18

Chapter 2

[At 2 AM ]

Nisha was lying on her bed.

She was still awake and was listening to some music. Her gaze was fixed outside the window. She was looking at the night sky and when she tried to search for stars; she got only disappointed. Because of street lights, stars were invisible, even though it was a time of midnight.

She approached the window and closed it, resulting in increasing warmth in the room. She then sat on the floor and suddenly her focus shifted towards the books on the shelf. Now, the shelf that used to have books on different topics is filled only with books about JEE Mains and Advanced.

Only those books were sufficient to bring back all the memories of the preparation years of JEE.

She began to ask herself questions.

"Why does no one understand I did my best for the exam?"

"Why does no one realise that I was asking for help? I wasn't giving excuses.?"

"Why everyone was telling me to quit or to do something out of my interest when I needed a little break from my studies?"

"I don't want to stay here"Her eyes started getting teary again, but she composed herself when she heard footsteps. She took off her earphones to ensure she heard correctly but soon realized that it was just her imagination. Still, her heart was beating fast.

"What if they came and found out that I am still awake? They will surely give me a lecture, and I don't have the energy to hear it now."

"Should I lock the door?"

She took 5 minutes to think before locking the door while ensuring she would unlock it before sleeping so no one would find out about it later.

After locking the door, she took some seconds to observe her space. It was a beautiful space for her. In the corner, there was her bed and her wardrobe was on the other side of the room. Her study table was near the window. As she looked towards her study table, she saw that she had written many formulas on the wall near the table, there were many sticky notes, some sticky notes were about key concepts of physics some were motivational quotes and there was one sticky note that caught her attention.

"JEE Advanced Rank 274" and besides that, there was a note saying," IIT Bombay".

She took those sticky notes because she was feeling ashamed while looking at those wishes, which she was sure that her future self would accomplish. She didn't want them in front of her eyes, so she took all the other sticky notes, tore them into small pieces, and threw them in the dustbin.

She knew that whatever everyone was saying about her would become pure truth if she stopped now. After getting poor results, her family told her to be admitted to any engineering college or to do a BSc. Because of that, she applied to 5 colleges in her state. Now she was waiting to get an email for admission confirmation, but there was no sign of that.

She again checked her email to find nothing. She let out a sigh and returned to her bed and lay down there and in some minute she drifted to deep slumber, without unlocking the door.

[In the morning to 6 ]

"Nisha! Nisha opened the door." Her mom was banging on the door while she was in her dreamland.

"Nisha!!!!!!!!!!!!!"Nisha woke up because of the raised voice of her mom coming from outside. Fear gripped her because she realized that she had forgotten to unlock the door, and also knew that this event could lead her towards rejection for permission to meet her friends.

She ran towards the door and unlocked it. Her heart started beating fast when she saw her mom's angry gaze.

"Why did you close the door?" her mom asked her in the same peach as before.

"Sorry Mom, I didn't realise I did that. I did it by mistake." She made some excuses because locking the door to her bedroom was not allowed. She wanted to continue but her mom stopped her in the middle and said," Don't tell me anything," and went towards the kitchen.

Nisha was still standing there in a frozen position. She regretted her actions and went towards the kitchen to apologise.

"Mom, sorr..." Nisha proceed.

"I don't want to hear anything. Working every day in the office and managing the home and, your kids never listen to you. What a great thing, isn't it? Look at your friends. Avni is studying in another city and doing everything alone and Nisha, she evened cracked NEET while managing everything and here you."

"Again comparison."She said to herself and she automatically lowered her shoulders as a hit of disappointment.

"We just told you one thing to 'not lock the door'. You can't fulfil it either." Her mom continued while grabbing a teapot.

"But why?" Nisha asked.

"Why Arav bro can lock the door and I can't?" Nisha continued elaborating on her question.

"Because we said. We are your parents and you live in the house, so you have to follow the rules of this family." Her mom replied in a bitter tone.

Nisha's frustration was building, but she decided not to reply. She knew that her mom was just scared of her teenage daughter who could not clear cutoffs, in other words, she was scared to lose her daughter. She wanted to clear many things, but she had no idea how to put all those in words, but her mind was replying.

"Mom, please, this is unfair. I won't do anything wrong. I know you are scared, but trust me your daughter is not someone who would end her life after all this. I will cry, but I want to smile and I will."