The next day, I entered the classroom and sat next to Kiran. I was worried how he would react, whether it would be weird or if things would go back to normal, but he greeted me like the usual.
"Can you hand me your physics homework, I forgot mine." He asked.
"What homework?" I was perplexed.
Both of us turned towards Ashutosh, and he himself was busy completing it. He laughed at us as we faught over who would get his book once he was done. We finally got a hold on it and decided to share the book.
Our Physics maam frequently gave us huge number of assignments and expected us to complete it all. She wasn't strict, yet we never knew how she would react. People called her bipolar.
On the other hand, we had our naive and cool Chemistry sir. His name was Rajkumar- which literally meant Prince. It was his lecture going on and we still were busy writing the homework. Not just me and Kiran. In fact, almost half of the class was the same as us. Sir noticed it and chose to ignore the fact for half way through the lecture, and then he suddenly snapped.
"Hey! What is this? Huh? I am teaching and you are busy writing some other subject. Ever thought how it makes me feel? Next time, I will bring vegetables and cut it in the classroom while teaching you. You would know my position then."
Our class was quiet for a moment. But then everyone burst out laughing.
Ashutosh was the one who laughed the loudest. He even enacted how our sir would cut onions and wipe his tears while teaching us organic chemistry. At that moment, I and Kiran too laughed looking at each other. All was forgiven and forgotten. Atleast, that's what I thought. The rest of our day went like usual and we got along as if nothing had happened at all.
When our school was dismissed, all of us left our class together and climbed down the stairs in a line. The students were supposed to walk in two queues during the dispersal. Prefects stood on each floor, between the queues and monitored whether the decorum was maintained.
I could see Sanika and one of her friend, as they walked in the other line. They were quite at a near distance from me. I was fortunate enough that my two friends were busy discussing about GTA cheat codes.
"Sanika, that prefect guy is always ordering you around. I think he likes you. He is cute right?" Her friend giggled.
I overheard them and I could see Sanika blush. She smiled shyly and pushed her friend.
"Shh! Maintain silence and walk in straight line!" The prefect ordered.
I looked ahead to see who the owner of the voice was. And he happened to be my classmate Tejas. The guy our teachers praised, the guy my friends acknowledged, the guy my parents compared me to, and the guy who made Sanika blush.
As we passed by, Kiran waved at him while he smiled back. I flinched for a moment as our eyes met. I could feel his condescending gaze piercing a hole in me.
Never must I have felt so insignificant as I felt that day. I felt like the smallest person on earth whom no one bothered knowing. Whom no one cared for.
I could feel all my repressed thoughts and emotions surging out of me. As if, the gate guarding it was broken. I absent mindedly walked towards my bus. That day, I realized I couldn't go on pretending to be fine.