15 Secret Santa.

I tried not to think too much about the crumbled piece of paper inside my tight fist. But let's face it. I was hyperventilating.

So it went like this. Christmas was in a week and like normal school kids, we played Secret Santa. And since Fate was a sadistic old bat who had no other job than to make my already sucky life suckier, it decided to play Cupid, and guess what? The paper had Rohan's name.

Did I mention that I'm oh so surprised? I didn't? Pretend that I just gasped and made a huge show of being surprised. Personally, I felt like some sick twisted female mutt (some witch other than Fate) was typing away my life on a computer, trying to find ways to land me in the most irritating situations ever. Huffing, I hitched my bag further up as I stomped towards the gate, leading us to the road going to the dorms.

What should I get him? Hrithik-anna said that it's for the duration of the entire week.

Seven gifts for seven days.

Seven gifts.

Seven.

Can the earth split up and swallow me?

Stop overreacting. A simple chocolate would do.

No, no, no, no. I can't settle for mere chocolates.

There are costly ones you know. Those coated nut and raisin ones?

But he hates raisins. Maybe I could make Christmas greeting cards, you know, snow themed, reindeer themed, Santa Claus themed, gingerbread themed and yada yada yada.

You totally can. Only thing is, you suck at them.

And for once, I agreed with my annoying conscience.

Oh well, it was a stupid game of Secret Santa. Only, it wasn't as simple as that.

*

*

*

I crept behind Karan-anna's hunched and oddly trembling back. I peeked at him a little, as silent as I could and saw a Polaroid camera in his hands. Hrithik-anna was sprawled in front of us, mouth wide open and drool running down his chin very glamorously. He muttered something inaudible and turned into another awkward position which made me wonder if secretly he was a jellyfish.

Karan-anna's trembling (which I figured out was muffled laughing) intensified as he took more photos with the Polaroid. He even tickled Hrithik-anna's nose with his own comforter and when Hrithik-anna made a sleepy, funny face, he took another photo. He flapped the photo in air with a triumphant smile. As inaudibly as I could manage with my aching toes, I leaned closer and as expected, Hrithik-anna did look hilarious in the photo. Totally not like the Dobermann dorm head everyone feared him as.

"We should make copies and stick that in the corridors and dining hall." The words were out before I could stop them and I bit my tongue. Oh crap. Karan-anna whipped around, pure horror in his face. His defensive mechanism kicked in and a second later, I was smashed into the wall, a powerful arm trapping me there. I wanted to roll my eyes, honestly. What's with this school's boys and choking this poor girl against the walls?

"What are you doing here?" he wheezed out. He realized a second later that my purple face wasn't because of a weird makeup fixation, he let me go.

"I came here to complain to the dorm head about the broken tap in our bathroom," I said as I looked over his shoulders at Hrithik-anna,"but apparently, he isn't available right now."

Karan-anna's face slackened into one of relief before sobering up again. He took my collar, pulling me closer, and whispered, "You didn't see me here with a Polaroid, yes? One word out that I own a Polaroid and you'll be mincemeat for dinner."

A cheeky grin made its way into my face as a bulb lighted above my head.

"If you plan on talking to my nose, brush first, cannibal." I dodged his reply punch and shot him another grin. "My lips will be sealed," I said, "if you lend me that Polaroid till Christmas."

*

*

*

My plan was this: take many secret pictures of Rohan, stick one photo for each day in areas only he'd be able to get them, with a note saying something (I still haven't figured that out), make a photo album of it, and give it to him on the last day of Secret Santa. It sounded genius actually. There was a tiny problem though: it sounded obviously girly. But again, Rohan wasn't your typical macho guy so maybe it could work...

So right now, I was perched behind three trash cans in the courtyard, trying to get a picture of Rohan, who was talking to Rohit. I groaned when the two boys kept moving and making it tough for me to get a good angle. As if hearing my internal praying, Rohit stood still, reading something from the book in his hand, and Rohan kept nodding..

Click.

With a grin, I waited till the picture was visible, only to see an ugly thumbprint and grit.

I groaned.

I just had to keep my finger on the lens next time.

Slipping the photo into my back pocket, I angled the camera, only to find both Rohan and Rohit missing.

Just my luck.

*

*

*

The first six days of the week before Christmas flew by as I ran behind Rohan, hiding behind dumpsters, benches, and even curtains, but either the photo was too blurry or seemed like I took it while riding a Maserati at 100 miles per hour while I was drunk to my neck. Then there were the occasional thumbprint ones. The last six days had taught me that photography wasn't exactly one of my talents. So during the six days of Secret Santa I’d had to slip in gifts without Rohan finding out who his secret Santa was. I gave him... useful things. Like pencils, erasers, and permanent markers. Cheap, but useful.

Yeah, keep telling that to yourself.

I didn't even try to fight back.

Tomorrow was the big day and honestly speaking, I wanted to call it quits, hand the Polaroid back to Karan-anna in mint condition, and settle for one of those expensive chocolates. Without the raisins.

Let me go facepalm myself.

I heard the door open behind me and hurriedly, I tried to push all the Polaroid photos into my bag before zipping it closed. "Hey bud," Rohan said from behind me and I cringed, the photos inside the bag seemingly weighing a thousand pounds.

It's not like I took those photos to stare at him, okay? Totally not, okay? It was purely just to give presents to Rohan. Yes, purely. Totally. Yeah.

"What are those?"

I yelped, scooting back. Rohan's smiling face came into focus, too close for my liking, and his breath on my face wasn't helping me think straight either.

"Stop sneaking behind me like that!" I said. I sounded unattractively squeaky.

Rohan laughed before getting off my bed and walking to the bathroom. Heaving a sigh, I zipped open the bag and peeked in. A blurry photo of Rohan laughing stared back at me. I took it on the third day in the courtyard, after dinner. The guys were making lame jokes outside the dining hall, not wanting to return to studying biology right after dinner. I had to excuse myself, fetch the Polaroid, run to a dark corner, and take the photo. I didn't know how it happened but the Polaroid didn't capture all the guys. Rohan was the only one laughing against the dark backdrop. And with the lights above his head, that photo looked good. Magical, even. Well, if you look past the blur. Or if you loved him. "So this was what you were up to," a voice whispered near my ear.

Giving an ear-splitting scream, I moved back once again, my hands flying in front of me in some karate pose. Seeing the culprit, I pressed my hands above my heart as I took deep breaths to calm my erratic heart. Rohan was sitting behind me with a cheeky grin. I threw my pillow at him, which he caught effortlessly before throwing it back at me. It hit me squarely on my jaw, bouncing to the floor. Before I could recover, Rohan shot two more pillows at me and let me tell you, when the pillows aren't that fluffy and when the thrower gives the right amount of force, even though there won't be any bruises forming, it did hit like a strong five year old boy.

"Cut me some slack," I muttered, "I'm a girl after all." Rohan chose to ignore my statement and deftly took the bag with all the photos. I didn't even try to stop him as he went through each photo, making comments about how I totally sucked when it came to photos.

Jeez, tell me something I don't know.

Finally, when he’d looked them all over, he looked up at me curiously. "Why?"

I shrugged, trying to appear indifferent as I told him, "My idea of giving you a Christmas present. You were in my lot for Secret Santa. I didn't want to settle for plain chocolates."

Rohan shook his head with a quiet laugh before beckoning me closer. He got me in a headlock and before I could pull away, he leaned his head dangerously close to mine, took the Polaroid and held it like Mr. Bean. He isn't going to, is he?

Click.

"You could always ask," he murmured as he flapped the strip of photo around till the image formed.

The photo looked a little glassy and we both looked a lot tired. I seemed bewildered, my eyes focussed on Rohan's right cheek, which was almost pressed to my left one, and Rohan was looking at the camera lens, his fingers through my hair. He was smiling, his single dimple making itself known, and because of the bulb, both our eyes looked shiny. The dull glow of the room made it look cosy and we both looked effortlessly happy though I was simply staring at him, not even a smile lighting up my face. It was the best photo I’d ever seen. And in a way, the photo looked intimate. We looked intimate.

"I like it," I heard myself say and Rohan laughed.

"Yeah, me too."

He took one of the photo frames from the small makeshift nightstand we made ourselves from a sturdy cardboard box and stuck the Polaroid photo in, effectively covering a six year old photo of Rohan standing on the beach with sand in his mouth. Rohan always said he hated the picture, though he’d kept it since his mother had insisted.

"There," he said, pleased with himself. Throwing a towel over his shoulder, he walked to the bathroom. "I'm going to use the restroom. Now sit and think of a proper present."

And though I stuck my tongue out at the bathroom's door, I couldn't stop the grin from growing big. After all, I did look perfect smiling from within Rohan's arms.