I was fuming. My brother had made a mess again. Argh! I was sick of his behavior. He always landed into some kind of mess and expected me or my mom to clean it up. But what he did today was extremely infuriating.
It all happened when we were going to school. Now, as it goes, siblings love to quarrel and for us it was always between our varied music tastes or some other random cooked up reason.
This particular morning it was on “Why I shouldn’t get a boy-friend.” Now, as I am a smaller sister, I had to hear what Sarthak was saying, but, that didn’t mean I had to agree with him. He was blabbering off some random points- which I didn’t hear.
Suddenly, he stopped speaking. I looked up and saw that a lad from a higher grade had stopped in front of us. He seemed nervous. I saw that he was fidgeting a lot. His hands were holding a rose. Oh no! I knew for what he was here. He had come to propose me- in front of Sarthak! Oh, this guy was going to destroy my life.
He composed himself and said, “I love you Ananya, will you be my girl-friend?”Before I could reply, my brother stepped in front of me. I could see veins popping out of his neck. I could see he was angry. Very angry. I tried to stop him, but he had gone into, what he called as berserker rage. He wasn’t going to perform any violence in front of me, so he put a mask on himself and spoke, “Well, I don’t know your name, peep. But I know this much that no one proposes my sister and goes off lightly. We will talk about this later.”
And just like that, Sarthak got rid of my problem. Or so he thought.
After all this drama, he ran quickly towards his class-room. I didn’t need to follow him, we both were in the same class after all, though I was a year younger to him.I entered the class. It was full of chaos- as usual. I saw that Sarthak had taken a seat in the last row. I went up to him and as I was full of anger from the incident which occurred this morning, I just spat out my words at him.
“Sarthak! Today you crossed your limits. You have no right to take control of my life. You shouldn’t have behaved in that bossy way with him. Now, promise me that you won’t beat him up.”I could see him fidget and ponder over my proposal. Finally, he gave a short nod. I was satisfied, because Sarthak always kept his word and never went against it. It was a major shortcoming for him.It was then I felt as if someone was pointing towards me. I turned around and saw that a new guy was chatting amiably with Shashank. And OH MY GOSH! For the first time a cute guy had come into our school. Many of us-gals- had a crush on Shashank, but this new chap was on a whole new level. It was since long I had a bubbly feeling inside me.
Moreover, just while I was checking him out, his eyes met mine. Simultaneously 3 things took place. I blushed like I was being proposed by a guy I like. I also giggled a bit. He looked at my reactions and gave a tiny smile. That was when my heart burst. This guy wasn’t meant to be this hot, or maybe that was my affinity towards him.
I quickly turned away from him and concentrated on controlling my emotions. I wasn’t called “The Bitch” just like that. I composed my face, smiled coldly towards him, went, and sat behind him. After all, what better way was to show this cute guy that he shouldn’t mess with me.I still remember the day they when they gave me that title. Heck, I remember it vividly.
“It all began on a fine summer day. It was 21st May. Our vacations were just around the corner. I was sitting with my boyfriend- Ravi. He was sitting me in class when our teacher was droning on and on and on. I held his hand and began scribbling with my left hand. It pays to be a left-handed person. We both had a small smile plastered to our faces. In short, it was the best time of my life.
The teacher saw through our euphoria and found out the real reason why we were smiling. Her features hardened. She had a cold smile plastered to her face. Sensing her scrutiny, I dropped my gaze and took away my hand from his grasp. His face fell but he didn’t say anything as he saw for what reason I had done it.
I was going to be punished.
As soon as I thought that, our teacher made me stand up and asked me the toughest question she could come up with. As it was extremely tough, I couldn’t answer it. Now her smile was so cold that I thought even the arctic would freeze over again! Her next words chilled me to the core.“Ananya, please stop being a snob and cut these mature acts. Now, it would be better if you paid a bit attention.”
I sat down, I couldn’t reply back to my teacher with that kind of tension in the air. Ravi patted on my hand twice for some kind of reassurance.
I tapped twice on his index finger and then concentrated on the class. I was hurt, this was the first time a teacher had launched a personal vendetta against me.
During the next few days, I did my work on time and didn’t try to contact Ravi, even though he tried like hell. I didn’t get back to him. Even Sarthak sensed that something wrong was going on in my life. He was the person who knew me to the core. He didn’t ask me, because he knew I would tell him when the time was right.
And so it went on that I received a letter from Ravi. He said on how he proposed me on Valentine ’s Day and how he made his crush into his girl-friend. I was crying now. He hadn’t broken with me butsent me a nice letter. But then I saw another letter below it. Yes, this was the letter of a break up.
I cried continuously for 3 days and 3 nights. It was then I became the bitch. I had decided to never let a guy come close to me.”
I came out of my past when I saw that the new guy was trying to make conversation with me. I didn’t give him the get-lost-or-I-kill-you attitude and went on with the nicer attitude with him. I know heard what he said, “Hello, I am new here and I have no seat to sit as of now. I sat with Shashank first buthis friend came and made me go away. Do you mind if I sit with you?”
I was seriously considering the possibility. It had been long- and I would like him sitting beside me. So I said, “Yeah, sure! Though I have one condition. You tell me your name! And by the way I am Ananya.”
He smiled and said, “I am Anant. Nice to meet you Ananya.”
"This is the second post of the Series Spellbound. Read the part one here: Spellbound #1
