The Clingy Ex – Part 01

11^th November 2013

So we both had a subject in common called Machine Learning. The first interaction with her happened when the instructor assigned me the task to collect the email IDs of every student so he could send us notes, as the exams were just two weeks away. As instructed, I started collecting the email IDs of every student in the class and there she was, an almost quiet girl who seemed an introvert to me at that time.

I then forwarded all the notes to the students sent by the instructor to the students and used to reply to the queries raised over email. Sometimes she used to send some queries too regarding the subject notes. The email queries soon turned into Facebook messages just a few days before the exam. Our conversations were simple at first—greeting each other, asking about exam preparation, and discussing subject-related topics. Before long, what started as conversations between the two of us expanded into a group of four, and we formed our own small circle.

28^th November 2013

It was our last exam of the semester, and the four of us went to watch a movie – Ram-Leela. And I guess that day was a turning point. We both felt that we had a spark. And from that day we started texting each other over Facebook Messenger more frequently. Texts used to happen before, but they were only one or two-liner texts limited to the subject discussion.

After the semester ended, she went back to her hometown, but our conversations continued despite the distance. We started talking a lot over text.

1^st January 2014

That was the day when I told her, “I like you.” The response I received was very flat. She said she was already talking to someone and was somewhat committed to him, and that she had always seen me as a friend. I was okay with that and didn’t feel hurt. I told her that I might have gotten carried away and apologized.

Two days later, I got a message from her. She said she had realized there was something between us and admitted that she had lied earlier about seeing someone. She didn’t know how to react at that time and said that she liked me too. I was very happy to hear that.

Even though we were now on the same page, the first 10 days after her acceptance were a bit difficult. The transition from a platonic friendship to a romantic relationship wasn’t smooth. We felt uncomfortable at first because we often didn’t know what to talk about, even though we liked each other.

15^th January 2014

Our semester break ended and the new semester began. We were glad because we could finally meet in person, talk freely, and overcome the discomfort we had over call. That day she didn’t go to her college and we decided over the phone to meet in the evening.

Our college had two campuses and our campuses were not the same. Her campus was around 24 km away from mine, but she stayed in a PG near my campus, roughly a 20-minute bus ride away. The Machine Learning course was the only subject we had in common, as it was offered jointly to students from both campuses. Our streams were also different.

She came to my college that evening. There were multiple exit gates, and we chose to meet near one that was rarely used. We sat there and talked about many things—mostly to get to know each other better—and it didn’t feel uncomfortable at all.

I also told her that one of our friends used to like her too, so we decided to do a prank on him. That evening, one of my professors saw me with her near the exit gate. I had told him earlier that I would go straight home, so I had no idea he would take that route and see us. We laughed about it, though it was a bit awkward. After that, we decided not to meet inside the campus again.

26^th January

By then, we had built mutual trust. From 26th January till September, during our second semester, everything went very smoothly—it felt like a fairy tale. We spent a lot of time together.

One distinctive habit of hers was that whenever we went out, she never let me pay the bill. Sometimes I insisted, and other times I quietly paid at the counter, but she was so adamant that she would say she would leave the money on the table—and sometimes she actually did. It didn’t bother her even if someone else might pick it up. I believed she did this out of love and concern, knowing that my financial situation was very weak.

Mid-September 2014 (In our 3rd semester)

She used to come to the mall almost daily, which was located near my campus. So my routine was that whenever she came to meet me, we would hang out for some time. Then I would accompany her back to her PG, and later I would take a bus home.

One day, it was very late in the evening, and I had some urgent work at home. So I told her that I wouldn’t be able to accompany her that day and would go straight home instead. She said it was okay.

At around 12:30 am, I got a call from her roommate saying that she hadn’t come home. I panicked badly after hearing this. I tried calling her, but her phone was switched off, which made me panic even more. I decided to look for her along the route from my college to her PG.

Meanwhile, I called a close friend of mine, narrated the entire incident, and asked him to inform the police if I didn’t call him back within an hour or so. I kept trying her number, but it remained switched off. I also told my mom that a friend of mine was missing and that I would be going out to look for her. She got worried too.

I left my house to search for her. I tried to find a taxi, but it was taking a long time at that hour of the night. Meanwhile, at around 1:15 am, I got another call from her roommate. This time, she said that she was at home all along and hadn’t gone anywhere.

I was stunned and almost clueless about what had just happened. I called her directly, and this time her phone was on. After picking up the call, the first thing she said was, “Because you didn’t come to drop me home, I wanted you to know that this could also be a possibility—that I might have gone missing.” I got infuriated. I told her it was very immature of her to even think of something like that. I argued with her a lot over this. She said it was just a prank and that I should take it that way. In the end, I calmed down and simply disregarded her behaviour.

Oct-Nov

Before the final semester exams, I called all of my friends from our new circle at my home. There were four of us, including her. After a few hours, everyone left but she stayed back. My mother knew she was a close friend, so she was comfortable with her.

Back then, when we used to open Facebook on our laptops. On the laptop, I showed her some videos on Facebook. After spending some time together, we both left my house. I accompanied her on the bus to her pg. On the way, she said, “Give me your Facebook password. I want to know what kind of conversations you do with other people.” I gave her a very strange look and directly refused. We argued a lot over this. The situation escalated to the point where she said, “There must be something wrong—that’s why you’re saying no. Are you double-timing?”

I was shocked and said, “How could you even say something like that?” She then gave me her password, even though I hadn’t asked for it. After a lot of arguments, I eventually agreed to share mine, but on one condition—that she would access it only in front of me. She agreed.

I dropped her at her pg and took a bus back to my house. On the way, I called her but she said she was busy with something so she could not talk.

When I reached home, I did some work. Around 11:30 pm—our usual time for chatting—I called her. She picked up, but her tone was unusually harsh. Without even greeting me, she started questioning me randomly. She said, “In 2010, you talked to this girl and said her picture was nice. You didn’t give me time, and it seems like you were talking to her as if you were in a relationship.” This was about a girl I used to like during my BTech, something I had already told her about at the beginning of our relationship.

In the one hour and twenty minutes it took me to reach home, she had gone through my entire Facebook history with every girl. That’s when the fights began.

 I asked her, “You agreed to check my account in front of me. Why did you open it behind my back? You broke my trust.”

She replied, “You lied to me. You didn’t tell me you were in a relationship with this girl.”

I said, “I was never in a relationship with her. I told you I used to like her during my BTech—that’s all.”

But she wasn’t ready to listen.

From that point on, fights became a daily occurrence. I had written some personal notes on Facebook about events from my BTech days, and she read those as well. After reading them, she said, “You could not come out of that feeling yet. You still like her and still think about her.”

I told her that those were very old notes and that the girl was a past which happened in 2010. I had no feelings left for that girl. But she used to argue over the same thing and the daily quarrels became a part of our routine. Every day she would say things like, “You lied to me. I feel cheated. You cheated me.” Once she even threatened to ask that girl directly if I didn’t give her my Gmail password.

During these daily fights, I changed my Facebook password. When she found out, she accused me again, saying it proved I was hiding something. I told her “I changed it because you broke my trust”, I said to her. But she was not ready to listen to anything. I thought changing the password would stop her from revisiting those old chats repeatedly, but I was wrong.  She had already taken screenshots of every chat and thus our fights and arguments never stopped.

My mental peace started deteriorating. I could not understand why was she behaving this way. She suddenly stopped talking to me and didn’t speak to me for almost a week. After a week I called her to sort things out. I persuaded her that there was no point in fighting about the things that had happened in the past. She understood me and we reconciled.

January-February 2015

We had to submit our thesis work in the final semester for the completion of our Master’s degree. She was extremely worried about it and felt she would not be able to complete it. She panicked to the extent that she had completely stopped working on it and was considering to drop out. Despite my repeated attempts to convince her otherwise, she did not listen to me. The mere thought of her dropping out of college created turmoil inside me so I took up her thesis topic myself, boggled my mind on it and started studying about it. I being an Electronics and Communication Engineering student did not have any prior knowledge of her topic — Deep Neural Networks. But somehow I could understand the gist of the topic for I found it to be interesting. Everyday I used to perform some experiments in the lab for my thesis and then spend time working on hers as well.

The placement drive was approaching and we used to study together in college. When the first company —a mass recruiter —visited our college, I chose not to sit for it because of the rule that once selected, we would be out of the placement process. I was aiming for better opportunities in my core area of research. She insisted that I should sit for the company since she was appearing for it too, but I didn’t for the same reason. Eventually she got selected.

March-April 2015

I couldn’t get selected at any of the core companies in my field. In some, I was rejected just before the final round and in others, I cleared all the rounds but did not find my name on the final list. In April one company visited our college which I guess was one of the last few companies left before the placement season. I knew that I had to sit for it even though it was not in my field. I took the test, gave the interview and got selected.

She fought with me over this as well. She questioned why I hadn’t sat for the company in which she got into so that we could have been together, even though I had already explained my reasons multiple times. Another reason for the fight was that the company in which I got selected into was the one that my BTech friend (the girl I used to like) had joined after graduation. She kept bringing this up, used to fight a lot with me over these things. Gradually, we started meeting less, down to once in two weeks.

June 2015

Meeting once every two weeks turned into once a month. This was the first time in our relationship that I said I needed a break. She reacted strongly. She said, “You just can’t do this. I knew that this day would come, now that it’s easier for you to reach your ex. I spent so much on you. You can’t just leave like this. You will not be the one to decide.”

I blocked her number and also from the messenger. I did not speak to her for almost 2 weeks. After 2 weeks I got a call from her cousin. She said that her condition was not good at all and she was depressed and was going crazy. She insisted that I speak to her. I got worried hearing this. I spoke to her normally. We somehow sorted things out and decided to give another chance to our relationship — a fresh start.

July-November 2015

I had started my PhD at the same college. Alongside that, I was home tutoring around 16 students at that time. So most of the time was either consumed in PhD work or with teaching, leaving me barely any time to talk to her. And whenever we did talk, we used to have some arguments. She used to tell me that I should not teach any female student and I should only teach boys. I felt very disgusted when she said that. I had reached my saturation level in fighting with her and I lied to her that I was only teaching boys. To avoid meeting her, I used to say that I was very exhausted from PhD work. I used to meet her once or twice a month and that meeting would be full of fear and anxiety. So mostly on Sundays, I used to meet her. The day would start with a normal fight about coming late. She would set the meeting time to be around 10:30 or 11 but I would reach her pg at around 12 or 12:30 pm because most of the time I used to wake up late in the morning because of the classes on Saturdays. The evenings of the meetings were painful too. She used to expect that I would spend a full day with her till 11 or 11:30 pm and then leave but at around 6 or 6:30 pm I used to tell her that I would have to leave. She used to just stand at a place and would not move. She used to say that she would come in front of a car or scooter. So I had to convince her a lot to go. She knew my address so sometimes even when we had not decided to meet she used to come near to my house, would call me, and then threaten not to leave unless I meet her. I often had no choice other than to meet her.

December 2015

We had our convocation of the college. I made a firm decision to join the new company and leave my PhD. She knew that I would be joining this new company and would be moving to another city. She realized that there was no point in holding things up. The toxic relationship of ours finally ended from her side as well, but for me, it had ended long before.

March 2016

My joining letter arrived and I began preparations to move. She asked me to meet her one last time before my departure. I was very scared to meet her for I knew her unpredictable nature but somehow I met her. It was a peaceful meeting and at the end, she wished me a Happy Journey. I was glad that it had finally ended and a new phase of life was waiting for me. But as people say, exes won’t always leave peacefully, that was perfectly valid in my case too.

– Story of an Anonymous guy

(Link for Part-2 : The Clingy Ex – Part 02 – BBlog)