Bugs Bite

CHAPTER NINE: Corollary

DISCLAIMER: Loads of crude language here onwards, so beware.
____________________________________

Time passed by, as it is wont to.
____________________________________

'Are you fucking serious?' Avish asked, rhetorically.

'I am as serious as I am in bed,' said Roy. 'Now move if you wanna know yours before everyone else does.'

They bustled across the hall and made it to the declaration board, hearts pounding to fight through their chests. It was already crowded there, and it took the two of them a while to get through rest of the anxious throng and see the damn list. Roy saw his name immediately, at eye-level. Avish, who was a bit shorter, had to look up.

'What!' he exclaimed.

'What happened, man?' Roy asked, concerned, as they made their way back.

'The hell! What rank did you get?'

'Uhm . . . thirty-nine, why?'

Avish legitimately shouted an abuse in his face.

'What - what happened, man, you're scaring me.'

'I came freaking second!'

Roy's jaw dropped. 'What?'

'I'm the second topper!' and Avish began to jump about the place, laughing and yelling the same thing at everybody he could find to yell at.

'Who's first?' Roy asked.

'Deep, duh.'

'The son of a bitch,' Roy swore under his breath.

All of their party had changed these last two years. The most significant change displayed by Avish, who was now fifteen, taller - though still relatively a bit short for his age - smarter and, well, as every other fifteen-year-old, filthier. The least significant change was associated with Deep: he still sport those stupid, thick-ass specs, still blinked like the damn geek he was, still came first every single term. Only arena he'd grown in, was height. That was literally all.

And Radha. She was still a heartthrob. She had grown into the ravishing young woman she had always promised to become. Avish low-key had a huge crush on her. He'd never really thought of their friendship that way, but she was, plainly put, irresistible.

They'd all planned to go chill out after the mid-term results came out. Divyam regretted not being able to come; he might be a chess progeny, but his intelligence went to tutor grass when it came to studies and after such poor results, his parents won't give him the permit. Raghu and one other member of the Boogies - currently on a hiatus, seemingly permanent - had famously flunked the exam.

As for Avish, he was feeling on top of the world. He stormed into his house humming a tune he didn't quite remember he knew from where

(remember)

-and he didn't care. It was a cool tune, was what mattered.

But he stopped right as he entered the threshold.

Outside the dim porch, his mother sat on a sad piece of furniture, head held in her bony hands and her back bent crooked. As she heard the approaching footsteps, she looked up and Avish saw her forlorn face. For a moment she was an appalling zombie and it was almost like a horrible dream-

(not a dream)

-and he feared she might just attack him, the way it goes in such horrible dreams.

(NOT a dream)

But as her dark, earnest eyes fell upon her son, Shweta transformed back from a zombie to herself. Her features burned with life. But then again, as Avish dashed forward toward her and noticed the large, hurtful botch on her face, swollen near the bottom chin - and she in turn noticed Avish noticing, her face lost its radiance again.