Kritvik Bhatt

“D-Damn it… Why…?!”

“WHY?! WHY?!”

“The world… is not really a happy place to live in—according to me, at least. I don’t know why, but, for some reason, I’ve noticed that… wherever I go, I… I always find myself coped up in a situation which, for some reason, snatches my happiness. Always.”

***

The sun was shining brightly as it sank in the middle of those couple stories high buildings which covered the smooth dark tarred road beneath with some green bushes on both the sides. Some cars stood on the edge of the road. However, my eyes were fixed at the sun setting down. It was evening time, with some cold blows flowing, just like the one which flew just in front of me for a second. The sun was setting, with the buildings covered by the faint lights of the yellow. The sky seemed like it had just started turning darker about half an hour ago.

My hands were on top of the black railing, my narrowed eyes gazing at the setting ball of dark orange light. I turned my head to the top–the bottom of the balcony of the apartment on top of mine covering half of my view–and noticed the dark blue sky and the grayish irregular shaped clouds faintly covering it at regular intervals.

“It… feels so similar,” I thought.

“Ahahahaa, right, right, Abhi,” I heard the faint laughs of an old man from the inside. I turned back, looking at the dark open door across the dimly-lit bedroom of mine, which had a study table on my left and a brown glossy bed to my right, which shone in the dullness of the evening.

“Ah, bhaiya, what are you even talking about! It’s all your blessings that brought us here!” I heard another faint voice, this time of a middle-aged man.

“Dad…”

I turned my right foot back and started to walk inside the room, leaving the door open. As I walked in, I turned my head to my right, looking at the bed. Lit by the evening sunlight, it had a white bed-sheet spread upon it with big red flowers. I then turned to the front toward the door, walked out, turned to my left, and then entered the other room which was just beside the previous one.

I walked inside the room, which, no doubt, was bigger than the previous room, and only had a bed to the right and a wardrobe beside it. I walked some steps in and then turned to my right, standing right in front of the bed. On top of the bed, an old man with wrinkles and white hair was seated with his legs spread open in front of him and his back taking support of the back of the bed. He wore a white traditional pair of kurta-pajama. Beside him was his wife, with a relatively fatter but shorter figure. She wore a dark green and black traditional Indian saree, her head covered by the cloth. Both were smiling. They were my father’s big brother and his wife. Technically, my uncle and aunt.

“So, son, are you enjoying here already?” My aunt turned to me.

“We just arrived here today,” I thought.

My father, lying on the left side of the bed in a coat-suit and socks on, turned his smiling face to me. He looked at me with his glasses. “He sure is, bhabhi-ji. At last, he got his own room!” He turned his head up at them.

“Yeah, he’s growing up, at last, and a growing man sure needs his own room!” My uncle replied.

“To damn with this room,” I thought, frowning inside, but never outside. Outside, my dried lips smiled as I replied. “Yeah, tai-ji. I’m having fun here.”

“Kritvik!” A faint voice scattered in the room.

“Go, your mom’s calling you,” My father said.

I turned to my left, looked at the open balcony and, through the open door and windows beside it, noticed the building which was painted faint yellow on the other side of the street. I then turned to my right, and started to walk away.

“Kritvik really is a nice and well-mannered child,” My uncle commented as I walked out of the room.

“Yeah,” My aunt said as she looked at my back leaving, and then turned to my father. “You really are a lucky father.”

“Yeah, bhaiya, bhabhi-ji,” He replied with a smile. “Anyway, do you know of some good restaurants where we can have dinner tonight?”

“Ah, at this age?!” I heard my uncle’s cracking faint voice as I walked through the edge of the drawing room with the sofa set and other stuff on my left. The drawing room didn’t have any lights turned on, nor was the sunlight enough at that time of the day to completely illuminate that room. So, the drawing room was a little dark, filled with shadows on all the corners.

My mom stood in the square kitchen in front of the doors of the rooms, where I was walking from. It was about two-steps wide. She had her back toward me. She wore a faint yellow kurta with tight leggings. She was short in height, had little to no fats on her belly, but had a little chubby skin. The black gas stove was turned on and illuminated the surroundings as it stood on top of the shining white marble which made the shelf of the house. She was working beneath the faint but pure white light which lit the kitchen. It looked modern, fit for the modern kitchen which it was.

“Bhaiya, we don’t really have anything at home tonight. Plus, Aarti is tired from all the journey and shifting too. It’s been a hectic day for all of us,” My father’s faint voice appeared.

“Yeah, I understand, Gautam, but…”

“What happened?” I asked my mother as I stood on her right, my arms crossed in front of my chest. She moved her right hand up and pointed at the cupboard above. “See if your hand reaches the packet of sugar above.”

I looked at the saucepan on top of the gas stove, turned my head up, slid the upper cupboard right, and then rose up on my toes. My hand touched the plastic packet filled with white crystals. I pulled it down and placed it in front of me, rose up to my toes again, and then slid it close.

“Good, you’re growing big, dear,” My mother replied.

“Obviously I will, mom,” I replied uninterestedly as I set my butt on the shelf adjacent to where my mom was working–my head now facing her–and glared at her right hand as she opened that packet with a knife in her hands. I then turned my head a little down, spacing out, my arms crossed in front of my chest.

The crackling of the plastic cover being torn apart and sugar being shifted to a metal container overshadowed the laughs between the brothers from the room on my left.

“Whatever people say about the COVID, I’m thankful to God that it came in. At last, it forced you to eat your veggies,” My mom commented with a smile as she kept the crackling plastic beside the metal container.

“Mom…” I turned my head at her with a smile up my dried lips. “I was always eating my veggies.”

“Yeah, and I’m lying.”

“I… I’m not saying you're lying, mom, but your factual information…” I moved up my pinched right hand in an effort to look sarcastically intellectual. “Your factual information was false, mom.”

“Anyway, do you like this place?” She asked as she turned to the gas stove and twisted it, turning it off with a click.

“Yeah, mom,” I said in a lower and cracking voice, turning my head down and crossing my arms again. I then turned to my left. “This place is good too.”

“See, my son, I know what you’re worried about,” She said in her caring motherly voice as she turned her head at me. She looked to the right of my face, and continued glaring for some seconds with a smile. I didn’t want to look in her eyes—I knew they were a little bit watery. I didn’t want to face her, but by the way she was glaring at me, I had no choice. So I gave up and turned to her, looking into her eyes. “You can… You can just make more friends here, okay, dear?”

I gulped in, the lump of my throat rising. I turned my head down. “Yeah, mom,” I replied in my heavier voice, using as few words as possible because I knew if I spoke more, I’m gonna break down.

“What will your friends think of you if they hear their cool Kriti literally started crying right on his first day here?”

My lips again turned into a smile as I turned my head up at her. “Don’t tell them, mom. And I’m not crying.”

“Then be happy and keep on smiling. Don’t overthink about the bad stuff which might happen here before even looking at what's in store for you.” She moved her right hand up and touched my cheek. “Just believe in God. He knows what’s best for you, okay?” She then turned to her tea, taking up the saucepan off the stove and then pouring tea in the cups, filtering it through a metal tea strainer. She then turned to the other cup, and then after some seconds, to the third one. The voice of hot liquid hitting the hot liquid already at the white dazzling cup made it seem appealing.

“Yeah, maybe… maybe I should give it a try.”

***

“Tomorrow… is the first day of my new school, huh?” I thought.

I was lying on the red and white bed-sheet. I was all alone in the dark. My eyes were wide open. The room was filled with the light of the moon coming inside from the closed windows covered with curtains on my left. I had my open eyes fixed at the ceiling on the top, which had a fan fixed upon a skilled work of a single layered false ceiling, all lighted in dark shades of blue and black.

I took in a deep breath and closed my eyes. “Damn… Why… am I stuck here, man?” I covered my eyes with my right arm. My lips clenched hard as I tried not to break down.

“What will your friends think of you if they hear their cool Kriti literally started crying right on his first day here?”

“Then be happy and keep on smiling. Don’t overthink about the bad stuff which might happen here before even looking at what's in store for you. Just believe in God. He knows what’s best for you, okay?”

“Yeah… I should not get depressed about it before even giving it a try,” I said to myself in my trembling tone.

***

My slender figure stood in front of the wide building filled with rows of clean windows and perfectly painted white.

“Damn…” My dark narrowed eyes widened a little in shock as I thought in awe. “What a building…”

‘Noida International Scholars School’ was written in shining red on top. It was three to four stories high, maybe. And it was modern. No doubt it was the typical school of a big city.

Some seconds later, I was walking in the corridors of the room. The corridor was open on my right, where I was able to see more classrooms on the other side of the greenery on the ground floor. Some trees and climber-plants covered my view of students with their heads tilted to their books, some writing, some focusing on the teacher. “It, no doubt, feels like an upgrade, just like dad said,” I thought to myself.

***

“Kartik!”

“Present, ma’am!”

“Kritika!”

“Present, ma’am.”

The teacher sat in front of the classroom on top of her desk, reading off a list with her glasses. She suddenly narrowed her eyes as she had some difficulties reading off the next name. “Rit… Ritik…?”

“It’s Kritvik, ma’am,” I turned my head up and said in a depressing voice. I was sitting in the front seat, right in front of her.

“‘Kritvik’. Did I say that right?” She asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” I replied, tilting my head down.

She nodded a little, turned her head down again, and continued taking attendance from the list while writing ‘P’ of present in front of their names in the sheet.

“Mohan.”

“Present!”

“Mukesh!”

“Present!”

“Prakash!”

“Present!”

“Sana.”

“Present, ma’am!”

“Oh, yeah, Sana,” My homeroom teacher turned her head up again, looking at the second or third seat of the row on my left. “I still don’t have your signatures on the board sheet. It needs to get ratified. Have you brought the details to ratify your information?”

“Yes, ma’am,” A soft feminine voice replied.

“Then go to the computer lab, meet Ms. Kapoor, and ratify it right now during the homeroom.”

“Yes, ma’am,” She stood up, walked to the front, and turned right to the door of the classroom.

I had my hands in between my closed thighs, my head tilted down. Just as she was leaving, I suddenly pulled my hands out, thinking of my outer appearance. I was moving my hands up and on the table and my head up as I looked at the feminine curvy body walking by in front of me, her face covered with a black mask, her pure and small eyes beautifully black, and her soft skin covered by our white shirt-trouser uniform. Time slowed down as I looked at her beautiful womanly hands, her little breasts, her tight belt on top of her belly, her arms—which were more like thin branches—and her black shiny straight hair, which covered her back.

“And… that’s when… this story began… That’s when everything which had been going downhill for me… started to incline up. Obviously, the change was not sudden, no doubt, but… sometimes… just a little change of pace is enough. I still don’t know what was so special about her that I saw. Maybe it was just my damned virgin eyes which had never seen women before, man! But… yeah, I’m excited to tell you about it! I don’t know what to say, what to tell you about it, and I’m feeling a little too excited that I’m being awfully clumsy right now with my words. But, you know this feeling, right? At that point, when she was going past me, I felt that, and I knew that, and I thought that… that…”

“Sana… is her name, huh?”