Moreover, I wished not to study anything in my eleventh standard, in order to take a rest after writing the tenth public exam and before writing the twelfth public exam. These thoughts of mine ruined me. I flunked in the very first exam but there were two reasons to that along with this. One was that I hadn’t really studied well for the exams. And the other was that the pass mark in my new school was a whopping 60%. Even thinking of that cumbersome pass percentage would cause fainting in the examination hall.
When I came to know that she and Syed had also flunked, I felt as if my wounded heart had at last been treated by a beautiful nurse.
After that we were all fearful of getting the progress report signed by our parents, as we were new arrivals to the list of failures. However, I made an idea. As per the idea I got ready at 8’o clock: The exact time to go for the bus even a minute’s delay would make me bunk my class. Then I first rushed to the bus stop from my home. Half way I turned back and rushed again to my home as if I had forgotten to get the signature in the progress card… I went shouting.
“Ma, I forgot to get the signature,” and on hearing this, my father rushed to take the pen.
I took the progress card out of my bag all in a bustle exactly showcasing urgency for which my mother had to give an immediate attention. Then I showed my report card to my mother. When my mother was about to put the signature, her eyes suddenly fell on the grade. So I shouted,
“Hurry, hurry it is already getting late."
I put down my hands over the F grade marked with a red ink as if holding the report card.
She signed without seeing the grades on it and as a continuation of the play I once again rushed with extreme speed and great relief.
In that following night, though I incessantly spoke with my mother about the other topics, she was keen on my report card. As soon as she asked, “what grade have you got?”
“This time I got only B grade, today you saw while you were signing, didn’t you?” I asked.
She asked, “I didn’t. Why have your grades dropped?”
“Ma what do you think of this school? Even getting pass marks in this school is difficult. Be proud that your son has passed. Don’t covet much,” I told her sagely.
Then after a few petty arguments I manoeuvred the plane of conversation in a different direction.
However, Syed has been always loyal to his mother. He said about his F grade to his mother, but that would not have been a problem had he not mentioned my getting the same shameful grade.
Like us, our mothers were also close friends. They always gossiped about their life (starting from the day they were born) and it is because of that, that my mother came to know my grade at last.
That day, I came to my house and shouted.
“Today the Chapattis you gave for my lunch are not sufficient. I am so hungry. Do you have anything to eat?”
My mom’s face turned red.
“We will see that later, what grade you have got this time?” She asked.
“How many times have I to repeat the same answer for this question” I grinned in mock disappointment and said, “B- grade”
“But Syed told his mother that you too have got F grade."
She asked looking into my eyes, while my father regarded me with suspicious eyes.
“I really forgot to tell you. On that day, Syed got flunked, while I got passed. He was so unhappy and requested me that he would say that I too got flunked in so beseeching a voice that I couldn’t help but acquiesce. So that it would be easy for him to manage his mother and convince her that getting pass marks in our school was so tough."
Though she believed this, in her eyes there still lingered some doubts.
“Today’s Chapattis you made for my lunch were so fantastic. The opulence in its taste could scarcely satisfy my hunger. Do have them now?” I asked and approached the kitchen.
My father, whose doubts bordered on suspicion earlier would have become unchangeable convictions. My mother would have kept the same Chapattis for his lunch as well and I dare say the notorious taste still stuck his tongue.
I do such things to remove myself from sticky situations. I often lied to my mother because we both liked the lies I used to tell her. Some days later my parents would be laughing at the puerile lies I had told them. So I always liked lying (harmless lies they were though), because I didn’t want our (my) happiness to be spoiled by a silly truth.
During those days, the life we lived within those walls was just like this, we lived every moment in blithe contentment. My parents were my world and like the moon that is inseparable with the Earth my thoughts always revolved around them. That was until the day she came into my dreams.
17.AS IN LOVE AS NEVER BEFORE:
The next week was full of fun and frolic. With the new friends that I had got in my new school and with my old friends we bunked the class and went to a movie. On that day, I saw one of the romantic movies, which left a complete impact on me.
I was sitting on my bench, no one was around us. She suddenly came near me, stroked my hair as gently as my mother’s stroke, kissed on my cheeks and then went…
At last as usual when my mother shouted
“Wake up, Krishna it is already late.”
I found that all those were just dreams. I hurt myself like the other ordinary lovers for the human inability to give life to their dreams …
That day I went to the school feeling something different about myself from what I have been these days. I felt that I had gone crazy yet I wished that craziness was not enough for me to love her. When I realised my longing for her, I just laughed at the things for which I had longed before.
When I went and sat in my class, I saw her coming. As she entered I saw her straight into her eyes, she saw me and gave me a courteous smile in her face. I thought for a while whether she too would have got the same dream like mine. I thought this for the whole day, from that day that I realised I had fallen in love for her as never before.
I realised for all these days my subconscious mind was always thinking about her, speaking about her and loving her. However, my mind was busy to lend ears to it. When my subconscious mind explained her importance through dreams, my mind realised its yearning for her, which had been concealed since the day it saw her.
If everyone who fell in love with someone thinks of the day they had realised that they have fallen in love then it would be surely the day, in which they had their loved ones in their dreams for the first time in their life.
That was the day I realised that a part of mine loves her dearly even without my knowledge. My heart hid the true love for her by the false shadows of lies, which I said to myself for the sake of my vicinity. At last I recognised it when my dream threw its lights over them.
I felt that feeling was something different, totally different from the attraction, infatuation, etc., which could never be experienced with anyone other than her. One may be first attracted by thousands, hundreds may infatuate but when it comes to love, it is always one. Love is so damn a thing that it always gives permission for only one soul to exist in our heart by saying its name.
A week later, I went to the terrace to sleep over there. Some nights of my Sundays were spent underneath of the stars in the terrace.
“As you were afraid of seeing her gaze
You came at night, when the whole world is asleep
In order to see how beautiful she really was
With the one sided love towards her
For some days you emaciated
And for some days you grew
For all these days, you thought someday she will be yours
But now I am sorry to say, that the one you loved
Is going to get married to another,
Who loves her more than you do
With the breath that has kissed your girl’s heart
I am sending you my first m
arriage invitation
Come there with your friends! Hide yourself in the huge crowd
And bless us while we walk down the aisle, you the little Moon.”
The little Moon was the first one to whom I confessed my love. When I feared that he might also be spell bound with her sleeping beauty, I warned him not to fall in love with her at any cost for she was made for me.
One day in the chemistry lab after doing our experiments, I went near the place where the teacher had kept the concentrated Sulphuric acid and Hydrochloric acid. They advised us that those were hazardous acids and we should not keep ourselves near them. Nevertheless, whenever we got the chance we tested whether what they had said was true or not by throwing papers or small wooden pieces over them.
I saw no one was around there so I decided to use that chance. I opened the book, which was kept in the side of that table, to tear a piece of paper from it. My eyeballs bulged out at that moment because that book’s first page contained her beautiful name.
“While, she wrote her name, haven’t the pen asked her to show him the creator of the world’s most beautiful one word poem? If it had asked then how could she have shown God to it, as he was the creator of her name?”
I thought a poem at that moment.
“You stupid, the poem is old, jaded and faded “I said to myself.
And I took the book home. I read that book until so late at night that even my mother wondered.
” If I were given all her books then I would have been the state first rank holder” I thought to myself.
I rehearsed many times
In Love : Once & Forever Page 9