The Binding String

T W E N T Y - T H R E E

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The social distancing is the best way to avoid it.
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According to Roohi, the day was just another bad day for her. She get scolded by Ritika miss for another time, got bullied by her classmate Shivansh again, her friend Tapasya pushed her another time in washroom but she had no one to share same. The school is not good at all, her old school was nice. She didn't have to stay there entire day, Dadu Dadi only send her there to play for few hours and later bring her back. They used to eat ice cream while coming back from school and at evening Dadi used to take her at park where they played together until dusk appears. If Dadi was there then she must have told her about that bully boy and she would scolded him in her heavy punjabi voice but whom she should tell here? Will Mumma listen her if she tell him that the boy Shivansh bully her everyday, will Papa scold Tapasya if she tell him that she pushed her in washroom?

She remained lost in her thoughts until the car stopped with jerk. She shifted her eyes from window to mumma who appeared pissed and annoyed. Roohi bit her lower lip when her Mumma held her hand and started to pull her towards building, it was the same hand where she got injured in afternoon. She tried to show her protest but her Papa stern eyes scared her more. The thirty seconds of elevator ride was scary for her, she don't know why they were angry but something definitely was not good with Mumma Papa today. When she stepped out from elevator a smile rose on her face seeing Pluto who was roaming in corridor and started to wriggle his tail seeing Roohi. She ran towards him and started to caress his head with her little palms. He is her best friend, a friend who loved her always, who listen her problems and always wiggle his tail knowing well she is right. She peeped inside the opposite apartment and found Aurbindo Uncle talking with someone over call, she smiled with relief seeing uncle there and Pluto is not alone. She know little babies shouldn't be left alone anywhere, "Pluto tum yahan kyon ho? Little babies bahar nahi rehte varna tum kho jaaoge na." (Hey Pluto what're you doing here alone? You might get lost here.) She innocently patted his head with smile unaware of her Mumma presence who came searching for her.

"Roohi what are you doing here? Come inside." She turned back only find her Mumma standing at doorway waiting for her. She silently came inside the apartment bowing her head down, otherside Ishita closed the door and looked at Roohi who went inside room without looking at anyone and otherside her husband was seated on armchair deeply engrossed in reading something from his mac book.

How can he be so ignorant, isko zara bhi nahi padi hai. She wondered placing her flip flops on shoe rack and went towards kitchen to make a coffee for herself. The evening came up with so much information all of sudden that it blocked all the senses of her brain, how would she able to deal with so much issues altogether? She never handled Roohi for once, she know nothing about her and her school how would she manage to handle her and improve her behaviour. She sighted pouring the coffee's in two cups and forwarded one cup to her husband who was still on conference call with his Ukrainian clients busy in discussing about the terms and conditions of the new business deal. Ishita unzipped Roohi's school bag and started to read her notebooks and workbooks which were filled with red marks, almost every question given by teacher was wrongly done by her, the simple one digit addition of 1+2 was answered as zero from Roohi. She started to read the page from her Mathematics workbook and rolled her eyes finding Roohi answering every question of additions as zero, "No wonder why she is getting zero in her exams." Ishita murmured under her breath after finishing reading her workbook which was more painted with red ink of her teachers. Next she opened her English workbook where the situation was poor as Mathematics, the girl hand writing was too poor to read and she had almost wrote all the alphabets wrong, the spelling of b a g was copied as d a g by her and spelling of d o g was spelled as b o g. Ishita threw her workbooks on the glasstop of dining table with thud and loudly called Roohi's name.