Stories

Blocked

A food blogger and an influencer, Reena was the best at her game. Known among many for her honest reviews, she was one of the most sought-after influencer. Always ready to collaborate, Reena believed in staying on her toes. Just like always, today too, she was burning the mid-night oil and working on her latest review article. That’s when her phone buzzed.

It was around 11.30 PM and was quite late for her to get any message. “Hi” said the message. An Instagram DM! @Bikeloverfoodie was the profile name. Display picture of a bike, the profile was neat and new. “Hello?” she replied. Instantly the “typing” symbol flashed and a new message was delivered. “I just wanted to say that I am a big fan of your work! Loved your Insta feed!”. Such messaged were common for Reena. Nothing seemed fishy. She checked her notifications bar and all her posts were recently liked by @Bikeloverfoodie. She smiled. Appreciations were always warm and blissful. ‘thank you” she wrote and kept her phone, but it buzzed again!

“You know. I went by your review and ate your recommended Pizza Dosa at the Ghatkopar Khau Gully. It was delicious! Thanks for the recommendation!”. Reena kept looking at the new message. Clearly this person wanted to have a small talk. “I am glad!” she wrote and then sent “You’re welcome”. She kept the phone aside and yawned. The link of writing her article was broken already and then the phone buzzed again.

Another message. “Can you recommend a good place for Sundae Ice Cream?”. Ice cream was her soft corner, she couldn’t ignore this one. She replied and then came another message. They both kept on talking and then when she looked at the clock, it was already 2AM.

Time flew by and the chat seemed never ending, while talking to this new person seemed interesting enough, Reena had to be up for her office the next day. “Listen. I have got office tomorrow. So bye bye for now” she wrote. In a jiffy came the revert. “One last question?”. “Go ahead” she wrote. “Can we meet once?”

Reena was little surprised at the request. She was talking to this person for the first time, didn’t know anything about him and now here was a request to meet. Before she could write anything, came in another text. “We can meet at the Vile Parle khau gully…At the famous dosa guy…he makes awesome paneer dosa!” @Bikeloverfoodie had hit the right chord. Reena shared a lot of memories with that place.

Thinking of them again, she smiled a little. A small smile that reflected more of pain than bliss, she looked at the screen. Something struck her and she viewed the profile. One of the pictures on the profile was familiar. She had seen it multiple times. She saw it and then she went back to the chat. Anger and dismay hovering on her face, she wrote “Viraj? You?”.

Moments passed by, she was growing anxious. “Yes…” came in the reply. “Why?” she punched in. “Just wanted to check up on you…” “So you made a dummy profile to talk to me???” “I had no option, you had blocked me from everywhere…I just wanted to see if you are doing fine….that’s all” “There is no need to check up on me after you have finished everything Viraj” she wrote, but didn’t hit then send button. She kept thinking.

The chat seemed cold now. The world around her was turning. She had never expected this. She then hit the back space, deleted everything. Hit the back button and went into the settings section. @bikeloverfoodie was added to the block list too…