Yes! There she was!
And, suddenly, I felt a huge wave of relief wash over me. It was as if the blood choked in my veins had begun to circulate again through my body. Her presence had fuelled life back into me.
Monday finally filled in the void that Sunday had created. The rest of the week was also full of fun.
Finally, it was the day we had been practising for all this while. It was the Annual Day.
I had borrowed a black suit and a red tie from Sushil for this day. English Ma’am had told me to go for that colour, while Nikita was supposed to wear a red sari. I guess she was wearing her mother’s. She had told me that she was getting a new blouse, but the sari was old.
I reached the school by 4 p.m. The event was scheduled for 6. The whole school was buzzing with activity. On one hand, the stage was getting the final touches; on the other hand, there was chaos in the green room behind it. My life was much easier than many of the other participants, since I didn’t need a fake beard or a bald head or any other prop. I just had to be myself. And I was all set to impress everyone in my borrowed suit and tie.
At 5.30 p.m. English Ma’am arrived, looking for both of us. I saw her from far away and ran towards the stage to impress her. She saw me running towards her. She waved at me and asked me to slow down. But how could I have slowed down! In that black suit, I felt as if I was going to take her to my prom night.
‘You look dashing, Ravinder!’ she said, and put her hand on my shoulder.
I looked at her hand on my body, and then at her face, and then took in the whole of her. She looked stunning in that golden-black sari. She had left her hair open. Her lips had a wet gloss and her perfume was magical. She looked taller in her heels. Her small blouse offered a nice view of her slender waist.
She was like … Okay, I wanted to marry her.
‘Thank you, Ma’am,’ I said, quite blankly, as I didn’t know how to react.
‘What happened?’ she narrowed her eyes and asked me with a naughty smile.
‘You look so beautiful, Ma’am!’ I gushed.
‘Oh … ho ho!’ She laughed, gracefully holding her hand over her mouth. As she spoke, her head swung from side to side, and then right back towards me. Her hair followed her head like waves in the ocean. I swear that moment was worth capturing on camera!
‘Thank you, Ravinder!’ She bent forward and adjusted the knot of my tie.
I felt very important.
She asked me to follow her to the teachers’ room. I asked her why. She didn’t say anything, but took my hand in hers and started walking.
I was about to faint! My hand was in her hand! Was this really happening? Oh boy! It really was!
Beyond an iota of doubt, I can say that that moment had the potential to drive me mad or even strike me dead with an overdose of unexpected joy. I had wanted this to happen—for her to hold my hand—but the timing of it was all wrong. In the next half hour, I was supposed to be on stage, in front of everyone—the school, the teachers and the chief guest. And her sudden touch had made me forget my lines!
I lived through this adrenaline rush till we entered the teachers’ room. There was no one inside. The lights were off but the leftover evening sunlight was good enough to be able to see. Ma’am let go of my hand and went to get something from her cupboard. I quickly brought my hand to my face, and, smelling it, gave it a kiss.
She turned back with something in her hands, which she didn’t show me immediately. She took a chair and asked me to come up to her.
‘This is for you,’ she said, revealing a red silk pocket handkerchief.
I was beyond happy to see it. She had actually thought to get me something!
She looked into my eyes. I felt shy and blushed. She smiled and tucked the handkerchief in the pocket of my coat. Underneath that pocket, my heart was beating fast enough either to register itself in the Guinness Book or to get admitted to the local hospital.
As she was so close to me, I breathed deeply in the scent of her body. I wanted to tell her what I felt for her. But then, I hadn’t prepared myself for that revelation. And, even without it, that evening was magical. I felt as if I was on top of the world! My luck was rolling and God was generous enough to make my wishes come true.
Half an hour later, I was on stage.
I looked at Ma’am sitting right in front of me in the front row. She gave me a thumbs-up sign. I looked at my pocket handkerchief and smiled at her.
The next two hours were awesome. I grew more and more confident as I spoke, and the transitions from my speeches into those of Nikita’s happened very smoothly. People clapped every time we came on to the dais to close the previous event and introduce the next one.
And then, just as it had started, the evening came to an end. Nikita and I took a huge applause—another moment I would never forget.
After the event, I met up with English Ma’am near the entrance of the green room. It was where most of the performers were getting their make-up removed and changing their dresses. Even before I could say anything, Ma’am approached me. Nikita, too, was right next to me.
‘Brilliant!’ she said, as she congratulated the two of us. We thanked her. But Nikita left us as soon as she heard her father calling her name from a distance near the podium.
I bade her goodbye and thanked God for allowing me some private moments with English Ma’am. It was the ideal time to celebrate my newly formed bond with her. I didn’t want the evening to end. I wanted to hold her hand. I wanted to feel her. I wanted to smell her.
I thought the best way to prolong that moment was to return the pocket handkerchief she’d got for me.
‘Here,’ I said giving that red silky square back to her.
She made a face and asked, ‘Didn’t you like it?’
‘No, no. This is just beautiful!’
‘Then keep it. I got it for you.’
I felt bubbles of love coming up inside me.
‘Really?’ I asked. I wanted to make sure that that handkerchief was for me, and that she had thought about me and bought it especially for me. She gave a huge smile and nodded.
Then it was time to go. It was the last day of school for that year. Ahead of us was the winter vacation. For the very first time in my life, I didn’t want to take a vacation.
The realization that I would now see her only the next year was making me emotional. I wondered if she too was going to miss me. It was close to 9 p.m. when she bade me goodbye at the main gate of the school. She waved. I wished her a merry Christmas and a happy new year in advance, and waved too. But she looked at my hand, and then brought down her waving hand to shake my hand.
She left the place, and I left only when she was out of sight.
I had discovered my first love at the age of fifteen!
That night I couldn’t sleep.
I began making a new year’s greetings card for her.
It is the second day of January—a brand new year. My body smells of Pears soap and my face smells of the Ponds cold cream that Mom has forcibly rubbed on to it, and which otherwise I avoid. I wear the red school sweater over my uniform.
I am excited to return to school. It has been exactly eight days now since I have seen English Ma’am. I am finally going to meet her today. I cannot suppress the smile that’s playing hide-and-seek on my face.
All through my journey from Burla, I prepare for what I will say the moment I see her. In the crowded bus, perched on to the bonnet adjacent to the gear stick, next to the driver’s seat, I am lost in my own thoughts. The noise of people, the squabbling of two ladies at the back over who had grabbed a seat first, the loud monetary negotiation between the conductor and a passenger—it all fails to make its way to me. My mind is relaxed and fresh. There is joy in my heart. Everything around me looks beautiful, even the helper of the bus who appears as though he hasn’t taken a bath in a week.
Every time the bus driver applies the brakes, I skid a bit further on my perch. The impact jerks me back to reality, re
minding me of the thing in my hands, which I must keep absolutely safe.
It’s a greetings card that I had made on a folded white chart paper. It’s too big for my schoolbag, so I am carrying it in my hands.
‘I have to give it to someone special in my school,’ I tell the driver when he asks me what it is. I tell him to drive slowly, so that it does not get soiled. He smiles at me.
I have painted it with watercolours. There is some cotton stuck on the paper to replicate winter snow, even though I’ve never seen snow in my life. I think the snow is romantic. There is also a picture of the red silk pocket handkerchief in it. I know she will recognize it. It is our secret.
From the bus stop till my school, I walk, guarding the card with utmost care. A mad truck speeds past me and splutters dirt on to me. In that cloud of dust, I have stepped into a puddle and spoiled my shoes and socks. But I am happy enough to have managed to save that card.
By the time I reach the school gate, I am tired of holding that card, but I hope she will love it. I’ve been holding it that way for more than an hour and a half. I keep the card on my desk and clean myself up. I want to look perfect when she sees me for the first time after the long break.
In every corridor of the school, everyone is wishing everyone else a happy new year. I don’t stop to wish anyone; nor do I respond to their wishes. I creep, then walk and then run to the teachers’ room. I want to give her my wishes before anyone else does.
Minutes before the students and the teachers assemble for the prayer, I am in front of the teachers’ room. A number of teachers are gathered around the long table in the room. They are all busy wishing each other. I knock at the door to ask for permission to come in, but in that loud crowd, no one can hear my knock.
Unable to stop myself, I slowly walk in.
Right then, something strange happens—I notice that the teachers are not quite wishing each other. They are all saying congratulations to a particular someone. There are laddoos in their hands.
I hear her name. And I hear it again.
I feel a tap on my shoulder. It is our Punjabi Ma’am. Before she can ask me what I am doing there, the Hindi Sir calls out from the other corner of the room, ‘Arey, Punjabi Ma’am, suna aapne? Hamaari English Ma’am ki shaadi tay ho gayi hai. Aaiye, muh meetha kijiye!’ [Have you heard the news! Our English Ma’am’s marriage has been fixed. Come, have some sweets!]
I hear that, loud and crystal clear.
All of a sudden, I can no longer move. I feel a deep pain in my chest, as if someone has stabbed me. I can’t hear any voices any more. In front my eyes, there are teachers, so many of them, but I fail to identify them. They ask me what has happened. I don’t answer them. I stand there with my greetings card in my hand.
I try to move my feet, but I have once again frozen. I try hard to move. I don’t want to cry in front of everyone. All of a sudden, I hear her voice. But I no longer want to face English Ma’am.
I run away from that place.
16
In Sadness and Defeat
From being someone who followed the English Ma’am everywhere she went, I now became the one who tried to avoid her at every step. From someone who waited the whole day to get a glance of her, I actually started hiding from her. Whenever I saw her walking down the corridor towards me, I would turn around and hide somewhere. Once or twice she even called out to me, but I didn’t listen. How could I? I felt cheated by her. I also felt a deep sadness within me.
My friends asked me the reason for my gloominess, but I didn’t say anything. I just shook my head. I began to avoid my friends and sat alone even during the break. Then, one day, while I was sitting on a bench outside the field, Nikita walked up to me.
‘Hi,’ she said with a smile.
I didn’t respond, but my sad eyes probably told her the story.
‘Listen, I know you like English Ma’am,’ she said hesitatingly.
I was shocked. How had she come to know? Could she just figure out! Was I that transparent?
But I chose not to admit it.
‘What? What are you saying?’ I asked with as much surprise as I could manage.
Girls are probably more mature than boys—at least, Nikita was.
‘It’s okay. My mother says it’s normal for us to have infatuations at this age. This is a sign of our growing up …’ she was going on, but I wasn’t listening.
All I was thinking was if Nikita was able to find this out, soon my friends would find out too. Or, seeing me here with Nikita, they would think I was getting attracted to her! There would be no end to their teasing me.
Nikita was still talking.
‘Nikita … I … I … have to go, I have a class,’ I blurted out, and ran away from her.
From then, I tried to act as normal as possible. Studies came to my rescue and I began to think only about my subjects and how I would do well in them. I began working hard for my board exams. Soon I began to feel normal again.
The day I heard English Ma’am had got married and quit the school, I didn’t feel quite as much pain.
I thought my board exams for Class X had gone off quite well. I kept saying so to my parents, who were always worried. There was still some time before the results would be announced. Everybody was tense about it.
So far, in my entire school life, I had been in the top 10 per cent of my class. It didn’t matter how fun-loving I was; I had managed to stay near the top ranks. But, in all these years of school, I was yet to achieve my ultimate goal of topping the exams. There were about a hundred students in the same class at Guru Nanak Public School, divided into several sections. Being the topper at this school was not an easy thing.
With all my hard work, I had managed to secure the second rank in the half-yearly exams of Class IX, which had again dropped to the third by Class X. But I had a lot of expectations from the board exams that I had written.
When the results came out in June–July, I was in for a shock. I had scored 69 per cent in all! This was the first time I had ever dropped below 70 per cent!
The topper from our town had scored 75 per cent. I was 6 per cent behind him. In the ’90s, anything above 70 per cent was a great score and a reason to celebrate. Mothers whose kids had done well had all the reason to call up and flaunt their kids’ marks in front of those whose kids had scored less.
‘My son scored 72 per cent. How much did yours score?’
As if you didn’t know?
I felt ashamed, embarrassed, guilty and humiliated, all at the same time. It had been my worst performance ever. And the board exams are discussed beyond the boundaries of school—across towns and cities. It’s a benchmark, I guess, for the entire nation. I had hopelessly slipped up on this benchmark.
When you expect fewer marks, you are able to handle this situation better. But when you expect to excel and something of this sort happens, you first have to learn how to come to terms with the dashing of your own hopes, and then cope with everyone else’s opinion about it. It was now that phase of my life.
At first, I went into denial. I sent in my papers for rechecking. But there was no luck. In Hindi, I had still scored 41 out of 100. My proficiency in the national language had pulled my entire percentage down. Some of my close friends tried to console me by saying that I should be happy because I had scored 98 out of 100 in maths. But they knew, as well as I did, that maths couldn’t change my aggregate.
As the reality of the low marks sunk in, I slowly went into a state of depression. The mothers of the batchmates who had scored better than me kept running into my mother and haunting my life. I wanted to run away to someplace else, where no one asked me about my exams or expected anything else of me. I wasn’t good enough for those expectations and those expectations weren’t good for me. Instead of treating my friends as friends, those expectations had made me start viewing them as my competitors. This should not have been the case.
Besides, despite all my hard work, I had scored way less than expected. What else co
uld I have done?
I decided to give up.
One day, I broke down in front of my mother and told her that she or my father should not expect anything great out of me, because I wasn’t as good as everyone else. I was smart enough but not the best, and I felt suffocated in this madness to become Number One.
Mom wiped away my tears. She made me lie down with my head on her lap, and stroked my forehead affectionately. She told me why she wanted me to succeed. She told me how my father worked hard to afford all the expenses of my education. She told me that my father hadn’t been able to complete his own education, because my grandfather hadn’t been able to afford it. Perhaps that’s why Dad made it a point that I took my education seriously.
Mom told me about the sacrifices that both of them had been making, only to afford a good education for my brother and me. She never asked Dad for new clothes for herself—only for us. She never did any shopping for herself, only for us. As a family, we never went out to a restaurant for a meal—we always ate at home. Before she told me, I never knew that most of the money that my father earned was being spent on our education. But it was in our hands to do the rest.
She told me that getting good marks for me should not be a matter of winning the rat race or showing off to everyone else. But a good education was our only way of bringing the family out of poverty. Our parents were not even concerned about themselves, only about my brother’s life and mine. The only way for us to have a good life when we grew up was to score the finest of results.
Whatever Mom said that evening kept ringing in my head for a long time. She had her reasons and, indeed, she was right in holding them.