What kind of friend are you?

 CHENNAI : The one who is always late 
Every group has this friend. They are never on time for anything — and mine was late for her own birthday party, once. If this friend was a period, I’d have a pregnancy scare every month. They also have a set excuse when they walk in two hours after we decide to meet. They use it over and over like we haven’t heard it before, and we all can repeat her excuse word for word. “Oh, I’m sorry, I got stuck at the —” “— the temple near your house, Thursdays are the worst days to meet, yes, we know. Sit down.” Eventually, you learn how to work around their habits by just telling them that the squad is meeting two hours before the actual meeting time, and still watch them walk in half an hour late.

The one who you’re into
This friend is just a friend. No, really. They’re really good looking, easy to talk to, and just your type, but you are just friends, and it works out well. They have a separate life, friends, and a lover, and you guys can hang out platonically without a soup song by an overly butthurt man-child playing in the background. But the second that piece of delicious platonic pie is back on the market, you’re siding into their direct message inbox faster than our PM wishes international leaders a happy birthday. Until then, you’re as carefully nonchalant as his tweets on crimes against children and women in India.

The one who is too pure
“—and then we went back to my place and went at it like-”
“No, no, no! Not in front of her! We haven’t had the talk yet!”
The Pure Friend just looks at you weirdly as you cover her ears. This is the friend who looks at life with a positive lens and an innocent giggle. They don’t have a mean bone in their body and would never do or say anything to hurt anyone or anything.

That is why they must be protected from the terrible things that happen in this corrupt world. When this friend got a boyfriend/girlfriend, the entire squad got ready for battle. The Mom Friend interrogated the ‘significant other’ for three days without food or water, the Introvert Friend analysed their social media for fudged accounts, the Extrovert Friend got to know all about their real-world interactions, the Meme Friend hacked into their computer, and the Late Friend came on time to meet them. The pure one must be protected at all costs.

 The One Who Is An Extrovert
There comes a moment when the Extrovert Friend sees your socially awkward behaviour and ‘adopts’ you. From here on out, you’re going to theatres in nice clothes and eating expensive popcorn instead of watching Netflix in bed while eating cold maggi. The Extrovert Friend will introduce his newly adopted child to everyone they know (which is very frightening but we have to do what Father says now), and throw you into the arms of the cute girl you’ve been trying to talk to with a wink and a helpful conversation starter. Everyone needs an Extrovert Friend in the group, because you know damn well that the squad will just send memes to the group chat and never meet in person until someone has a birthday, dies, or worse, gets married.

The One Who Is A Meme
Ah, the meme friend. Every single sentence is a reference to either a Vine or a viral video. Every dance move is one of those millennial flailing movements. Every social media post is a shared meme. This extends to their social relations, too. I once texted my Meme Friend after he went through a rather tough break-up to check on him and he  replied with the  “yeh dark nahin hain bhai, yeh life hain” meme. I know that talking to him won’t help him feel better, because he needs his own special session of therapy of staying up till 6 am, managing their meme account on Reddit.

The one whose laugh is funnier than the joke
Cracking a joke in front of this friend is like eating a large McDonalds combo meal — you don’t know which one is going to break them. Everyone has a different variant of this friend — there’s the clapping seal, or the loud witch’s cackle. It’s impossible to stop her. She’ll be laughing about the joke for the next four hours, and every time she remembers it, she’ll crack up again for another four hours. The whole squad will laugh, because no joke is as funny as her laugh.

 The one who is going to rule the world
This friend is not only ridiculously smart, they also have a diabolical side that terrifies you. Currently, they’re in some Ivy League school in the US after getting a scholarship because they found a cure for cancer, or something. They tried explaining it to you, but you fell asleep after they said ‘using nano-technology to genetically modify’ something-or-the-other. While this is all well and good, you were awake for the part where they told you they were going to sell the technology to the Russians and the US at the same time, just to start a war, before selling it to the Japanese in exchange for year-round tickets for sumo wrestling.

The one who you bully
“Hey, the chips are on the top 
shelf. Need a ladder?”
“Hey, the drinks are in your love 
life, need a miracle?”
“Whoa, somebody’s acting too big 
for her size five boots.”
“Well, you’re going to die alone 
and sad, so suck it!”
You know every insecurity, stupid incident and failed romantic encounters in each other’s lives, and these are your weapons against each other. Every moment spent is a painful but playful exchange of verbal abuse, emotional blows and sometimes physical attacks against each other. But at the end of the day, the only person who is allowed to make fun of them is you, so that crazy jerk who called her short in the club is going to be licking the floor clean, exactly at your friend’s eye-level. After all, their insecurities are your weapon to not only wound them, but to heal them.

The one who is an introvert
The poor Introvert Friend. The poor, poor, socially-inept, anxiety-prone, stressed, Netflix-bingeing, anime-watching, Vitamin D-malnourished soul. The Introvert Friend is so bad at social situations, she makes the Rahul-Modi hug look like a passionate embrace between two long-separated Titanic survivors. In that metaphor, the Introvert Friend is Jack — frozen and not getting on the damn raft you’ve made for her that has space for two people, dammit. No matter how many times you try to help the Introvert Friend, it doesn’t work, but if that means the two of you are dabbing to In My Feelings in a corner of the club instead of twerking with the cool kids, it doesn’t matter, because they are some of the truest, kindest, and most loyal people in the room.

The Mom friend
What’s scarier than your Mom? The Mom Friend, because at least your mother doesn’t know the hot mess you are when you go out clubbing. And while your real mom may remind you of your Math scores every time you forget to clean your room, the Mom Friend brings up how you had a tequila-vodka-whiskey-rum shot every time she picks you up, before throwing you a water bottle and reminding you to stay hydrated. Thanks, Mom Friend, because you’re the homie that’s saving me from a UTI and a heavily-documented visit to Kauvery Hospital.

The One Who Is Buff
This friend can only speak about body building and exercise, and every conversation usually turns into a detailed explanation of his daily visits to the gym. I have to be honest, I only know what a protein shake is because of this guy. I used to think it was a new version of the Harlem shake. This massive, beefy guy will also display his massive beefiness at every opportunity. He once bench-pressed my friend just to prove that he can and does lift, bro.

The one who is your therapist
Emotions are tricky to handle for any person, but not for this friend. They dance through your repressed stockpile of feelings like Prabhudheva (them) shimmies around Kajol (the feelings) in Strawberry Penne, while Aravind Swami (you) just look confused so as to why AR Rahman (life) added a dramatic marching theme to a ballad (this metaphor isn’t happening). Despite never having a relationship, they know exactly what to say and do, even though you still maintain ‘it isn’t real if you ignore it’ is a healthy decision. It’s like getting good advice from Suhana Khan on how to make your own career — you didn’t think it would work out so well.

The one your parents love more
This is your oldest friend, and closest partner-in-crime, and you’ve grown up together. This means your family has seen them grow, and they like them better than you. They know that friend’s favourite food, dreams for the future and intricacies of their love life, while they still don’t know your correct age, even though the two of you are the same age.
“Hello?”
“Hey dude, where are you?”
“I’m out with some friends, why?”
“I’m at home having dinner with your parents, will you be joining us?”
“THEY’RE MY PARENTS, DUDE!”

The One Who Swears Too Much
Have you ever wondered how many swear words could be squeezed into single sentence? Look no further than this friend, who uses expletives as an adjective, verb, noun and tense form. Of course, he sometimes uses them as expletives. Mostly it is used in the worst possible times, like in front of your parents and family. Eventually, your family learns to accept his lingo as just part of the angry, foul-mouthed, spit-spraying package that is that cad.

The One Who You Worry About
This is the friend who always gets into the weirdest situations no matter what they do. They joined a cult because they were too nice to say no to the clearly crazy woman handing out flyers. They were also involved in a knife fight in the middle of the street because they thought 3 am was a great time to take a walk. They helped a cab driver compose a wildly erotic message to his wife because they just wanted to help and give the cab driver a ‘woman’s opinion’. They attract more weirdos than an Indian K-Pop forum, and every time you see them they have another crazy story to tell you. “Oh, yesterday I bumped into a woman who asked me to sign off my first-born to her.” “Did you?” “…she seemed to be working through some rough stuff.”