The Dinner

The restaurant sat on the edge of a fading city square, its neon sign flickering weakly in the winter evening. Arjun arrived first, his heavy coat wrapped tightly around his frame. The years had not been kind to his once-athletic build, though his thick salt-and-pepper hair and thick black framed glasses, gave him an air of dignity. He chose a corner table, away from the noise of the bar, and ordered a scotch for himself. 

As he waited, he checked his phone for messages—a habit he hadn’t shaken even after years of silence. The last time he and Nikhil had spoken, it had been through a brief exchange of texts, a “let’s catch up soon” thrown in almost mechanically. But tonight, after all these years, they’d finally made it happen.

The door opened, and Nikhil walked in, dapper in his sharp suit, his gait confident. Arjun waved, and Nikhil broke into a smile—a wide, familiar grin that hadn’t changed since their college days.

“Late, as always,” Arjun teased as Nikhil slid into the seat across from him.

“Some things never change,” Nikhil shot back, loosening his tie. “Although I see some things do,” he added, looking Arjun up and down.

“Good to see you too,” Arjun said, rolling his eyes. But the warmth at seeing his old friend overrode the sarcasm. 

“Whiskey for you too, the regular?” 

“Nopes. I’d rather have a beer tonight. After ages” Nikhil replied as he slid back on his chair a tad more comfortably. 

The conversation began with the usual pleasantries, skimming the surface of their lives. Arjun worked as a mid-level manager at a logistics firm, stuck in the same job for the last decade. Nikhil was a partner at a law firm, his name occasionally appearing in the papers for high-profile cases.

“You’ve done well for yourself,” Arjun remarked, eyeing Nikhil’s polished watch and crisp attire.

“And you’ve… aged gracefully,” Nikhil quipped, but there was no malice in his tone.

The conversation meandered through safe topics—mutual friends, family, the city’s ever-worsening traffic. But as the drinks flowed and the hours stretched, the conversation turned deeper, as it always did with them.

“You ever think about what we wanted to be?” Arjun asked suddenly, swirling his glass.

“What do you mean?”

“You know, back in college. We had all these dreams, all these plans. I was going to start my own business. You were going to become a writer.”

Nikhil laughed, but it was hollow. “Ah, yes. The novel I never wrote. Still sitting in a folder somewhere on my laptop. One day, maybe.”

“Do you ever miss it?” Arjun pressed.

Nikhil hesitated, his smile fading. “Sometimes. But life happens, doesn’t it? Bills, deadlines, responsibilities. You wake up one day and realize the life you’re living isn’t the one you planned—it’s just the one that happened to you.”

Arjun nodded, the words striking a chord. “You know, I tried once. To start a business, I mean. After Rina left.”

Nikhil looked up sharply. “You never told me that.”

“What was there to tell? It failed. Miserably. Took out a loan, sunk all my savings into it. By the time I realized it was a sinking ship, it was too late. I’m still paying it off.”

For a moment, neither of them spoke. Then Nikhil said softly, “I didn’t know things were that bad.”

“I didn’t want to tell anyone,” Arjun admitted. “Especially not you. You were doing so well, I didn’t want to seem like some pathetic loser.”

Nikhil leaned forward, his voice earnest. “Arjun, you’ve never been a loser. You’ve been through more than most people could handle, and you’re still standing. That’s something.”

Arjun chuckled bitterly. “Standing, maybe. But barely. And what about you? Do you ever feel like you’re just… going through the motions?”

Nikhil hesitated, his jaw clenching, his grip on his beer bottle tightening. He looked around the room, as if searching for an escape, before finally meeting Arjun’s gaze. 

“Every damn day,” he said quietly. “The big house, the car, the fancy suits—it all looks good from the outside. But the truth is, I’m barely keeping it together. The firm’s not doing as well as it used to. I’ve been dipping into my savings to cover expenses. And… Shruti and I are separated. She moved out six months ago.”

Arjun stared at him, stunned. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I didn’t want you to know,” Nikhil said with a shrug. “I didn’t want anyone to know. It’s funny, isn’t it? We spend our whole lives pretending we’ve got it all figured out, when the truth is, we’re all just trying not to fall apart.”

The words floated in the air, filled with truth.

“I miss her,” Nikhil admitted after a moment. “Even after everything, I still miss her.”

Arjun nodded, understanding. “I miss Rina too, sometimes. Even though it’s been years.”

“Remember Maryam, the girl I liked but gave up on because you liked her too? “

“Yeah right. As if she had any interest whatsoever in you. You used me as a convenient excuse, to leave with your dignity intact.”

Both of them laughed at their reminiscence. 

They sat in silence for a while, the weight of their shared struggles settling between them. But it wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. It was the kind of silence that only came with a friendship forged over decades—the kind of silence that offered the comfort of understanding. 

“You know,” Arjun said finally, “I think the only time I ever feel like I can be completely honest is when I’m talking to you.”

“Same,” Nikhil admitted. “The rest of the world is too quick to judge. But with you, I don’t have to pretend.”

They raised their glass and beer bottle in an unspoken toast, the drinks catching the light as they clinked them together.

As they stepped outside, the cold air bit at their faces. The city was asleep now, the quiet punctuated only by the occasional distant hum of a passing car.

Arjun declined Nikhil’s offer of a ride, saying he wanted to walk. As they stood by the curb, Arjun said, “Thanks for tonight. I didn’t realize how much I needed this.”

“Me too,” Nikhil replied, clapping him on the shoulder.

As Arjun walked away, his steps were lighter, his heart a little warmer. Life was still messy, still uncertain, but for the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel alone.

Nikhil watched his friend disappear into the shadows, shoving his hands deep into his coat pockets. His breath clouded the air as he stood there, unmoving. Something inside him felt lighter—like a door he’d long kept shut had finally creaked open.

He thought about the evening, about how easy it had been to talk to Arjun even after so many years. There was no pretense, no judgment. Just the unspoken understanding of two men navigating lives that hadn’t quite turned out the way they had planned.

For Nikhil, who spent his days in boardrooms and his nights in an empty house, that connection was everything. It reminded him that no matter how much he stumbled, no matter how far he fell, there would always be someone who saw him—not the lawyer, not the name on the door, but him.

As he walked to his car, the city lights blurring in the cold, he felt a strange sense of peace. He wasn’t sure what tomorrow would bring—whether the firm would survive another quarter, whether Shruti would ever come back. But tonight, he had been reminded of something he’d almost forgotten: in the quiet zone of an old friendship, there was always room to find yourself again.

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