THE DARKER SHADES OF NOVEMBER

CHAPTER 1 : A moment in Life

“How much more do you wanna study now? It’s almost midnight.”

“Just 15 more minutes, please?”, I said.

“Ughh, fine, but only 15 minutes. I’ll come and check on you after sometime.”

“Okay mom. Thanks”

“Good night honey.”

“Good night mom.”

I saw her leaving the room and picked up my pen and started writing again. My mom always tells me not to study much but what I know is that she feels really happy and proud about it. She likes it when I study for hours and in my life too, studying matters a lot. I want to make my parents proud and give them a free and relaxed life. Well, maybe because I too have a lot of dreams just like every other person in this world. My dreams aren’t rare but that never stopped me. Everytime I think about them, I just smile. But at this time, I don't really know how to complete them. All I know is that I will need to study for that and I’m sincerely doing this. 15 years old me is filling  notebooks with the places I want to go, the adventures I want to do and the fun fact is that I'm adding more and more to them. Even my instagram feed is full of this and I hate it for this. I have no idea how much time it’s gonna take to complete them but I hope it gets completed because I wanna live this life.

Everything was going normal until a strange guest arrived and surprised the whole world. Meet Mr. COVID - 19.

He is like an angry young man who changes faces like no one else. He is the guest no one wanted. I’m still in high school and now because of our strange guest I'm taking online classes at home. It’s been 4 months since the first lockdown. 

Everyone has their own views about it but y’all should listen to mine.

The months have been honestly eww and no one can deny this fact. My classes have been sleepy and it runs in the background while I share memes with my friends on social media. So far, the experiences have been awful. 

But, neither a pandemic nor an earthquake can cancel the tuition classes. 

I had my science class today. I looked at the screen of my phone, the temperature was body-melting 100℉. I sighed at my helplessness. 

“Why do they have to teach us every other day? Can’t they just give us an off someday?”, I said to myself.

I looked at the clock on the kitchen wall. It was 3:50 PM , the class started at 4 o’ clock. As I left the house, I looked up. The sun was shining brightly in the sky above my head. I entered the silent street and kicked a pebble while I walked carelessly. Everyone was in their house chilling under the air conditioners and here I was, enjoying a natural heater out here. Hot air blew but it could neither pass through my hair nor could wash my face up, it just moved some lifeless leaves and a handful of sand all along the street  because THIS is not a strawberry world of someone’s dreams or a cheesy movie, THIS is MY life and as I said, It was boring.

My hair was tied up in a bun and beads of sweat collected on my forehead. My upper lips itched because of the heat under my mask. It was peaceful and quiet, just the way I liked it so I tried to ignore the itching and concentrate on the silence but it couldn’t last longer. The sound of an engine entered my ears. Thus, immediately ruining my peace and much needed damned silence! I looked up and saw a scooty entering the street from the other end. I screamed internally,

“Can’t I have at least 5 minutes of peace!? Oh god!” while internally throwing my hands up.

I stared at the annoying stranger wanting to punch him on his freaking little  face. I took a deep breath as my forehead wrinkled. I slowed my walking speed as the vehicle came closer. I observed it and because I could remember every little detail, I had a description ready within the next 10 seconds.

Also, I’m not a creep so you shouldn’t judge me because my strong observation skills.

It was a blue scooty. I scanned the stranger, he wore a white tee and a black lower. He had a backpack on his shoulders so, he definitely was a student too. Maybe a little older or at least of my age. The dark blue straps of his bag caught my eyes. My eyes went up to see his face. He wore a mask that covered half of his face. There was no helmet on his head. So, I could only see his eyes and hair and honestly, they were enough to tell me how cute this guy would be. The wind blew his dark hair back revealing his forehead.

He looked at me once or maybe twice. He kept his face straight. For once, he came nearer and nearer and in a matter of time, went farther and farther. As he passed by my side, I immediately looked down at my clothes and sighed with relief.

At Least the clothes were good.

I turned my face in the direction he went and looked at his back until he disappeared. I stood there for a solid minute while my bag weighed me down.

So, why did I stand there? 

The answer is I don’t know.

It was only then when I realised my hands were shivering and my heart was pounding softly against my chest. How can someone’s presence be so powerful to give you such body reactions just by a look?

Huhh, I don’t know. 

THIS GUY! 

Now, we're gonna get some real problems to deal with because THIS WAS NOT RIGHT! WHAT WAS HE!? And for me this was irritating because Stasie doesn’t like guys that easily. I’ve got a standard afterall. Like the book boyfriends, Ahhhh!

After he completely disappeared, my heartbeat became normal and my surroundings turned silent again but this time, I was a little hollow and missed the pretty stranger. This was when a thought hit me hard that I would never be able to see him again. This world has so many faces and among them, hundreds of people pass by you everyday. What can even be the chances? 1 out of 1000 or probably, 2 out of 1000? But right now, my brain is incharge and not my heart so it doesn’t matter much.

I sighed and started walking towards the class again. That day, I couldn’t study well because this guy was all over my brain. I couldn’t even understand what the heck was wrong with me. This guy was slowly occupying my brain. Time seemed to get longer and longer and every passing second felt like an hour. As Percy Jackson said, all thanks to Kronos for this lagging time!