The Unforeseen Path

Chapter Two

You know how when you go in places with extreme weather conditions, they first make you acclimatize to it before diving you into it? Well, for a good month or so, that's what we all were doing.

Teachers were acclimatizing to the horrendous bunch of students they had received, and students were acclimatizing to the horrendous syllabus they had received.

Everyone was trying to gage who was like what. Girls were trying to decide which other girls were cool enough to hang out with and boys were deciding which girls to hit on. And I witnessed some things I would never have in girls school.

Like this one time a guy called Vikram (whose name I only knew cause he was known to the whole class since like the first day) just went down on one knee and proposed to this random girl on a dare. Then there was this guy called Saurabh who literally asked other girls to scoot over a bit, just so he could stare at Riya, a girl sitting three rows in front of him, in midst of lectures. Personally, I found it really endearing.

Then there were whispers of plans of groups of people hanging out at some or the other place, and deciding whom to call or not.

I never tried actively participating in those conversations, still whenever I saw people in groups talking, discussing about some after college activity, I'd find myself looking around.

I did somewhat engage socially in class, I talked to other students as they crossed my path, but mostly I stuck to my own kind, that is girls, which I knew best. Only in my coaching, did I talk to the guys.

What I liked most about being in a class was: answering whenever questions were asked, be it in English, German or Math class. The joy of getting things right and being appraised for it never lost its charm for me.

But here it wasn't just me, whose answers were good, Myra and Rekha were the actual stars here. Whenever Mayra and Rekha answered in class, nobody wanted to hear what anyone else wanted to say, even the teachers, because both of them were so good at it. And for the first time in class, I didn't like the one thing that I'd love in school : answering in class. Now, it just made me feel inadequate, like somehow I majorly lacked. I was so intimidated by both of their's strength, that whatever answers I gave lacked confidence.

Still, Myra and I continued to be friends and would sometimes sit together for lunch. And I couldn't help and notice how she was sometimes surrounded by girls who were already considered popular. I also saw that guy Vikram, the popular one, trying to strike up conversations with Myra. And I felt, in my gut, a lingering thought that the friend I made on first day, slipping far from my reach.

I had to yet, see her clearly for myself.

***

It was a german lecture where we were being taught how to read numbers in German and our teacher asked for volunteers. Habitually, I raised my hand and noticed Myra raising her hand. Our mam told us to write down our phone numbers and read them out loud in german, one by one.

While I was mentally preparing to say those numbers out loud, Myra had already started reciting the numbers first and when she did, some guy from the back said,"lets write her number down," and some guys cheered to that. That comment creeped me out a bit , as I didn't want anyone to have my number, also I didn't have any experience with guys so I didn't know exactly what they would do. When it was my turn to pronounce a number, I decided I wouldn't exactly recite my phone number and as I began, my voice was shaking, words were mispronounced, as compared to Myra's confident, clear pronunciations.

And slowly I heard chuckles starting from the last bench , followed by laughter, students pointing at the stuttering girl, which was in this case me.Myra who was standing closed to me told the german teacher joined them and said,