sorted this out one way or the other. They are close to me, for some reason. I… could just shift dates or some stuff, maybe, and talk this stuff out with everyone. Aaryan and Sana… I don’t think I could have, for some reason.”

The sun was setting down slowly. The sky was turning darker, obviously. The evening was slowly turning into night. The irregularly shaped clouds covered the sky a little, but not completely. And beneath that sky, everyone was walking here and there, peacefully talking and chilling at the place, buying stuff, clicking photos, eating, and doing other stuff.

I smiled. “I enjoyed a lot. Or… did I?”

“Hey!”

I turned my head rightward at Sana, who had just called me.

“Are you getting bored?”

“Huh? No…?”

“But I am, you see,” She said with a smile. “Let’s go home now.”

“Huh? Why are you getting bored here all of a sudden?”

“Well, I follow her religiously, so I know a lot of things about her already. All she’s doing here is repeating all of those things. So I’m not really interested in it. Let’s get out and eat somewhere.”

I smiled. “Okay, man. But if she sees us walking away, she’s gonna feel hurt.”

“That’s sad,” She said as she stood up from her seat, turned right, and then turned her head back toward me. “Like, that’s her fault, you see.”

“Uh, okay,” I said with a smile as I stood up and started to follow her as we walked through the people sitting in their seats toward the alley.

She stepped on the footpath in the middle of the rows of seats and turned right, opposite to the stage, and I continued to follow her as we walked away from the stage toward the booths and stalls again.

We just walked past the last couple of rows and entered an alley of stalls on both the sides as she asked, “Anyway, what do you want to eat?”

“Anything that we’re gonna find outside, man.”

She chuckled. “You see, I don’t really think it works like that.” She turned her head downward toward her smartphone in her hands and turned it on. “Like, we should search some restaurants nearby, you see.”

“You do that.”

“I am,” She said as she clicked on some stuff on her smartphone screen.

I turned my head toward her phone and started to look at it.

We both—again—were walking in between so many people and the place was filled with the indistinct chatter of people joking and laughing and talking and just chilling. In the background, there was also the sound of Kirishima coming through the speakers, even though it was too little to make anything out of it.

“Man, there’s a lot nearby.”

“No. They’re all about five to ten minutes away.”

I nodded.

“I don’t wanna walk this much.” She turned to me as she said, “I have a feeling that I’d just step out of this place and there’d be something to eat.”

“Damn, man. You’re really hungry, I guess.”

“I am.” She turned to her phone again.

***

“H-H-How…?!”

“I said it! I said that I have a feeling about it!” Sana said as she started to run away.

“Wait!” I shouted as I started to run behind her.

We had just come out of the entry pathway to the JenCon, man, and just on our left, for some reason, were stalls of food and stuff filled with people with bags on their backs. Maybe they had come out of JenCon too, since they looked young and had bags.

There was actually a highway in front of the JenCon’s entrance, and the cars were running speedily beside us as we stopped running in front of the stalls and started to walk in front of them, checking the stuff. First of all, there was a momos’ stall, where a man was sprinkling some sort of spices. He then handed the plate to the group of guys in front of them, who were already eating from some other plate. I then looked at the stall right in front of it.

Those stalls, for some reason, were made of wood and stuff. They had a little bulb on top, turned on, and food stuff beneath it.

“What do you want?” She asked me as she suddenly turned back. “They have aalo-tikkis, momos and Chinese stuff like that, aalo patties, kachori, and some more things around.”

“Huh? You decide.”

“You do.”

“… Momos,” I smiled. “Just like the last time.”

“Last time?”

I frowned a little. “Remember we ate momos after school once?”

She frowned too. “I-I guess I do.” Her eyes suddenly widened. “Yeah! I do!”

I turned back and started to walk to the stall. “Yeah. Just like that day, man.”

She nodded. “I remember it was you who paid.”

“Yeah,” I turned my head to my right at her and said, “Because I ain’t poor, man.”

She looked into my eyes and replied, “Saying you’re not poor is the biggest proof you are!”

“Huh?!”

“Yeah!” She turned her head to the front. “You see, I read somewhere that it’s only the poor who say that money doesn’t matter or that they’re satisfied and have everything they need, and even that they’re not ‘poor’.”

I frowned as I turned to the stall. “Damn no.”

“Damn yes!” She said as she turned her head to the front. That group of guys was still there on our right, and since there was not enough space that both that group and the two of us could stand in front of the stall at once and eat, I simply stood behind her. “Bhaiya, how much is one plate of steam momos?”

“Fifty,” The fat guy on the other side replied.

She turned her head downward toward her bag and said, “Make one plate.”

“Hmm,” that guy replied as he turned to the stall, opened the steamer beside him which sent off a cloud of steam above, and started taking out momos through spoons.

I suddenly turned to my pants, took out my wallet, and opened it as I said, “I’ll pay, man.”

I took out a note of fifty rupees and raised it toward the guy as he raised the plate of paper with a bunch of momos on top of it. I took the plate with my left hand and kept it down in front of me.

She turned her head to me, smiled, and said, “Like, why does it always have to be you who pays for momos?”

I smiled too as I took up a piece, dipped it first in the ketchup, then at the mayonnaise, and then took a bite. With the bitten piece in my hand, I chewed as I said, “I can’t wait, man. I’m hungry.”

She turned to the plate and took a piece too. Steam was still coming out of the plate as the ketchup and mayonnaise continued to flow toward the momos and drench them.

She too took a bite as I did.

I turned to her as I chewed and asked, “Does this JenCon happen every year?”

She turned to me and shook her head. “Not really. You see, the first time was a couple years ago, just before COVID, and it’s the second time. But since it was COVID in the middle, we can’t really say for sure.”

I nodded. “Damn.”

“Anyway, did you like it?” She asked.

I gulped down and replied with a smile, “No doubt at it—I had a lot of fun.”

“Like, I didn’t really think you’d have a lot of fun, you see, because you’re not really into Jenshin and other anime games.”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “But it was surely a fun experience, for some reason. But I’d really like to attend something like this again, just related to anime as a whole.”

“Yeah,” She nodded as she took another piece. “You see, there’s this AniCon too which is conducted every year. And, luckily, it does happen every year.”

I chuckled once. “When are we going there?”

She smiled as she took a bite and chewed. “Dunno. And, I’ve heard that it’s kinda cringe, you see.”

***

Seconds passed, minutes passed, and the number of momos on the plate decreased, obviously. The sky was a little darker than it was before.

The next moment, both of us were inside the metro station, waiting for the train by glaring at the empty tracks. We were also talking a little and smiling.

“Yeah, and then…” She was narrating some sort of story, maybe, and her eyes were on me.

I had my head tilted down, staring aimlessly toward the tracks. My hands were inside my pants. I was smiling too.

“I never wanted that day to end, man. Seriously. But… it was ending… right in front of my eyes, and I could do nothing but let time pass and abide by its damned laws.”